Gupta emails and state capture doing damage to the ANC: Mantashe
ANC secretary general Gwede Mantashe says that the latest allegations surrounding thousands of leaked emails implicating the Gutpa family and several government officials is doing damage to the ruling party – but there is more to it than one family.
Speaking at a Foreign Correspondents Association (FCA) meeting on Wedensday, Mantashe echoed sentiments in an ANC statement on Friday (2 June) that the Gupta email leak was deeply concerning and that there needed to be an investigation into the matter.
However, he stressed that the issue was larger than simply the Guptas, with calls for at least three investigations into the matter of state capture: the first being the Gupta state capture, another for apartheid-era state looting and another looking at capture post 1994.
In all of the cases, the allegations that state companies and government officials have been captured are doing damage to the ANC, he said.
“Our view is that all of them merit investigation, but can’t do all three of them in one investigation,” he said. “We will do this, but in the long term we need a bigger inquiry, what happened and why did we inherit a bankrupt state?”
“The Guptas and the issue of the president is very exciting now. The compromise is that we must have a broader commission that doesn’t only focus on one family.”
Mantashe said that while he and the ANC are convinced that the Guptas are an “immediate trigger” in the state capture saga, it is not limited to them.
“There will be others,” Mantashe said.
President Jacob Zuma, who is implicated in the state capture saga, has denied wrongdoing and the Gupta family and its companies have also denied all allegations of influence-peddling or improper dealings.
Mantashe’s comments come six months before the ANC holds a conference where members will choose a successor to Zuma.
He said the debate about removing the 75-year old leader would become “less complex” when a new ANC leader is chosen at the party conference in December, according to Reuters.
Zuma has survived two attempts from within the ANC to get him to step down. According to Mantashe, there has never been a formal motion for Zuma to step down, rather appeals directly to the president from individual members.
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