Jacob Zuma: the rise and near fall of South Africa’s President.

In 2008, a year before becoming President, Jacob Zuma
faced 700 counts of corruption.(Getty)

After seven years in office building a bulwark against his opponents by loading pivotal posts with his cronies – and avoiding answering charges of corruption and fraud – the leader of the ANC may yet stand trial.

These are dark days for South Africa. Exports are falling; commodity prices are falling; the rand has slumped. The economy shrank by 1.2 per cent in the first quarter of 2016 alone: it is now only the continent’s third largest. Unemployment is at 26.7 per cent – an eight-year high – and business confidence is at its lowest for more than two decades.

Citizens are being urged to tighten their belts, drastically. But not everyone is suffering. Last month it emerged that the wives of president Zuma – he has four – have had 11 new cars bought for them in the past three years, for a combined cost of about 8.6m rand (£374,000). The money was supplied, helpfully, from the official budget of the police.

The President himself isn’t doing too badly, either. Months after the finance minister delivered a draconian austerity budget, the defence minister confirmed in May that the purchase will go ahead of a shining new presidential jet, whose value has been estimated at £1.75m.

After a decade of controversy, scathing court judgments, and allegations of political bullying and cronyism, the reputation of President Jacob Zuma seems to have hit an all-time low. A question that has been asked sporadically for years is now being asked constantly, in a deafening chorus of exasperation: how did Nelson Mandela’s dream of a ground-breaking democracy, of a prosperous, peaceful “rainbow” nation, come to be trampled on like this?


Ray Hartley.
Full story at Independent UK.