Spin doctor Ryan Coetzee’s return to active politics as a Democratic Alliance “strategist” has been clouded by his alleged unauthorised appointment as consultant to the Western Cape administration.
Coetzee, DA leader Tony Leon’s former close confidant, has been unable to shake this bugbear for 18 months. After almost a year out of the news while studying for an English honours degree and working part-time for the DA, Coetzee (29) finds himself reluctantly back in the headlines for his role as adviser to former Western Cape premier Gerald Morkel.
The latest attack has come not from the DA’s former partner, the New National Party, nor the African National Congress. Instead the United Democratic Movement, which chairs the Western Cape public accounts committee, recently revived its call for a probe into his R279-an-hour contract.
“This whole thing annoys me,” said Coetzee in his usual brash manner.
He dismissed the claim as a smear campaign, a “hook to damage the DA”.
“There’s nothing to be gained from all this attention. I just want to do my job and go home and read interesting novels.”
Coetzee says he resigned from the DA during his stint as consultant and rejects claims of irregularity. He says a legal opinion cleared his contract in terms of public-service regulations. He points out that Joel Netshitenzhe, head of government communications, is a member of the ANC’s national executive, the communications adviser to the ANC and a public servant at the same time.
Coetzee’s intelligence, fluency and ability to think on his feet are widely acknowledged. But he is often accused of machiavellian manoeuvring — even within the DA — arrogance and a “love of his own voice”. The Capetonian makes no bones about his dislike of “guilt-ridden white lefties”.
He is hated by NNP members, who view him as the architect of a plan to strip their party’s assets and to marginalise its leaders after the DA was formed, as well as being Leon’s eyes and ears in the Western Cape administration.
Coetzee joined the Democratic Party at 18 because “it accords with my values and beliefs”. He started working for the party after a six-month stint as a teacher after obtaining a liberal arts degree.
He was first employed as a personal assistant, but wrote to Leon to say the leader needed a strategist. He got the job.
Some observers credit him with devising the DP’s “Fight Back” election campaign in 1999 — and of turning the anti-ANC fears of many white and coloured voters into support for Leon. He was increasingly identified as Leon’s right-hand man.
Consultants from the United States were hired to draft the party’s battle plan and to introduce the polls, surveys and focus groups that became associated with Coetzee’s political style.
But even within the DA there is unhappiness about his perceived hold over Leon. Coetzee does not deny he is close to the DA leader, but argues the strategy is to discredit Leon through him.
He insists it will fail: “Tony is the most popular opposition politician by miles. Every poll shows that.”
Some in the ANC concede the DA communications strategy has raised its profile beyond what its size warrants. But Coetzee is also blamed for costly political blunders, including triggering the break-up of the alliance and subsequent loss of the Western Cape to a joint ANC-NNP administration.
Leaked documents from his stolen computer in early 2001, dubbed the “Coetzee Papers”, mooted the marginalisation and ultimate removal of then co-leader Marthinus van Schalkwyk.
“I am a victim of crime,” Coetzee says. “I have no regrets … I just do my thing and try to do it well.”
Now another of his computers is under scrutiny: the Western Cape is probing whether Coetzee used his time as a consultant to the province to do DA political work. At the same time he was employed in the then-mayor Peter Marais’s office to draft the DA council’s communication strategy.
According to Die Burger, the investigators have found documents on Zimbabwe, on how to polish the image of Movement for Democratic Change leader Morgan Tsvangirai and letters Coetzee wrote to newspapers.
The DA has taken umbrage at the leaking of this information to the media, branding it a political campaign to discredit him through unfounded insinuations.
Coetzee will more than likely weather the latest uproar. Trailing clouds of past controversy, he is once again in the inner circles of the DA. Even his enemies must concede that he is a political survivor.