Pretoria – The presidency on Saturday dismissed allegations by the Mail and Guardian newspaper of “tensions” between President Jacob Zuma and his deputy Cyril Ramaphosa.
“The presidency is shocked by the fabrication published by the Mail and Guardian claiming that there are tensions between President Jacob Zuma and Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa because the deputy president did not attend the ANC gala dinner last night, 8 January 2016,” it said in a statement.
“The newspaper goes on to claim that the absence of the deputy president took other leaders by surprise and also mentions a lot of other gossip and innuendo. This is preposterous.”
Ramaphosa was in Juba, the capital of South Sudan, in his capacity as Zuma’s special envoy, “as announced to the whole country before departure”, the presidency said.
Ramaphosa was supposed to arrive back in South Africa in time for the African National Congress’s 104th anniversary gala dinner on Friday night.
“However, his South African Air Force plane developed technical difficulties and he had to return back home commercially. He landed back around 1.30am in South Africa during which time the gala dinner had ended. Had the reporter inquired, he would have obtained the facts before spreading lies to the public.
“We hope that the Mail and Guardian will endeavour to improve reporting standards. The department of defence is currently exploring solutions to the problems of the current SA Air Force planes that break down and cause inconvenience to the president and the deputy president,” the presidency said.
– African News Agency (ANA)