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South Africa: Deputy Minister Humiliated The ANC
http://www.africaeagle.com/2014/09/south-africa-deputy-minister-humiliated.html
Why was he allowed to continue making damaging remarks without rebuke? asks Pinky Khoabane.
After the latest and perhaps most humiliating communication blunder by an ANC minister, the question that must be asked is whether the ANC needs to forego its principles and values of free speech – for which much blood was lost – and gag its officials.
Gag in the sense of developing a communication policy with guidelines on how members should conduct themselves on public platforms and the enforcement of truth as a basic tenet of their communication.
This policy would, among others, comprise of rules of what they can say and what they should guard against saying, a lesson in diplomacy, common sense and when to keep their mouths shut.
It should be made mandatory that each public official have a written speech from which they are prohibited from straying.
This may sound draconian but private sector organisations adopt stringent communication policies where their employees are concerned as a way of ensuring that their secrets remain confidential and to save themselves from the bungles of the likes of Minister of Defence and Military Veterans Kebby Maphatsoe.
In a rare show of unity, Africans this week joined forces in their disdain for accusations by Maphatsoe that Public Protector Thuli Madonsela was a CIA spy. Exchanges between some members of the ANC and the public protector in response to her reports, have been ongoing, but× Maphatsoe has not only reached what is arguably an all-time low but it also caused a diplomatic row between× Africa and the US.
The deputy minister, speaking at the unveiling of the tombstone of Umkhonto we Sizwe member Linda Jabane, said: “We must think hard and deeper about the unity of the ANC and the unity of the alliance. The Lion of Chiawelo died for his country, we can’t allow people to hijack the ANC.
“We’ll fight and defend the Congress.
“UThuli umele asitshele ukuthi ubani ihandler yakhe (Thuli must tell us who her handler is).
“Thuli Madonsela can’t claim to say she was a member of Umkhonto we Sizwe and then all of a sudden she is acting like a counter-revolutionary.
“I said in my speech that these Chapter 9 institutions were created by the ANC and they are now being used… and if you ask why, it is an agenda of the Central Intelligence Agency… America want their own CEO la e South Africa (Americans want their own CEO here in South Africa) and we must not allow that.”
This was on a Saturday.
The following day, Madonsela responded with a demand for the deputy minister to provide evidence, saying failure to do so should be followed by a retraction or he would face a legal suit.
The US top envoy to South Africa, Patrick Gaspard, weighed in on the accusations calling them “baseless” and “offensive”, according to media reports.
So Maphatsoe not only managed to embarrass the ANC and the country but also managed to embroil another country – America no less – in his falsehoods.
And in the middle of this storm was absolute silence from the ANC.
The deputy minister still had a chance to retract the statement on the basis that he was “misunderstood and misinterpreted” as he eventually did, three days later.
By now he had been contacted by the journalist, Ndaba, who had viewed the video which was posted on social media YouTube by none-other-than the MKMVA itself apparently.
So he knew the video of his remarks existed and instead of saving the government and the ANC embarrassment, he opted to call a press conference on Monday, at which he flip flops between confirming that Madonsela’s actions resembled those of a spy and backtracking on the accusations.
“The way she has been handling the matters of the ANC about the president, we can’t conclude otherwise.
“And Comrade Lucky has just said, in exile you’d identify a person by his or her actions that this one is an enemy agent.”
But that wasn’t before leaving with another aspersion as a parting shot: “So her actions in that office… of undermining any institution, she thinks she’s God.”
This is cringe-worthy stuff!
When pressed for evidence, Maphatsoe, by his own admission, said proving that someone is a spy was difficult, in other words, he didn’t have concrete evidence.
So why the heck say it on a public platform given the difficulty and why not simply save face and retract the statement given that you have no evidence?
On the same day the ANC released a statement: “The African National Congress has noted requests for comment on the remarks made by the MKMVA chairperson about the public protector. The ANC believes the exchange is extremely unfortunate, however the ANC has no information at its disposal to comment further on the matter.”
