MAKHUDU SEFARA | ANC’s existential crisis: state capture arrests are too little too late

Mosebenzi Zwane, once high and mighty at the height of former president Jacob Zuma’s ruinous reign, this week smiled sheepishly in the dock trying to make light of his fall from grace.

It may be a case of too little too late for the ANC, but we must not fail to acknowledge when the ANC is visibly trying to undo its mess. Whether it will succeed is moot. But those who gifted us huge state capture corruption are falling like a house of cards.

Zwane, a former MEC of agriculture in the Free State, is the latest in a long list of those who wined and dined with the infamous Gupta brothers who remain on the run. He faces charges of fraud and corruption, whose details were ventilated at the state capture commission of inquiry. In his final report recommendations, commission chair Raymond Zondo said Zwane, former department head Peter Thabethe and others should be criminally prosecuted for stealing millions meant to help about 100 farmers in Vrede, a small town in the Free State.

Zwane’s arrest comes after the arrest of former Eskom CEO Brian Molefe and former Transnet CFO Anoj Singh on fraud and corruption charges. Former Transnet CEO Siyabonga Gama; former Transnet board member Iqbal Sharma; suspended ANC secretary-general Ace Magashule; former ANC MP Vincent Smith; former Mangaung mayor Olly Mlamleli; businessman Edwin Sodi; former correctional services commissioner Linda Mti are some of the people arrested. Other notables include former police chief Khomotso Phahlane, arrested in connection to a R54m corruption scandal.

These arrests happen as the Special Investigating Unit is also tightening the screws around individuals and private firms caught with their fingers in the cookie jar. And, of course, world-renowned management firm Bain was banned from doing public sector work for 10 years.

We often don’t praise fish for swimming. But we have a history of our fish previously suffocating and dying in the pond.

So, at a general level, the police, SIU, the National Prosecuting Authority seem to have rediscovered their mojo.

In a country with multiple things going wrong — and I have not said anything about Andre de Ruyter yet — we should be able to say it is a good thing that Zwane, Molefe, Magashule and others have appointments with presiding officers in various courts.

The general unhappiness with the ANC might make some people miss the point: something good, something positive is unfolding in our criminal justice system. The people who probably thought themselves untouchable, who walked with an air of impunity, are now facing the full might of the law.

There’s a caveat though for the ANC: these arrests do not necessarily translate into a change in perception that the ANC can be trusted with the public purse. While the arrests are helpful, the ANC bigwigs must be hoping that convictions will be in its end of term report ahead of the 2024 elections.

The ANC faces an existential crisis. While there’s progress on the ground with notable arrests, its leader’s credibility is also in ruins. He used to be the poster boy for anti-corruption. Not any more. He now must explain to a corruption-weary electorate his alleged criminality and/or complicity in crimes committed at his now infamous farm in Limpopo, Phala Phala.

Other than the president, his main challenger in the upcoming elective conference in December is a corruption-tainted Zweli Mkhize, nominated by the biggest province of the ANC. That he was somewhat forced out of office on the weight of claims of corruption is not a consideration for those nominating him. Is this the leader to help restore public trust in a party tainted by capture? Could the ANC KwaZulu-Natal members not have found a leader without a putrid stench of corruption to nominate.

Put differently, the ANC seems to be digging its own grave as it tries to redeem itself. Even if you add Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma to the mix, she too isn’t saying the right things. Forget that she’s publicly supported by Zuma, her latest pronouncements on the step-aside rule create disturbing impressions about her.

What would help is having a president not mired in the Phala Phala controversy — or pretenders to the throne whose ethical conduct is beyond reproach. But that seems a bridge too far for the ANC, does it not?

In the end, though, the arrests, even if too little too late to save the ANC from itself, are good for the country. May we see more mirthless smiles in the dock as we did from Zwane this week.