Mbeki tears into Zuma, warns voters against MK Party ‘led by people who tried to destroy Sars’

The MK Party, a breakaway political formation of the ANC, is led by the same people who tried to destroy the South African Revenue Service (Sars). This is according to former president Thabo Mbeki, who on Thursday sent a warning to South Africans ahead of the May 29 elections that they need to be careful and know who they will be voting for.

The MK Party was formed in December as another ANC breakaway party and is led by former president Jacob Zuma. It will contest the upcoming election with him as its face and he's emerged as its No 1 candidate for parliament, despite his criminal record that bars him from election to the National Assembly.

Sounding the alarm about South Africans being careful who they vote for, Mbeki spoke at length at an engagement at Unisa on Wednesday about how reports by the Nugent and Zondo commissions were scathing on his successor, essentially placing Zuma at the heart of attempts to destroy critical state institutions and the democratic state.

It says there in black and white that Jacob Zuma was part of the leadership in the process to destroy Sars. That's not my opinion; I'm telling you what the Zondo commission says

—  Thabo Mbeki, former president

“So in terms of these breakaways from the ANC, take that breakaway [MK Party], you can understand that it is led by the same people who tried to destroy Sars. This is exactly the same people, so you can understand who they are,” said Mbeki.

Mbeki's remarks could be seen as part of the ANC's elections campaign strategy after several reports suggested he will form part of his party's machinery towards the polls.

He said the Nugent commission detailed how there were people who took a decision to destroy Sars as an institution and that the Zondo commission concurred and went further to place Zuma at the centre of those efforts.

“One of the extraordinary conclusions in the Zondo commission report on the Sars matter says one of the people who played a leading role in the efforts to destroy Sars was the president of the Republic of South Africa. That's a strange conclusion. Fortunately I was not president at the time,” said Mbeki.

"The Zondo commission says in terms of all the evidence that we received, one of the things that stands out is that the president of the republic made certain that he was one of the leading people in terms of the Sars processes and in terms of the Eskom processes. And of course you know who the president was. And it says there in black and white that Jacob Zuma was part of the leadership in the process to destroy Sars. That's not my opinion; I'm telling you what the Zondo commission says.”

It was baffling that Zuma, a sitting state president at the time, would be part of those who sought to destroy the very same Sars that his government needed to run the country, he said. This was because Sars accounted for more than 95% of state revenue, he added.

“Now that's a bit of a conundrum, that you would have the president of the republic of South Africa participating in a process to destroy the institution that gives him the means to govern. That's a kind of contradiction that then raises the question: who indeed is this president? Because there is no way you are going to be able to square the circle that the president of the Republic of South Africa acts to destroy the South African Revenue Service.

“Either the Zondo commission is entirely wrong or we are dealing with a person who is entirely wrong.”

Mbeki also sought to link load-shedding to Zuma by arguing that a report found load-shedding to be the result of a deliberate action in early 2008 after people at Eskom ignored warnings to replenish coal supplies at its power stations.

The delay in constructing and completion of the Medupi and Kusile power stations was also part of this grand plan to destroy South Africa as a democratic state, Mbeki said.

It therefore does not make sense, he said, that Zuma would establish and run the MK Party while saying he remains a member of the ANC.

“In that context of what has been happening in the country, how do we understand the breakaways? Just take the MK Party — you can’t say, 'I remain a member of the ANC, but I support a party which is going to campaign to defeat the ANC.' That doesn’t make sense. One of those two things is wrong.”