Reports about Ramaphosa’s ‘affairs’ part of campaign to discredit him, says expert

Family values and leadership is still an issue in South African and African context, but all that is aggravated by the deterioration in societal moral standards in general, an expert has said.

This was the view expressed by political analyst, André Duvenhage who said the recent reports about deputy president Cyril Ramaphosa’s extra-marital affairs appear to be part of a dirty tricks campaign aimed at discrediting him.

He said this is the first instalment and more could be expected to come from the Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma camp. The campaign would (allegedly) continue and intensify towards the ANC’s elective national conference in December.

“Our social structures are falling apart. We are really in a crisis as South Africa when it comes to morality. But moral issues had always not been a big issue in the political leadership in South Africa because the ANC support base has not been as sensitive to this issue,” he said.

While stating that he was careful not to defend Ramaphosa on the claims levelled against him as published by the Sunday Independent at the weekend, Duvenhage said Ramaphosa was better off compared to Jacob Zuma when it came to morality.

The paper reported that Ramaphosa did not practise what he preached on moral and ethical leadership, and allegedly used his wealth to prey on multiple women who included university students.

“There is a certain moral code in South Africa, but Zuma is a lot lower in moral rating than Cyril Ramaphosa,” Duvenhage said.

However, the analyst said the political dirty tricks are not new in politics nor unique to South Africa. He said this happened the world over and often occurred during leadership contestations.

However, one of the women at the centre of the allegations has since vehemently denied having anything to do with Ramaphosa. Nonhlanhla Radebe, a member of the ANC Sefako Makgatho branch in Gauteng, said she had never even met Ramaphosa in her life.

Radebe, who threatened to sue for defamation of character over the allegations against her, said this was part of a desperate campaign to prevent Ramaphosa from taking over from Zuma as ANC president. Her party branch vowed to stand by Radebe until she cleared her name.