Political analyst Sandile Swana says some people in the ANC and the cabinet are guilty of treason following the July 2021 riots in Gauteng and KwaZulu-Natal.  The imprisonment of former president Jacob Zuma for contempt of court allegedly sparked the wave of civil unrest.  

Resulting protests against the incarceration triggered wider rioting and looting.  

Much of it said to have been fueled by the country’s high unemployment rate and economic inequality worsened by the COVID-19 pandemic.  

More than 350 people were killed and more than 3000 others arrested in the worst violence that South Africa had experienced since the end of apartheid.  

Swana says many people owe the country an explanation about what happened in July last year.

“They incapacitated the State Security Agencies and continued on and on. So, certain ministers in my judgement were physically, absolutely implicated in what was going on. And Cyril Ramaphosa has not been able to pin-point people to say these people need to be arrested. From his own party in the NEC, in the top six and in the cabinet.” 

President Cyril Ramaphosa says the July unrest was a hugely humiliating event for him as president, the state and the country’s poor people whose vulnerabilities were exploited by the instigators.
Ramaphosa was testifying the SA Human Rights Commission hearings into the July 2021 unrest. 

Ramaphosa says the instigators of the riots were hell-bent on exploiting the most vulnerable in the country for their own selfish interest. After five hours of testimony and grueling cross examination, President Ramaphosa apologised to the nation for the pain caused by the riots and the loss to businesses. 

More than 50 billion rand was lost to the country’s economy. 

Ramaphosa says he does not agree with allegations that his controversial statement on ethnic mobilisation was behind the July 2021 riots.

He says he understands why the statement he made in July last year was controversial and might have caused ill-feelings in the country.

Ramaphosa says he corrected this and publicly said that the information he got about the causes of the riots did not support his point that the unrest was instigated along ethnic lines.

He says like all South Africans he was following the news, comments and posts on social media.

Ramaphosa was giving an opening statement at the hearings of the South African Human Rights Commission’s investigation into the July 2021 unrest in Johannesburg.