South Africa is spiralling into chaos under the leadership of President Cyril Ramaphosa. 

Here is a leader who has stumbled from one embarrassing crisis to another, fumbling the ball, seemingly fiddling while Pretoria burns. 

Most infamous among Ramaphosa’s foibles was his handling of the break-in at his Phala Phala home, a scandal for which he has so far escaped accountability. We’ve never gotten to the bottom of the hundreds of thousands of dollars stashed in couches and other furniture that adorn his Limpopo game farm, with investigations and reports into the matter either conveniently clearing the president of any wrongdoing, or having had their adoption and public release blocked by political machinery.

I assume one of the shady deals made to include the DA in the Government of National Collusion– erm, Unity was for the centre-right party to drop the matter. 

But it’s not just Phala Phala that taints Cyril’s “legacy” – his complicity in the 2012 Marikana Massacre prior to him taking up the highest office in the land is another thing he’s never faced the music for. 

Now, as South Africa’s president, Cyril Ramaphosa has fallen asleep at the wheel. 

Ramaphosa’s military chief, General Rudzani Maphwanya goes on an ostensibly unsanctioned visit to Iran to meet his army counterpart, placing further strain on tensions between the US and South Africa. The visit was a clear disjunct with South Africa’s foreign policy.

Did Ramaphosa not know General Maphwanya was visiting Iran? Does the president not receive a daily security briefing? Is he not the Commander-in-Chief? 

In July, Navy Admiral Monde Lobese launched a scathing attack against the Treasury, accusing it of sabotaging the operational capacity of the SANDF through inadequate budget allocations.

Also in July, Lieutenant-General Nhlanhla Mkhwanazi, KZN Police Commissioner, held a press briefing dressed in Special Task Force fatigues, dropping bomb shells about corruption and interference in police investigations at the highest level of SAPS management, right up to the Police Minister.

All this happens on Ramaphosa’s watch, and he does… nothing?

Does he even know what’s going on?

Ramaphosa admitted in April 2022 to the commission investigating the 2021 civil unrest and riots that cost the South African economy R50 billion (with a “B), that there was a failure of Crime Intelligence leading up those eight fateful days in July. 

Riots that happened on his watch. 

Surely such a failure would not be allowed to repeat itself by our Commander-in-Chief?

Nope, fast forward to July 2025 and we have vigilante group March and March actively preventing South African citizens from entering public healthcare facilities, in full view of the police, emboldened by the fact that some of them—whose actions are illegal and resulted in their arrest—were let off with a warning. 

March and March continues to operate illegally, demanding people present ID documents to enter public healthcare facilities. The security cluster is “monitoring the situation”, while the Commander-in-Chief holds a National Dialogue costing the country millions. 

e-Hailing drivers came under brutal attack at Maponya Mall in Soweto just last week, resulting in one of them being burnt to death. Where was Crime Intelligence? Where was the Commander-in-Chief? Does he know this level of lawlessness is taking place?

More worrying still last week was the torching of the Home Affairs building in Germiston. Where was the criminal intelligence here? Has the Commander-in-Chief held Crime Intelligence accountable? His Security Cluster? Whose feet is Cyril holding to the fire? Does Ramaphosa know?

If President Cyril Ramaphosa simply doesn’t know what’s going on, he’s not the right man for the job; if he does know what’s going on and is just allowing it to happen, he’s definitely the wrong man for the job.

* Lance Witten is the Editor of IOL. 

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