Nkosinathi Phiwayinkosi Thamsanqa Nhleko (born 10 October 1964) is a South African politician and formertrade unionist fromKwaZulu-Natal. He was theMinister of Police andMinister of Public Works in thesecond cabinet of PresidentJacob Zuma. In March 2024, he resigned from theAfrican National Congress (ANC) and became the national organiser for Zuma'sUmkhonto we Sizwe Party.

Raised inEmpangeni, Nhleko rose to prominence as the general secretary of theTransport and General Workers' Union from 1989 to 1993. He was elected to thefirst post-apartheid Parliament inMay 1994 and represented the ANC in theNational Assembly until September 2005. During that time, he served asChief Whip of the Majority Party from 2002 to 2004. From 2005 to 2014, he took a hiatus from legislative politics to work in business and public administration, including ascorrectional services commissioner in Kwa-Zulu-Natal and as director-general in theDepartment of Labour.

In May 2014, Nhleko returned to national government as Minister of Police, an office he held until March 2017. During this period, he made several controversial decisions, including recommending that Zuma should be absolved of personal liability inNkandlagate. After a cabinet reshuffle, he served as Minister of Public Works from March 2017 until February 2018, when he was sacked by Zuma's successor, PresidentCyril Ramaphosa. Thereafter he served as a backbencher in theNational Assembly until the2019 general election.

Nhleko was born on 10 October 1964^[1] in Ndabayakhe,^[2][3] a village nearKwaMbonambi in the formerNatal Province.^[4] He grew up in Matshana in nearbyEmpangeni.^[2] From 1982 to 1986, he attended Amangwe High School in Matshana, where he was active in student politics,^[5] but he did not matriculate: he failed his exams twice and missed a third sitting because he had been detained by theapartheid police.^[6]

After theend of apartheid, Nhleko nonetheless attended university; he completed a diploma inlabour law at the Graduate Institute of Management and Technology in 2007 and then a master's degree in leadership and change management atLeeds Metropolitan University in 2012.^[6]

Nhleko became active in thetrade union movement in the 1980s. He rose through the ranks of theTransport and General Workers' Union, an affiliate of theCongress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu), to become general secretary from 1989 to 1993.^[4]

In South Africa'sfirst post-apartheid elections in 1994, Nhleko was elected to theNational Assembly, the lower house of theSouth African Parliament.^[7] He represented theAfrican National Congress (ANC) but was nominated as a candidate by Cosatu, the ANC'sTripartite Alliance partner.^[4] Over the next two legislative terms, he held several positions in the assembly, including as a delegate to theJudicial Service Commission, chairperson of thePortfolio Committee on Public Service and Administration, and chairperson of the ANC parliamentary caucus.^[8][4]

In May 2002,^[9] Nhleko was appointed asChief Whip of the Majority Party after the incumbent,Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula, becameDeputy Minister of Home Affairs.^[10] The following year, theMail & Guardian named him as one of 20 politicians who would "emerge as key figures in our public life over the next 10 years"; according to the newspaper, he had "made a favourable impact as an efficient backroom organiser" in the National Assembly.^[11]

However, on 24 June 2004, shortly after the2004 general election, the ANC announced that, with immediate effect, Nhleko would be replaced as chief whip byMbulelo Goniwe. His demotion to the parliamentary backbenches was viewed as surprising, and he did not provide an explanation beyond saying that he had been "redeployed" by the national leadership of the ANC.^[9] After a year as a backbencher, Nhleko resigned from the National Assembly on 1 September 2005, ceding his seat toVusi Nhlapo.^[12] TheMail & Guardian lamented his departure from Parliament, saying that he (along withNed Kekana,Vusi Mavimbela, andRaenette Taljaard) had formerly "seemed poised to make it a site of interesting politics".^[13]

After his departure from legislative politics, Nhleko ran his own company.^[13] In 2006, he was appointed as regional commissioner ofcorrectional services inKwa-Zulu-Natal,^[4] in which capacity he oversawSchabir Shaik's release on medical parole.^[14] He went on to serve as deputy municipal manager inUmhlathuze Local Municipality and as head of the specialised anti-corruption unit in the nationalDepartment of Public Service and Administration.^[8][15]

On 24 May 2011, theDepartment of Labour announced that Nhleko had been appointed asdirector-general, succeedingJimmy Manyi.^[15] During his two years in that position, he was also rumoured to be the frontrunner to succeedBheki Cele asNational Police Commissioner,^[16] though he did not ultimately get the job.

