The Betty Ford Connection: Mbeki's Recruitment Secret Revealed

It can now be told: Thabo Mbeki has recruited several ministers, deputy-ministers and directors-general from fellow pisscats he met at the Betty Ford Clinic in the US. In this way he hoped to conceal the dirty little secret of his alcoholism.

Mbeki has been in local clinics and the BFC in California to recover from whisky-drinking binges that have got him into embarrassing situations on more than one occasion. Memorably, one Saturday night in 2002 he was arrested for "driving suspiciously" with three blonde prostitutes in his vehicle. The incident occurred near the Morningside Clinic in Sandton.

On several occasions Mbeki has been shipped of to the BFC to dry out, where he bumped into Manto Tshabalala-Msimang (he later appointed her and health minister) and Bongi Njobe-Mbulelo (who drank her way through her term as D-G of agriculture).

Another of Mbeki's BFC recruits is Dr Nkosazana Dlamini Zuma, foreign affairs minister, recently seen on television paralytic and barely able to speak when asked to address a crowd about "events in Zimbabwe".

Dipsomaniac couple Charles Nqakula (safety and security minister) and Nosiviwe Mapisa Nqakula (home affairs minister) hit the double jackpot when they ran into Mbeki at the BFC juice bar early in 2003.

* WATCH THIS SPACE FOR FURTHER BFC RECRUITMENT REVELATIONS