ANC Secretary-General Fikile Mbalula has mounted a robust defence of Dina Pule’s return to Cabinet.
Mbalula argued that the former minister had accepted responsibility for past misconduct, undergone “ethical rehabilitation” and deserved a second chance after more than a decade outside the executive.
Mbalula’s remarks come a day after President Cyril Ramaphosa reappointed Pule as Minister of Social Development, a decision that drew criticism from opposition parties and the Congress of South African Trade Unions, who questioned her return to government given the circumstances under which she left Cabinet in 2013.
Pule served as communications minister between 2011 and 2013 before being fired after Parliament’s Ethics Committee found that she had breached the Executive Ethics Code by failing to disclose her relationship with a businessman who benefited from a contract awarded by her department and accompanied her on several government-funded overseas trips.
Speaking during a media briefing on Thursday, Mbalula acknowledged public concern over the appointment but said the ANC believed South Africans should not condemn individuals “in perpetuity” after they had been sanctioned and demonstrated genuine reform.
“We do not dismiss the concern this appointment has stirred, and we understand where it comes from,” Mbalula said.
“Ours is a movement in the midst of renewal of its values, its ethical standing and the trust of the people. South Africans are right to hold their leaders to the highest bar.”
He said Pule had accepted the consequences of her conduct more than a decade ago, stepping down from government and public office before the ANC had even formally adopted its step-aside policy.
“Comrade Pule faced a process more than a decade ago. She was sanctioned by that process, and she accepted the consequences,” he said.
“She stepped aside before we even made it policy. In government she was sacked. In Parliament she stepped out. She never served in any structure of the ANC. She disappeared.”
Mbalula said Pule spent years working outside the political spotlight before gradually rebuilding the confidence of the organisation.
“She did not want to be defined by a mistake in time. She went back to the ground and worked to uplift thousands upon thousands away from the limelight. That is what accountability looks like.”
He argued that Pule had subsequently earned back the trust of ANC members by being democratically elected to the party’s National Executive Committee, assuming senior responsibilities in the ANC Women’s League and returning to Parliament.
“A person who has answered for a mistake, served the sanction, and rebuilt trust through the free choice of her peers and the electorate is not to be condemned in perpetuity,” he said.
“The ANC stands fully behind the person of Comrade Dina Pule, behind her ability and behind the President’s prerogative to constitute his executive.”
Mbalula revealed that Pule had also undergone internal ethics counselling and consulted ANC veterans as part of what he described as a lengthy rehabilitation process.
“Comrade Pule, among others, underwent internal ethics counselling within the movement. She consulted with our veterans whose wisdom and moral authority the ANC holds dear.”
He stressed that although the ANC’s Integrity Commission did not exist when Pule left government, she voluntarily subjected herself to a process of reflection and correction.
According to Mbalula, the key question was not whether Pule had erred, but whether she had demonstrated remorse and changed her conduct.
“The process of renewal didn’t say you must punish people in perpetuity. The process of renewal says you reject the incorrigible.”
“Is Dina incorrigible? We believe the comrade has learned from her mistakes.”
Mbalula also rejected comparisons between Pule and former Social Development Minister Sisisi Tolashe, who was recently removed from Cabinet after failing to declare the donation of two luxury vehicles to the ANC Women’s League.
He said Tolashe was now undergoing internal ANC disciplinary processes and expressed hope that she, too would emerge rehabilitated.
“The question is whether Sisisi will learn from her mistakes and become a different cadre in the long term.”
While acknowledging that the ANC would continue holding its members to high ethical standards, Mbalula insisted the criticism directed at Pule ignored the process she had already undergone.
“I think the criticism is harsh on this comrade, on this human being,” he said.
“We have condemned her to the ashes even when she has repented and we have seen through deeds that this comrade has changed and undergone a full process of rehabilitation.”