President Thabo Mbeki has sacked the outspoken Deputy Minister of Health, Nozizwe Madlala-Routledge. In a statement issued late on Wednesday night the presidency said that it "wishes to inform the nation that acting in terms of the provisions of the Constitution of the Republic of South Africa, President Thabo Mbeki has, today, relieved the Deputy Minister of Health, Ms Nozizwe Madlala-Routledge, of her duties with effect from today."
The pretext for the removal of Madlala-Routledge from her position appears to be a trip she made to Spain earlier this year, without having received prior permission from the president. On Sunday City Press reported that the deputy minister had been invited by the International Aids Vaccine Initiative to address a seminar scheduled for June 12 to 15.
She had informed the acting Minister of Health, Lulu Xingwana, that she would be taking her son, an NGO activist, and her advisor Sukhthi Naidoo on the trip. The trip cost R161 000. On Xingwana's written instruction Madlala-Routledge wrote to Mbeki to request permission to attend. Mbeki replied in writing on June 11 with a curt "Not Approved" along with is signature.
Business Day quoted an anonymous source in the Health Ministry as saying that what had happened was that Madlala-Routledge had left on June 11 on the mistaken understanding that approval was due to be granted. She had apparently been informed, while waiting for her flight at OR Tambo Airport, that the approval had been processed and she was only awaiting the letter from Mbeki. It was only after her arrival in Spain that she was told that permission had been refused, after which she immediately returned to South Africa via London.
Mbeki has loyally stood by ministers who have been willing to put their hand in the fire for him, if required, regardless of their performance or conduct in office.
Madlala-Routledge though has refused to follow the presidency's line on HIV/AIDS. Indeed, in an interview with the Sunday Telegraph in December last year she criticised both Mbeki and Health Minister, MantoTshabala-Msimang, for their approach to the epidemic; stating that the government has been in "denial at the very highest level" over AIDS.
The article claimed that she had called for President Mbeki to take an AIDS test. It commented, "Fainter-hearted politicians might doubt the wisdom of asking that of a leader who has himself questioned the link between HIV and Aids. But Mrs Madlala-Routledge is confident about calling on her colleagues to follow suit." (She subsequently distanced herself from this claim.)
Madlala-Routledge told the newspaper, "I've been sanctioned because I've spoken in parliament, and was told I may lose my job. I must only say what she [the health minister] says, and this is official. For me that is gagging. But I've not observed the gag."
Last month Madlala-Routledge and Naidoo visited the Frere Hospital's maternity section after the Daily Dispatch reported on poor conditions in the maternity section there. She described the situation as a "national emergency" - a statement which flew in the face of efforts by the president and the health minister to underplay the gravity of the situation there.
