Johannesburg - A confident ANC Youth League president Collen Maine on Monday said that there was no law that prevented him from meeting with the wealthy Gupta family, whom he “had no problems with”
“Part of responsibility of leadership of the ANCYL is to engage with everybody in society, be it in business or elsewhere, including the media. I engage with everybody including the Guptas. Whether I have been to [Gupta family homestead] Saxonwold is not anyone's business... it is a private matter. I am not prevented by any law to go anywhere I want to go in the country,” Maine told reporters in Johannesburg following the ANCYL national working committee meeting.
“If the Guptas are a problem to you, they are not to me. I engage them with many other stakeholders. They have actually sent me an invite to attend the ANN7 South African of the Year Awards and I am going to attend!”
On whether he has been captured by the wealthy family, said to be wielding so much power including who gets appointed in President Jacob Zuma's cabinet, Maine said if meeting various people constituted being captured, “then he is captured”.
“If engaging stakeholders is being captured, then I am captured...but mainly I am captured by the responsibility I was given by the ANCYL.”
However, Maine avoided answering a question on whether he had received money, gifts or a house from the Gupta family.
According to media reports, Maine's luxury R5 million house in Pretoria was financed by the Guptas. The monthly repayment bond on the house was at least R140 000.
An African National Congress national working committee (NWC) meeting was underway on Monday.
Former Public Protector Thuli Madonsela's explosive “State of Capture” report was expected to be discussed at the meeting
The league rubbished the report and accused Madonsela of being a “drama queen who launched a Democratic Alliance report” before she left office
“It is our view that the Public Protector did this to launch a DA campaign ahead of 2019 national elections. This is confirmed by the resignation of the CEO in the office of the Public Protector Louisa Zondo who took up a post in the DA Tshwane municipality,” said spokesman Mlondo Mkhize
He said leaking of information from the report to the media was done in a deliberate attempt to attack Zuma and many ANC members and leaders.
“We call on implicated individuals to take the report on judicial review, particularly looking at the Constitutional question of the establishment of a judicial commission which we understand is the function of the State president and no other person. The argument that the president cannot form commission is just a thing to hide behind, because he established the arms deal inquiry.
The ANCYL called on the Zuma-led leadership to “stop panicking” as Madonsela's report was “half-cooked” to cause commotion in the country. The ANC leadership must stop having meetings informed by “headline news”, said Mkhize.
New Public Protector Busisiwe Mkhwebane should also take Madonsela's report on judicial review to avoid it tarnishing the image of her office, he said.
Madonsela investigated the alleged influence and improper relationship of the Gupta family in the removal and appointment of ministers and directors of state-owned entities.
The 355-page report implicated Zuma, his son Duduzane, Minister of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs David Van Rooyen and Minister of Mineral Resources Mosebenzi Zwane, Eskom CEO Brian Molefe and the board.
African News Agency