Zuma says did not apologise to Malawi over road remark
President Jacob Zuma of South Africa has told his country’s Parliament that his government never apologised to Malawi over disparaging remarks he made at a Gauteng African National Congress (ANC) manifesto forum launch in Johannesburg last month.
On Monday this week, the State-owned South Africa Broadcasting Corporation (Sabc) News Online reported that Zuma refuted apologising to the Government of Malawi for his recent comments on the country’s roads.
Zuma, in response to a question in Parliament on his government’s correspondence with the Malawi High Commission in South Africa regarding his comments, is quoted by the Sabc News Online as having said: “It is a matter of fact that Africa has a poor roads infrastructure.”
Sabc further quoted Zuma as having said there is no correspondence received from Malawi, and that South Africa never sent any retraction on the matter.
Zuma was widely quoted in the media last month as having said: “We can’t think like Africans, in Africa, generally. We are in Johannesburg, this is Johannesburg. It’s not some national road in Malawi.”
He made the comment in an apparent attempt to convince motorists to accept plans to impose toll fees on highways around Johannesburg.
But his comments prompted Malawi to summon South Africa’s High Commissioner in Lilongwe, Cassandra Mbuyane-Mokone, to clarify the statement.
The following day, Zuma reportedly sent his Deputy Foreign Affairs Minister Marius Fransman to Malawi to meet President Joyce Banda at Kamuzu Palace in Lilongwe.
Malawi Minister of Information and Civic Education Brown Mpinganjira last month told The Nation that Zuma apologised through Fransman.
But on Tuesday, Mpinganjira could not immediately react to Zuma’s statement in Parliament, saying he needed time to consult.
Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation Principal Secretary George Mkondiwa, at the time, said Mbuyane-Mokone was apologetic.
But Zuma’s U-turn contradicts what his spokesperson Mac Maharaj said after Zuma’s jibe.
“I have received numerous calls from Malawians being angry and after long discussions, they come around and say, yes, let’s not make a mountain of a molehill,” Maharaj said. “Let me apologise for that and withdraw it.”
He said the comments did not reflect how Zuma thought or how he acted in forums about Africa.
Democratic Alliance parliamentary leader Lindiwe Mazibuko last month demanded that Zuma must explain the blunder to Parliament.
Why is Malawi government defending someone who insulted by saying he apologized while we all know that he didn’t?
Do these these greedy malawians have brain in their head?
Why is any Malawian at all angry at calling a spade a spade,.. Is it not obvious – a matter of fact as Zuma puts it – that our roads are really bad, and many other things for that matter ?. Do Malawians also need some form of ‘reputation laundering’, like the one we are hearing about on Cash-gate. Lets learn to see mediocrity where it exists and work to improve our situation. Nobody owes us a living
Zuma simply said the truth. shame to our leaders is it not sad to be a president of a poorest country. You can move in nice cars but your countrys poverty is still a reproach
@Makanjira, Zuma never insulted Malawi. Since when did telling the truth amounted to an insult. While our president and her cronies are busy stealing money anthu ena akuona. Shame on our presidents. I support and defend what Zuma said. Its a lesson to our corrupt presidents. Zuma yomweyo kuti wa wa wa!
I mean why should our leaders want to be praised even where they do not deserve that? Look at JB, she hires a PR company paying enormous amounts of money just to paint her good despite much evidence that her administration and PP orchestrated the unpopular cash-gate scandal. They will always level bad things to former administrations and credit themselves on good things done by the same and yet shovel all their failures to Kamuzu, Muluzi and Bingu. akosana this is absurdity. It is politics of crooks. ZUMA YOU DESERVE MOST OF THE MALAWIAN CREDIT. YOU DID BETTER NOT TO APOLOGIZE. AND NEVER SHOULD YOU APOLOGIZE. TO WHO SHOULD YOU APOLOGIZE AND WHY? YOU SAID THE TRUTH> How can on earth a president stay in office for two years and spend all the days traveling? Can such a phony leader have time to plan development? SOUTH AFRICA DO NOT APOLOGIZE FOR YOUR PRESIDENT SIMPLY SAID WHAT HE SAW WHEN HE CAME TO SADC MEETING AND HE WAS SAYING THE TRUTH.