Ramaphosa must implement Zondo’s recommendations to save the ANC

When the Titanic set out on its ill-fated maiden voyage in 1912, it was considered unsinkable.

Four months before it sank, a liberation movement that was to later govern South Africa was formed. At the height of its powers it, too, considered itself unsinkable.

The ANC celebrated its 110th anniversary at the weekend in the midst of what some political commentators have called its sinking. And as if to keep mimicking the actions of those on board the Titanic as it sank, the two major factions of the ANC are more concerned about who will be the party’s new leader in December this year.

They want the deck chairs on this sinking giant to be rearranged. With the amount of obvious sabotage that the ruling party’s president has had to deal with recently, it beggars belief that he still wants to be captain of this sinking ship (unless his major aim is to redeem his own legacy).

In the same week that he had the lights switched off on him while literally mid-sentence on stage, he received the first part of Acting Chief Justice Raymond Zondo’s report from the Commission of Inquiry into State Capture.

If rumours of sabotage by the radical economic transformation (RET) faction to keep embarrassing their own party’s president at every turn are true, it would be the worst-case scenario of cutting off their noses to spite their faces.

Ramaphosa’s failure as president is the ANC’s failure. This is the sort of shortsightedness that made the RET faction campaign against their own party in KwaZulu-Natal to spite their own president.

If the president decides to take no action after Zondo put in so much effort to pinpoint the guilty players in state capture, it will be victory of sorts for the faction that wants him out.

The RET faction doesn’t only want power back within the ruling party so they can continue with state capture, they want power back so that many within their ranks will avoid finding themselves in orange overalls.

Unfortunately for voters, the retribution that they so deserve after state institutions were deliberately hollowed out and billions looted hinges on who wins the internal battles within the ruling party.

ALSO READ: First part of state capture report finally available to public

The president spoke over the weekend about how his party’s internal unity must not come at a cost to the state and the taxpayer. But his track record indicates he is lacking in delivery. He is his own worst enemy because he entered into a pact with a section of the RET faction to get the votes to be president.

Now, he cannot act against them. For the president to act in the interests of citizens he will have to go against his own instinct for self-preservation.

To save South Africa from the senselessness of burning parliaments, smashing windows at the Constitutional Court or the threat of random looting in the future, the president will have to implement the recommendations of the
reports, not just in making changes to procurement in government but also equipping the National Prosecuting Authority to jail those who set SA on a destructive path.

If he does as Zondo says, he might redeem his own legacy and buy his sinking ship one more term in government.

Most importantly he will have shown SA is not a banana republic.