The Presidency ducking and diving on Zuma’s declaration of interests

9 November 2017

Last week Thursday in Parliament, I asked President Jacob Zuma to respond to the allegations that he had received a R1 million a month salary from his friend Mr. Roy Moodley’s company, Royal Security, while he was President.

President Zuma replied saying “I did not receive payments from private individuals or companies during my tenure as President, other than those which have been disclosed or reported to the necessary authorities” (our emphasis)

After this reply, I wrote to the Director-General (DG) in the Presidency, Dr. Cassius Lubisi, indicating that I would like to view the President’s declaration of interests documents for all the years of his Presidency. Dr Lubisi is the person responsible for such, as per the Executive Ethics Code.

Section 7.5 of the Code makes it clear that ”Any person has access to the public part of a register during office hours of the secretary concerned”.

I have made it clear to Dr. Lubisi that I will be coming to the Union Buildings tomorrow,Friday 10 November, to view the President's declaration of interests and that they ought to be ready to be viewed by then.

In an initial responding letter, the DG notified me that this documentation would take some time to compile as it is “voluminous”.

The DG’s response makes no sense at all. The President's declaration of interests documents are public documents and should already be compiled and ready to be viewed at any time by anyone - as per the Executive Ethics Code. Moreover, the DG's comments and subsequent ducking and diving are suspicious at best - and raise questions as to whether these documents do in fact exist.

It should not take more than a week to produce documents that should have been filed timeously by the President each year. No more delay, let’s see whether President Zuma declares his million Rand a monthly salary, or not.

Issued by Mmusi Maimane, Leader of the Democratic Alliance, 9 November 2017