Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa says law enforcement agencies should follow the example of the National Assembly and investigate allegations of state capture involving State-owned entities.
Ramaphosa was replying to questions in the National Assembly. He says the National Assembly should be commended for starting the inquiry into allegations of state capture involving the State-owned Entities, such as Eskom and others.
The law enforcement agencies have been accused of dragging their feet to begin their investigations into allegations of state capture.
After some delays and clarity on the terms of reference of the inquiry into Eskom by the Public Enterprises committee of the National Assembly, the process finally took place.
And Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa says the institution should be praised for leading the way.
Ramaphosa believes that there is ample evidence of state capture and therefore, there is no need to wait for the establishment of the judiciary commission of inquiry to begin the investigations.
“Other institutions, especially the law enforcement agencies, need to pursue all these allegations with equal vigour and determination and I have said on numerous occasions that we would like the National Prosecuting Agency; we would like the Hawks; and indeed all these institutions that are meant to investigate wrongdoings to immediately commence and in fact proceed with their investigations.”
Ramaphosa was asked why the executive has not done anything in relation to allegations of state capture like the national Parliament has done. He shifted the blame to the relevant ministers as responsible to initiate such processes.
“It is not the responsibility of the IMC, nor does it have the mandate and powers to consider the allegations of state capture into state-owned entities. That is the question that really rests to the relevant ministries that are shareholders to these state-owned enterprises.”
He repeated previous calls made by government for the establishment of the commission of inquiry.
However, he appealed to the opposition benches to practice patience and wait for the Constitutional Court to give a ruling on who should head the commission.
On the recent release of the Heher Commission report on the feasibility of a free higher education, Ramaphosa says the government is applying its mind.
“The government is going to be responding to the Heher report and I will say when it comes to that, let us wait for the response from the government.”
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