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By Itumeleng Mafisa

Journalist


SA awaits Cabinet announcement: Will the ANC bow down to the DA?

The future of President Cyril Ramaphosa is in the hands of the DA, says political analyst Sipho Seepe.


Political analyst Sipho Seepe said he believed that the ANC would eventually submit to the DA’s demands of Cabinet posts and other positions.

Top ANC members have described demands made by the DA for government positions as outrageous.

The DA had been asking for key portfolios including the international relations and justice. The party was also demanding the deputy president post as well the minister in the presidency, which would see it able to influence some of the president’s decisions.

Ramaphosa will submit

“My sense is that the ANC will succumb to the DA’s demands,” said Seepe.

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He said he believed that many in the ANC’s National Executive Committee (NEC) had been compromised by their relations with the private sector and business people who were in favour of the ANC co-governing with the DA.

“The current ANC NEC leadership is highly compromised. Most of its members have been co-opted by white capital to the extent that they are unable to extricate themselves from the DA,” Seepe said.

Seepe said should the DA leave the Government of National Unity (GNU), it would go ahead with plans to ensure that president Cyril Ramaphosa is removed as president.

“The DA has been bold to suggest the Phala Phala scandal has elements of money laundering written all over it. Should it exit the GNU, it will ferociously pursue this matter and this is what the ANC of Ramaphosa fears,” he said.

The DA had in the past approached the US government to investigate possible criminal violation of its laws related to the Phala Phala scandal.

But recently the party’s federal chairperson Helen Zille had indicated that the DA would not participate in moves to have Ramaphosa impeached over the Phala Phala matter.

This led to suspicions of a secret deal between the DA and the ANC.

Both parties have disagreed on the existence of a secret agreement.

Meanwhile, South Africa is waiting with baited breath to see who will Ramaphosa appoint in his new Cabinet.

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