Professor Koos Malan’s piece, published in The Common Sense over the weekend, is a disappointing exercise in ideological distortion that confuses reckless libertarian cosplay for genuine constitutionalism. Malan ignores the hard, practical work we have been doing since I assumed office in 2024.

Instead of engaging with the facts of South Africa’s most serious animal disease challenge in decades, he chooses to clumsily paint a weak and unconvincing picture of me and my colleagues as “African National Congress (ANC)-light” totalitarians at war with the private sector. Nothing could be further from the truth.

From day one, I have treated the private sector and organised agriculture as indispensable partners — not obstacles — in the fight against foot-and-mouth disease (FMD). In July 2025 I convened a major FMD Indaba that, for the very first time, brought together government, veterinarians, researchers, and industry stakeholders. This directly led to the appointment of a ministerial task team that was deliberately structured with 50% private-sector specialists, including private veterinarians and experts from dairy, beef, feedlots, diagnostics, and export sectors.

We followed that with an industry coordination council dominated by bodies such as the Milk Producers’ Organisation (MPO), Red Meat Producers’ Organisation, AgriSA, TLU SA, the African Farmers’ Association of South Africa, and others to drive implementation and monitoring.

Record

The record of private-sector involvement since I became minister speaks for itself:

• •For the first time, industry bodies were permitted to purchase vaccines. The Red Meat Industry Services purchased hundreds of thousands of vaccines for their members. The MPO purchased and rolled out 50 000 vaccine doses to KwaZulu-Natal dairy farmers at their own cost in late 2025. I publicly thanked them and described such initiatives as “exactly the type of partnerships our country needs”. They have continued to play a leading logistical role in distribution.
• •We have authorised dozens of private veterinarians – 64 in the Free State alone – to administer vaccines under the national framework, because the state simply does not have the capacity to vaccinate the national herd at the required scale on its own.
• •Red Meat Industry Services and other industry players have made tangible contributions to funding, logistics, and rollout.
• •For the first time the vaccine monopoly in South Africa has been broken and private sector players are importing vaccines into the country.
• •We restarted local FMD vaccine production at the ARC Onderstepoort facility for the first time in over 20 years, while securing the largest-ever single imports of vaccines (including million-dose consignments) through public-private partnerships with international suppliers.
• •The national strategy I announced in January 2026 explicitly relies on industry for distribution, traceability, awareness campaigns, and on-the-ground delivery, while government handles procurement of quality-assured vaccines supplied free to farmers.

This is not statism. This is responsible governance of a notifiable, highly contagious disease listed under the Animal Diseases Act as one requiring coordinated state oversight to protect the entire national herd, our export markets, and food security.

Unregulated, fragmented private procurement and administration – the specific demand advanced by Sakeliga and the Southern Africa Agri Initiative (SAAI) – risks introducing mismatched vaccine strains, breaking zoning and movement controls, spreading the disease further, and jeopardising South Africa’s international disease status. That is not “vigorous civic sector” action; it is a threat to biosecurity discipline at a time when we are trying to stabilise and then eradicate the current outbreak and regain our FMD-free status (lost in 2019) over a 10-year phased plan.

Regulatory Authority

The Pretoria High Court has already affirmed the department’s regulatory authority and declined the urgent unregulated relief sought by the litigants. Even in that context, we tabled a formal scheme for greater private participation (subject to veterinary oversight and quality controls), and the court has directed us to finalise aspects of it. We remain committed to lawful private-sector involvement – we have been all along – but it must occur within a coordinated national framework, not as a free-for-all.

I have never denied the frustration many farmers feel. The outbreak has caused real pain and economic loss. But turning this into a culture-war caricature does not help. Nor does Malan’s attempt to equate basic biosecurity regulation with ANC-style totalitarianism.

Constitutionalism is not anarchy or the absence of state coordination on public goods like disease control. It is the rule of law, checks and balances, and effective governance that empowers citizens and businesses rather than abandoning them to chaos.

The Democratic Alliance has always stood for a vibrant private sector, clean government, and opposition to ANC overreach and cadre deployment. That is precisely why, wherever we govern, delivery is better and corruption is the exception.

In this portfolio I am applying the same principle: harness every ounce of private capacity, deregulate, liberalise, break monopolies, all while maintaining the discipline needed to beat FMD and restore South Africa’s agricultural competitiveness.

I invite Professor Malan – and the organisations with which he is actively involved (something he conveniently failed to disclose!) – to drop the ideological grandstanding and work with us inside the tent. The private sector has been central to the FMD fight under my watch from the beginning.

Let’s focus on results: more vaccines, faster rollout, stricter biosecurity, and ultimately a healthier national herd. South African farmers and the economy deserve nothing less.