For South African President Cyril Ramaphosa, a two-year-old corruption scandal known locally as ‘Farmgate’ has unexpectedly resurfaced, bringing with it the very real threat of impeachment proceedings that could cut short his final term in office. The controversy centers on an unreported 2020 theft of roughly $580,000 in hidden U.S. cash found stashed inside a sofa at Ramaphosa’s private Phala Phala game ranch, a property the president owns outside the capital.
The scandal first came to public light in 2022, when a former director of South Africa’s State Security Agency filed an official police report revealing the theft and levying serious accusations against Ramaphosa, including money laundering, improper conduct, and a deliberate cover-up. According to the accuser, Ramaphosa deployed his personal security detail to hush up the 2020 incident to hide the existence of the undeclared cash, rather than reporting the crime through official law enforcement channels.
Ramaphosa has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing, offering his own account of the origin of the funds. A prominent wealthy businessman before entering politics, with a long-documented passion for game and livestock breeding, the president says the cash came from the private sale of buffalo from his ranch to foreign buyers. He explained that a staff member had stashed the money under the sofa cushions out of concern that the property’s shared safe was accessible to multiple on-site workers, adding that he had notified the head of his official presidential police protection unit immediately after the theft was discovered.
Following the 2022 public revelations, South Africa’s Parliament appointed an independent investigative panel to probe the allegations. The panel’s final report concluded that there was credible preliminary evidence of serious misconduct by Ramaphosa. It noted that the president failed to officially report the theft through standard legal channels, that the source of the large cache of foreign cash had not been properly verified, and that the total sum involved could be far larger than the $580,000 Ramaphosa has acknowledged. The report also added that Ramaphosa allegedly exploited his presidential office by contacting then-Namibian President Hage Geingob to help secretly track a theft suspect who had fled across the border into the neighboring country. The panel formally recommended that Parliament launch a full impeachment inquiry.
Ramaphosa survived the first attempt at impeachment in late 2022, when his party, the African National Congress (ANC), held an outright parliamentary majority and voted as a bloc to reject the panel’s findings and dismiss calls for an inquiry. But two major opposition parties immediately challenged the parliamentary vote in the Constitutional Court, South Africa’s highest judicial body, arguing that the process violated constitutional procedure and that the panel’s evidence mandated the formation of a special impeachment investigation committee.
Earlier this month, the Constitutional Court ruled in favor of the opposition, overturning the 2022 parliamentary vote and clearing the way for impeachment proceedings to move forward. Parliament has already confirmed it will establish the required investigative committee as ordered by the court.
The president has moved quickly to push back against the revived proceedings. State broadcaster SABC confirmed this week that Ramaphosa has formally filed court documents challenging the independent panel’s findings, which he says contain “grave flaws.” He has repeatedly stated he has no intention of resigning from office.
Under South Africa’s constitution, removing a sitting president via impeachment requires a two-thirds majority vote from the 400-seat National Assembly. While the ANC lost its absolute parliamentary majority in the 2024 general election, the party still holds enough seats to unilaterally block any impeachment motion against Ramaphosa. The 73-year-old president is currently serving his final allowed term, which is scheduled to conclude in 2029.