About the Guptas: ‘What we know today, we didn’t know then,’ ANC’s Gwede Mantashe tells inquiry

Mantashe’s opening statement dealt with cadre deployment, the party’s relationship with the Gupta family and with how the system of parliamentary oversight works in a party-led, proportional representation electoral system. 

“No ANC MP was told to stop thinking,” said Mantashe as he explained how the party views parliamentary oversight. 

He spoke about how the party had come to be influenced and ensnared by the Gupta family and its patronage networks. “A few years after arriving, Mr Ajay Gupta became a member of President Thabo Mbeki’s International Advisory Council. [Later], he approached the ANC to establish ANN7 and The New Age,” said Mantashe, explaining that the ANC had welcomed the opportunity to diversify the media. 

“We needed diversity. At that stage we did not know their other businesses.  What we know today, we didn’t know then,” he said, adding that the party only clicked to the family’s shenanigans when it landed a private wedding plane at Waterkloof Air Force Base in 2013 and when Transport Minister Fikile Mbalula (then serving in a different portfolio) remarked during an ANC NEC meeting that he had been told of his deployment by the family.  As the family’s hold over the state became clearer, the ANC did not tell its MP’s not to ask questions or “stop thinking”, said Mantashe.  

Mantashe said he realised ANC MPs could face tension between party loyalty and loyalty to voters. “We have stressed they should apply their minds to their purpose in Parliament [which is to] enhance the developmental agenda. They should be thinking MPs [but] South Africa is a very young democracy, and we should tread with caution when making majority decisions like the removal of a president. 

“I have experienced a party removing two of its former presidents, and the consequence [was] a breakaway from the ANC [the formation of the now-defunct COPE].” 

Mantashe said the party did not believe in the “Samson Option”, where MPs had to be made to choose between party and state. 

The party did not encourage willy-nilly support for motions of no-confidence in Parliament. “We can’t create a crisis and collapse the country. All parties operate caucus systems [which exercise party control].”

The party did not have a cadre deployment policy but a deployment policy, “and it makes a huge difference”. 

Mantashe replaced ANC Secretary-General Ace Magashule, who was supposed to have represented the party at the Zondo Commission.  

Commission chairperson Judge Raymond Zondo announced that President Cyril Ramaphosa would no longer appear before the commission on 22 and 23 April due to state obligations.  He would still appear on 28 and 29 April. DM