Cyril Ramaphosa comfortably won re-election as head of South Africa’s governing party just weeks after a scandal threatened to derail his political career, and now faces an uphill battle to rebuild its flagging support heading into a national vote in 2024.
A second five-year term for Ramaphosa at the helm of the African National Congress should reassure investors that his administration will continue with reforms to revive the stuttering economy. The rand gained as much as 2.6% against the dollar.
Ramaphosa, 70, garnered 2,476 votes for the top ANC post, and former Health Minister Zweli Mkhize 1,897. He considered quitting as the nation’s president earlier this month after an independent panel denounced his handling of the theft of foreign currency that was stuffed in a sofa at his game farm, but later backtracked and denied wrongdoing.
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The results were announced by Kgalema Motlanthe, the ANC’s head of election, at the party’s elective conference on the outskirts of Johannesburg on Monday. Paul Mashatile, previously the ANC’s treasurer-general, easily won the deputy leader post, Gwede Mantashe was narrowly reelected as its chairman and Transport Minister Fikile Mbalula was chosen as secretary-general.