In November 2013, theStar reported that he had been removed unceremoniously from his director-general post "following a breakdown in the relationship between him and Labour MinisterMildred Oliphant".^[17] Nhleko agreed that "challenges" between him and Oliphant "have made the relationship to be irreconcilable to an extent that I do not believe we can continue to work together".^[17] According to theMail & Guardian's sources, the centre of the row between Oliphant and Nhleko was the Compensation Fund, an agency under the department, and in particular the fact that Nhleko had launched a forensic investigation into the fund that was subsequently blocked by Oliphant.^[5] He left Oliphant's department on secondment to the Department of Public Service and Administration, pending a determination on his employment by the president;^[17] he ended up serving in the compliance department in the office ofLindiwe Sisulu, then theMinister of Public Service and Administration.^[5]

Nhleko's activities in the Department of Labour were later the subject of a large civil lawsuit, launched by a founding member of the Workers Association Union. The complainant, Thebe Maswabi, alleged that WAU had been established with the encouragement and funding of government agents, including Nhleko, who wanted the union to compete with theAssociation of Mineworkers and Construction Union, which was hostile to the ANC.^[18][19]

After the2014 general election, PresidentJacob Zuma announced that Nhleko would joinhis second-term cabinet asMinister of Police.^[20] During a parliamentary debate on Nhleko's first budget vote speech two months later,Dianne Kohler Barnard of the oppositionDemocratic Alliance wrongly accused Nhleko of having "left school somewhere in standard nine [and having] no further education"; she later said that she'd gotten this information from theWho's Who website.^[6][21]

Early in his tenure as minister, Nhleko made controversial changes in the leadership of theHawks, suspending Anwa Dramat as the unit's head and then appointing Berning Ntlemeza to replace Dramat.^[22] ThePretoria High Court later declared Ntlemeza's appointment invalid after an application by theHelen Suzman Foundation.^[23] Nhleko also established a multi-disciplinarypolice task force to investigate and seek to preventpolitical killings in South Africa, announced in June 2016.^[24]

However, Nhleko received the most attention as minister for his actions during the prolonged public controversy aboutsecurity upgrades at Zuma's Nkandla residence. Following thePublic Protector's report on the saga, which found Zuma personally liable to pay for the upgrades, Nhleko was appointed to conduct the government's own investigation. On 28 May 2015, he presented his findings to Parliament, recommending that Zuma should be absolved entirely and that the state should bear the cost of the upgrades. According to Nhleko, all of the upgrades – including a cattlekraal andparticularly controversial fire pool – were justifiable and even necessary security features.^[25] The National Assembly adopted Nhleko's report in August 2015,^[26] although theConstitutional Court later ruled, inEconomic Freedom Fighters v Speaker of the National Assembly, that the assembly had violated theConstitution in endorsing Nhleko's recommendations over those of the Public Protector.^[27]

In the interim, Nhleko elaborated on his defence of Zuma in other public forums,^[28] leading aMail & Guardian editorial to excoriate him for "merrily continu[ing] to make a fool of himself as he peddles lies and distortions to keep Zuma personally unaccountable for state spending at Nkandla".^[29] Nhleko had been viewed as part of Zuma's "inner circle" for some time,^[30] and by March 2016,City Press reported that Nhleko had become one of Zuma's "most dependable allies".^[31]

In March 2015, Nhleko suspendedRobert McBride as the head of theIndependent Police Investigative Directorate. McBride challenged the decision and won in September 2016, when the Constitutional Court ruled that Nhleko's decision was invalid.^[32] After the judgement was handed down, the Democratic Alliance called for Nhleko to resign.^[33]

