Remember the undignified end of a hero
There is a terrible tradition of African leaders going with dignity. Possibly the most egregious example was Ugandan military leader Idi Amin, who was responsible for perhaps 300,000 deaths and spent the final years of his life at the Novotel Hotel in Saudi Arabia.
To take a more recent example, the same rules of departure were apparently applicable to Zimbabwe’s Robert Mugabe, who keeps his egregious wealth.
The mechanics are simple. People are so relieved to see the back of a corrupt leader that they are prepared to trade a future of luxury for the tyrant in exchange for the possibility that his departure will create a better future. Perversely, it is often a sensible trade. But it does create a weird incentive for tyrants to become so awful that their populations will give anything to see them go.
Part of the deal often involves a process of deliberate forgetting and, perhaps, forgiving. The trade doesn’t work if people want revenge, so the only alternative is to sweep as much of the history under the carpet as quickly as possible. South Africans are past masters at that.
The passing of the Zuma era is an extremely lightweight version of this phenomenon but it has some of the same characteristics. Ironically, the ANC has a huge incentive to support the notion of “going with dignity” and indulging in the art of forgetting too. It would prefer not to be reminded of its role as an accomplice. So expect a lot of statements containing the words “respect”, “honour”, “dignity” and so on.
But as an example of just how hollow those words will sound, I would like to pay my respects to Moses Chaka, formally an auditor in the Free State agriculture department, now dead, after being dragged behind a bakkie. Over the years, investigative journalism unit amaBhungane has reported on the death of Chaka, who died in February 2013 because doctors apparently weren’t able to stop the bleeding from his extensive wounds. No definitive link has been discovered yet between Chaka and the infamous Vrede dairy farm, but the circumstantial evidence is enormously suspicious.
First, Chaka was responsible for examining the department’s expenditure, including the project in which Guptacontrolled company Estina obtained a rent-free, 99-year lease on the Krynaauwslust farm outside Vrede, the hometown of then agriculture MEC Mosebenzi Zwane.
Second, the year before Zwane had championed the project and, according to media reports at the time, Chaka was “asking questions” about it.
Third, the investigation into Chaka’s murder has been more than unusual. At first, it was going well, according to a member of the family to whom amaBhungane spoke. Then all of a sudden they were told it had become “complicated”. Every time the case was submitted to an inquest court, the presiding officer sent it back because the police had not spoken to some crucial witness or other.
Chaka was lured to his death by a late-night call to his cellphone, but police weren’t able to get the phone records. Then they did get them. But the person who phoned Chaka denied having anything to do with the case, and that is apparently where it ended. By the one account we have available, Chaka was a remarkable man. He got his job after his efforts to restore financial order to the Setsoto municipality, which hit the news following the death of activist Andries Tatane in 2011. He was known for his tough anticorruption stance.
The rest of the story we now know because of the Gupta leaks e-mails (not, incidentally, because of the public protector’s investigation, which was released on Friday and adds zero to our knowledge of what happened). The project was showered with money, perhaps R200m over the years, most of which went missing. The 400 cows bought for the project are apparently dead.
Specifically, R30m that was supposed to go to the dairy project was diverted through a web of Gupta-related firms to Dubai and back, all audited by KPMG, to pay for the wedding of Vega Gupta and Aakash Jahajgarhia in 2013. Zwane, now in charge of one of SA’s most crucial industries as mineral resources minister, was still a Free State MEC.
The Estina case is crucial because, as you might imagine, if you are involved in a criminal enterprise it is a good idea to act through agents and keep your own name out of it. Some of the frauds that suckered Eskom and Transnet have no Gupta name attached to them, although the links are obvious.
But perhaps because of the personal nature of the wedding and the urgent need to splash money, the Estina case is crucial not only because it is such an egregious case of fraud, but because it’s the one case where the Guptas’ signatures are on the documents.
John Le Carre wrote in one of his novels that in times of trouble, “one must think like a hero to behave like a merely decent human being”.
Chaka proves that dictum. When Zuma “goes with dignity”, think of him.
THE ANC HAS A HUGE INCENTIVE TO SUPPORT THE NOTION OF ‘GOING WITH DIGNITY’ AND INDULGING IN THE ART OF FORGETTING TOO