There are so many hot potatoes in South African politics these days, it’s hard to figure out which one is the hottest.
And as our next national elections get ever closer, the political intrigue is playing out like a well-scripted soapie.
There’s the Eskom billions that allegedly found its way to a relative of the boss’ and the Gupta bank accounts.
There’s the Gupta emails, with the latest revelation being that they apparently spied on some of our country’s top bank bosses.
And guaranteed there are lots more revelations coming from those leaked emails.
Funny how underhanded business is being uncovered by means of underhanded business. But I suppose in this case, it’s the lesser of two evils.
It’s becoming very difficult to find a state entity these days that isn’t rumoured to be captured by SA’s most notorious family.
And I see it’s something that’s not escaping Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa, who may just use it to his advantage.
He recently mentioned that the country needs a “capable, uncaptured leader”.
Reading between the lines, he may be telling voters that they must remember that his competitor for the top job has “Zuma” in her surname, leaving us to imply from that what we will.
Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma may still live to regret not dropping the hyphenation in her name when she divorced, because it may just end up costing her the presidency.
Then in the middle of all the mess, stands our president.
It’s becoming harder and harder to believe his claims of innocence in any and all of it.
And even harder to understand the support he continues to enjoy within the ANC.
But I think that’s about to be tested by the hottest potato of them all - the secret ballot around the vote of no-confidence in him.
Speaker Baleka Mbete passed that potato on to the Constitutional Court in the hope that she would be able to sidestep making a decision.
DECISION TIME: Speaker Baleke Mbete to rule on secret ballot
But our country’s top judge proved he was just as good at sidestepping the buck that was being passed his way.
In fact, his fellow judges agreed with him, resulting in a unanimous decision that Mbete can and should in fact make the decision herself.
I can just imagine how mad she must have been at that decision.
Meanwhile, Zuma was sterk gevriet in Parliament last week, telling MPs how much the people love him and how he’s doing an excellent job.
He also said that the ANC will win the 2019 elections and added that the party will win back the metros it had lost to the DA.
Those are the words of a man who is either delusional, or very sure of himself.
You have to wonder what it is that he knows that we don’t, that gives him that kind of bravado.
Has he got some very special muti? Or does he simply have so much dirt on so many influential ANC members that they wouldn’t dare go against him?
Which brings us back to the Guptas. How many ministers exactly have they captured with our cash?