Ramaphosa set to name new Cabinet. What did Mandela’s look like in 1994?

Newly inaugurated President Cyril Ramaphosa is due to announce his new Cabinet for South Africa’s seventh democratic administration soon, and it is expected that he will pick ministers from across the political party spectrum.

After the 29 May 2024 election, when the ANC failed to get a clear majority by garnering only 40.18% (159 seats in the National Assembly) of the national vote, it was forced into constituting a government of national unity (GNU), where it invited parties represented in Parliament to join in the running the South Africa.

Already on 14 June 2024, a deal was put in place that gave a Democratic Alliance (DA) member of Parliament (MP), Annelie Lotriet, the position of deputy speaker of the National Assembly. She is Thoko Didiza deputy.

However, it remains the president’s legal prerogative to pick Cabinet ministers and their deputies (although deputy ministers are not part of Cabinet), as reiterated by ANC parliamentary chief whip Mdumiseni Ntuli on Thursday morning.

“It [the appointment of minsters] will be based on what the president has decided in exercising his prerogative,” Ntuli said.

WILL PORTFOLIOS BE SHARED ACCORDING TO ELECTORAL PERFORMANCE?

However, because the GNU in its current form includes the DA (they received 21.81% of the vote – 87 seats), Inkatha Freedom Party (3.85% – 17 seats), Patriotic Alliance (2.06% – 9 seats), Good party (0.18% – 1 seat) and most recently, the Pan Africanist Congress of Azania (0.23% – 1 seat), it is widely expected that some, if not all, these parties could be represented in Ramaphosa’s GNU Cabinet.

The uMkhonto weSizwe (MK) Party, led by Jacob Zuma, and Julius Malema’s Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF), have ruled out their participation in the GNU, with Malema saying they would not sell out.

MK Party and EFF received 14.58% (58 seats) and 9.52% (39 seats) respectively

There is some precedent for this multi-party Cabinet.

In 1994, after the ANC won the first democratic elections with a 62.65% majority, then-president Nelson Mandela reached cross the political aisle and invited members of other parties to serve in his GNU Cabinet.

NELSON MANDELA’S GNU CABINET

So, how did Mandela put together his GNU and who was in it?

His Cabinet members were picked from three parties, namely the ANC, National Party and the IFP – with the Freedom Front, Democratic Party, the African Christian Democratic Party and the PAC uninvolved, even though they had seats in the National Assembly.

Sources: Africa Report, SA History, Wikipedia

Which names would you like to see in Ramaphosa’s soon-to-be-announced Cabinet? Drop your answers in the comments section below