Tensions between Nhleko and McBride remained. In December 2018, after Nhleko had left the ministry, McBride alleged in an affidavit to theZondo Commission that Nhleko had been involved in the establishment of 16-member covertparamilitary squad, recruited in 2016 and trained in thePeople's Republic of China. Nhleko had apparently helped the members of the squad gain employment in law enforcement agencies, including the Hawks and police crime intelligence.^[30] TheDaily Maverick said that he approached the newspaper to demand that they retract publication of McBride's allegations.^[34] According to McBride, the members of the squad, mostly from northern KwaZulu-Natal, had been recruited through Indoni, a youth moral regeneration movement founded by Nhleko's partner, Nomcebo Mthembu.^[30][35] There had earlier been reports that Indoni had done business with Nhleko's ministry.^[36] Following McBride's testimony, Nhleko himself was summoned to testify before the Zondo Commission; he concluded his testimony by maintaining that, "I always acted in the best interest of both the law and the public."^[37]

Just after midnight in the early hours of 31 March 2017, Zuma announced a controversial cabinet reshuffle that saw Nhleko appointed asMinister of Public Works.^[38] Nhleko announced a target of creating 1.4 millionjob opportunities in the 2017/2018 financial year throughthe department's extended public works programme and other schemes.^[39] However, he remained in the portfolio for less than a year: on 26 February 2018, he was sacked and replaced byThulas Nxesi. He was sacked byCyril Ramaphosa, who had recently replaced Zuma asPresident of South Africa.^[40]

Until then, Nhleko had served in the cabinet from outside Parliament; the day after Ramaphosa's reshuffle, on 27 February, he was sworn in to an ANC seat in the National Assembly, replacingMakhosi Khoza, who had been expelled from the party.^[41] As an ordinary Member of Parliament, Nhleko joined theStanding Committee on Finance, where he served until he left the National Assembly in the2019 general election.^[42]

In March 2024, Nhleko retired his ANC membership. In a resignation letter printed in theMail & Guardian, he said that the party's "current values and principles are not aligned to mine".^[43] The letter reserved special criticism for ANC secretary-generalFikile Mbalula, who had recently disowned Nhleko's handling of Nkandlagate^[44] and whom Nhleko accused of "bankruptcy, lunacy, and [a] defunct manner of thinking".^[43] He also criticised what he described as the ANC government's "dismantling" and privatisation ofstate-owned enterprises.^[43] Mbalula responded to the letter by redoubling his criticism of Nhleko,Tweeting that, "Indeed our revolution did produce villains,"^[45] and the ANC's KwaZulu-Natalprovincial secretary,Bheki Mtolo, was quoted as having said, "It's good riddance, it's long overdue."^[46]

Three weeks later, Nhleko was appointed as national organiser for former President Zuma's newly establishedUmkhonto we Sizwe Party (MK Party).^[47] He held that role during the party's2024 general election campaign,^[48] and, along withTom Moyane andSihle Ngubane, he was a member of the party's delegation to the post-election coalition negotiations.^[49]

Nhleko is a member of the eBuhleni faction of theShembe Church.^[50] He married Nothando Nkomo in a traditional Shembe wedding at theUniversity of Zululand in November 2014,^[51] though the couple reportedly separated in 2016.^[52]

• Mr Nkosinathi Nhleko at People's Assembly

• 1964 births
• Living people
• People from Empangeni
• Politicians from KwaZulu-Natal
• African National Congress politicians
• Government ministers of South Africa
• Members of the National Assembly of South Africa 2014–2019
• South African trade union leaders
• Alumni of Leeds Beckett University
• UMkhonto we Sizwe politicians
• Members of the National Assembly of South Africa 1994–1999
• Members of the National Assembly of South Africa 1999–2004

• Articles with short description
• Short description is different from Wikidata
• Use dmy dates from April 2022
• Date of birth not in Wikidata