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Johannesburg - The outspoken Mzwanele (Jimmy) Manyi is, at the behest of the Gupta family, a strong candidate to become director general (DG) of mineral resources, Fin24's sister publication Rapport reported on Sunday.
Manyi, an ardent supporter of President Jacob Zuma, is also friends with the Guptas and even presented a talk show on their TV channel, ANN7.
He laughed when the Sunday newspaper, part of Netwerk24, questioned him on Friday about the Guptas and the position, and insisted that he knew nothing about it.
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Two impeccable sources in the government however confirmed that Manyi applied for the post and that he was being considered for it.
"There is strong pressure from the Guptas that he should get it," said one of the sources.
'Oversupply' of coloureds in the Cape
Manyi is especially infamous for the statement he made while chief spokesperson for the government in 2011 that there was an "oversupplyof coloureds" in the Western Cape, and that they should be redeployed to other provinces.
This sparked an outcry, including from Trevor Manuel, then minister in the presidency, who called Manyi a racist in an open letter.
The DG position has been vacant since February following the unexpected resignation of Thibedi Ramontja.
Ramontja announced his resignation in December, two months after Zuma replaced mineral resources minister Ngoako Ramatlhodi with Mosebenzi Zwane.
Within days after the resignation, it was announced that the Optimum coal mine had been sold to the Gupta- and Zuma-owned Tegeta Resources.
The transaction was closed in the weeks after Zwane met with Glencore's management at the company's headquarters in Baar, Switzerland. The Guptas were at Glencore's headquarters at the same time.
It was an open secret in the corridors of the department that Ramontja was not prepared to put up with the political interference Zwane caused in the department.
Manyi has in the past held two DG posts.
The first was DG of Labour, but he was fired by the then minister Membathisi Mdladlana in May 2011 for trying to persuade the Norwegian ambassador Tor Christian-Hilden to use him as an intermediary for the conclusion of contracts with members of the Black Business Council. Manyi was the BBC chairperson at the time.
Zuma fired Mdladlana a month later.
Shortly afterwards, Manyi was appointed DG of the government's information service in place of Themba Maseko, who earlier this year revealed that Zuma had asked him at the time to help the Guptas kickstart their newspaper, The New Age, by buying advertising space for government advertising in the newspaper.
Following this, Manyi was appointed the government's main spokesperson for two years, but his contract expired in August 2013 and was not renewed.
He had been involved in several black business organisations, but resigned from these posts when he became government spokesperson.
Since then he has established a new organisation - the Progressive Professionals Forum.
He is a busy and controversial user of Twitter, which he uses mainly to praise Zuma.
Manyi has a technikon diploma in economic geology and describes himself as a "chartered marketer".
* For this article and more news in Afrikaans, visit Netwerk24.
