Patrick Mclaughlin: Ramaphosa warming up for a fight - ANC remains clinging to BEE

Key topics:BEE is under fire for enriching elites and costing SA R5 trillion, 4m jobsZondo Report ignored as lawlessness, corruption, and violence surgeNew Procurement Act faces backlash for prioritising race over merit in tenders.Sign up for your early morning brew of the BizNews Insider to keep you up to speed with the content that matters. The newsletter will land in your inbox at 5:30am weekdays. Register here.Support South Africa’s bastion of independent journalism, offering balanced insights on investments, business, and the political economy, by joining BizNews Premium. Register here.If you prefer WhatsApp for updates, sign up to the BizNews channel here.The auditorium doors will open for BNIC#2 on 10 September 2025 in Hermanus. For more information and tickets, click here..By Patrick Mclaughlin*.Whilst the Zondo Report to Parliament gathers dust at home, on the international stage at the G7 in Alberta, Canada, Cyril Ramaphosa continued to broadcast to the world his beliefs on global equity and the importance of accountability. Meanwhile, back home, warning lights are flashing across his desk. The survival of South Africa’s fragile Government of National Unity is increasingly incompatible with the ANC’s unyielding obsession on BEE.Last week, Moody’s added its voice to the growing chorus, stating that any upward re-rating of South Africa’s economy is "constrained by persistent, deep-rooted challenges such as low growth, domestic political tensions and perceptions of corruption." To many this warning has been the voice of doom.The UntouchablesDespite mounting evidence that BEE has outlived its purpose and mutated into a conduit for elite enrichment, Ramaphosa and NEC loyalists cling to its principles as a sacred pillar of post-apartheid justice. This refusal to confront reality is now a liability to both the economy and the GNU’s stability. A new study by the Free Market Foundation and the Solidarity Research Institute estimates that BEE has cost South Africa R5 trillion and led to the loss of 4 million jobs.Globally respected institutions — and increasingly, South African voices — point out that BEE serves a narrow band of politically connected individuals, not the millions it claims to uplift. The economic fallout is real, and the social fractures it deepens are visible.Murders and MoreSimultaneously, South Africa’s corruption problem remains unaddressed. From farm murders to gang warfare to looting at every level of government, lawlessness is rife. But the defining failure remains the President’s inertia on the Zondo Commission findings — 429 days of testimony, 300+ witnesses, and a final report from the Chief Justice himself.It has been buried under Presidential indifference.Surviving through SilenceThe ANC’s silence on BEE’s failings and its deliberate paralysis over the State Capture report have two likely roots:Protection — The upper echelons of the ANC/SACP/Cosatu alliance are too intertwined with the beneficiaries of the current system. Reform equals exposure. Desperation — With its electoral fortunes fading, the ANC is falling back on the populist crutch of racial politics, hoping muscle memory among its voter base will hold..Read more:.From redress to reassessment: The evolution of BEE and the legal, political reckoning.Mantashe Plays BothMinerals and Energy Minister Gwede Mantashe, a key Ramaphosa ally and de facto ANC gatekeeper, also continues to insist BEE is non-negotiable. And yet, when mining executives balked at mandatory empowerment criteria under the new Mineral Resources Development Bill, Mantashe backpedalled.In the end, he granted exemptions for geological prospecting simply because prospecting companies are a rare breed, difficult to harness under bureaucratic control and there aren’t too many of them. So now, it :flexibility for the mining lobbyists working with the Minerals Council of SA on exploration but rigidity for everyone else.Procurement Act Under FireThe Democratic Alliance is now taking Ramaphosa’s newly signed Procurement Act to court, alleging improper procedure in Parliament. Indeed, the record shows strange happenings. In last-minute tweaks, the Bill was scampered through Parliament using the ANC majority in the National Assembly in time for the 2024 elections, effectively declaring skin colour the most decisive factor in awarding state tenders — value-for-money being downgraded to second place. Overseen by ANC veteran Yunus Carrim, whose finance committee bent rules until they broke by allowing spoken input from National Treasury, meetings being held in a manner which stretched parliamentary rules and the imagination. What was a wordy and long Bill was rushed through against a time barrier, opposition voices being stifled as a result in a cynical display of parliamentary power.Watch my handInteresting was the rider obtained by the DA in its frustration at being side lined during a process so clearly timed to beat the May 2024 election clock and that eventually forced Carrim’s hand. He conceded that after 12 months of the Act’s operation, the Bill before them must be re-evaluated in terms of its stated objectives. That means a new round of NEDLAC consultations, gazetted public comment on redrafted clauses, and a fresh Public Procurement Bill placed before Parliament…….. but with no ANC majority next time.The Act as it stands also places a "compliance office" within National Treasury itself, a blatant conflict of interest, presumable the reason why Carrim allowed treasury officials to become part of the parliamentary meeting with a speaking role.Apartheid in ReverseThe result of all this? A legislative regime that replicates apartheid logic in reverse. Instead of opening opportunity, it re-closes it based on pigmentation. Instead of redressing inequality, it hardens it — politically, economically, and socially.What’s worse: international investors are watching. Moody’s is warning. And yet, Ramaphosa fiddled in Alberta while his house at home burns.The GNU cannot survive this level of ideological stubbornness, legislative abuse, and selective justice. South Africa needs reform, not repetition.*Patrick McLaughlin: Editor, parlyreportsa

Patrick Mclaughlin: Ramaphosa warming up for a fight - ANC remains clinging to BEE

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