DA slams Ramaphosa for ‘ANC silence’ on Bosasa scandal

Following Cyril Ramaphosa’s commitment to combat corruption as part of his government’s plans for SA’s “new dawn”, the DA has slammed the president and his party for what they call “silence and inaction”.

Speaking at the council of foreign relations on Monday, Ramaphosa answered a number of questions from a select audience on various topics about the current state of South Africa with regards to issues such as the economy, his stimulus package, land reform, and corruption.

Ramaphosa made a number of promises with regards to his government’s approach to tackling corruption, both in the public and private sector.

Ramaphosa explained: “The corruption has not only been the preserve of the public sector, it’s not only been the preserve of government, state-owned enterprises, or government institutions. We’ve also found quite a lot of corruption in our corporates. A number of international companies have been complicit in the corruption that has permeated a number of our state-owned enterprises in our economy, and some of them have been involved in gigantic scandals of corruption that have led, I’m sad to say, to billions of rands being lost to pension funds, to insurance companies, and that has actually been quite a horrendous story that our country has gone through.

“I’m sure that our state [and] our criminal justice system is going to be very busy in dealing with this matter.”

On Thursday, the DAs Phumzile van Damme pointed out that it has been 25 days since the Bosasa scandal broke.

“The ANC governments’ silence and inaction on this matter calls into question President Cyril Ramaphosa’s apparent commitment to rooting out corruption which is endemic in the party and the government,” said the DA in a statement.

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The opposition cited reports that several key ANC officials and national ministers received security upgrades and other benefits from Bosasa which then secured contracts worth R10 billion from various government departments.

One such official is ANC MP Vincent Smith who recently had to step down as chair of the joint constitutional review committee on amending section 25 of the constitution to allow for expropriation of land without compensation.

DA chief whip John Steenhuisen reported Smith to parliament’s ethics committee and laid criminal charges against him and the other implicated ANC officials (including Gwede Mantashe, Nomvula Mokonyane and Dudu Myeni) for allegedly receiving benefits from Bosasa.

The DA added: “Action speaks louder than words. While it is easy to talk tough on corruption, the ANCs complete silence combined with the lack of action on this matter proves it is not serious about rooting out corruption. It also shows that there is no real commitment to ensuring that those involved in the Bosasa scandal are held accountable.”

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