No1 'dragging us down'

As the ruling party pointed fingers at the public protector's office yesterday for the leaking of the Nkandla report, another investigation revealed that South Africa has fallen to its worst ranking on a global measure of corruption.

The spending on improvements to President Jacob Zuma's personal home, the Guptagate saga and the red shoes of our former communications minister have made South Africa look more corrupt than it did a year ago, SA's Corruption Watch said.

The country is sliding down the rankings and nine other African countries now look less corrupt than South Africa, according to the Corruption Perception Index, released by Transparency.org yesterday. Botswana is Africa's star and ranks as the 30th-least corrupt country.

South Africa slipped three places in the past year to 72nd out of 177 countries.

The index uses a set of surveys and available data, from the World Bank among others, to gauge how the public sector is perceived.

Somalia, North Korea and Afghanistan fared the worst, while Denmark and New Zealand were the least corrupt.

Brazil, Serbia, Bosnia-Herzegovina and the tiny island nation of Sao Tome and Principe have the same ranking as South Africa.

Local pressure group Corruption Watch said yesterday that South Africans were growing intolerant of the abuse of public resources and were losing trust in political, public, and business leaders.

"The Gupta wedding saga and ongoing fiasco surrounding the president's private Nkandla residence are indicators in the past year of impunity in operation," said Corruption Watch executive director David Lewis.

"[We] are of the view that perceptions of corruption will not change until political and business leaders are held accountable for their conduct," the group said.

With the public outcry over Nkandla increasing daily, the ANC went on the offensive yesterday, questioning the integrity of public protector Thuli Madonsela.

It demanded the immediate release of the full report into her investigation of the spending of more than R200-million of public funds on Zuma's private KwaZulu-Natal residence.

"The sooner she does that [releases the full Nkandla report] the better," ANC secretary-general Gwede Mantashe said. "If she waits until the eve of the elections, as the ANC we will have no choice but to believe that she is playing political games." The ANC believes Madonsela is part of a "political ploy" aimed at tarnishing the image of Zuma and the ANC and fears the Nkandla saga will dent its performance in the coming national elections.

Speaking at the same press conference as Mantashe, ANC deputy secretary-general Jessie Duarte, also lashed Madonsela's office for the leak of the provisional report on Nkandla (excerpts of which were published in the Mail & Guardian newspaper on Friday).

"Did she give the report only to affected parties or did she give the report to other people for comment? Maybe we need to ask that question," said Duarte.

The ANC blamed Madonsela's office for the leak because, after publication of what was purported to be her provisional report, she had announced measures to stem further leaks, Duarte said.

Madonsela has rubbished claims that her office leaked the report, arguing instead that leaks arose once provisional reports had been given to the affected parties for comment.

Earlier this year Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan criticised the media for reporting only one side of corruption, saying that, though there was corruption on the fringes and government was intent on wiping it out, questionable practices were found also among business people.

In June, Minister in the Presidency Trevor Manuel admitted that there was gross abuse of supply chain management in the public sector, but added that for every greasy palm in the government "there is a corruptor in the private sector". And where companies have admitted to collusion and uncompetitive behaviour the authorities have been harsh on those involved. Construction companies who copped to being involved in collusive tendering for as many as 300 projects, among them building for for the soccer World Cup in 2010, agreed to paid fines of R1.46-billion in June this year.

About 100 COPE members marched to the Port Elizabeth High Court yesterday to say "hands off public protector Thuli Madonsela" and highlight their support for the national campaign against gender-based violence. - Additional reporting by Unathi Jongihlathi