Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa has been accused of reckless politicking by the opposition Democratic Alliance (DA) for praising the South African Democratic Teachers’s Union (Sadtu) in an apparent bid to win its support for his drive to become the leader of the African National Congress (ANC).

“The DA condemns Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa’s self-serving praise of Sadtu over the weekend,” DA education spokesperson Gavin Davis said.

“Cosying up to Sadtu may help Ramaphosa’s chances in the ANC’s leadership election, but it hurts the prospects of poor children who suffer in an education system captured by Sadtu bosses.”

Ramaphosa told Sadtu’s KwaZulu-Natal congress the union had been a boon, and not a burden, to the country.

“Some people don’t like strong unions, but the ANC does,” he told delegates.

Davis said this flew in the face of persistent concerns that the union was exercising a stranglehold on education, which were backed up by the findings of a ministerial task team set up to investigate the so-called “jobs for cash” scandal.

According to the task team, the department effectively controlled only six of the country’s nine provinces and where its authority was weak, unions determined “policies, priorities and appointments”.