Due process: Ivan Pillay
With the country on a knife-edge over continuing threats to oust and arrest Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan, supporters of President Jacob Zuma are planning to move in for the kill.
The president’s supporters have a “hit list” of Cabinet ministers and others in key positions they want removed, insiders claim.
During a week of high tension and unprecedented public calls for the attacks on Gordhan to stop, talk of a Cabinet reshuffle gained momentum.
The Mail & Guardian has established the ministers are at risk over their perceived failure to back Zuma. They include Higher Education Minister Blade Nzimande, Agriculture Minister Senzeni Zokwana, Public Works Minister Thulas Nxesi and his deputy, Jeremy Cronin, as well as Trade and Industry Minister Rob Davies and Deputy Finance Minister Mcebisi Jonas.
And the Zuma camp apparently wants to blame ANC secretary general Gwede Mantashe for the party’s poor performance in the local government elections.
The ANC Youth League fired the first salvo when it suggested Mantashe, and not Zuma’s scandal-ridden tenure, was responsible for the party’s poor election performance.
ANC and government insiders, who spoke on condition of anonymity, believe the Hawks’ summoning of Gordhan this week is part of a broader strategy to eliminate Zuma’s political opponents ahead of the ANC’s elective conference in 2017.
Targeting the reds
Several of the ministers at risk are members of the South African Communist Party. Speculation is that Nzimande may be moved to a smaller portfolio “to keep him busy” because it would be too risky to have him outside the government ahead of the elective conference.
Zuma is said to want his ex-wife and African Union Commission chairperson Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma to take over the ANC’s hot seat next year, whereas the SACP and some in labour federation Cosatu want his deputy, Cyril Ramaphosa, to succeed him as president.
The SACP has become one of Zuma’s strongest critics and its leaders have not shied away from questioning his relationship with members of the Gupta family.
Meanwhile, Transport Minister Dipuo Peters may also be on her way out after she allegedly refused to enter into business deals with the Gupta family in a number of agencies under her control.
Following this week’s tensions over the Gordhan arrest threat, it seems unlikely that the anti-Zuma faction will go down without a fight.
Gordhan refused to appear before the Hawks on Thursday, where he was expected to be given warning statements alongside two former revenue service officials, Ivan Pillay and Johann van Loggerenberg.
SACP second deputy general secretary Solly Mapaila said the Hawks’s move against Gordhan was politically motivated and done with Zuma’s blessing.
“He [Gordhan] is seen as an impediment to the looting of state-owned enterprises. Co-ordinated groupings that have captured parts of our state have found treasury to be a stumbling block, whether it’s SAA or Denel. It’s [a] politically motivated [move] by people who are linked to the president, the Guptas and them,” Mapaila said.
“We have asked the president to ask the Hawks to stay away from Gordhan. I don’t think that will happen, though. I suspect that they [the Hawks] do it in his [Zuma’s] name,” he said. “We want to protect the looting of state institutions; Pravin has been an important buffer.”
He raised the possibility of insider trading over the Gordhan uncertainty, saying that “some elements benefit when the rand dips because they trade in currencies”.
‘No one is above the law’
Youth league secretary general Njabulo Nzuza said Gordhan was not above the law and that, if there was a strong case against him, he must face the music.
“If he is innocent, we must move on. It’s part of the legal process. We don’t want this to divide the government,” said Nzuza.
Cosatu echoed the youth league’s sentiments. Mantashe this week again condemned the Hawks’s treatment of Gordhan. He said the ANC needed to be liberated of the way money influences people and compromises the party.
“Today [in the ANC], we deal with money. Today, we see councillors fighting for positions. People are shooting each other for money and positions. Maybe I must take responsibility for that?” said Mantashe rhetorically.
ANC national executive committee members Billy Masetlha and Enoch Godongwana were scathing of how the Hawks were treating Gordhan, with Masetlha labelling it “unacceptable and totally regrettable for the national good”.
He added: “Whatever it is, it smacks of political factional nonsense that can never be condoned in a professional outfit.
“They [the Hawks] must desist from that conduct. I don’t have a brief for Pravin, but he has done excellent work in the seven months since his appointment.
“We would be in a worse situation if it were not for him. Hands off Pravin,” said Masetlha, who previously served as head of the National Intelligence Agency. “I have serious problems with the individuals that are making these decisions because I happen to know who they are.
“The agenda of those individuals is suspect. They must stop it now. It is so political that it must never be entertained.”
He warned Zuma against reshuffling the Cabinet to oust Gordhan, saying this would be “mediocrity at its worst”.
Naming names
Eskom chief executive Brian Molefe and ANC MP Sfiso Buthelezi have been touted to replace Gordhan and Jonas in the finance ministry. Jonas fell out of favour with the Zuma faction after he told of how the Gupta family had offered to make him finance minister.
The decision to replace Nhlanhla Nene with little-known Des van Rooyen as finance minister in December saw the rand shoot past R15 to the dollar, and the stock market lost R230-billion in value and the bond market shed R217-billion.
On Tuesday evening, after news broke that the Hawks had summoned Gordhan, the currency again weakened from R13.50 to the dollar to more than R14, where it stayed on Thursday.
On Thursday Zuma said: “The negative effect of these matters on our economy, personal pressure on the individuals affected as well as the heads of institutions, however disturbing, cannot be cause for the president to intervene unconstitutionally.
“The broader speculation linking these investigations to government and state-owned institutions is equally unhelpful, and is also false and misleading.” — Additional reporting by Lisa Steyn
‘There are no charges, only allegations’
Although Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan refused to submit to the Hawks’ questioning, his former colleagues, Ivan Pillay and Johann van Loggerenberg, spent just over four hours inside the Hawks head office.
When they emerged they were tight-lipped.
“I don’t know,” said Van Loggerenberg, when asked why the meeting had taken so long.
“My clients will be following due process in accordance with their rights,” their lawyer, Robert Levin, said. “There are no charges, only allegations.”
Pillay and Van Loggerenberg seemed unflustered, even when descended on by the large media contingent. Also present were supporters from civil society bodies such as Right2Know, which displayed a “no secrets, no lies, no spies” banner grimy from use.
The two men, former judge Johann Kriegler said earlier, were “entitled, as human beings, to moral support” after having been “destroyed”.
Asked whether President Jacob Zuma had any role to play in the matter, Kriegler barked out a laugh. “Are you being serious? That is my only answer.”
His organisation, Freedom Under Law, and the Helen Suzman Foundation intend to show their support for the officials by way of the courts, Kriegler said.
Gordhan on Wednesday dismissed corruption claims and explained the circumstances around which he had authorised the early retirement and rehiring of Pillay on contract.
He said it was done after a request from then Sars boss Oupa Magashula, who confirmed that the Hawks had also asked him to make a warning statement.
— Phillip de Wet
For more on this developing story, go to mg.co.za/pravin