President Cyril Ramaphosa named labour & employment minister Thulas Nxesi as a temporary replacement for Ayanda Dlodlo, whose departure as the political principal of the public service department has left some cabinet members nervous about a possible reshuffle.
Dlodlo took up the position of public service & administration minister in August 2021 after a cabinet shake-up largely triggered by the unrest in July, which caught some ministers napping. She is leaving the country to start a new job at the World Bank, where she will be one of three board members representing the interests of 25 African member states.
Her departure has left some ministers on tenterhooks, according to several executive members who spoke to Business Day on condition of anonymity, surmising that Ramaphosa is likely to use the opportunity to fill the position for a wider reshuffle in response to the reports on state capture and the political unrest in parts of KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng.
The reports, which paint a picture of incompetence on the one hand and possible corruption by ANC officials on the other, have put Ramaphosa in a quandary over how to respond. Failure to act against members of his executive risks undermining his pledge to build what he calls a capable, ethical state, as well as to crack down on corruption, which became endemic during the nine-year tenure of his predecessor, Jacob Zuma.
But Ramaphosa may be hesitant to fire senior ANC leaders, who command support among branches, ahead of the party’s internal leadership contest in December.
Still, the vacant position in the public service department, as well as the reports, have left some minister nervous. “It seems like he has to reshuffle, but we don’t know if he will,” one minister said.
Ramaphosa has undertaken to present an action plan for the implementation of the recommendations of the state capture report to parliament within four months of the final report being submitted to him. This date has since been pushed out after the high court extension of the lifespan of the commission to the end of April.
He testified on Friday before the SA Human Rights Commission investigation hearing into the July 2021 unrest, which is probing the cause of the apparent breakdown in law and order.
Ramaphosa last reshuffle his cabinet in August 2021, opting for a soft touch approach that saw several ministers, including Dlodlo, who was state security minister at the time, reassigned. Then defence minister Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula was promoted to speaker of the National Assembly. Zweli Mkhize, who was implicated by the Special Investigating Unit in a tender scandal, was the only minister to lose his job.
Before that, Ramaphosa redesigned the national executive shortly after the 2019 national elections and a year earlier after taking over from Zuma.
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