In less than a fortnight, South African President Jacob Zuma has fired two finance ministers from his cabinet. The first was Nhlanhla Nene, who resisted Zuma's excesses and was replaced with little-known David van Rooyen who was expected to rubber stamp Zuma's wishes. World markets reacted immediately, causing the Rand to fall precipitously and the stock market to tumble.
The ANC, however, was largely mute. Among those who broke ranks on this issue wasTutu Fellow and ANC activist Shaka Sisulu. His leadership and voice gave others the room to also come out against Zuma treating the treasury as his piggy bank. As a result, for perhaps the first time, Zuma backtracked and replaced van Rooyen with Pravin Gordhan, who had served as South Africa's Finance Minister previously from 2009 to 2014. Sisulu, the grandson of ANC stalwart Walter Sisulu, took to Twitter to disagree with fellow ANC members who were either silent on Nene's axing or supportive of the President.
One news story on Sisulu's courage and leadership check out Sisulu's Twitter account @ShakaSisulu. Since then, others such as ANC activist Barbara Hogan have also voiced concern or opposition to President Zuma's leadership. On social media, #ZumaMustFall is trending with marches being added to the hashtags in various locations around the country.
Archbishop Desmond Tutu, the patron of the African Leadership Institute, has also warned the ANC-led government that its governance of the country is out of keeping with the values for which it stood when it opposed Apartheid. His stern warning can be found here on the African Leadership Institute's website.
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