In the week that the ANC decided to charge Julius Malema with indiscipline and bringing the party into disrepute, it also emerged that the SA Revenue Service, the Hawks and the Public Protector had also started investigating the young firebrand.

Isn't that nice? Isn't it wonderful? Or is it?

I hold no brief for Malema. He is patently dishonest: he holds himself up as a champion of the poor while at the same time not just enjoying but flaunting his incredible wealth.

Most of this wealth has clearly been acquired by rent-seeking, by skimming off the taxes of poor people. Instead of adding something to the value chain, he is a man who just adds a new layer of cost.

Those who stand on podiums and proclaim that it is Malema's right to be rich miss one key point: he is not entitled to enrich himself at the expense of the poor by the rent-seeking of companies like his On Point group in Limpopo.

Instead of being a leader of the poor, Malema is a man who uses the poor for his own ends.

What is going on here?

Why have the institutions of the state, the Hawks and the SA Revenue Service in particular, done nothing about Malema for all this time?

Why is it that when City Press and other newspapers started raising the red flag about Malema's wealth way back in 2009, no one lifted a finger?

Why is Malema being investigated and possibly charged now?

Are these investigations coordinated?

We have been here before. We have seen state institutions being used for political ends.

The man who alleged that President Thabo Mbeki and his administration were using organs of state to go after him was none other than Jacob Gedleyihlekisa Zuma, our current president.

Zuma needs to explain to the nation whether Malema is being pursued because he is indeed dipping his fingers into places they should not be dipped, or whether he is being pursued because he has proven too opinionated for the comfort of some ANC leaders.

For those who want Malema subdued and removed from the political discourse this might seem a moot point. Many might want to see this rude, racist and uncouth youth kicked out immediately and by any means necessary.

However, Malema is also a citizen of the fine republic we have nurtured over the past 17 years.

He deserves the same free, fair, transparent justice that we all submit to.

He might be some people's worst enemy, but it is for this reason that the law must not be bent for or against him.

In fact, the law must be as fair for him as it is for every citizen of South Africa.

Our state institutions are what stand between us and anarchy.

Zuma, whose poor leadership the ANC Youth League is now waking up to, is not a man who has a great reputation for protecting and nurturing our institutions and the judiciary. Indeed, we should worry about the judiciary in particular as this president seems to have gone out of his way to undermine its independence.

That is the only way to explain his confirmation of Mogoeng Mogoeng as the chief justice.

Mogoeng's judgments suggest he is a man who hates women, children and gay people. His rulings reveal an ultra-conservative, unprogressive mind-set.

There is virtually no one among his colleagues who thinks this man should be the chief justice. The best his supporters can do is beg us to "respect the president's decision".

This is a slap in the faces of the many extraordinary jurists at the Constitutional Court, people who have ably demonstrated their understanding of the imperatives of our Constitution.

In Mogoeng's hands, our Constitutional Court is headed for the rubbish bin.

Zuma oversaw the disbanding of the Scorpions, the undermining of the National Prosecuting Authority and the politicisation of the police and the intelligence services. In his hands, our institutions are in grave danger.

The Malema investigations are crucial to our understanding of how the ANC and the battles within it relate to and have an impact on the institutions of our country.

It is not for us to prove that Malema is being pursued for political ends. It is for Zuma and his administration to ensure that political battles do not determine who gets investigated and who does not.

Malema needs defending because tomorrow it will be Kgalema Motlanthe, or Mathews Phosa, or Zweli Mkhize, or Tokyo Sexwale.

All these men have been linked to the campaign to unseat Zuma, whether rightly or wrongly.

Will they now be in the spotlights of the Hawks? Or SARS? Or some other state investigative body?

What about the intelligence services, Zuma's own hunting grounds?

We need to be told.