Former ANC Youth League leader Fikile Mbalula will be a much better leader now that he has undergone his initiation into manhood, a prominent Xhosa traditional leader said on Sunday.
"Because of the training he has undergone he is definitely going to be a much better leader than he was before," said Patekile Holomisa, president of the Congress of Traditional Leaders of SA.
Mbalula, who is 37 and already has one child, has completed a month at a traditional circumcision school in Philippi on the Cape Flats.
He was released on Friday after a hut-burning ceremony, and was flown to Bloemfontein in businessman Tokyo Sexwale's private jet for a celebration at his mother's home in Bloemfontein.
Among those at the celebration were former ANC chief whip in Parliament Tony Yengeni and ANC Free State chairperson Ace Magashule.
Holomisa said the initiation ceremony was extremely important in Xhosa culture, as it taught young men how to deal with women, children, elders, community affairs and with their equals.
"You can't be considered a leader if you are not a man," he said.
"It's improper for a boy to take on a man's responsibilities as a leader. You can lead children, but not men."
Asked how this sat with the fact that Mbalula had already for years played a major role on the national political stage, Holomisa said he assumed Mbalula would during his initiation have "done something of a retrospection", looking at whether the way he had conducted himself was what he would have done had he been a man at that time.
He said it was expected that Mbalula would "improve for the better" now.
"The kind of leadership that he will give will be more dignified now than the rabble rousing he had to convey while he was still a boy," Holomisa said.
"He will be measured in his tone. He will still be fiery, I imagine, in his oratory, but there will be an element of dignity in the manner in which he conveys his message now."
Mbalula would from now on be respectful to his elders even if he attacked them politically.
"These cultural practices add to the quality of leader that you are, be it in business, in church or politics. People will say: 'There's a man speaking'," Holomisa said.
Mbalula's presidency of the youth league ended in April 2008. He is a member of the ANC's national executive committee. - Sapa