You’d think a matter so grave as to suggest that the ANC had employed an impostor in its government would require immediate response, not await “requests for comment”.
How remarkable is it then that the ANC had no information “at its disposal to comment” when the incident had taken place three days earlier? Surely, when reports surfaced that accusations had been made and a legal suit was on the cards, the mother body should have immediately engaged Maphatsoe and asked for answers, even from among those who attended the event?
If there was any doubt about Maphatsoe’s accusations at Saturday’s unveiling, Maphatsoe had, at the Monday briefing, reiterated his belief that Madonsela’s actions resembled those of a spy, which should have warranted a much stronger rebuke by the ANC.
By the time Maphatsoe was summoned to HQ to explain himself, the damage was done and the ANC was left to salvage whatever reputation it could from the fallout.
When the following day the deputy minister was asked to explain himself to the National Assembly, it was expected that he would have been told to apologise and retract the statement but more importantly, that a script would have been laid out for him with a stern warning not to stray from it.
The MK veteran could have made it simple for himself and the country by apologising and retracting but in his explanation, he had to rely on falsehoods again.
This time it wasn’t the CIA or Comrade Lucky’s experience with spies while in exile or Thuli’s sense of self-importance, it was the journalist who wrote the story: “The journalist who wrote that article of The Star was not at the event. He used secondary documents.”
Maphatsoe swore he had SMSes in which the journalist confirmed he had not attended the event.
But again, the deputy minister was economical with the truth. As it turns out, the journalist contacted him about a recording of the unveiling of the tombstone and questioned him about his CIA remarks.
“I reject the allegations about what I said. We have records that can be made available if people want.” All these protestations in the face of a YouTube video of his assertions that Madonsela must reveal her handlers.
You’d think Maphatsoe’s love for the ANC and devotion to the unity of the party and its alliance partners would – in front of his peers in government and opposition parties – propel him to save the ANC the irreparable damage he had caused. No, he doesn’t. Instead, he opts to lie to Parliament. Funny love this is.
Source: Sunday Independent
After the latest and perhaps most humiliating communication blunder by an ANC minister, the question that must be asked is whether the ANC needs to forego its principles and values of free speech – for which much blood was lost – and gag its officials.
Gag in the sense of developing a communication policy with guidelines on how members should conduct themselves on public platforms and the enforcement of truth as a basic tenet of their communication.
This policy would, among others, comprise of rules of what they can say and what they should guard against saying, a lesson in diplomacy, common sense and when to keep their mouths shut.
It should be made mandatory that each public official have a written speech from which they are prohibited from straying.
This may sound draconian but private sector organisations adopt stringent communication policies where their employees are concerned as a way of ensuring that their secrets remain confidential and to save themselves from the bungles of the likes of Minister of Defence and Military Veterans Kebby Maphatsoe.
In a rare show of unity, Africans this week joined forces in their disdain for accusations by Maphatsoe that Public Protector Thuli Madonsela was a CIA spy. Exchanges between some members of the ANC and the public protector in response to her reports, have been ongoing, but× Maphatsoe has not only reached what is arguably an all-time low but it also caused a diplomatic row between× Africa and the US.
The deputy minister, speaking at the unveiling of the tombstone of Umkhonto we Sizwe member Linda Jabane, said: “We must think hard and deeper about the unity of the ANC and the unity of the alliance. The Lion of Chiawelo died for his country, we can’t allow people to hijack the ANC.
“We’ll fight and defend the Congress.
“UThuli umele asitshele ukuthi ubani ihandler yakhe (Thuli must tell us who her handler is).
“Thuli Madonsela can’t claim to say she was a member of Umkhonto we Sizwe and then all of a sudden she is acting like a counter-revolutionary.
“I said in my speech that these Chapter 9 institutions were created by the ANC and they are now being used… and if you ask why, it is an agenda of the Central Intelligence Agency… America want their own CEO la e South Africa (Americans want their own CEO here in South Africa) and we must not allow that.”
