South Africa

It appears that the curious case of Cape Judge John Hlophe might reach its resolution soon one way or the other. Hlophe has been accused of trying to influence judges on the Constitutional Court to rule favorably for Jacob Zuma in one of the stages of the ANC President’s corruption case. Hlophe has applied to the Witwatersrand Local Division asking that the court have the Constitutional Court’s actions ruled invalid. That hearing, the first of its kind in the country’s history, was to take place today.

If the court grants Hlophe’s application, this sordid little incident will represent little more than a footnote in South Africa’s always lively political history. But if Hlophe suffers defeat his case will almost certainly provide part of a chaotic backdrop against which Zuma’s political hopes will play out.

Jacob Zuma would like to have the corruption charges against him thrown out. Barring that, he hopes that a policy of delay will buy him time to find a way out of his crisis. He knows that in some circles among his allies and among those who have not taken sides there is a hope that there is some way out of this mess that will not destabilize the ANC further, and thus destabilize South African politics and society.

Judge Chris Nicholson on Tuesday announced that his decision on whether to toss the corruption charges (per Zuma’s application) will not be made until next month. In the interregnum Zuma, his lawyers, and his political supporters (and probably not a few of his detractors) will feverishly work on finding some compromise, pulling some levers, and finding some rabbits to pull from hats in order to stave off what in ordinary circumstances might seem like an inevitable trial that may well not go well for the country’s presumed next president.

Jacob Zuma desperately wants to avoid the corruption charges that he faces. The talk when I was in South Africa was that the charges would be thrown out, less on the merits than out of a sense of expediency. At the same time, Zuma needs the charges either to go away or to be weakened to the point where he can reasonably argue that he faces a political witch hunt. Conviction on charges that have sent some of his alleged co-conspirators to prison would presumably sound the death knell for his presidential ambitions.

For all of these reasons, today’s decision by South Africa’s Constitutional Court that the search and seizure of Zuma’s property was proper looms as a particularly grim defeat, especially coming as it does just days before Zuma’s lawyers are going to try to have the corruption charges against him dismissed. The court also dismissed Zuma’s appeal to stop the National Prosecution Authority (NPA) from utilizing documents that had been part of the case against Zuma’s convicted former financial advisor Schabir Sheik on charges of fraud and corruption similar to those the ANC leader now faces.

Even more ominous for Zuma, the first decision came with only one dissent. The second was unanimous. Thus the country’s highest court, which has for some time been presumed to be pretty evenly split along, for lack of a better conceptual framework, Zuma-Mbeki lines now appears to be fairly united in terms of its attempts to focus on the matters of law in the Zuma case. The Constituional crisis that many observers thought might come to pass as the result of the supposed divisions on the court appear to have been dramatically overstated or else have been ameliorated for the greater good. Either way, Jacob Zuma is having a bad day.

Crises tend to escalate quickly in South Africa. Just weeks ago there were precious few South Africans who could have identified John Hlophe, the Cape Judge President. Now he is at the center of a row over his alleged involvement in the ongoing arms scandal that some are calling “the greatest showdown in South Africa’s legal history.” Let us assume that this charge is hyperbolic – from the Treason Trials to Jacob Zuma’s forthcoming charges related to those Hlophe faces, the country has not lacked for legal drama, especially in the era after 1948. Nonetheless, the fact that it can be written speaks to the gravity of this crisis.

The ANC is standing behind Hlophe, who adamantly rejects all of the charges, nationally as well as in some of the provinces.  As usual in South Africa, it is difficult to discern where justice, loyalty, and politics converge and where they separate. One tends to assume that all decisions are in some way political. Whether that is cynicism or realism talking, I’ll let readers decide. 

Jacob Zuma is in trouble. Yesterday Constitutional Court Justice Zac Yacoob announced that he had “no difficulty” with the justifications that the state put forth to justify the search and seizure operations it conducted on Zuma and his attorneys’ homes and offices and that the “creative conspiracy” Jacob Zuma was allegedly involved in justified broad investigation. Even before the Constitutional Court levied its ruling state lawyers accused Zuma of attempting to “delay justice” by his gambit of challenging the state’s evidence and the National Prosecuting Authority accused Zuma’s seemingly desperate machinations and attacks against the state (the very state he hopes to lead) of “[giving] the administration of justice a bad name.”

