In September 2008, he was appointed to the cabinet of President Kgalema Motlanthe, who named him as Minister of Intelligence.

[2] Between 1984 and 1990, he served in underground structures of the African National Congress (ANC), which at the time was banned by the apartheid government.

[1] He was a backbencher, again representing the KwaZulu-Natal constituency, until after the 2004 general election, when the ANC nominated him to chair the Joint Standing Committee on Intelligence.

[4] On 25 September 2008, recently elected President Kgalema Motlanthe announced that Cwele would be appointed to his cabinet as Minister of Intelligence, a position vacated by the resignation of Ronnie Kasrils.

At the commission, three top SSA officials – Mo Shaik, Mzuvukile Maqetuka, and Gibson Njenje – testified that Cwele had obstructed investigations into the influence of the Gupta family and into Arthur Fraser's use of a slush fund to operate the controversial Principal Agent Network.

[14] However, the final report of the Zondo Commission largely accepted the officials' account, concluding that Cwele had obstructed both investigations in order to protect President Zuma's interests.

[22] He was retained in the cabinet when Ramaphosa replaced Zuma as President of South Africa in February 2018.

His own former portfolio was merged back into the newly renamed Ministry of Communications of Digital Technologies, to be led by Cwele's former deputy, Stella Ndabeni-Abrahams.

[17] However, after the election, he was sacked from Ramaphosa's second cabinet; Aaron Motsoaledi was appointed to replace him as Minister of Home Affairs.

[17]After Cwele resigned from frontline politics, President Ramaphosa designated him as South African Ambassador to China.