4 years after his predecessor Jacob Zuma was dismissed and then imprisoned after a series of scandals, South African President Cyril Ramaphosa is facing a similar possible fate, as a crack within the ruling National Congress Party is pressing to remove him from office on suspicion of his involvement in a financial corruption case that threatens to end his political life in the event that he is arrested. formally convicted.

The scandal that arose around Ramaphosa, 70, - which threatens his political future - was called "Phala Phala", a nature reserve located in Limpopo Province on the borders of Botswana, Zimbabwe and Mozambique, in which the president owns a large farm.

From this farm, which includes animal species, including buffaloes, the scandal erupted when in 2020 thieves stole hundreds of thousands of dollars and possibly millions hidden under sofa cushions, and accounts differ regarding the size of this stolen money if some sources estimate it at 4 or 5 million dollars.

And last Wednesday, an investigation committee set up by Parliament and chaired by former Justice Minister Sundayel Nkobo presented "compelling evidence" that would incriminate the president who was supposed to release the money but did not.

The report said Ramaphosa may have broken the law with regard to the money hidden in a "little used room" on his ranch, but a pro-president NCP lawmaker said the report did not say he would be held accountable, but suggested it might have been necessary to do so.

However, the report put the fate of the president at stake, and the possibility of his impeachment reverberated strongly in the corridors of the ruling party, although he may have obtained sufficient support from the party leaders to avoid impeachment.

And the presidential spokesman announced on Saturday that Ramaphosa does not intend to resign and will seek a second term in 2024, and he also said that he will fight politically and judicially to refute these allegations.

The head of the investigation committee hands the Speaker of Parliament the report on the Vala Vala scandal (Reuters)

Buffalo deal

The scandal came to light last June when a former intelligence official - described as close to Ramaphosa's opponents in the National Congress Party - filed a complaint about the money stolen from the Ramaphosa farm, and the complaint accuses the president of not reporting the incident to the police or tax authority.

In his response to the suspicions raised about him, Ramaphosa said that the amount that was stolen from his farm is only 580 thousand dollars, not millions of dollars, stressing that the amount is the price of buffaloes that a Sudanese businessman bought from him and paid for it in cash.

According to the chief's account, one employee saw fit to hide the money under couch cushions rather than put it in a safe that many employees could access.

But the report handed over to Parliament stated that the president should explain the source of the foreign exchange that the thieves seized from his farm in Valla Valla.

News websites quoted Ramaphosa as saying that he had never betrayed the oath, denying all allegations raised against him in this case.

Ramaphosa speaks during a meeting of the National Congress Party last July in Johannesburg (Reuters)

Politics and business

President Ramaphosa is not only a statesman. Nearly two decades before his election as president of the country, specifically in 1997, he resigned from the National Congress and devoted himself to business. During his hiatus from political work, he turned into a businessman with great wealth.

According to Forbes magazine, Ramaphosa's wealth was estimated in 2015 at about $450 million, making him among the 50 richest people in Africa.

The magazine indicates that the current president built his wealth from his commercial activities, as he founded the investment company "Chanduka" in 2001.

However, after his appointment in 2014 as Vice President Zuma, he gave up managing his commercial activities to avoid conflicts of interest, and sold his 30% stake in Chandoka, which later merged with the “my brother” company, forming a group whose assets are estimated at about $ 900 million.

The Executive Committee was convened on Friday to discuss the repercussions of the accusations against the (European) president.

The ghost of isolation

And before his election in February 2018 as president by parliament after winning an internal ballot by a simple majority of the votes of members of the party of the late leader Nelson Mandela, Ramaphosa campaigned with the slogan of fighting corruption, and made a number of promises, but over time they evaporated or little was achieved. , according to his critics.

Today, he finds himself under pressure, not only from his party, which suffers from divisions, rampant corruption, and a continuous decline in its popularity, but also faces some pressure from public opinion for reasons including the economic downturn, especially due to the repercussions of the Corona pandemic.

And before the presidential spokesman announced Saturday that the president did not intend to resign, the South African news site IOL reported that Ramaphosa might have announced his resignation, as he was scheduled to deliver a speech last Thursday, but he did not.

The local newspaper, The Sowetan, also indicated that Ramaphosa had consulted with his allies to announce his resignation, and said that his failure to attend the ruling party's executive committee meeting held on Friday had angered members.

A number of NCP branch chiefs, including the head of its KwaZulu-Natal branch, called on the president to resign in order to avoid judicial and parliamentary trials.

On the other hand, Ramaphosa obtained the support of influential leaders in the ruling party and businessmen, in addition to the head of the Anglican Church, Thabo Makgoba.

Less than two weeks before the congress of the Congress Party, the possibility of Ramaphosa's removal remains pending on the internal balances, given that the party has a two-thirds majority in Parliament, which will discuss on Tuesday the report on the Vala Vala scandal.

It is noteworthy that the same party had previously, after long disputes, forced the former president (Zuma) to resign after he was accused of corruption cases, and was later referred to the judiciary and spent a period in prison.

Recently, Ramaphosa seemed the most prominent candidate for a second presidential term in 2024 if the party won the upcoming elections, but the suspicions surrounding him may keep him away from the competition even if he does not escape accountability in this case.

The British newspaper The Guardian said that if Ramaphosa lost the leadership of the ruling party, it would be difficult for him to continue in his position as president, but it ruled out that half of the ruling party's deputies in Parliament would vote in favor of his removal.

Meanwhile, South Africans fear that if the isolation option prevails, this may lead to a repeat of the unrest scenario that took place last summer following the arrest of the former president, in which deaths and injuries were reported and described as the worst wave of violence South Africa has witnessed in years.