(Zapiro, Mail & Guardian, 11 March 2008) 

So what now? Well, although Zuma still has his defenders, and presumably will marshall those supporters through his trial, scheduled for August, things do not look good for the embattled president of the ANC. And presumably even if his base sticks with him, Zuma is destined to lose a lot of his soft support or those who, even if they do not consider themselves loyalists, were willing to go along with his ascension. The NPA appears confident that it will successfully prosecute Zuma and that he will be convicted.  If that happens, all hell will almost certainly break loose, at least in the short run. Even now the business community is jittery and South Africa’s international reputation has taken a hit, whether fairly or not.

So, now what? Well, the legal process still has to play out, and one assumes that Zuma will continue to put up a fight given that his freedom and his political life are at risk. But it does not take a lot of imagination to see the political buzzards circling Zuma’s corpse before long, even if he emerges unscathed from his trial but humiliated and weakened, which seems inevitable. Zuma does not strike me as the type to resign, but would the ANC call for a special conference, a revisitation of Polokwane? And who will emerge to challenge Zuma? Nkosozana Dlamini-Zuma? Tokyo Sexwale? Or perhaps my long-suspected coyly reluctant candidate, Cyril Ramaphosa?

Whatever happens, my guess is that the schadenfreude is barely hidden at Tuynhuys, where Thabo Mbeki probably wears a guilty smile on his lips today. The beleaguered President has taken quite a beating of late at the hands of Zuma and his supporters. This must seem like apt poetic justice.  

Jacob Zuma’s day in court has come. Well, not the big day that everyone anticipates, but the ANC’s president and South Africa’s presumed successor to Thabo Mbeki has appeared before the Constitutional Court to determine which documents might be able to be used against Zuma (and the French arms company, Thint) and which may be excluded. The question swings on whether the Scorpions search and seizure that secured the documents in 2005 was legitimate. The final decision will inevitably play a huge  role in Zuma’s corruption case. Exclusion would represent a major victory for Zuma and a defeat for the state. But if the court allows the documents to be included, Zuma’s defense might be in trouble.

In the meantime, Zuma recently gave an extensive and wide-ranging interview to the Financial Times last week in which one of the central issues was the seemingly contested nature of internal ANC politics. The tone of the interview (or at least the interviewer) and a story that accompanied it  raised the ire of the ANC and its spokesman Jessie Duartie, who felt the need to write in to the Financial Times with a rejoinder. Zuma and his people seem to have had to clarify comments to the media quite regularly of late, which brings about the question of the kind of relationship Zuma and the ANC will have with the press during a Zuma presidency. Naturally much depends on the outcome of his trial, but even Thabo Mbeki had a honeymoon period with the media, however short it must have seemed from Mbeki’s perspective.

Well, this cannot be good for Jacob Zuma. Schabir Shaik has admitted that he bribed the ANC president “with the intention to corrupt him.” Shaik, who has been convicted of corruption charges, is hardly an unimpeachable witness. And his testimony is not sufficient to put Zuma in a jackpot. But it hardly helps. And Zuma’s prospects cannot be enhanced when officers of the court such as Advocate Wim Trengove asserting, “In the end, Mr Shaik bribed Mr Zuma for his protection, and intervention and political influence.”

There is a new story about political intrigue, firings, scandal, corruption, and crime reverberating through South Africa with the issue of an arrest warrant and suspension of National Police Commissioner (and head of Interpol) Jackie Selebi. This might represent Thabo Mbeki’s stiffest political challenge yet, which is in itself saying something. 

The Mail & Guardian editorializes hopefully on the prospects of Africans developing African solutions to African problems, using the Ibrahim Index  as a springboard and less hopefully on the Salebi mess.

Meanwhile, recent data from an internal ANC audit of party membership indicates that Jacob Zuma is the front-runner for the party’s presidency. One wonders if this sort of news might not hasten Cyril Ramaphosa to leave the private sector and return to public service. Ramaphosa, who has remained steadfast that he will not run for the ANC leadership, stands as my (mild) upset candidate to emerge with the party and national presidency. 

What are the odds of reforming Nigeria’s corruption ridden oil industry? The Economist lays out the long odds.

The Boston Globe has an editorial about how scientists increasingly can trace DNA — “genetic markers” – to tell us a great deal about not only the origins but also the movement of human beings from our earliest origins in Africa to today.

Is South Africa indifferent to the Darfur crisis? Pambazuka News believes so. There is little question that the country ought to be doing more to address the situation. Also at PN, Rotimi Sankore presents a rather sophisticated cri de couer about the Zimbabwe situation in which, ultimately, Robert Mugabe’s endless reign of power is the crucial problem.