Unlike Mbeki, Zuma is treated like an irresponsible child

Ican never quite figure out if the idea of shared accountability means anything. Whenever someone points fingers at President Jacob Zuma as personally responsible for the economic mess SA has become, the quick response is usually that he is a symptom, not a cause, of some wider systemic failure that others are responsible for. That failure can be pinned on the ANC or on postapartheid governance or even on global economic and political developments.

But if we are to claim that Zuma is a symptom rather than a cause, we have to make some uncomfortable assumptions. One is that Zuma somehow lacks agency; that he does not have any authority or power to make active decisions of his own; that his actions are somehow predetermined by the system or conditions in which he finds himself.

That would be a very strange view to hold, as it simultaneously defends the president and condemns him. Would we ever say the same of Thabo Mbeki, that his decisions were somehow not his to make and inevitable given the environment he found himself in? Does anyone seriously believe we should hold anyone but Mbeki accountable for his decisions to frustrate the roll-out of antiretroviral treatment, which led to so many unnecessary deaths?

Alongside that black mark, should he also be credited with driving the economy to its best postapartheid economic performance? In the case of Mbeki, it seems we are quite willing to grant him agency on those fronts. In the case of Zuma, many baulk at doing the same.

And therein lies the condemnation. As SA hurtles towards a severe economic recession, with GDP in the first quarter contracting 0.7% — soon to be made far worse by further downgrades of our debt — some commentators are trying to spread around the responsibility. In doing so we seem to be saying that Zuma is too weak, too compromised, too incapable to really be held responsible for the calamity we find ourselves in.

Such thinking imagines Zuma as a child who can’t really be held responsible for smashing an ornament an adult stupidly left within his reach. In contrast, Mbeki was an adult and fully responsible for his actions, both the failures and achievements.

This seems to me to be deeply misguided.

Even if Zuma is little more than a vassal for instructions from Saxonwold, it was his choice to become that. The Constitution invests significant power in the position of president and the person who exercises that power has full legal responsibility for doing so.

When Zuma made the decision in 2016 to instruct then finance minister Pravin Gordhan to abandon an investment roadshow to return to SA and, a few days later, to fire him, it was his decision alone. He might have made it because of the pressure he was put under by the Guptas or the Russians or other actors, but that does not change the fact that it was he who ultimately made that decision.

He is no child, no creation of systems or forces around him, but a fully sentient conscious being who made decisions that are and will continue to drive the country towards an economic catastrophe.

And one day, if he is still around to face the music, he will be held accountable. Just as the legacy of Mbeki has been constantly picked over, so will Zuma’s. Even if some sort of amnesty is given to him, public opinion will not let him off. Even if he receives billions to go, to add to the mountains of cash that apparently have been parked for him in Dubai, it will be a life of constant public condemnation that will face him.

Mbeki will never escape the millstones of his misguided policy on HIV/AIDS and Zimbabwe, despite his significant achievements on other fronts.

There is even less ambiguity about Zuma, who has no achievements at all to distract from the unmitigated disaster that has been his presidency. The public will never let him off. If he ever does accept an amnesty of the kind some in the ANC are apparently thinking up to ease him out, it will be cold comfort.

Politics being what it is, one day a government will come to power on a slate that includes holding Zuma accountable no matter what deal is done now. Just look at Brazil.

But just as Zuma is an agent who must be held responsible, so too must we be held responsible. Every South African has allowed Zuma to do what he has done and continues to do so.

We have the agency and the power to resist. We have the vote, but we have much more. We can speak out. Our prosecutors, investigators, journalists, accountants, civil servants, business people all have agency and space to take action within their own domains. Some have done so admirably. Others have failed miserably. They too should be held accountable.

A system is really just groups of people behaving in certain ways. Accountability resides in the people who can each be asked what they as individuals have done. We will be asking for many years into the future .

HE IS NO CHILD, NO CREATION OF SYSTEMS OR FORCES AROUND HIM, BUT A FULLY SENTIENT CONSCIOUS BEING