Sunday Tribune

ZONDO TAKES AIM AT RAMAPHOSA

SAMKELO MTSHALI samkelo.thulasizwe@inl.co.za

President Cyril Ramaphosa has come under the spotlight in the final part of the report of the state capture commission which said that the head of state should have known of corrupt activities, including his CR17 campaign receiving funds from Bosasa.

In the report, released on Wednesday, commission chairperson Justice Raymond Zondo slammed Ramaphosa, saying that Ramaphosa’s repeated claims of being in the dark about the funding of the CR17 campaign which led to his victory at the ANC’S 54th National Elective Conference in Nasrec in December 2017 had potentially troublesome implications.

“The many admissions Ramaphosa made about the potential for corruption were not helping in the fight against corruption,” said the report.

Justice Zondo said Ramaphosa’s acknowledgement of the existence of the scourge of corruption within the party and promising to fight it was not something new.

“This is a clear admission that the role of money in contests for ANC leadership positions contributed to conditions in which corruption and state capture could take place,” Justice Zondo’s report read.

The report added that various ANC leaders had been implicated by testimony and that there had also been substantial evidence that the party was a beneficiary of state capture, receiving payments from third parties alleged to have corruptly-acquired government contracts.

“In his own statements, Ramaphosa conceded the existence of corruption and state capture, and the role of the ANC therein. He had conceded not only that there has been corruption, but that it is both continuing and pervasive, in government and in the party,” it read.

Ramaphosa has also come under fire recently, following revelations by former spy boss Arthur Fraser of the theft of $4 million (R63m) at Ramaphosa’s Phala Phala game farm in Limpopo in 2020.

The scandal, which has threatened Ramaphosa’s presidency, came to light after Fraser filed charges against him for money laundering, corruption, failure to report a crime, and acting in contravention of the Prevention of Organised Crime Act, related to the theft of the large sum of money hidden on the farm.

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2022-06-26T07:00:00.0000000Z

2022-06-26T07:00:00.0000000Z

https://sundaytribune.pressreader.com/article/281556589509377

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