Disgraced Zuma rises from the ashes, zooms into contention
JOHANNESBURG: Jacob Zuma was in disgrace last year - a South African president forced from office by scandal and then in court on corruption charges.
Right now, he is in the midst of a remarkable makeover, wooed by a ruling party that recognises his enduring appeal and is anxious to paper over divisions ahead of elections this mid-year.
The image of Zuma and successor Cyril Ramaphosa, smil- ing and cutting cake together at an African National Congress (ANC) party event, is generating concerns about how far Ramaphosa’s anticorruption drive can go after years of alleged malfeasance in the Zuma administration.
“We’re getting along very well,” Ramaphosa said on Tuesday at the commemoration of the 107th anniversary of the party’s founding. It was held Francoise Bettencourt Meyers, the granddaughter of the founder of cosmetics manufacturer L’oreal SA, is the richest woman in the world, with a net worth of in Kwazulu-natal province, a stronghold of support for Zuma and key to the ANC’S electoral fortunes. Ramaphosa said the former president had a role to play in a party struggling to recove r the popularity it enjoyed when it took power at the end of white minority rule in 1994.
The fact is, some Zuma loyalists, including ANC secretary general Ace Magashule, retain influence and there is growing scepticism about whether the divided party can fully reform.
“Ramaphosa has wielded his broom in the relatively short time that has been available to him. But the situation remains dire and his greatest problem probably resides in the extent of support that he enjoys in the ANC,” said David Lewis, executive director of Corruption Watch, a non-profit group.
Lewis predicted that efforts to combat corruption in South Africa will be a major campaign issue and that the ANC’S efforts to project unity could backfire.
Zuma, meanwhile, has raised his profile in the run-up to the election, joining Twitter and posting chatty videos in which he argues that the state should pay his legal fees. The folksy 76-year-old has even made a deal to record antiapartheid songs.