Johannesburg — "I deny allegations of being involved in a plot to challenge the presidency of the ANC (African National Congress). I've served the ANC in various capacities throughout the years and remain committed to the unity of the ANC and the country". Those are the words in a statement issued by Cyril Ramaphosa.
Ramaphosa is an erstwhile contender for the presidency of South Africa and now a leading businessman in his country. He was once a former powerful trade union boss, who made his name in the struggle for liberation in his country as a prominent and outspoken anti-apartheid activist. Ramaphosa was once considered a natural heir, indeed the political heir and probable successor of Nelson Mandela.
He lost out to Thabo Mbeki, who is now president of the African National Congress and the country, the man it is now claimed, Ramaphosa and others are plotting to unseat and, more seriously, possibly to harm.
That is why Ramaphosa had to issue such a curt statement. He may not have wanted to, but it seems his hand was forced.
Ramaphosa, a former secretary-general of the African National Congress and two other former top men in South Africa's governing ANC party, Tokyo Sexwale and Mathews Phosa, have all been fingered as 'plotting' against President Mbeki. The three are now the subject of a state intelligence probe.
The order and the allegations came from the Minister of Safety and Security, Steve Tshwete, who told the national broadcaster, SABC, in an interview on Tuesday night that he had launched an investigation into the alleged conspiracy to oust Mbeki.
Tshwete did not specify precise motives, but he had earlier told the South African Sunday Times that whatever evidence was gathered could be 'very damaging' to certain ANC leaders. He mentioned a disinformation campaign against Mbeki and made it plain that he felt the president could be in physical danger.
The minister said rumours were being circulated that the president was behind the assassination in 1993 of the South African Communist Party leader, Chris Hani. Hani, like Ramaphosa, was widely tipped as a successor to Nelson Mandela and therefore a possible rival to Thabo Mbeki.
Ramaphosa, Phosa and Sexwale are all known to have had aspirations to lead their party and their country. Though all three have changed careers and moved into business, they retain considerable political support. All three have been sidelined in the political hierarchy and have slipped out of the limelight.
Like Ramaphosa, Sexwale and Phosa, who were both ANC provincial premiers in Gauteng and Mpumalanga respectively, have dismissed the allegations.
Mbeki himself, in a television interview also broadcast on Tuesday night on the independent commercial South African station, e.tv, stoked the rumours by questioning potential challengers for his twin jobs as party president and president of South Africa.
"People have got natural ambitions. Some people want to be president of South Africa, that's fine. The matter that is arising is the manner in which people pursue their ambitions," Mbeki told e.tv.
The president went on to say, "It's a conspiratorial thing....I know you have business people who say 'we will set up a fund to promote our particular candidate and we will then try to influence particular journalists'".
Phosa told local radio in Johannesburg on Wednesday night that the accusations were not new and that he had already discussed them with senior members of his party. "The allegations are not worthy of any comment. They are an insult to the intelligence of South Africans," said Phosa.
He added that the source of the rumours, which he said dated back two years, was a discredited former ANC youth leader in Mpumalanga, James Nkambule, who was being investigated for fraud.
Those are the bare bones of the latest incident that is causing more raised eyebrows and furrowed brows, as well as renewed quizzical looks and concern in South Africa about the Mbeki presidency.
His detractors, and they are becoming increasingly vocal, are disturbed. They have questioned Mbeki's judgement and say the president lacks confidence in his own chequered leadership. The critics imply that this has prompted an abnormal fear, even paranoia, of competition and conspiracies and plots by people - including members of the ANC - to undermine and get rid of the president.
Mbeki watchers also accuse the South African leader, in power since Mandela bowed out in 1999, of being too thin-skinned, over-sensitive, unable or unwilling to countenance criticism and a poor communicator when it matters.
Mbeki told e.tv that he wanted an open debate 'about everything including the presidency' to avoid any such developments. "Because once you start a conspiratorial thing then you are implanting a destructive process, because whoever might feel threatened, they themselves enter into a conspiratorial underground thing and you get all sorts of manoeuvring".
The president said the debate should be in front of the South African public, which would be the judge. "And so I am very keen indeed that if there's any talk of plotting - those who have the information must come out openly, publicly and say that this is what we know about the plotting, this is who is involved and so on. It's better".
The president's critics have chided his inner circle for spending too much time trying to massage and protect Mbeki's image and keep at bay real or imagined rivals who might challenge his authority, instead of tackling grave national problems, such as AIDS, and regional crises including Zimbabwe.
Even Mbeki's deputy president, Jacob Zuma was not beyond suspicion. He had to deny an earlier rumour that he was gunning for Mbeki's job as president, after a recent national executive committee meeting of the African National Congress.
The surprise denial by the deputy president came after the circulation, within ANC circles, of a pamphlet calling for Mbeki to be a one-term president (the South African constitution allows him to stand for two five-year terms). Zuma strongly rejected claims that some of the president's trusted aides were in fact plotting against him.
Then there is the issue of the president's private life which has come into the open in recent weeks and is being freely discussed on national radio and in South African newspapers. A leading local journalist, Max du Preez, told a radio discussion show that it was an open secret in the political milieu that Mbeki was a 'womanizer'.
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Du Preez felt that this warranted unfettered public debate because Mbeki's private life was affecting how he governed the country.
The ANC declared war on the veteran journalist who it branded a racist and a 'commissar for apartheid'. Du Preez, a white Afrikaner, is best known for his pioneering and investigative anti-apartheid reporting during the liberation struggle.
A national daily newspaper which featured Du Preez's comments on its front page the next week has since apologized to President Mbeki.
The image of a philandering president is not new. Winnie Madikizela-Mandela, herself a senior member of the ANC, wrote a letter about it to Deputy President Zuma, which was leaked to the press. Madikizela-Mandela hinted that the matter needed to be dealt with by the party. Apparently this has not happened.
The president's loyal lieutenants have hit back in support of Mbeki. Their remarks and comments are all over the national airwaves, local radio and the newspapers in South Africa.
But questions are still being asked, concern is still being expressed about the quality of leadership of a man, the poet-president as he has been dubbed, who has become the self-styled champion of the continent and the much-touted African renaissance.
If President Mbeki cannot handle South Africa, some are asking, how can he expect to take on the west and rest of the the world on Africa's behalf?
