Letter to Mahlamba Ndlopfu: My leader, in SA even jogging has politics

In the interests of a healthier South Africa and safeguarding both the Presidency and the pavements of Johannesburg, I suggest you convene an Advisory Panel on Jogging.

By Bhekisisa Mncube

17 Oct 2025

Ah, Chief Dwasaho! It seems your jogging route passes only through the most fragrant gardens: where cash, guns and tenders bloom in perfect harmony.

A brisk morning stretch (stench) of the legs before another day of running a country (your side hustle) that can barely crawl, teetering on the edge of economic and moral collapse.

You tell us you didn’t know whose house it was. You didn’t go in. You weren’t coming out. You just happened to pause outside, where the tender air was thick enough to slice with the National Treasury knife.

Jogging politics

You see, my leader, in South Africa, even jogging has politics. I jog; therefore, I am a jogger. Perhaps not. Every step leaves a footprint on the public conscience.

The video shows you, head glistening, security detail alert, pausing to greet a DJ who spotted you outside the home of a man we’ve come to know as Morgan Maumela, of the Tembisa Hospital “Mafia”, nephew by marriage, and tenderpreneur of national (dis)repute. The DJ captured the moment: laughter, hugs, warmth, and that presidential aura that melts suspicion into selfies. Hollywood, anyone?

The video doesn’t lie; you was (sic) there, my leader. Your spin doctor confirmed it. Yet, in your defence, you claim ignorance: “I didn’t know whose house it was.” Truly? “I didn’t know whose house it was. I didn’t go inside. I wasn’t coming out.”

My leader, that’s a powerful trilogy of denials worthy of the Book of Proverbs remix: “I was there, but I wasn’t there; I saw, but I didn’t look; I paused, but I didn’t stay.” A whole Head of State jogging blind through the alleys of Tenderland? My leader, the optics (stench) would make even Shakespeare weep: To jog or not to jog, that is the question.

But my leader, South Africans are not naïve joggers in this political marathon. We have run this route before. We have watched the movie, read the reviews, and seen the credits. We have heard the “I didn’t know” refrain from CR17 and Marikana to Phala Phala. It’s the national anthem of plausible deniability. The problem is, every time you jog past a scandal, the smell of smoke (stench) follows. And it stinks to high heaven.

Jog and the moral fog

My leader, it’s not about how far you run, but where you choose to stop. You can’t campaign on clean governance in the morning, then jog into the moral fog by afternoon. Even if you didn’t go in, the video went viral.

The people see the president outside a tender mogul’s house, smiling like a man who’s come home. The nation, weary from hunger and corruption, sees confirmation, not coincidence.

So, my leader, next time the legs itch for a jog, perhaps stay within the Union Buildings compound. Or better still, take the nation with you, not through hashtags and hugs, but through honest accountability.

Tell us why your path always leads to the gates of the well connected. Tell us how we can jog out of this pit of ethical fatigue. Who still remembers the loot from Bosasa, and the millions that found their way into the CR17 campaign kitty? Or the R8-million ($580,000) in cash hidden in a sofa at Phala Phala?

And now Morgan Maumela, allegedly involved in the R2-billion Tembisa Hospital corruption scheme, lives not in Tembisa but in Sandhurst, Sandton.

Yet you, my leader, and your vigilant security detail, presumably with a spy or two, claim you didn’t know that South Africa’s most wanted tenderpreneur lives merely paces from your jogging route. Truth is, the country is on fire, and no amount of jogging will keep the smoke (stench) out of Mahlamba Ndlopfu.

Advisory panel on jogging

My leader, in the interests of a healthier South Africa and safeguarding both the Presidency and the pavements of Johannesburg, I suggest you convene an Advisory Panel on Jogging. You’ve had panels on Economy, Land and Climate; surely, the time has come for one on cardiovascular ethics.

