If social development minister Sisisi Tolashe were a South African driver she would surely be one of the 752 minibus taxi drivers pulled off the road in Gauteng in March for operating an unroadworthy vehicle and without a valid driving licence.
Flaunting all the rules of the road, zig-zagging in and out of traffic, unconcerned about passenger safety or compliance and disrespectful to other motorists is an apparent fit to Tolashe’s behaviour in the social development department.
Her latest stunt strikingly resembles the defiance of a driver who navigates our public roads with a fully-laden vehicle carrying the hopes and dreams of ordinary South Africans, with faulty brakes, worn tyres, broken headlights, defective indicators and cracked windscreens.
A Daily Maverick report revealed Tolashe, who wields her clout as president of the ANC Women’s League (ANCWL), received two luxury vehicles worth more than R1m from Chinese officials. While the minister initially claimed they were donated to the Women’s League, the vehicles were reportedly registered in the names of her children rather than the organisation.
In a parliamentary reply, Tolashe has maintained the cars were for the ANCWL, but the organisation has officially denied having any record of the donation. And the Chinese embassy is keeping mum.
On Wednesday ActionSA MP Dereleen James laid criminal charges against the social development minister at the Cape Town Central Police Station for allegedly misleading parliament regarding undeclared luxury gifts.
James, who has been a fierce critic of Tolashe, says the minister is lying to parliament, and evidence points to a deliberate attempt to mislead the legislature to hide personal gain.
She has submitted a complaint to the public protector for breaching the executive members’ ethics act and laid a formal complaint with parliament’s ethics committee for a “blatantly deceitful attempt” to bypass transparency protocols, not to mention how highly irregular it is for a sitting minister to receive such high-value items from foreign officials without formal declaration.
Beyond the criminal charges, James is also calling for President Cyril Ramaphosa to remove Tolashe from her position.
Democratic Alliance MP Nazley Sharif is also asking heavy questions of Ramaphosa: whether Tolashe obtained presidential permission to accept and retain the gift of two Chinese luxury SUVs in 2024.
The allegations come as the department that distributes hundreds of billions of rand in social grants to millions grapples with a series of sudden suspensions, secondments and staff reshuffles.
Earlier this year Tolashe butted heads with her predecessor Lindiwe Zulu over DSDTV — an in-house communications channel that is claimed to have saved the department millions.
In January she told parliament DSDTV, launched in July 2023 under Zulu, was introduced without a business plan, operated for nearly two years without proper monitoring, and had been characterised by the questionable appointment of various service providers.
She said the auditor-general had uncovered the “potential mismanagement of public funds on DSDTV”, prompting her to suspend the channel pending a formal investigation into it.
The suspension came after a Sunday Times exposé of the department’s wasteful spending, including a controversial R3m trip to a UN event in New York.
Two months after that report, former communications head Lumka Oliphant — a key driver behind DSDTV — was suspended over alleged mismanagement of the integrated justice programme and unauthorised expenditure on DSDTV. She was later dismissed without a disciplinary hearing.
The allegations come as the department that distributes hundreds of billions of rand in social grants to millions grapples with a series of sudden suspensions, secondments and staff reshuffles.
Insiders say these were driven by the minister through director-general Peter Netshipale, who was controversially appointed on a five-year contract in March last year.
Cabinet minutes dated March 26 2025 show that his appointment was approved for a one-year contract, with a remuneration package of R2.259m per annum, because Netshipale was already 64 ― beyond the standard retirement threshold for public servants.
This prompted a probe in October by parliament’s joint committee on ethics and members’ interests following a DA complaint over allegations of misleading the legislature.
Tolashe has also faced criticism for shielding her special adviser, Ngwako Kgatla, from accountability and disciplinary processes related to his previous position in government and for appointing an unqualified niece of Kgatla’s as her chief of staff, an appointment she has since reversed after whistle-blowers raised the alarm.
With the criminal investigation pending, Ramaphosa can’t let this latest question mark over her “ethical leadership” of a department slide.
He is already facing the heat over his decision not to dismiss suspended police minister Senzo Mchunu from his cabinet, but the rules should apply.
Ramaphosa needs to demand executive accountability from one of his own and the only way to do that is to put Tolashe on leave and convene an investigation into alleged governance failures.
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