The removal of outspoken ANC MP Makhosi Khoza from her position as chairwoman of parliament's portfolio committee on public service and administration is a clear message that some leaders of the ANC are untouchable. This space is not big enough to accommodate the long list of transgressions President Jacob Zuma has committed since he first occupied the high office, many of which would have justified his immediate sacking. Zuma's inner circle has also been on the rampage, breaking every rule in the book.
In a country where everyone was equal before the law, Zuma, his son Duduzane, Faith Muthambi, Mosebenzi Zwane and a long list of bosses at state-owned companies would be facing criminal charges for handing over the sovereignty of our country to the Gupta family.
The protection that the ANC has extended to the rotten apples within its ranks is the betrayal of a promise the party made after it suffered humiliating defeat in three big metros last year.
The ANC national executive committee undertook to conduct introspection and "deal with perceptions of the ANC being arrogant, self-serving, soft on corruption and increasingly distant from its social base".
But the ANC has done nothing to carry out this promise. Its arrogant, self-serving and corrupt leaders have been shielded in the name of unity.
It is instead those who have stood up to the rot who are being hounded out of the organisation.
Khoza is scheduled to appear before a provincial disciplinary committee for publicly declaring that she would no longer support an immoral president.
There is a strong push to haul former Ekurhuleni mayor Mondli Gungubele and former tourism minister Derek Hanekom before disciplinary committees for similar offences.
Come 2019, the same party will come knocking on our doors, begging for our votes.
Voters will remind them of that 2016 promise, which has not been fulfilled because of a lack of will to act against wrongdoers.
