Alert 188 – Ramaphosa announces long-awaited coalition cabinet

President Cyril Ramaphosa, on 30 June, announced his new cabinet almost five weeks after the 29 May general election. This new executive is the result of extended negotiations after the African National Congress (ANC) lost its ruling majority and Ramaphosa was forced to secure a coalition agreement in order to form a government. The President opted for what he calls a government of national unity (GNU) but what is in reality a multi-party coalition. The GNU consists of ten parliamentary parties representing over 70% of the seats in the National Assembly.

Ramaphosa’s new cabinet is reflective of this bulky coalition and is the largest cabinet and executive team in South Africa’s history. There are now 32 ministers and 43 deputy ministers bringing the entire executive team to 77, with the inclusion of the President and the Deputy President. Although the President claims that this was necessary to accommodate the exigencies of the GNU and its members, it is really the result of Ramaphosa’s need to satisfy power brokers and concerned parties within the ANC. Exemplifying this, the President created two additional ministries, and eleven departments will now have two deputy ministers. The ANC also controls 20 of the 32 ministries (62.5%) despite securing only 40% of the seats in the National Assembly.

Notably, of the ten parties that have signed onto the GNU, only six received ministerial posts and will be in the cabinet, while two other erstwhile opposition parties have received deputy minister positions. (A full breakdown of the cabinet is included below this alert).

Ramaphosa has also ensured that the ANC retained control over the country’s primary economic portfolios including Finance, Trade and Industry, Energy, and Mineral Resources. The Democratic Alliance (DA) secured deputy ministerial positions in some of these portfolios, but the message is clear that the ANC will continue to oversee economic policy. This move will likely be welcomed by investors and currency markets as it indicates policy stability. Affirming this, Enoch Godongwana has been reappointed as finance minister and the even-keeled former mayor of Johannesburg Parks Tau has been appointed as the new Minister of Trade, Industry, and Cooperation. Importantly, Ramaphosa has reassigned energy policy to a newly formed Electricity and Energy Ministry bringing responsibility for South Africa’s energy challenges under the sole mandate of Electricity and Energy Minister Kgosientsho Ramokgopa. This strengthens Ramokgopa’s hand and will simplify the bureaucracy and power struggles that have undermined South Africa’s response to the energy crisis.

The DA will be satisfied with the cabinet positions it secured. The party will have some influence in the economic cluster via its deputy ministers and the party has ministerial positions in key frontline departments. These include the Agriculture; Basic Education; Communications and Digital Technologies; Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment; Home Affairs; and Public Works and Infrastructure departments. This will enable the DA to implement practical policy and operational changes in these areas that could result in measurable successes on which the party will be able to campaign in future. These are also portfolios that play to the DA’s administrative strengths.

Particular scrutiny will be placed on the DA’s Siviwe Gwarube who is the new Basic Education Minister, new Home Affairs Minister Leon Schreiber, and Public Works and Infrastructure Minister Deon MacPherson. These are key portfolios which have daily impacts on the lives of voters and are central to service delivery challenges in the country.

Similarly, Velenkosini Hlabisa, the leader of the Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP), has been appointed as the new head of the Department of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs (COGTA). As such, he has been tasked with overseeing the improvement of local government and service delivery in the country. Arguably more significantly, the IFP has been assigned the Public Service and Administration portfolio, where the presence of a former opposition party presents a unique opportunity for the professionalisation of the civil service and limiting cadre deployment in government.

This new cabinet is a clear success for Ramaphosa. He managed to ensure that the ANC remained the dominant force in government while ensuring a large centrist coalition government with a two-thirds majority in the National Assembly. The full nature of these coalition negotiations will become clearer as the various chairpersons of the parliamentary committees are elected. These should be drawn from across the GNU and lead to increased government oversight.

There are persistent concerns about this new government. Firstly, the large and unwieldy size of the executive is a clear obstacle to effective governance. This will increase the public sector wage bill and will lead to the formation of factions and cliques, which is anathema to Ramaphosa’s preferred leadership style of consensus building. Policy implementation and governance will also be dependent on ministers and deputies that originate from different parties being able to work together.

Yet, there is cause for cautious optimism, Ramaphosa’s new cabinet has the potential to make the substantive policy and governance changes desperately needed in South Africa. This new cabinet is much younger than the previous administration and the presence of rival parties within the government will provide voters with a comparative view of governing ability and this competition should fuel a desire for improved performance and increased scrutiny of any mismanagement within the cabinet itself. This early hopefulness appears to be shared by the currency and security markets as both the Rand and the Johannesburg Stock Exchange (JSE) responded positively to Ramaphosa’s cabinet announcement.