Steenhuisen ‘desperately’ waiting as Roman Cabanac still in office six months after being asked to leave

25 Mar 2025

It’s been almost 200 days, about six months, since Agriculture Minister John Steenhuisen said he’d ask his controversial chief of staff, Roman Cabanac, to consider resigning. Now, Steenhuisen is ‘desperately’ waiting for action to be taken, while Cabanac says the minister is communicating with the media rather than with him.

Roman Cabanac is still working as per his contract as chief of staff for Agriculture Minister John Steenhuisen, despite the minister telling a full Cape Town Press Club in September 2024 that he had asked the podcaster to consider resigning.

It’s been six months since Steenhuisen asked the podcaster to step away from his position.

This week, Cabanac told Daily Maverick: “I am continuing with my job as per my contract. The minister is communicating in the media that a resolution is ‘close’ but I haven’t had any formal communications in this regard.”

Cabanac was appointed as a senior civil servant after the 2024 elections. Questions were immediately raised about his qualifications and past inflammatory statements, such as derogatory comments towards senior government officials, including President Cyril Ramaphosa.

Steenhuisen told Daily Maverick this week: “Despite being a political appointment, Mr Cabanac refused to resign when asked to step down. We too are waiting desperately for action to be taken. However, proper process in terms of the internal HR management and our labour law is required to be followed.”

He continued: “It is vital to ensure that procedure is followed to the letter of the law and the internal practice of the department. I am assured by my HR department that they are treating this matter with the urgency it deserves and with due regard to the necessary protections offered to every single employee in the department, including Mr Cabanac.”

Cabanac’s appointment caused an outcry from the public and those within Steenhuisen’s party, the DA.

Daily Maverick reported in November 2024, about two months after Steenhuisen asked him to consider resigning, that Cabanac was still in his position, while the Agriculture Department said “the matter of Mr Cabanac is receiving attention, in line with government processes”.

In February 2025, eNCA reported that Steenhuisen said Cabanac’s removal was in its final stages and that he did not have “any interaction with him or work with him” despite Cabanac still working as his chief of staff. Steenhuisen had said he was “very confident” that the process of removing Cabanac “had reached its final stage”.

The position of chief of staff comes with an annual salary of R1,436,022 as part of a remuneration package, at taxpayers’ expense, according to a parliamentary reply from Steenhuisen.

Daily Maverick has previously reported that this process could drag on for months and, as labour lawyer Kgomotso Mufamadi said, it would be difficult to remove Cabanac if he did not want to resign, potentially compelling the Agriculture Ministry to offer a golden handshake.

Why is Roman Cabanac controversial?

After Cabanac’s appointment in August 2024 he deleted many of his controversial tweets. However, on his Morning Shot podcast he has referred to Ramaphosa as a “p*es”, to ANC secretary-general Fikile Mbalula as “handicapped” and to Ramaphosa’s spokesperson as “Cyril’s Spokesretard”.

As Daily Maverick reported, Cabanac is also a Trump supporter and openly pro-Putin, and enjoys mocking Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. He has also tweeted that South Africa could “learn from Viktor Orbán”, the Hungarian strongman who has dismantled democracy in that country.

Locally, he also had openly flirted with apartheid denialism by hinting that the Sharpeville Massacre – in which 69 protesters were killed by apartheid police – may not have happened in the manner history records.

Read more: Steenhuisen’s podcast bro appointment of Roman Cabanac is a low for the DA

The Centre for Analytics and Behavioural Change found that Cabanac has not only interacted online with pro-Russian X accounts, he was hosted in May 2024 by Rosatom, the state-owned Russian nuclear energy company, which took place during the general elections.

But didn’t he apologise for his comments?

As Daily Maverick reported in September 2024, just a few weeks after his appointment, Cabanac said: “In the past, I built my brand as a critic of the previous government. I pushed boundaries to gain attention on social media and sometimes made divisive, idle and poorly considered statements in the heat of online journalism. While some of the criticisms were well founded, I also admit that others were insensitive and provocative, driven by the desire to debate.”

Read more: Roman Cabanac acknowledges ‘controversial behaviour’ and urges South Africans to give him a chance

Cabanac said: “I am committed to working with anyone who shares the goal of a prosperous, united South Africa. Together, we can ensure food security, create jobs and build a thriving economy.”

He asked that South Africans who were against him “to reconsider their judgement of me, or to at least afford me the chance to do the job and to evaluate me after it is done, just as they have with others who have faced public scrutiny or even criminal convictions but are working towards the greater good for the sake of the government of national unity.”

‘Lip service’ from the minister

Public Service Association general manager Reuben Maleka criticised Steenhuisen’s handling of the Cabanac matter:

“Every employee has the rights enshrined in the [Labour Relations Act]. Despite the conduct of Mr Cabanac he still has to be subjected to fair process to termination of his employment. Normally the employee would be subjected to a disciplinary hearing on the allegations to ensure fair process and procedure to terminate employment.

“The minister has abdicated his responsibilities to invoke a disciplinary hearing, or he is deliberately dragging the matter with no intention of terminating Mr Cabanac’s employment.

“It is unprecedented that an employer requests an employee to resign on such serious allegations and six months later the employee continues to render service under the day-to-day interaction with the minister and nothing has happened. It is trite that the minister was just paying lip service when he made a public call for the employee to resign. The minister is happy with the conduct of the employee.” DM

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Politics

Why is Roman Cabanac controversial?

But didn’t he apologise for his comments?

‘Lip service’ from the minister