Johannesburg - ANC Chairperson Gwede Mantashe has dismissed claims that President Cyril Ramaphosa is thinking of resigning.
On Wednesday, retired Chief Justice Sandile Ngcobo’s three-member Independent Section 89 Panel found that Ramaphosa had violated his oath of office in handling the break-in and theft of a huge amount of money in US dollars at his Phala Phala game farm.
Amid the findings, it was widely reported that Ramaphosa would resign as head of state. This is supported by an announcement that he would address the nation on Thursday evening, but it was later postponed.
The ANC’s National Executive Committee (NEC) is preparing to hold a special meeting in Nasrec today.
Mantashe, in an interview with one of the broadcasters, said he has known Ramaphosa for quite some time now and said one of the things he hates is getting to a noisy space.
“He would easily take that decision, but the decision to give the report space to be interrogated and be tested is the most correct one,” said Mantashe.
He said he believes that if one is accused, they have a right to defend that space and take that report on review.
“My own view is that the most premature decision will be for President Ramaphosa to just step down prematurely without due process. When we took the resolution on step aside, which is the most abused and vandalised resolution of the ANC, we said when a person is charged, let that person step aside. The report of the panel is not using the word should or had to but uses may because it knows that it cannot take a decision of finding the president guilty or not,” Mantashe said.
He said it opens a way for Parliament to start a process to interrogate that space.
Reacting to reports suggesting that Ramaphosa was on his way out, Mantashe accused the people of making assumptions, knowing the sensitivity of the president to a noisy space.
“The NEC will table the report, and my own view, as Gwede, I don’t think that Ramaphosa must just step out and leave but must allow the process to take its course and take a decision,” Mantashe said.
A number of NEC members had called for Ramaphosa to step aside, one of them being Dr Nkosazana Dlamini Zuma, even at what was said to be the last NEC meeting, she urged Ramaphosa to step aside after she said the president did not take the NEC into confidence on what really happened in Phala Phala farm.
Mantashe said he has listened to a number of the same voices who called for Ramaphosa to step aside for more than two years now.
“When we go to the NEC, we are likely to hear voices that are fresh on the issue. Those people who have been saying go now have been saying that for two years. They never accepted the outcome of the 54th national conference. They always said he must go any time. This is another opportunity for them. We will listen to them, but there will be a discussion in the NEC,” he said.
Earlier this week, Mantashe said the ANC could have handled the Phala Phala scandal a little bit better,
“The ANC sometimes assumes the responsibility of absorbing things that should go to the judicial processes to itself, and in the process, it gets hurt. The Phala Phala issue is in the parliamentary, Receive Bank and SARS process. The ANC sometimes take a short cut and wants to absorb that into its own self, and in the process, it gets hurt because it is not the competent body to do the investigation. The ANC must listen to investigations. Outcomes of the investigations must inform the decision of the ANC,” said Mantashe.
He said the ANC must call out a meeting now because there is a report out because there is a basis for discussions, and therefore, saying the way forward is as follows, following a report.
“We are not an investigating body. We are a political party. The only crisis that we must manage is that sections in the ANC get agitated. They attack each other all the time. That is what we must deal with, not the report. The Phala Phala report must be investigated properly, and the ANC must take a decision on the outcome of the report,” Mantashe said.
The Star