Why government is rotten to the core
HE left the national police commissioner's office with his tail between his legs, but Bheki Cele is back in politics.
Cele has returned from the political wilderness and is a key player in the ANC’s election campaign ahead of the 2014 general election.
He was fired by President Jacob Zuma after being censured by a commission of inquiry into the police’s Pretoria lease fiasco.
And Cele is in good company: on the list are a number of disgraced ANC politicians who surprisingly made a comeback.
Former ANC chief whip Tony Yengeni was convicted of fraud during the tendering process for the controversial arms deal while he was a member of a parliamentary committee reporting on the same matter.
He entered Pollsmoor Prison on 24 August 2006 and was immediately transferred to the less strict Malmesbury Prison. On 15 January 2007 he was freed on parole after completing just under five months of his four-year sentence. Yengeni is now a member of the ANC’s National Executive Committee.
Zuma was acquitted of rape and the jury has been out on his corruption and money laundering allegations for more than a decade.
Former ANC Youth League leader Fikile Mbalula had an affair with a model – who later claimed she was pregnant with his child. He lived to tell the tale and is the Minister of Sports in the Zuma cabinet.
Vusi Mona left the City Press newspaper under a cloud after he was found to have shares in a company that had contracts with the Mpumalanga government.
Mona is now the spokesperson for the SA Roads Agency Limited and has been leading the ill-fated campaign to convince Gauteng motorists that e-tolling is the next best thing.
A Sunday Times report revealed that former police and National Prosecuting Authority spokesperson Makhosini Nkosi owned a brothel on the premises of his communications business office in Randburg.
His police ministry contract ended in June, but Nkosi has always had a love affair with government as spokesperson and is sure to return at some point.
Sacked Communications Minister Dina Pule was reprimanded for awarding a multi-million rand tender to her boyfriend’s company and entertaining him at government’s expense.
She got a slap-on-the-wrist 15-day suspension and a 30-day salary fine – and remains an MP. The ANC did not take action against her.
Recycle deadwood and you get a government that’s rotten to the core.
