Top six share blame for Zuma’s impunity

The ANC missed an opportune moment in March 2016, when it failed to take any meaningful action after the Constitutional Court delivered its stinging judgment on Nkandla.

Any pretence at self-correction was betrayed by the governing party rallying around President Jacob Zuma.

The apologies from Zuma and the ANC for the “confusion caused” by the Nkandla debacle left a bitter aftertaste with the electorate.

On March 31, the nation watched as Chief Justice Mogoeng Mogoeng, flanked by other Constitutional Court justices, read out the judgment that left no doubt about the public protector’s powers and the need to comply with the office’s remedial action.

The judgment was widely hailed as cautious, clear and decisive in equal measure in dealing with the delicate legal and political issues.

The highest court in the country was cautious in its handling of the legalities in the case as it had to perform a balancing act that ensured it did not encroach on the executive and Parliament’s discretionary powers. But the Constitutional Court did not miss a beat in also delivering a skilful rebuke of the executive and Parliament for their appalling handling of the Nkandla scandal.

As the ANC and Zuma scrambled to put their own spin on the judgment, the EFF, DA and the United Democratic Movement basked in the glory as the opposition scored a major moral political victory against the governing party.

The court left no doubt about whose shortcomings — executive excesses and Parliament inaction — had led to the Nkandla issue dragging on needlessly.

As if to mark the anniversary of that judgment, Zuma effected a wide-ranging cabinet reshuffle at the end of March 2017. The fallout is still being felt.

Zuma got rid of Pravin Gordhan, whose ministry had to calculate the sum the president had to repay to the state, in a symbolic broadside to his detractors.

On both occasions, Gwede Mantashe, Cyril Ramaphosa, Baleka Mbete, Jessie Duarte and Zweli Mkhize, as the figureheads of the ANC collective, stood by Zuma and went about business as usual.

Mbete, as National Assembly speaker and head of the legislative arm of the state, did not fare well when the Constitutional Court judgment on Nkandla was made. It was on her watch that Parliament displayed a flagrant disregard for its oversight role by allowing the adoption of woefully inadequate reports in the legislature: that of Public Works Minister Nathi Nhleko, which was preceded by the “firepool” spectacle, and the ad hoc committee on Nkandla’s questionable assessment of the upgrades to Zuma’s home.

Ramaphosa, as the leader of government business, did not cover himself in glory either. Mbete and Ramaphosa, more so than Mantashe and Duarte, should be held to a higher standard because of the key positions they hold, but both have fallen way short of what is expected of them.

However, the entire top six should be held accountable for the current state of affairs, which is characterised by the president’s cavalier disregard for governance.

Not even the ANC’s dismal performance in the August local government elections could spook it into conducting meaningful introspection.

The ANC often speaks of and invokes its internal processes and tradition whenever a crisis unfolds, but with each successive failure to rise to the occasion, the governing party is building a case against itself.

It missed the Nkandla moment and repeated the exercise in the March reshuffle. How many more moments will it miss before realising that it is cornering itself into irrelevance?