Ramaphosa set to take over in S Africa
Zuma steps down but maintains innocence
JOHANNESBURG: South Africa will today welcome wealthy former businessman Cyril Ramaphosa as its new president following the resignation of scandal-tainted Jacob Zuma.
Mr Zuma announced he had stepped down in a late-night television address in which he took some digs at the African National Congress (ANC) party that had threatened to oust him via a parliament no-confidence vote.
In a 30-minute speech, Mr Zuma said he had “come to the decision to resign as president of the republic with immediate effect”.
“I have only asked my party to articulate my transgressions and the reason for its immediate instruction that I vacate office,” he said.
Mr Zuma, 75, has been in a lengthy power struggle with Mr Ramaphosa, the deputy president. Mr Ramaphosa won control of the ANC when he was elected as its head in December.
Mr Zuma, in an earlier TV interview on Wednesday, said he had received “very unfair” treatment from the party that he joined in 1959 and in which he had fought for decades against apartheid whiteminority rule.
He said he was angered over “the manner in which the decision is being implemented ... I don’t agree, as there is no evidence of if I have done anything wrong.”
The party’s national executive committee ordered Mr Zuma recall from office on Tuesday, after a 13-hour meeting at a hotel outside Pretoria, but he at first refused.
ANC officials said that if Zuma did not resign, the party’s lawmakers in the Cape Town parliament would vote out Zuma on Thursday. But senior party official Jesse Duarte said after the resignation that “we are not celebrating”.
“We have had to recall a cadre of the movement that has served this organisation for over 60 years, it’s not a small matter,” she added.
Mr Zuma, who had not completed formal education, was jailed alongside Nelson Mandela under apartheid and rose through the ranks of the ANC to take power in 2009.
But his rule was dominated by graft scandals, economic slowdown and falling popularity for the celebrated liberation party.
In a day of high drama, police on Wednesday morning raided the Johannesburg home of the Gupta business family, which is accused of overseeing a web of corruption in Zuma’s government.
Police said three unidentified people had been arrested in investigations into “Vrede Farm” — allegations that millions of dollars of public money meant for poor dairy farmers were syphoned off by the Guptas.
Local media reported that Mr Zuma had been pushing for an resignation deal that included his legal fees to fight multiple criminal charges, but he denied the allegations in his resignation speech.
One case against him relates to 783 payments he allegedly received linked to an arms deal before he came to power.
Other graft allegations have centred on the three Gupta brothers, who are accused of unfairly obtaining lucrative government contracts and even being able to choose Mr Zuma’s ministerial appointments.
The political wrangling of recent weeks plunged South Africa — the continent’s most developed economy — into confusion over who was running the country, with last Thursday’s annual State of the Nation address cancelled at the last-minute.
Mr Zuma was in any case scheduled to stand down next year after serving the maximum two terms since coming to power in 2009.