Mokonyane: Just another politician after all

A few months ago I wrote about Gauteng Premier Nomvula Mokonyane suspending the former director of Gauteng’s roads and transport department, Sibusiso Buthelezi.

It’s been reported that a disciplinary process against Buthelezi was aborted mid-stream and that an agreement was reached. As a Gauteng citizen I am curious why such a settlement suddenly became necessary. Why did the government drop the disciplinary process against someone accused of conducting back-hand deals, someone who was rumoured to have many politicians in his back pocket? Is the taxpayers’ money being used to cover up and protect those that Buthelezi was going to expose should he have been dragged through a disciplinary inquiry.

At what point is this rot going to stop? How many golden handshakes must the public tolerate. Nobody is really made to face the music of their actions? Was Mokonyane blackmailed? Are we facing a situation where people including the premier may be implicated in this mess and hence the bravado of suspension to create the impression of tough action.

In Gauteng, it is well-known that one of the most obvious corruption feeding troughs is the Gautrain, which happens to fall in this department. An open and transparent disciplinary process would once and for all have exposed what has allegedly become a “corruption stock exchange” at the heart of the Gauteng government. I am certain that any attempt to make the head of department face embarrassing questions on whatever charges were proffered was sure to expose the web of deceit that underlies some of the transactions linked to the Gautrain. There is no doubt that some important people both in and out of government were going to have their dirty linen aired over this. And so to avoid such embarrassment you and I have to pay to let someone, possibly with a bag full of information on graft, go quietly into the good night.

If the new ministerial committee on corruption wants a case, this is it. Cases like this, where there is a payout instead of punishment, erode the public’s confidence in the government’s ability to deal sternly with corruption and incompetence. I will expect the committee to ask questions. I expect them to haul the premier over the coals. But I am not holding my breath. Once again I predict that the matter may not even make it onto the committee’s agenda, whose job is seen by sceptics as damage control — where deliberate, deliberations centre on how best to protect comrades whose reputations are being tainted by these untidy allegations of corruption.

Sadly our global graft ranking has not been aided by this shameless cover-up. And as for Mokonyane, just another politician after all … long on promises, slogans and threats but short on fearless action against even the most glaring of cases. I am truly saddened.