Time to purge the deadwood from Ramaphosa’s cabinet

Yesterday marked a full two years since President Cyril Ramaphosa appointed the current national executive. In a country that had become too accustomed to a president reshuffling his cabinet in the middle of the night at the slightest provocation, perhaps it is a sign of a return to stability that Ramaphosa has kept his team unchanged for so long.

In the nine years he was in office, Ramaphosa’s predecessor, Jacob Zuma, reshuffled his cabinet at least 10 times.

According to Business Day, the longest time that a Zuma cabinet remained unchanged was 18 months, and this was the period immediately after the start of his second term in 2014.

When he named the current cabinet soon after the 2019 general election, Ramaphosa had to play a balancing act of trying to reduce its size while at the same time ensuring that the various constituencies and factions that make up the ANC felt sufficiently represented.

A few Zuma-era ministers tarnished by allegations of corruption and other wrongdoing were dropped while others were retained. New ministers, including politicians who had played prominent roles in the campaign to have Ramaphosa elected ANC president two years earlier, were also included — even though some of them had graft clouds having over their heads.

There were a couple of good appointments too, both of veteran ministers and new ones.

Although the president said at the time he had put together a team that was going to “accelerate inclusive economic growth, tackle poverty, fight corruption and end state capture”, it was clear that a substantial number of those in the cabinet were not up to the task.

But such was “the balance of forces” within his party that he felt compelled to keep all sides happy.

Almost halfway through his five-year term, it is now opportune for the president to reconfigure his national executive. Recent political developments suggest that the “balance of forces” within the ANC has tilted in Ramaphosa’s favour.

He has no excuse, therefore, not to restructure his government in whatever way he considers most suitable.

Ahead of his election as president, Ramaphosa promised a much smaller cabinet with very few deputy ministers. Although his current executive, in terms of numbers, is an improvement on his predecessor’s, it is still too big and can do with pruning.

He also promised to run a clean government that would “fight corruption and state capture”. Such a pledge, however, is undermined by the continued presence of ministers, deputy ministers and other presidential appointees whose names feature prominently in past and current corruption scandals.

Hardly a week goes by at the state capture commission, headed by deputy chief justice Raymond Zondo, without fresh allegations of corrupt conduct being levelled against a serving minister or a deputy.

The anti-corruption message has also been undermined by the revelation of various self-enrichment schemes set up to raid the coffers created to help the country fight the pandemic.

No amount of explaining can win back the trust of citizens who have been deeply hurt and angered by the greed of some of our politicians and their associates. The only thing that would satisfy most South Africans would be for justice to take its course and for those found guilty to be jailed.

In the meantime, however, the president can demonstrate his commitment to the fight against corruption by purging his government of those who have serious and credible allegations levelled against them.

If all goes according to plan, the ANC will be holding its elective national conference in December next year. Some, therefore, may think it unwise for the president to create for himself potential new enemies by dropping members of his cabinet.

However, it is the electorate that he should fear the most, not delegates to his party’s national conference.

For what use is it to win a party conference only to lose the next general election? Rallies outside the Pietermaritzburg high court may suggest otherwise, but the reality is that the majority of South Africans are tired of corruption and are growing suspicious of politicians and their unfulfilled promises. It can only be a matter of time before they start using the polls to punish the corrupt and those who keep them in office.