#TBT: Nathi Nhleko insists ‘firepool’, cattle kraal and chicken coop are security features

President Jacob Zuma, if political sangomas in newsrooms across the country are to be believed, could be old news as soon as this weekend when the ANC national executive committee (NEC) concludes its national working committee (NWC) at the St Georges Hotel in Irene.

St Georges Hotel is the ruling party’s choice of conference venue and borders a squatter camp without basic services. In the past it has been argued that this is not an ANC problem, as the ward belongs to the Ekurhuleni Metro Council and the provision of housing at the local level is not Lindiwe Sisulu’s responsibility. However, Mzwandile Masina, the mayor of the municipality, himself happens to be a member of the ANC provincial executive council (PEC).

The pundits will have us believe that even if Zuma were to stay, some of Zuma’s trusted lieutenants would be shown the door.

In this week’s edition of Throwback Thursday, we take a look at the sterling performance of one Nathi Nhleko, then minister of police who ‘overruled’ Thuli Madonsela, public protector at the time, that Zuma must reimburse a portion of the R246-million security upgrades on Nkandla.

Nhleko said the firepool, chicken coop and cattle kraal and amphitheatre were all necessary security features and disregarded Madonsela’s finding that Zuma unduly benefited from the upgrades.

“The SAPS security evaluation reports states that entrances to the homestead should be controlled and that security equipment and infrastructure should be installed in those entrances. Operational effectiveness of such security equipment infrastructure necessaries non-interference,” he said.

Anticipating that many South Africans would simply not understand how a cattle kraal would protect the president, he offered a further explanation.

“We then discussed the family Zulu dictionary cattle kraal is defined as isibaya. Traditional village of huts, enclosure for sheep and cattle,” he added