ANALYSIS: ANC ices Sisisi Tolashe — but remains silent on second minister in SUV scandal

The ANC Women’s League has placed its president, Sisisi Tolashe, on a leave of absence while disciplinary proceedings against her proceed, but there’s been no word about the fate of Maropene Ramokgopa.

The ANC Women’s League (ANCWL) president, Sisisi Tolashe, is on “special leave” following her axing by President Cyril Ramaphosa as minister of social development, with secretary-general Nokuthula Nqaba assuming Tolashe’s ANCWL functions on an interim basis until Tolashe’s internal ANC disciplinary processes are concluded.

The decision, taken unanimously by the ANCWL’s National Executive Committee (NEC) at a special meeting in Boksburg on Saturday and confirmed in an ANCWL statement on Monday, follows the ANC’s highest decision-making body’s endorsement of the party’s Integrity Commission’s findings against Tolashe and the referral of her matter to its National Disciplinary Committee.

It looks, on the surface, like accountability in action. But there is a question the ANC has not clearly answered: what has happened to the other minister, also prominent within the ANCWL, implicated in the very same Chinese SUV scandal that helped bring Tolashe down?

As Daily Maverick revealed in April, the minister of planning, monitoring and evaluation, Maropene Ramokgopa, is accused of accepting three BAIC X55 SUVs — the same model at the centre of the Tolashe allegations — from Chinese representatives in late 2023. As in Tolashe’s case, these appear to have been intended ostensibly as donations for the ANCWL, where Ramokgopa serves as national coordinator.

Daily Maverick traced one of those vehicles to Ramokgopa’s son, Xhantilomzi Ntuli, whose name appeared on the registration records for a yellow BAIC X55 from January 2024, a few months before Tolashe’s children had BAIC X55s registered in their names.

A second such vehicle, Daily Maverick established, was seen being used by members of the family of Luvo Makasi, a close Ramokgopa associate, in a township near Whittlesea in the Eastern Cape. Although Daily Maverick received information that the third BAIC X55 received by Ramokgopa was being used, via a driver, by Ramokgopa’s elderly mother in Limpopo, we were unable to confirm this.

Ramokgopa’s spokesperson flatly denied she had received any cars from Chinese officials, even after being presented with the registration records. No alternative explanation for the provenance of her son’s vehicle was offered.

Ramokgopa did not disclose receiving any gifts in Parliament’s Register of Members’ Interests for 2023, 2024 or 2025.

At a media briefing held on Saturday at t