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Accumulated issues are building up against Zuma – court cases may be inevitable

Accumulated issues are building up against Zuma – court cases may be inevitable

29th September 2014

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It is a week of corruption-related intrigues and manoeuvring, among other questionable things, in South Africa. First The Sunday Times has revealed some more damning allegations against President Jacob Zuma regarding his alleged involvement in arms deal corruption. For the first time someone, in this case a “fixer” who acted for the French arms company Thales, confirmed under oath previous allegations that Zuma had allegedly received a bribe of R500,000 a year from Thales to help block a damaging corruption investigation into the company and Zuma, together with a donation of €1-million  (R14.3-million current exchange rate) to the ANC and other benefits that lasted until Zuma became president. The ANC and Zuma yesterday shrugged these allegations off as “nothing new”, yet Thales executive Pierre Moynot has reportedly confirmed much of it, the first time this has happened.

And this week Julius Malema, leader of the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF), will appear in court on corruption, fraud, money laundering and racketeering charges. Ironically this comes at a time when the erstwhile ANC Youth League leader and one-time defender (with his life) of Zuma has become one of Zuma’s most vocal critics in connection with the Nkandla millions, calling for Zuma’s arrest and imprisonment. Also ironically, more than 700 charges of mostly the same kind as those Malema faces, were dropped in Zuma’s case on a procedural technicality after Zuma’s lawyers mysteriously produced the so-called spy tapes.

And last month Zuma lost a five-year court battle to keep secret the spy tapes which were finally handed over to the Democratic Alliance (DA). This weekend The Sunday Times became the first newspaper to publish transcripts of the tapes, promising to reveal more on its website later in the week. The DA, EFF and other opposition parties have also withdrawn from the parliamentary ad hoc committee dealing with Public Protector (PP) Thuli Madonsela’s report on the R246-million “security upgrade” at Zuma’s private home at Nkandla, KwaZulu-Natal. This was after the majority ANC members of the committee refused to call Zuma to appear before the committee and reduced the PP’s report to carrying the same weight two government reports - requested by Zuma’s then security cluster ministers and by himself – which have widely been rejected as cover-up attempts.

And the Zuma-appointed Seriti Commission of Inquiry that is ostensibly probing corruption in South Africa’s  Strategic Defence Procurement Packages has been seriously discredited by key legal personnel resigning and key public figures withdrawing from testifying before it, all making claims that suggest a cover-up. Pressure is also mounting on the government to release full details of Zuma’s secretive “nuclear power deal” apparently concluded with Russia, with opposition parties and others crying foul, demanding transparency and saying it will lend itself to corruption on a huge scale.

·  What to make of it: The sum total of all these developments is that the pressure on Zuma to face the music – and be forced from office – is now much bigger than just being driven by the Nkandla scandal. It is becoming unbearably big. All of Zuma’s alleged past and present sins, starting with the 2007 ANC national conference at which Thabo Mbeki was crudely ousted with the help of Malema and others, are coming together in one big push. Inevitably something has to give. Logic suggests that it no longer is a question of when will the ANC give him the boot, or when will he have his day in court, but rather which will happen first.

Everything points to the inevitability of much of this ending up in court. The contents of the spy tapes – if they are as revealing and damning as claimed - could well be used for the corruption and other charges against Zuma to be reinstated. Every legally prescribed avenue for dealing with the PP’s Nkandla report has been exhausted or blocked by Zuma and the ANC, leaving only the courts as last resort. From reported legal opinion it seems that the withdrawal of the opposition parties from the ad hoc committee paves the way for court actions. Legal opinion also seems to suggest that testimony given under oath and reported by The Sunday Times relating to the arms deal and fingering Zuma, can only be legally and conclusively disputed in a court of law. With the Seriti Commission allegedly failing to give full and fair expression to its mandate, and with claims that it is compromised and has a hidden agenda, that process too could arguably give weight to alternative legal actions being instituted.

However, there is one big problem. Much of the criminal justice system that would have to deal with this – from unravelling the truth, conducting further investigations, instituting criminal charges or other legal steps, to hearing any resulting cases – has been seriously compromised since the advent of the Zuma era in 2007. Heads of the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) who sought to prosecute Zuma were removed and replaced with ones allegedly more positively disposed towards him (barring perhaps the most recent appointee). The very effective independent special investigative unit the Scorpions, that had first investigated Zuma, was disbanded and replaced by the arguably far less effective and certainly not independent police unit under ministerial control, the Hawks. The very professional and effective Public Protector has effectively been undermined, disempowered and even publicly discredited by the ANC and Zuma. On at least one occasion a  court order that could have put pressure on Zuma has blatantly been ignored without any punitive action resulting. Even the body that effectively appoints judges has been compromised by political appointees and manoeuvring, while questions were also raised by many about the suitability of the current chief justice that was appointed by Zuma. And the key security and justice cluster ministers appointed by Zuma have repeatedly been drawn from among his inner circle of loyalists, mostly from his home province and the underground networks he once controlled in the liberation struggle era. Parliament with its ANC majority and allegedly biased Speaker have also been undermined and compromised as fair and effective arbiters, while the Nkandla ad hoc committee is equally compromised. Any reasonable person would think all of this taken together renders Zuma just about untouchable. That certainly is the impression he and his close advisers and backers are giving. After replacing its head and reconstituting it, the one-time independent and effective Special Investigative Unit (SIU) has become something of a tool of the president, appointed and instructed by him.

However, only this past week clear signs emerged from the ANC that a succession race for the next ANC and state president is already under way in the ANC. This means old loyalties will succumb to new alliances, making Zuma’s position less secure. There have also been growing signs of discomfort and even outright annoyance among some in the ANC over Zuma’s many controversies. And the so-called Russian nuclear deal also upset many in the ANC as Zuma played this one solitaire without informing key people whose noses were badly out of joint as a result. There is probably more. But what this means is, Zuma’s support networks could be under pressure, even start crumbling. Which also means the criminal justice system and key officials could be affected. Taken to the next level, this means Zuma, or the activities closely associated with him, could well end up in court. Such a court case/cases could easily drag on for the next two years at least. The ANC faces crucial municipal elections in two years’ time when it will seek to undo its urban losses of  this year’s general election. Having Zuma around in these elections, especially if he is publicly being dissected in a court of law with accompanying negative media attention, may just prove to be too much for the ANC and Zuma could be shown

Written by Africa-International Communications political analyst and editor Stef Terblanche

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