Honesty will not be inculcated while corruption with impunity is allowed to continue. The first order of business of the new Cabinet should be to address the matter of 'ending corruption', as President Cyril Ramaphosa put it when inviting participation in the GNU.

Listen to this article 13 min Listen to this article 13 min Much has been written on the prospects of success of the new Cabinet which has many members drawn from a variety of parties that responded positively to the invitation extended on behalf of the ANC by its president on 6 June 2024.

The invitation to form a government of national unity was necessary because the ANC did not win enough seats in Parliament to secure the election of a president for the country. It has only just under 41% of the votes cast by the 58% of registered voters who turned up at the polling stations in May 2024.

It is a misnomer to call the new Cabinet a government of national unity, or GNU. Had all the parties in Parliament responded positively, a GNU was possible, but some made sure that they would become the opposition by attaching impossible-to-perform conditions to their acceptance of the invitation.

Others, more politely, declined the invitation of 6 June. In the end, 11 of the 18 political parties represented in Parliament formed a grand coalition government at national level that seems to like to call itself a GNU. The 11 parties...