RAMAPHOSA STEPS IN AFTER ZUMA QUITS OVER GRAFT ROW
WORLD
Cyril Ramaphosa was elected as South Africa’s president in a parliamentary vote on Thursday after scandal-ridden Jacob Zuma reluctantly resigned on orders from the ruling African National Congress (ANC).
South Africa’s main stock market index jumped nearly 4 per cent, putting it on track for its biggest oneday gain in more than two years as investors welcomed Zuma’s resignation after nine years in office plagued by corruption allegations.
Zuma decided to resign following an impasse with the ANC, which was planning to side with opposition parties in Parliament to oust the embattled leader through a motion of no confidence.
Zuma, 75, announced he had stepped down in a latenight nationally-televised address, three days after the ANC's national leadership decided at a marathon meeting to ask him to resign, which he had defiantly refused. “I resign as President of the Republic (of South Africa) with immediate effect,” Zuma said, ending a nine-year tenure before his second and final term of office which was scheduled to end with national elections in 2019.
But he remained adamant that the decision of the ANC to replace him with Cyril Ramaphosa, who was elected in his place as the new President of the ANC two months ago, was “wrong”.
“I disagree with the decision of the leadership of my organisation, (but) I have always been a disciplined member of the organisation,” Zuma said in a 30-minute speech, pledging to continue to serve the political organisation he had joined as a teenager to fight from exile against the minority white apartheid government.
Commenting on the unprecedented possibility of him being removed through action by his own party in Parliament if he did not resign, Zuma said: “I fear no motion of no confidence or impeachment. They are the lawful mechanisms for the people of this beautiful country to remove their president.”