Obed Bapela

Kopeng Obed Bapela (born 28 February 1958) is a South African politician who is currently serving as the Deputy Minister of Public Enterprises since 6 March 2023. Before that, he was Deputy Minister of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs from 2014 to 2023. A member of the African National Congress (ANC), he has been a member of the National Assembly since 2002 and a deputy minister since 2010.

Bapela rose to prominence through the anti-apartheid movement in Alexandra, and he served in the Gauteng Provincial Legislature from 1994 to 1999. After joining Parliament in 2002, he rose to become Chairperson of the National Assembly before President Jacob Zuma appointed him as Deputy Minister of Communications from 2010 to 2011. After that he served as Deputy Minister in the Presidency from 2011 to 2014 and then as Deputy Minister of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs from 2014 until 2023, when President Cyril Ramaphosa appointed him to his current position.

A longstanding member of the ANC, Bapela was formerly Provincial Secretary of the party's Gauteng branch. He has been a member of the ANC National Executive Committee since 2012 and has been particularly active in foreign affairs, including as the party's head of international relations between 2013 and 2015.

Early life and career Bapela was born on 28 February 1958 in Alexandra, a township outside Johannesburg in the former Transvaal Province. He was the eldest of seven children, with four brothers and two sisters. He trained as a cadet reporter at the Weekly Mail, in a cohort of trainees that also included Ferial Haffajee.

At the same time, his involvement in anti-apartheid activism intensified in the early 1980s. In 1979, he joined underground structures of the African National Congress (ANC), which at the time was banned inside South Africa; He was also a member of the Congress of South African Students, and in 1983 he became a founding member both of the Alexandra Youth Congress and of the United Democratic Front. He was later the deputy president of the Alexandra Youth Congress. his involvement in the committee led to his indictment in the Rand Supreme Court on treason charges, with Bapela, Mayekiso, Richard Mdakane, and two others accused of attempting to render Alexandra "ungovernable". He was detained on several other occasions in the 1980s During the term, he chaired the legislature's portfolio committee on safety and security. In the same period, he was Deputy Provincial Secretary and then Provincial Secretary of the ANC's Gauteng branch.

After that, in 2000, Bapela was assigned to the ANC's headquarters at Luthuli House, where he was the party's coordinator for international relations.' he was elected to a full term in the seat in the 2004 general election and later was appointed as chairperson of the assembly, deputised by Andries Nel. He also remained involved in foreign policy; in 2005, the Mail & Guardian named him one of 100 people who would "shape South Africa in the decade ahead", in his case as "a growing force in foreign affairs".

Deputy Minister of Communications: 2010–2011 On 31 October 2010, President Jacob Zuma announced that Bapela would become Deputy Minister of Communications under newly appointed Minister Roy Padayachie. The opposition Congress of the People welcomed his appointment, saying that he had been "highly focused on modernising Parliament" in his former positions.

Deputy Minister in the Presidency: 2011–2014 On 24 October 2011, President Zuma announced a major cabinet reshuffle in which Bapela was appointed to succeed Dina Pule as Deputy Minister in the Presidency for Performance Monitoring and Evaluation. He deputised Minister Collins Chabane.

During this period, at the ANC's 53rd National Conference in December 2012, Bapela was elected for the first time to a five-year term as a member of the ANC's National Executive Committee (NEC). According to the Mail & Guardian'', he had been "one of the key lobbyists" on Zuma's successful campaign to be re-elected as ANC president at the conference. He was appointed to lead the NEC's subcommittee on international relations, His replacement followed reports that, under his leadership, the subcommittee had contradicted the government's position on certain sensitive issues – such as South Africa's membership of the International Criminal Court – and thus had complicated diplomatic relations.

Deputy Minister of COGTA: 2014–2023 Pursuant to the 2014 general election, Bapela was appointed as Deputy Minister of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs in Zuma's second-term cabinet. He held the office for close to nine years, gaining appointment to the same position in the first and second cabinets of Zuma's successor, President Cyril Ramaphosa. After the 55th National Conference, in early 2023, he was appointed to return to the NEC's subcommittee on international relations, this time as deputy chairperson under Nomvula Mokonyane.

Deputy Minister of Public Enterprises: 2023–present Weeks after the 55th National Conference, on 6 March 2023, Ramaphosa announced a cabinet reshuffle which saw Bapela moved to become Deputy Minister of Public Enterprises.

Bapela was given the 96th spot on the ANC's national parliamentary list ahead of the 2024 general election. At the election, the ANC won only 73 seats from the national list, resulting in Bapela losing his seat in the National Assembly.

Personal life Bapela met his first wife, politician Connie Bapela, in 1981; they had three adult children before she died in February 2018. In October 2019, he announced his engagement to Palesa Ngomane, a civil servant from Mpumalanga.

Bapela's parliamentary residence in Cape Town was burgled in 2005. In February 2016, he was admitted to Milpark Hospital with minor injuries sustained in a car accident on the N12 highway near Fochville, Gauteng.