As panel chairperson, I nominate the ever-alert SAPS Deputy National Commissioner for Crime Detection, Lieutenant-General Shadrack Sibiya. Despite Sibiya being prone to mixing up his tenses, forgetting which page of his affidavit to refer to, and sometimes confusing who reports to whom, he remains a man of raw instinct, not academic jargon.

He would, of course, rope in his “associates”, who are definitely not his friends: Brown Mogotsi and Vusimuzi “Cat” Matlala. Together, they would design a fraud-proof Presidential Jogging Plan (PJP) with a preapproved route, GPS tracking, and an ethics checkpoint based on Numbers Gang protocol every 500 metres.

Jogging golden rules

The PJP’s first rule is no jogging past tender moguls, in-laws, or anyone currently under Special Investigating Unit investigation.

The second rule is no selfies with potential state witnesses.

And the third, the golden rule: all jogs must begin and end at the Union Buildings, not at the gates of the politically connected, or nephews. The plan shall clearly state that the president may jog only near the shadowy places of the “Big Five”, as approved by Mr Brown and the Cat himself.

The Cat, of course, is a perfect match, an unofficial Deputy Commissioner of Police (Covert Operations) already, with field experience in vanishing acts. And Mr Brown? Our very own deep-cover spy chief, moonlighting as a citizen informant. Between them, they could transform the Presidency’s morning runs into an intelligence-gathering marvel.

For symbolic effect, the panel might include a commemorative sprint past Mr Brown’s house, for by your own admission, my leader, you never quite know whose gate you are jogging past. Mr Brown, after all, knows more about Crime Intelligence operations than most officers in the SAPS.

According to Sibiya’s testimony, Mr Brown once provided him with “valuable information” that clearly originated within Crime Intelligence. He, Sibiya, saw nothing untoward. Perhaps Mr Brown could now brief your bodyguards on recognising when a morning jog smells like a low-budget cover-up skit.

Brown secrets

My leader, I do not make these jogging recommendations lightly. Sibiya confirmed knowing both Mr Brown and Cat Matlala. He even admitted to having breakfast with Mr Brown, a hearty meal served with a side of Crime Intelligence secrets. Mr Brown, ever the civic-minded informant, reportedly shared details about an ongoing Crime Intelligence operation investigating none other than Sibiya himself with Sibiya.

And yet, before the parliamentary Ad Hoc Committee on the Capture of the Justice System, Sibiya insisted that Crime Intelligence reported to him. A curious arrangement, if you ask me, being both the hunter and the hunted, served by intelligence briefings that arrive over bacon and eggs in some discreet diner.

So, my leader, my proposal to include two members of what the SAPS once (im)politely termed the “Drug Cartel” on your Presidential Jogging Advisory Panel is not out of kilter. It is, in fact, poetic justice. In the shadowy corridors of intelligence, they call it an off-the-grid operation, perfect for a Presidency that keeps jogging into controversy by accident.

This way, my leader, when next you lace up your trainers, your jogging panel will ensure every step is sanctioned, surveilled and sanitised. Even your heartbeat will require a clearance code. The nation, at least, will rest easy knowing that the president’s morning jogs are now matters of national security, monitored, logged and perhaps one day declassified before another Zondo Commission in 2032.

That commission, no doubt, will be appointed to investigate why the Madlanga Commission of Inquiry into Criminality, Political Interference and Corruption in the Criminal Justice System’s groundbreaking recommendations were left to gather dust. Not in the vaults of state secrecy, but on the forgotten shelves of the Presidency and the Department of no-Justice and un-Constitutional non-Development library.

Between the fading pages of past reports, your jogging plan will lie, a relic of aborted reforms, a footnote in the long race between greasing palms and public service.

Route of crisis

General wisdom from the alchemist, son of MaMlambo: a president’s jogging route is no private whim, but a map of power and proximity.

When the route passes through the homes of tender princes, it reveals more than it conceals. When the camera captures hugs outside the palace or the monument of greed, we don’t see fitness or coincidence, but familial ties. Perhaps a presidency that confuses personal “tender” warmth with the obligations of public duty.

Till next week, my man. Send me jogging. DM

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