Bejani Chauke

Bejani Chauke (born 16 June 1971) is a South African political strategist and a member of South Africa's 7th parliament, who was the principal political advisor to the President of South Africa, Cyril Ramaphosa, from 2018. He is also known for managing the CR17 campaign that secured Ramaphosa's election as president of the African National Congress (ANC) at the ANC's 54th National Conference in December 2017. He was formerly a political advisor to Thandi Modise while she was Premier of the North West and Chairperson of the National Council of Provinces. In November 2022, the Financial Mail reported that Chauke had resigned as Ramaphosa's political advisor amid his campaign for election as ANC Treasurer-General at the party's 55th National Conference.

Early life and career Born on 16 June 1971, Chauke was born and raised in Green Farm near Malamulele in the northeast of what is now Limpopo province. In the 1990s, he studied political science at the University of Limpopo at Turfloop, where he became involved in politics. He followed her to the National Council of Provinces (NCOP), where she was NCOP Chairperson and he was her political advisor. He was advisor to Modise in 2014 when she was investigated on animal cruelty charges relating to her private farm in the North West; in 2019, he appeared as a witness in the case.

CR17 campaign: 2015–2017 Ahead of the 54th National Conference of the African National Congress (ANC) in December 2017, Chauke ran Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa's successful campaign for election as ANC president. The Daily Maverick said that he was by then already "a long-time activist and ally of Ramaphosa's". He joined Ramaphosa's team at an early stage, heading "the logistics of the campaign" from September 2015 to May 2016. In August 2016, he was reportedly involved in securing the controversial involvement of businessman Cheslyn Mostert in the campaign; as Chauke urged that "things needed to move quickly" and operational infrastructure needed to be established, Mostert provided the campaign with a base on his smallholding at Randjesfontein on the Midrand.

In subsequent months Chauke was official national campaign manager, with oversight of all aspects of the campaign and responsibility for its ultimate success. Working above project manager Marion Sparg in the campaign's organisational hierarchy, he managed the campaign's team of organisers and fieldworkers and was the main channel of communication between the operational side of the campaign and its political committee. His brief was reportedly to focus on the ANC's campaign in the 2019 general election. News24 said he was perceived as Ramaphosa's "right-hand man" and "fixer"; he has also been described as "a wily politician" and "a sharp and strategic mind".

Chauke was reappointed political advisor in May 2019 when Ramaphosa won re-election to a full term as President. In subsequent years, he was also sometimes described as the President's Special Envoy as he acted as Ramaphosa's emissary on several occasions, including in August 2019, when he met with Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia; in October 2020, when he met with Congo President Denis Sassou Nguesso in Brazzaville, Republic of the Congo, about the African Union's involvement in the Libyan peace process; in June 2021, when he met with Chadian President Mahamat Déby in N'Djamena, Chad; and in September 2022, when he met with Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed in Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates. Ramaphosa also reportedly dispatched him at least thrice to Kinshasa to meet with the government of the Democratic Republic of Congo.

ANC Treasurer-General bid: 2022 In September 2022, ahead of the ANC's 55th National Conference, the Citizen reported that Chauke was a candidate for election as the Treasurer-General of the ANC, a full-time position based out of ANC headquarters at Luthuli House and one of the so-called Top Six slots on the party's National Executive Committee. He was the favourite candidate of branches in Limpopo, North West, the Northern Cape, and the Western Cape. Masina, the former mayor of Ekurhuleni, derided Chauke as an "unknown" and said he had been nominated because he was "dishing money". However, Chauke accepted the nomination and subsequently premised his candidacy on strengthening the policy role of the Treasurer-General's office.

When the nominations list was released, the Financial Mail reported that Chauke had resigned from his position in the Presidency. and has been involved in humanitarian initiatives in Green Farm.

Controversy

South African Airways sale In October 2022, Chauke was implicated in an alleged corruption cover-up by Kgathatso Tlhakudi, who had been suspended as Director-General of the Department of Public Enterprises when he was himself implicated in corruption. Tlhakudi claimed that he had been "iced from his role" in the department after he alerted Chauke and Phindile Baleni, the Director-General in the Presidency, to allegations that Public Enterprises Minister Pravin Gordhan had been involved in improprieties related to the sale of the government's stake in South African Airways.

Phala Phala burglary

Alleged testimony by Wally Rhoode Chauke was implicated in events surrounding "Farmgate", a burglary at Ramaphosa's Phala Phala farm in Bela-Bela, Limpopo in February 2020. During the burglary, which was made public by Arthur Fraser in 2022, a group of people, reportedly Namibian nationals, stole a large sum of dollars in cash. In July 2022, Mzilikazi wa Afrika reported for the Sunday Independent that the head of the Presidential Protection Service, Wally Rhoode, had told the Public Protector that Chauke had met Namibian President Hage Geingob to discuss the burglary. Rhoode allegedly said that he and Chauke, on Ramaphosa's instructions Rhoode also allegedly said that he and Chauke were flown in a Namibian state helicopter to Windhoek, where they spent the night at the Namibian state house and where Chauke met privately with Geingob the following morning. According to the document, the foreign currency stolen at Phala Phala had been secretly and illegally smuggled into the country by Chauke on chartered flights from various countries, including Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Morocco, and Equatorial Guinea. The document alleged that, once in South Africa, Chauke had hidden the cash in a sofa in his personal residence; the sofa had then been transported to Phala Phala before its theft in February 2020. It also alleged that after Fraser exposed the burglary in June 2022, Chauke transferred a further $20 million in cash to a property developer in Cape Town for "safekeeping". The document called for an investigation into the origins of the stolen cash, as well as for a lifestyle audit of Chauke personally because he "clearly enjoys a lavish lifestyle far beyond that to be expected of a presidential adviser".

Boy Mamabolo text message In November 2022, various Independent Media newspapers reported that Boy Mamabolo, an ANC Member of Parliament, had "threatened" Sifiso Mahlangu, the editor of the Star, for his reporting about Chauke in connection with the Phala Phala burglary. Mambola allegedly sent Mahlangu a series of text messages in which he said that Mahlangu should stop reporting on Chauke because "".