Democratic Alliance leader Mmusi Maimane says he agrees "slightly" with former president Jacob Zuma about the name "state capture", laying the blame for the phenomenon at the feet of the ANC.
"I agree slightly with president Zuma to say it's not state capture. It's corruption by the ANC. We must call it that because state capture can be confusing. It's the cancerous corruption that has, in fact, destroyed the resources of our people," he said.
Maimane was referring to Zuma's comments on Wednesday when he denied the existence of state capture and said that the term state capture was just a "politically-decorated expression".
Zuma made the remarks when he spoke to students at Walter Sisulu University. He hit out at the ongoing state capture commission of inquiry, insisting that no arm of the state in South Africa had been captured.
On Thursday, Maimane spoke in Durban, where he announced Zwakele Mncwango as the party's premier candidate in the province. However, for a moment, he turned his attention to Zuma's comments.
'We will deal with state capture'
He said the commission, chaired by Deputy Chief Justice Raymond Zondo, should be "narrowed" and only the ANC should be invited.
"It's no accident that every person that has appeared there is an ANC person. In the NDR (National Democratic Revolution) the ANC set itself up to say we are going to capture the state. That's what they said. Jacob Zuma only benefited [from] corruption, but the project of state capture is always an ANC project," Maimane claimed.
"Today we can focus on Jacob Zuma alone but in truth, if you go to municipalities in Johannesburg, R18bn was stolen. It wasn't by Zuma. We are talking about SOEs (state-owned enterprises) today but frankly municipalities and provinces have been captured for a long time. So, in fairness, let's narrow the scope and invite the ANC. We will deal with state capture," he said.
He suggested that state capture would only be stopped once the ANC stopped deploying people to the government "who work only for the organisation".
"Because at this point in time, what is to guarantee that state capture won't happen again? It is going to happen if we keep the same systems in place. It's going to be repeated," he said.
The commission of inquiry is investigating allegations of undue influence by the Gupta family on the former president and state-owned enterprises.
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