While you were asleep: Ramaphosa defends Russia stance, retracts f*kol

President Cyril Ramaphosa fears f*kol. Yes, you did read that correctly. While responding to questions from opposition MPs in Thursday’s question session in the House, the president used the offending Afrikaans word to respond to a question posed by Julius Malema.

The EFF leader accused the president of being scared of replacing police minister Bheki Cele, who has come under fire recently for rising crime statistics and Cele’s perceived large supporter base in KwaZulu-Natal, which Ramaphosa will need in an ANC election year.

“Honourable Malema, I heard what you have said, but I fear f*kol,” said Ramaphosa in response to the question. It seems like Ramaphosa has been spending some time with his transport minister, Fikile Mbalula ­– the originally Mr Fear F*kol or so his Twitter handle used to proclaim.

While the use of the word might be unbecoming for a president to use and certainly within the walls of parliament, it did provide a lighter moment in what can sometimes be a dull and dreary legislative process. MPs often seem uptight and stuffy as was the case when United Democratic Movement (UDM) chief whip Nqabayomzi Kwankwa raised a point of order calling the use of F*kol unparliamentary after asking his Afrikaans first language speaker colleagues whether the term was befitting of parliament.

Before the speaker could make a determination, the president got and said “cancel that word and maybe say niks [nothing]” also an Afrikaans word quipped the president before the ANC benches burst into chuckles with the president asking the speaker if he should retract the word f*kol.

Other than the president’s colourful language, he defended South Africa’s stance on Russia and that he had heard from Russian President Vladimir Putin himself that peace negotiations were progressing positively.

Ramaphosa said other nations had approached South Africa to be a mediator in the process while he added that he would still like to speak to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

The president said that the war in Ukraine could have been avoided and leading scholars and politicians shared South Africa’s view on the conflict, “The war could have been avoided if NATO had heeded the warnings from amongst its own leader and officials over the years that its eastward expansion would lead to greater, not less instability in the regions.” 

In the markets, the dollar softened yesterday on the back of peace talks among Russia and Ukraine, but any sign of a resolution is still far off. The result of stalled negotiations means the oil price has jumped sharply again.

“EM currencies are holding on to yesterday’s gains, with the rand trading near R14.85/$ levels at one point yesterday. We are currently trading slightly softer at R14.94 versus last night’s R14.92 close. As we head into the long weekend, the Rand is likely to continue in a R14.85/R15.00 range today, barring any major geopolitical changes,” comments TreasuryONE.

On the commodity front, gold is currently trading 0.4% softer at $1,935, platinum is flat at $1,027, while palladium is 4.25% firmer at $2,618. The price of Brent crude closed just over 8.0% and is currently a further 2.4% higher trading at $109 a barrel.