State capture may be just the opening act
WHILE President Jacob Zuma plays fast and loose with the public trust, pouring scorn on former public protector Thuli Madonsela’s State of Capture report, a moment of reckoning is drawing nearer.
It is hard to see how the all-powerful ratings agencies can find much comfort in developments in South Africa these past few months. Where we take one step forward in avoiding the seemingly inevitable fall to junk status, we somehow manage to take at least two steps back.
Growth in the economy is glacial, at best, while the “political noise” that the ratings agencies have warned threatens our prospects shows no sign of abating.
If anything, Zuma appears determined to stand his ground, aided and abetted by a chorus of yes men who trot out the old “white monopoly capital” argument, supposedly as a counterpoint to Zuma and some of his ministers’ scandalous dalliances with the Gupta family.
This week, we reveal new details of how documents prepared for a cabinet discussion on turning the economy around were leaked to associates of Gupta companies by advisers to former finance minister Des van Rooyen. The man Zuma assured us was ideally suited to be finance minister lost no time in dancing to his real master’s tune.
If, as now seems likely, Van Rooyen was the Trojan Horse that would deliver the National Treasury into the laps of the Guptas, it would have been a new low for governance under Zuma’s baleful administration.
Fortunately, the outcry against Van Rooyen’s tenure in the finance ministry was so intense that Zuma was forced to back down, a development which Zuma’s supporters ascribe to the influence of “white monopoly capital”.
Not that Zuma appears fazed by any of this. With the solid backing of his supporters in the leadership of the ANC, Zuma appears prepared to go to any lengths to save his own skin.
A central part of his strategy and that of his surrogates is, of course, to demonise the opposition, which, you’ve guessed it, is also subservient to the demands of “white monopoly capital”, as is Madonsela, of course.
This week, Zuma yet again gave notice that he has no intention of going anywhere without a fight, a fight that may cost South Africa its future.
He warned: “It’s like those who steal today — they say Zuma steals, while they are the worst thieves. They have investigated me all over but they are finding nothing because I’m not doing anything. If they have found anything‚ it would be over [for me]. Those are the thieves and I know they are stealing. I’m just watching them. I know them.” Then he added, ominously: “Let’s stop worrying about nothing. I will always be here, for better or for worse.”
The shameless disregard for the fate of their people after they have been forced out of office has long been the hallmark of dictators throughout history, and South Africa looks increasingly to be the latest example of this phenomenon.
These are the sort of leaders so taken by their own importance that they cannot envisage a future without them at the centre. Or perhaps, in Zuma’s case, he just wants to stay out of prison, given the long list of charges he could face.
It’s an alarming thought that state capture, as damaging as it has been, may just be one of many shameful legacies Zuma will leave in his wake.
Perhaps the worst of Zuma is yet to come. Beyond the scandal of state capture, perhaps our futures have been captured as well.