GEORGE NEWS - Ask many average South Africans what they think of Paul Mashatile as the next president, and the stock answer will probably be: “Paul who?”
Not much is known about the man who might follow in the footsteps of Mandela one day to lead this country of over 64 million inhabitants.
That is, if he manages to survive a rising tsunami of personal imbroglios and political upheavals - to ultimately succeed Cyril Ramaphosa to become the sixth president of a democratic South Africa.
But a lot of water (mostly polluted) has to pass under the Jukskei River Bridge before that happens. Which is why the timing of Pieter du Toit’s latest magnum opus, The Dark Prince, is so crucial.
Described as an “unflinching portrait of Mashatile’s controversial rise through the ANC ranks to the doorstep of the presidency”, the book provides a deep dive of a political enigma wrapped in a riddle of rhetoric.
The sinister-looking front cover photo of the president-in-waiting - with his brooding Machiavellian demeanour and bloodshot eyes - says it all.
It’s not an easy read. Yet it is compulsive reading for anyone who wishes to know what to expect when Ramaphosa’s term of office as head of state is due to end in 2029.
Dark horse
An amalgam of student activist, struggle apparatchik and politburo lackey, Mashatile has survived internecine strife and steadily ground his way through the ANC ranks to join a party elite that today feels entitled to enjoy the lewd and lavish excesses of an entrenched culture of patronage and extraction.
He may not appear as venal as a Jacob Gedleyihlekisa Zuma (yet), nor does he seem as intellectually aloof as a Thabo Mvuyelwa Mbeki. But neither does he have the charisma of a Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela, nor the phlegmatism of a Matamela Cyril Ramaphosa.
Instead, Shipokosa Paulus Mashatile, deputy president of the ANC and wannabe president of South Africa, is a dark horse - biding his time while basking in a cesspool of unbridled hedonism.
“Politically, Mashatile is the quintessential party man, never straying from ANC dogma and ideology, faithfully repeating established maxims and beliefs despite repeated policy failures,” writes Du Toit.
His meticulously researched compendium of the country’s youngest deputy president (Mashatile was born in 1961) is probably the most comprehensive study available of this complex operator.
This rendition of Mashatile’s unspectacular rise to power is interwoven with an insightful narrative of ANC factionalism and contemporary South African politics.
Humble beginnings to Alex Mafia
Born on a farm in Gerhardsville near Pretoria, Mashatile lived with his father, a preacher, and his mother, a domestic worker, who sold vegetables to support their eight children.
He later moved to Alexandra Township - the genesis of his political awakening. It is within this melting pot of diverse political traditions where he forged lifelong allegiances with comrades who would later become known as the Alex Mafia.
They include Mike Maile, Bridgman Sithole, Nkenke Kekana and Keith Khoza - who continue to feature strongly as beneficiaries of Mashatile’s inner sanctum of political influence in Gauteng.
It was during his years as Gauteng MEC for Finance and Economic Affairs that Mashatile’s penchant for fine living reached gastronomical heights.
In just one year, between June 2005 and June 2006, he spent R163 000 at his favourite restaurant, the five-star Auberge Michel in Sandton. In just one day alone in August 2006, he splurged over R100 000 at this exclusive establishment.
His latest profligacy - on a salary of just over R3m - is the full run of a mansion in Constantia, Cape Town, valued at almost R29m, as well as a palatial home in Waterfall, Midrand, worth R37m.
In June this year, he was exposed as having direct links to Bellamont Gaming, a shareholder in Sizekhaya Holdings, which won the lucrative licence to run the national lottery.
With the magnifying glass of a diligent forensic investigator, Du Toit faithfully tracks Mashatile’s career ambitions throughout his political vicissitudes, analysing his public speeches and policy statements to get to grips with an inkblot character of opaque political values.
Birds of a feather
Perhaps Mashatile is best defined by the company he keeps - or doesn’t keep. And of late, his controversial friends and associates sully any future hopes of a clean presidency.
As a protégé of former ANC bigwig Tokyo Sexwale, Mashatile was caught in the crossfire of Sexwale’s bitter feud with Mbeki.
And while he may have been openly defiant of Jacob Zuma, he has rubbed shoulders unashamedly with accused diamond swindler Louis Liebenberg, and partied prolifically at the R78m Clifton mansion of controversial businessman Edwin Sodi, who has been linked to some of the most venal state capture crimes.
Perhaps the most glaring fault line of reputational risk for the president-in-waiting is undoubtedly his ‘string of lovers and girlfriends’.
Love life
Du Toit quotes a News24 article of August 2023 in which the ‘Don of Melrose Arch’ was “known to attend alcohol-fuelled parties with young women in tow, sometimes going to upmarket nightclubs in Johannesburg”.
When he married second wife Humile Mjongile in March 2023, the wedding came as a rude shock to several other scorned paramours who simultaneously believed they were in long-term relationships with the deputy president.
One of them, Gugu Nkosi, spilled the beans on her eight-year tryst with Mashatile even while he was married to his first wife, Manzi, who died in 2020.
Nkosi purportedly received monthly payments totalling R100 000 from “at least four businessmen who looked after her needs in a period when Mashatile was an MP, MEC for Human Settlements in Gauteng and the ANC’s treasurer”.
Safe distance
“He has always been only one or two degrees removed from questionable deals or wealthy individuals,” writes Du Toit. “Private donors to the ANC paid for the needs of his romantic partners and others paid money directly to him. Mashatile is in this sense as close to an echo of Zuma as a kept politician as we have seen since 2018.”
In the final chapter, Du Toit issues a grim warning. “The ANC’s elective conference in 2027 will be as destructive and divisive as those that preceded it. The country’s erstwhile governing party has been involved in a noxious civil war for almost two decades. This war is not about policy, direction, the economy or social change. It is about access to resources and state power, however and wherever you can get them.
“Mashatile is now the last man standing … And he represents the darkest impulses of the ANC. He would have no qualms about forming alliances with formations antagonistic to constitutionality and the rule of law if it meant the ANC could remain in power.
“If Mashatile wins the ANC’s leadership, the Zuma-Gupta era won’t be seen as an anomaly in South Africa’s post-1994 history: it will be seen as the prototype for future party structures and leaders. And Mashatile will be the inheritor.”
About Pieter du Toit
Bestselling author Pieter du Toit grew up in Durbanville, the eldest of four children. A journalist for more than 20 years, he is currently assistant editor at News24, heading its celebrated investigative team.
As a serious eight-year-old, Du Toit compiled his first chronicle based on the Helderberg plane crash of 28 November 1987, detailing as much as his bright young mind could dig up on South Africa’s worst air disaster.
In his foreword to The Dark Prince, Du Toit dedicates the book as follows: “For my sons whom I want to flourish in South Africa.”
Garden Route-based communication specialist, Muriel Hau-Yoon reviewed the book for Group Editors' readers.
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