President Cyril Ramaphosa, after two days of tough questioning at the Zondo commission, declared that his silence as SA’s deputy president during the excesses of Jacob Zuma’s administration should not be interpreted as complicity.
Having come in trepidation, Ramaphosa said he “left with many scars”.
He also back-pedalled on his statements made earlier in the commission proceedings that he did not know about state capture, saying “if ever the impression was created that I really did not know, that would be the wrong impression as there were signposts along the way”.
One of these was Fikile Mbalula telling the national executive committee in 2011 that he had heard about his appointment to cabinet from a member of the Gupta family. Another was the landing of the Gupta wedding party at the Waterkloof Airbase in 2013.
“One could not immediately join the dots, but the signposts were there. Were we complicit? The answer is no. Could we be said to have been negligent, it could well be,” Ramaphosa said.
“There were a whole lot of battles I got involved in quietly and silently; there are a number of them.”
Ramaphosa described his conduct during the Zuma-led administration as “strategic” and designed to enable him to stay in the system, change what he could and live to fight another day.
In its final report the commission can be expected to express a view on Ramaphosa’s testimony, with evidence leader Paul Pretorius saying that the three years of evidence heard by the commission strongly contradicted Ramaphosa’s claims about knowing very little of what had gone on.
Acting chief justice Raymond Zondo also commented at the conclusion of Ramaphosa’s evidence, saying that “while there might be arguments for and against what was a ‘strategic’ situation, and it might not be easy to say which one is right, the fact of the matter is that between 2011 and 2017, the Guptas and their entities were able to access R57bn of taxpayers’ money.”
Zondo’s recurring concern during Ramaphosa’s testimony was that state capture should not be enabled to happen again, asking how could SA be certain that a different cohort of leaders would not respond to the same situation in the same way.
Ramaphosa said that he felt convinced that state capture would not happen again as the ANC was being renewed and state institutions were being strengthened. He also spoke about the importance of strengthening whistle-blowing legislation as those who acted to expose wrongdoing had risked much and lost heavily.
A dominant concern of the commission has been the ANC’s cadre deployment policy, about which both Ramaphosa and ANC chair Gwede Mantashe have faced detailed questioning.
Ramaphosa has defended the practice of sending cadres to key institutions such as state-owned enterprises, saying it is an acceptable way for a governing party to ensure state functionaries execute the party mandate.
He said the ANC’s deployment committee made “recommendations” and did not instruct, because state bodies remained the appointing authorities.
Pretorius told Ramaphosa on Wednesday that his testimony was not borne out by evidence. The committee discussed appointments, including to the judiciary, and instructed its ministers to act on its decisions.
The commission is also likely to make a finding on the ANC’s deployment committee, with Pretorius suggesting on Wednesday that it could pronounce on its constitutionality.
On Thursday, before closing his evidence, Ramaphosa pleaded with Zondo not to make an adverse finding on the deployment committee.
“Many people would dispute it, but it is a fact. I will keep saying the governing party is not the appointing authority; there are many examples of the governing party showing a preference and then the preference having not emerged,” Ramaphosa said.
Thursday’s testimony also focused on the intelligence services, the extent to which they were subverted under state capture and Ramaphosa’s failure to clean them out, despite this knowledge.
In December of 2018, Ramaphosa received a high-level report by former minister of intelligence Sydney Mufamadi, which recommended criminal proceedings against former intelligence minister David Mahlobo and former director-general Arthur Fraser, whom Ramaphosa moved to the department of correctional services.
However, having appointed both of them to high positions in his administration, Ramaphosa was asked whether they were still deemed suitable for appointment. He said he was awaiting the commission’s report to act against those who had committed wrongdoing.
Regarding the subversion of the intelligence services, Ramaphosa told Zondo: “Many unexplainable, incomprehensible and inconceivable things happened. The commission will help us to deal with what went wrong and identify who the perpetrators were. The commission is going to be the final washing machine that will help us cleanse the state.”
Zondo said that while he had intended for Ramaphosa to be the final oral witness, he would still consider other applications to be heard if they were properly motivated.
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