Lindiwe Sisulu: Why do cabinet ministers who claim to find the actions or policies of the government they serve in intolerable never resign?

Minister Lindiwe Sisulu is not the first South African cabinet minister to continue serving in a government whose policies and actions they claim to abhor. She won’t be the last either. For as long as their supporters ignore the fact that such ministers are collectively responsible for the policies and actions of the government they serve in, and as long as supporters do not expect such ministers to act on their (real or purported) principles by resigning from the government, this will continue.

Much has been written about the recent article purportedly penned by minister Lindiwe Sisulu, in which she attacked the Rule of Law, slandered senior judges, and suggested that ANC politicians (presumably most of her colleagues in cabinet) have been co-opted by “colonised capital”, and only take “care of themselves and their families while those who put them there go to bed hungry, waiting for crumbs from the table”. (more…)