Tafelberg Short: Nkandla - The end of Zuma?. City Press

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СКАЧАТЬ project is neither “smart”, nor likely to lead to any “growth”. From a public policy perspective, we know that success in artificially creating new towns has been patchy across the world.

      Yet there is a far more important point in the debate on Nkandla. In a poorly governed province which struggles to provide basic services like water and sanitation for many rural communities, this project is a monumental folly.

      If there is any money to spare in the country’s emptying coffers, it should be spread equitably across many communities. Obviously, the DA is not suggesting that every community and project should receive an identical share. We simply ask for fairness through equality of opportunity for all.

      This project also speaks of a failure of leadership on a wider front. The most important constitutional obligation of the state is to protect its citizens, especially the vulnerable. This week, we were reminded that the women of South Africa face daily threats to their very lives. Our communities are blighted by gratuitous violence against women and children.

      Not far from Nkandla, we heard recently how grandmothers in KwaZakhele have had to take to the streets to protect their community and to tackle criminality. Many news reports have shown that the young people and men of KwaZakhele failed to protect the women of this community.

      While this is true, the most proximate failure is of the state to protect its citizens. Yet we hear extra policing has been extended to the president’s own community of Nkandla, and his homestead. While Nkandla is locked down like the Pentagon, danger lurks outside the walls of the president’s impenetrable castle.

      This president, who lives in a bunker of the mind, is now building one in reality.

      The funding of the controversial Initiative also proved to be a murky area, just like the president’s homestead.

      The department of agriculture initially vehemently denied spending money on the project. “We have not spent any money on Masibambisane,” said Palesa Mokomele, spokesperson for Agriculture Minister Tina Joemat-Pettersson, after reports that R800 million had been moved from the department to the project.

      Mzobe also denied receiving money from the Department of Agriculture. “If we had that kind of money we would not be using our own money to pay the Masibambisane volunteer workers.”

      Mzobe reportedly travelled first class and stayed in five star hotels, including The Michelangelo in Sandton, when attending rural development meetings. He was adamant that he picked up the bills himself. “If I go around in rural areas, I use my own car, I pay for petrol and I pay for tollgates. And if I go to Gauteng, I pay for my own ticket (and) pay for my own accommodation,” he said. Mzobe said he got a good discount at the Michelangelo because he stayed there regularly for three years. “The government is not paying a cent and Masibambisane is not paying either. I use my own credit card with money from my business,” he said.

      But agriculture official Steve Galane admitted: “The department of agriculture, forestry and fisheries had made a pledge of R10 million towards the cattle, goat and irrigation cooperatives of the (Masibambisane) project.” Agriculture spokesperson Selby Bokaba then said that the department had contributed seeds (maize and beans) and fertiliser worth R3 million to Masibambisane.

      In October 2012, the agriculture department’s annual report directly contradicted repeated denials from both the department and Agriculture Minister Tina Joemat-Pettersson. The department was grilled in Parliament, but the department’s director-general condoned the irregular payment, and no further action was taken.

      Joemat-Pettersson then embraced the concept and Masibambisane became the flavour of the year in the department. Mzobe became a frequent visitor to the agriculture department, often engaging with the minister, officials said.

      However, according to departmental sources, private donors got edgy when Masibambisane’s figures didn’t make sense.

      By the end of 2012, Deebo Mzobe was being accused by officials in the rural development department of being too big for his crocodile-skin boots. Officials who City Press interviewed were worried about how strong a force Mzobe had become in the department.

      They said Mzobe had organised several meetings with ministers at Joburg’s OR Tambo International Airport and that most of the calls and meetings concerned development in Nkandla.

      But Mzobe downplayed his influence with the ministers. “The influence with ministers is simply not true. I speak to ministers like I would speak to you, to promote Masibambisane,” he said.

      He admitted to having a close relationship with Agriculture Minister Tina Joemat-Pettersson. “Normally we spoke with her quite often, more than with other ministers, but we discussed nothing serious,” he said. He also admitted that he briefed Zuma about the government meetings. He said: “President Zuma is a chairperson of Masibambisane. He needs to know what we are doing. He dedicates a couple of days a year to meet with the people working in Masibambisane.”

      In June 2013, there was widespread outrage when it emerged that almost R900 million from different government departments had been pledged to a new food-security programme administered by Masibambisane at a meeting at the presidential guesthouse in Pretoria.

      The Department of Rural Development released an annual report in September 2013 which showed that R65.2 million was channelled to a “food-security programme” run by the Independent Development Trust (IDT). The IDT was a partner and funder of Masibambisane and a source confirmed that the money was meant for projects linked to Masibambisane. Mzobe denied receiving any money from the IDT. He said it had its own food-security projects that it implemented on behalf of government.

      Then, in October of that year, Rural Affairs Minister Gugile Nkwinti for the first time opened up about the controversial Masibambisane development.

      Nkwinti, whose department had been closely associated with the project, in effect accused Masibambisane of hijacking rural-development initiatives. “It was the way it was managed and the way it has been projected. It is out of order,” he told City Press at a media breakfast organised by the presidency.

      In an interview with City Press at the same function, Zuma defended his role, saying he was “doing this as Jacob Zuma, not as the president”. He said because he was an elder, people respected him in the area. “It is an initiative from the peasants in the rural areas,” he said.

      But Nkwinti lashed out at the handling of the project. “What is happening in reality is that our department puts up fences. It is our department that does the work,” he said. “But at the launches of each initiative it was projected as if Masibambisane did all the work.”

      “For me, it is a great initiative from the community,” he added. Rural development even designed a model for the project. But when the Masibambisane project moved to the Free State and Limpopo, “it assumed a different character, which is not what the president wanted to see”. He said the idea was that the community should be driving the development, but instead it turned into a top-down project.

      Another source in the department said “I can tell you now, people are not happy in the department. We have a mandate, but we are running around doing workshops for Masibambisane. At first it was an Nkandla thing, and then suddenly when questions were being asked about the president’s home town getting preferential treatment, it had to be rolled out all over the country.”

      The official said the department was running around to do Masibambisane projects while the NGO was getting the credit. “People are talking, but you can’t question too much if the sentiment is that this is coming from Number One (Zuma) himself.”

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