President Cyril Ramaphosa is expected to give Cabinet roles to several political parties in the GNU. It can be a strange situation for opposition politicians. We spoke to someone with experience: former Freedom Front Plus leader Pieter Mulder, who served as deputy minister of agriculture in former president Jacob Zuma's first Cabinet.

Q: Can you take us back to the context in which you were appointed as deputy minister of agriculture in the first Zuma administration, while also leader of the Freedom Front Plus?

Pieter Mulder: It was 2009, and Zuma was sort of the saviour at that stage, strange as it seems now, after [Thabo] Mbeki and the internal fighting. [Zuma] had had some meetings with the Afrikaners beforehand; he was reaching out to Afrikaners. The idea I got was that he wanted to do a Mandela GNU.

He reached out and offered [Cabinet positions] to [IFP leader Mangosuthu] Buthelezi and to me. Buthelezi said yes, but only if he's a full minister. In the end, the IFP was out and I was in, which was quite difficult. If [Buthelezi] was in it, it would have been easier for me.

What complicated my situation was [former National Party leader] Marthinus van Schalkwyk: he accepted a minister role and became a member of the ANC. A lot of my constituents feared that I too would be co-opted [into the ANC]. But in the end it wasn't my decision; it was my party structure's. We had talked till 3am.

We had five conditions...