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The Independent Democrats (ID) Parliamentary Leader Joe Mcgluwa says the South African government should have put more thought into their aggressive lobbying for one of the country’s top ministers for an African Union (AU) post.

This follows the news that Home Affairs Minister Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma is running as chairperson for the African Union Commission in Addis Ababa. If Dlamini-Zuma is elected, she will have to resign from her current post as minister and would be required to relocate to Addis Ababa where the AU’s headquarters is situated.

‘I find it difficult to accept that government has been keen on the decision for Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma to run for the post given the fact that South Africans are still celebrating the department’s milestone achievement of the first unqualified audit for home affairs since the dawn of our democracy,’ states Mr Mcgluwa.

‘It has been a long and bumpy road for the department which was heavily burdened with fraud and corruption.

‘The first blow for South Africa was that Home Affairs received qualified audits year after year for more than a decade. Now that Dlamini-Zuma, a custodian to the course of good governance, is considered to be released from her duties South Africans are facing another terrible potential blow to outstanding human potential in Dlamini-Zuma,’ says Mcgluwa.

‘It is time for President Jacob Zuma and his cabinet to make bold decisions for the benefit of this country simply because service delivery has been negatively affected by outrageous tendencies such as cadre deployment, cabinet reshuffling and irregular tender processes to name but a few.

‘South Africa needs Dlamini-Zuma more than the AU at this critical stage of her department’s stabalising process. Should the minister be the successful candidate in the AU election, her dedication and hard work within Home Affairs may have the potential to collapse in the face of government,’ Mcgluwa says.