Bheki Cele is his own worst enemy

PARLIAMENT has been busy this week, almost behind the scenes, censuring some errant MPs. The prospect of being docked nine days pay for not declaring the tip of his VBS iceberg is hardly going to cost the deputy Teletubby-in-chief Floyd Shivambu much sleep – but it is a very serious reprimand.

You wouldn’t think so if you were to read the red troll army’s furious spin campaign on social media, but it does show the National Assembly is not actually moribund – and will act upon its own. But the biggest announcement of all, was Monday’s finding by Parliament's Joint Committee on Ethics and Members' Interests that Police Minister Bheki Cele had to apologise to crime activist Ian Cameron for his outburst last year in Gugulethu.

Cameron, who looks like the kind of character who could spark a row in an empty house, stood up at a community meeting and triggered a rage of biblical proportions in The Twat in the Hat. The reaction is so bad, so over the top, it should be mandatory watching in all PR for CEO programmes.

If you haven’t seen the clip yet, do yourself a favour and watch it. Cele responds to a question by Cameron on the police’s efforts to fight crime with an answer that is simultaneously defensive, plays the race card before segueing seamlessly into an ad hominem attack that is both entitled and wholly irrelevant to the question that was asked. It ends with Cele in a total froth, bellowing “sharrup, sharrup”, before his officers frog march Cameron out of the hall.

This week, Parliament found Cele’s behaviour had been unbecoming of his office and ordered him to apologise to Cameron in the Assembly. It’s a simple request – and a fairly innocuous one, but it’s a bridge too far for our overweeningly vain minister of police. He has refused, calling it laughable. In fact, he’s going to the courts to have it reviewed. (As an aside, it’s fascinating how many of our political leaders take pot shots at the judiciary, yet almost unfailingly rely upon the same judges to sort out their lives when things don’t go their way.)

The saddest part is that by doubling down, Cele cheapens his own very real pain as a South African growing up under a brutal and dehumanising regime on the altar of his own vanity. Cameron caught him out and embarrassed him in public. But by apologising and being prepared to be vulnerable, Cele might persuade a whole lot of South Africans to have far more patience with him for the herculean task he has as police minister in a country that is rapidly becoming a byword for lawlessness.

Instead, he’s just reinforced what most of us already think: that he is an arrogant and entitled politician interested only in serving himself and the crony elites that enable him by demonising any legitimate criticism of the work he is doing – or in this case not doing.

And that, minister, isn’t a laughing matter. But none of us can go to court to get you removed.

* Kevin Ritchie is a seasoned former newspaper editor and current media consultant. He writes the weekly Carping Point column.

** The views expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of the DFA.