By Lehlohonolo Lehana.
On Tuesday, Mbalula addressed the media at the ANC’s local government workshop in Boksburg, East of Johannesburg.
Mbalula remarks stand in stark contrast to the claim by Mashatile’s office that the deputy president was not present during the incident.
Eight officers from the police’s VIP unit made their first appearance in the Randburg Magistrate’s Court on Monday.
One of the accused yesterday told the court that the deputy president had left the scene during the incident.
They arrived at his Midrand home 40 minutes later and reported the incident to him. Mbalula said when one was in a convoy, it was most likely they would see what happened around them because “you are being defended”.
He said Mashatile did not command the attack.
“The deputy president has never said he was not in the convoy. What we said as the ANC is that this matter must be investigated by IPID [Independent Police Investigative Directorate]. The deputy president has said himself this must happen,” he said.
Mbalula was asked if the ANC would ask Mashatile to step aside, in line with the resolutions on party members found on the wrong side of the law.
“So where does the step aside come in there? There is no step aside there. What we said as the ANC is that this matter must be investigated,” Mbalula said.
Meanwhile there is a rift in the WhatsApp group, which was created to ‘defend’ Mashatile, around the printing of a T-shirt design depicting the face of the deputy president.
Mashatile’s spokesperson, Vukani Mde, said the deputy president had no knowledge of the group, nor did he endorse it.
One of the members of the group shared a T-shirt design, with the face of Mashatile in front and a big logo of the ANC; on the back of the T-shirt was Mashatile’s face and the words ‘HAND OFF PAUL MASHATILE [sic]’.
However, other members of the group did not take kindly to the design.
One member of the group said: “Please don’t print any T-shirts [with] DP face it will cause confusion [sic]. We must stay away for now.”
The member, who had posted the picture of the T-shirt said it was “too late” as it had already been printed.
The ANC has been against the culture of T-shirts depicting the face of any leader, except the party’s president.
Mbalula, also wants to know why the ANC-led government is spending money on statues and football teams when people are suffering.
He said: “Comrades, why do you spend the money of the municipality when it is impoverished on sponsoring teams? From the point of PR and image, you just portray the ANC as a government that just doesn’t care.”
Touching on this, and including the Nelson Mandela statue in the Eastern Cape, Mbalula said: “Many statues (are erected) every day – a municipality [builds a] Mandela statue. These statues are expensive. Why do you prioritise Mandela’s statues? Mandela has got many statues.
“We have, in fact, built a Nelson Mandela statue in the Union Buildings? And so, every council, when they run out of ideas, they produce a statue.
“We must be reminded by social media and our critics that we are doing something wrong. We can’t. We must stop ourselves; we are in charge. We can’t complain to somebody else; we are in charge.”
He said the intervention workshop would focus on holding ANC officials accountable by addressing mismanagement in municipalities.
“This workshop assists us to say it cannot be business as usual. That shouldn’t be happening where we govern.
“It is not a workshop where we strategise about the last five years; no, that work has been done. We know where the problem is.