This was on a Saturday.
The following day, Madonsela responded with a demand for the deputy minister to provide evidence, saying failure to do so should be followed by a retraction or he would face a legal suit.
The US top envoy to South Africa, Patrick Gaspard, weighed in on the accusations calling them “baseless” and “offensive”, according to media reports.
So Maphatsoe not only managed to embarrass the ANC and the country but also managed to embroil another country – America no less – in his falsehoods.
And in the middle of this storm was absolute silence from the ANC.
The deputy minister still had a chance to retract the statement on the basis that he was “misunderstood and misinterpreted” as he eventually did, three days later.
By now he had been contacted by the journalist, Ndaba, who had viewed the video which was posted on social media YouTube by none-other-than the MKMVA itself apparently.
So he knew the video of his remarks existed and instead of saving the government and the ANC embarrassment, he opted to call a press conference on Monday, at which he flip flops between confirming that Madonsela’s actions resembled those of a spy and backtracking on the accusations.
“The way she has been handling the matters of the ANC about the president, we can’t conclude otherwise.
“And Comrade Lucky has just said, in exile you’d identify a person by his or her actions that this one is an enemy agent.”
But that wasn’t before leaving with another aspersion as a parting shot: “So her actions in that office… of undermining any institution, she thinks she’s God.”
This is cringe-worthy stuff!
When pressed for evidence, Maphatsoe, by his own admission, said proving that someone is a spy was difficult, in other words, he didn’t have concrete evidence.
So why the heck say it on a public platform given the difficulty and why not simply save face and retract the statement given that you have no evidence?
On the same day the ANC released a statement: “The African National Congress has noted requests for comment on the remarks made by the MKMVA chairperson about the public protector. The ANC believes the exchange is extremely unfortunate, however the ANC has no information at its disposal to comment further on the matter.”
You’d think a matter so grave as to suggest that the ANC had employed an impostor in its government would require immediate response, not await “requests for comment”.
How remarkable is it then that the ANC had no information “at its disposal to comment” when the incident had taken place three days earlier? Surely, when reports surfaced that accusations had been made and a legal suit was on the cards, the mother body should have immediately engaged Maphatsoe and asked for answers, even from among those who attended the event?
If there was any doubt about Maphatsoe’s accusations at Saturday’s unveiling, Maphatsoe had, at the Monday briefing, reiterated his belief that Madonsela’s actions resembled those of a spy, which should have warranted a much stronger rebuke by the ANC.
By the time Maphatsoe was summoned to HQ to explain himself, the damage was done and the ANC was left to salvage whatever reputation it could from the fallout.
When the following day the deputy minister was asked to explain himself to the National Assembly, it was expected that he would have been told to apologise and retract the statement but more importantly, that a script would have been laid out for him with a stern warning not to stray from it.
The MK veteran could have made it simple for himself and the country by apologising and retracting but in his explanation, he had to rely on falsehoods again.
This time it wasn’t the CIA or Comrade Lucky’s experience with spies while in exile or Thuli’s sense of self-importance, it was the journalist who wrote the story: “The journalist who wrote that article of The Star was not at the event. He used secondary documents.”
Maphatsoe swore he had SMSes in which the journalist confirmed he had not attended the event.
But again, the deputy minister was economical with the truth. As it turns out, the journalist contacted him about a recording of the unveiling of the tombstone and questioned him about his CIA remarks.
“I reject the allegations about what I said. We have records that can be made available if people want.” All these protestations in the face of a YouTube video of his assertions that Madonsela must reveal her handlers.
You’d think Maphatsoe’s love for the ANC and devotion to the unity of the party and its alliance partners would – in front of his peers in government and opposition parties – propel him to save the ANC the irreparable damage he had caused. No, he doesn’t. Instead, he opts to lie to Parliament. Funny love this is.
Source: Sunday Independent
