ANC President Cyril Ramaphosa’s office leaked audio of him saying he would rather fall on his sword over CR17 donations than hear public money was used to fund the party’s internal leadership campaigns was not an attempt to shield corruption.
Instead, the head of his office, Sbongile Besani, said Ramaphosa was trying to explain that he wouldn’t divert attention from the scrutiny of his own campaign for ANC leadership in 2017 – already by questioning the funding behind other leaders’ campaigns.
A local blog released the leaked audio following a meeting of the ANC’s National Executive Committee over the weekend – leaks of audio clips from the closed sessions have found their way into the public domain since it started holding meetings via virtual platforms due to COVID-19.
Besani said while the CR17 campaign was being discussed during the meeting, a series of questions about other campaigns were posed to the ANC president.
“There are all kinds of things in this space about the usage of state resources for campaigns and so on, but I would not use those kinds of motivations to hide accountability on the CR17 funds,” Besani said.
Clement Manyathela speaks to ANC head of the Presidency Sibongile Besani to understand the context of the audio.
As the NEC we normally don’t discuss publicly how the discussion of the meeting evolves because it will create a lot of confusion. This leak can only serve to perpetuate the distortion of those discussions.
Sibongile Besani, ANC head of the Presidency
The heart of that clip is that the focus was the CR17 funds which were being ventilated in the courts of law. In the process of these matters receiving attention in the courts, there were also a number of concerns that other campaigns during Nasrec were also using state resources.
Sibongile Besani, ANC head of the Presidency
The President was explaining that the focus should be on CR17 funds than bringing other issues because if we do so it will be as of we are diverting the attention of the issue of CR17 funds. The issue here is not about the president shielding corruption.
Sibongile Besani, ANC head of the Presidency
It is unacceptable for the public money to b used for campaigns, that is the essence of it. That is what the president is asserting.
Sibongile Besani, ANC head of the Presidency