President Cyril Ramaphosa is facing mounting pressure to dismiss higher education minister Nobuhle Nkabane amid the row over her apparent lies to parliament and new disclosures that she turned a blind eye to corruption at the construction sector education & training authority (Ceta).
Already in hot water in parliament for allegedly misleading MPs about an “independent panel” she claimed had approved politically connected names for the boards of sector education & training authorities (Setas), Nkabane faced fresh questions this week over her apparent failure to act on charges of corruption at Ceta.
Setas have a combined budget of more than R20bn and have long been sites of corruption and theft by ANC-aligned figures.
Today in the Sunday Times, prominent academic Prof Malegapuru Makgoba added his voice to the chorus of calls for Nkabane to step down, saying she had become "a disgrace and an embarrassment to the higher education sector."
The president will be left with no option but to act decisively against her
— High-ranking government official
A source close to Ramaphosa said if parliament was to find that Nkabane had lied to MPs, he would fire her.
“Should parliament reach [such] a finding ... the president will be left with no option but to act decisively against her,” said the senior government insider.
This week the Sunday Times established that since July last year, Nkabane has been sitting on evidence of alleged tender irregularities and rigging of board appointments at Ceta.
Whistleblower Tumiso Mphuthi, senior manager in supply chain management (SCM) at Ceta — who was suspended two years ago — told the Sunday Times that Nkabane’s ministry had ignored her efforts to expose wrongdoing.
Before her suspension Mphuthi accused the Ceta CEO, Malusi Shezi, of tender rigging. She has taken her allegations to the Ceta board, Nkabane’s office, parliament’s portfolio committee on higher education & training and the public protector — but none of them has initiated an investigation.
The allegations included that tenders were awarded to service providers that never submitted bids, and that Shezi intervened in procurement transactions involving millions of rands.
On her suspension Mphuthi was hit with 20 charges related to protected disclosures she had made in 2019, and when she continued to make waves she was hit with a further 43 charges.
Mphuthi first made reports to Nkabane’s office a year ago soon after the minister had been appointed, after she lost faith in the board then in place at Ceta.
“I have constantly been failed, and it did not make sense to me why these allegations, which are backed up with documentary evidence, are being ignored,” she said. “And at the same time I can see that the CEO, the person involved in most of these irregularities, was painting me as this person who is corrupt, with the help of the board that left in March.
“If I am guilty, why has it been two years since my suspension and they have not produced any evidence of any wrongdoing? Does that make any sense? I had hoped that the minister would intervene and launch independent investigations [but] this has never happened. I have approached her office three more times since last July and still nothing has happened,” Mphuthi said.
In May she escalated her fight to the Presidency, saying her pleas had fallen on deaf ears.
“I write this letter with a heavy heart and a deep sense of desperation,” she said in her letter to President Cyril Ramaphosa.
“The procurement environment within public entities has become increasingly politicised, corrupt and unethical. Instead of serving the public and upholding compliance, many leaders within these entities are driven by self-enrichment and disregard for the law. I say this not lightly, but from personal experience.
“In June 2024 I reported SCM irregularities involving the CEO to the board ... I became the target of public attacks by the board chairperson and was charged with the very same irregularities I had reported,” she told the president.
“Shockingly, these charges were drafted by the CEO himself without HR involvement, and the board allowed this blatant abuse of power to continue unchecked. I have now been on suspension for nearly two years. I am financially and emotionally exhausted, forced to fund my legal defence while the CEO uses state resources to fight whistleblowers,” Mphuthi wrote.
“I feel betrayed by the very system I have served with integrity for over two decades. I believe I am being punished simply for doing my job: upholding compliance and refusing to turn a blind eye to corruption. My situation sends a dangerous message to other public officials: that reporting corruption will destroy your life.”
New information suggests there are deep rifts between Nkabane and her director-general over the Setas and the processes allegedly initiated by the DG to extend the terms of board members that expired at the end of March.
Shezi, speaking through Ceta spokesperson Lebogang Phasha, said the allegations against him were “false and malicious”.
“The Seta boards are appointed by the minister ... with limited input from the Setas or their CEOs,” said Phasha.
She has brought this sector into disrepute and her continued presence in the position of minister continues to damage this vulnerable sector
— Prof Malegapuru Makgoba in an opinion piece
“The department of higher education & training has undertaken an investigation into the allegations of board manipulation at Ceta and found no evidence of wrongdoing. Its report has been sent to the national skills authority. Please verify with the department before printing.”
Mphuthi said there could not have been any investigation without her, as a whistleblower, being contacted by an investigator.
"They're lying," said Mphuthi.
The allegations were put to Nkabane but she had not responded at the time of publication.
A government insider familiar with the matter said Nkabane’s woes keep growing: “If she had said, in the very early stages, ‘I never had a panel,’ I am sure people could have advised her what to do. But to stick to something when you know it’s not there, it’s bad.”
ANC MP Tebogo Letsie, who is the chair of the portfolio committee on higher education, said Nkabane was provisionally due to appear before the committee on July 11, along with her five-member “independent panel”. Her two deputy ministers, Buti Manamela and Mimmy Gondwe, have also been invited to the meeting.
Letsie said the committee was calling the two deputy ministers even though they had previously said they played no role in the Seta board appointments.
“Remember that this is a ministry. If they did not play a role, they must put it on record, so it does not look like they told us that in the dark corners. We want them to tell us to our faces, if they played a role or not,” he said. “In the meantime, I have written to these panellists and said they must give me written submissions to say what their role was in this thing. We want those responses by Wednesday.”
He said at face value, Nkabane appeared to be in breach of section 17 of the Powers, Privileges & Immunities of Parliaments & Provincial Legislatures Act. The legislation makes it a criminal offence to deliberately provide false and misleading information to parliament.
“This looks like she’s provided parliament with inaccurate information, either on May 30 or June 17. So, members are saying we must activate section 17, subsection 2 [of the act] of those who lie [to parliament],” Letsie said.
The act provides for a prison term of up to 12 months.
Letsie added that he was consulting parliament’s legal advisers.
DA MP Karabo Khakhau has laid a complaint against Nkabane with the public protector.
Presidency spokesperson Vincent Magwenya confirmed that Ramaphosa had received a report from Nkabane detailing her version of events that led to the withdrawal of the appointment of the Seta boards. However, he said Ramaphosa was yet to go over the report as it was received as he was leaving for Canada to attend the G7 summit.
“The report arrived just before we departed for Canada. He is yet to go through the report and engage with the minister,” said Magwenya. “The matter remains a priority for the president and he will be attending to it as soon as humanly possible. It is vital that the matter is attended to for the sake of certainty and stability in the sector and in the department.”
Meanwhile, Makgoba, a former University of KwaZulu-Natal vice-chancellor and national health ombud, said the only honourable course for Nkabane was to quit. She had disgraced Ramaphosa and publicly embarrassed him, the higher education sector and her department.
“She has brought this sector into disrepute and her continued presence in the position of minister continues to damage this vulnerable sector,” he said in an opinion piece.
Would you like to comment on this article?
Sign up (it's quick and free) or sign in now.
Please read our Comment Policy before commenting.