A South African judge ruled yesterday that prosecutors were wrong to charge African National Congress (ANC) President Jacob Zuma with corruption, effectively clearing the way for the 66-year-old former freedom fighter to become the country’s next president.
Judge Chris Nicholson’s ruling included biting criticism of prosecutors and of political leaders all the way up to South African President Thabo Mbeki, saying there was reason to believe the decision to charge Zuma was politically motivated.
Nicholson upheld Zuma’s complaints that he should have been consulted before the National Prosecuting Authority decided to resurrect corruption charges against him last year in connection with a huge arms scandal that has dogged South Africa for the past decade.
As head of the ruling ANC party, Zuma is likely to run for president next year when Mbeki’s second and last term ends. The ANC’s political dominance all but assures its leader of victory in the presidential race.
The decision to “prosecute the applicant is invalid and is set aside,” the High Court judge said, concluding a two-hour reading of his ruling.
Zuma’s supporters in a court room packed with top ANC officials broke into cheers in a scene broadcast on national television. A jubilant Zuma embraced his lawyer.
Nicholson cautioned that his ruling did not touch on guilt or innocence and said prosecutors could file charges again once they had met the requirement of consulting with Zuma.
The National Prosecuting Authority, though, will come under huge pressure not to file charges again. Parliament is pushing through legislation to scrap its elite investigating unit, the Scorpions, in response to ANC anger over what its members see as the Scorpions’ persecution of Zuma. Even some business leaders had suggested that the charges against Zuma should be dropped in the interests of future political stability in Africa’s economic powerhouse.
Tensions had mounted in recent weeks, with Zuma supporters threatening to make South Africa ungovernable if his trial went ahead. Influential ANC Youth League leaders have repeatedly said they are prepared to kill and die for Zuma.
Zuma is hugely popular among poor South Africans who feel alienated by Mbeki’s intellectual aloofness and are tired of waiting for their living conditions to improve 14 years after the end of apartheid.
Even though Mbeki is barred by the Constitution from running again for the nation’s presidency, he ran against Zuma for the party leadership, apparently trying to exercise control over who would succeed him.
Mbeki’s spokesman, Mukoni Ratshitanga, said he could not immediately comment on the Zuma judgment because of its length.
“One would have to look at the judgment before any comments are made, if comments are necessary,” Ratshitanga said.
In the ruling, the judge dealt at length about concerns raised by Zuma that the charges were brought to besmirch him as he challenged Mbeki for the ANC presidency.
“I’m not convinced that the applicant was incorrect in averring political meddling in his prosecution,” Nicholson said.
Nicholson also expressed concern that prosecutors were influenced by members of Mbeki’s Cabinet and said it was “improbable” the ministers acted without Mbeki’s knowledge and agreement.
The entire episode appears to have formed part of “some great political contest or game,” Nicholson said.
“There is a ring of the works of Kafka in this,” he added.
Zuma was initially charged in 2005, but that case was dismissed on a technicality in 2006. He was recharged last December, just days after being elected ANC president, with racketeering, corruption, money laundering and fraud related to the multibillion rand government arms deal in the late 1990s.
POLITICAL PRISONERS VS DEPORTEES: Venezuela’s prosecutor’s office slammed the call by El Salvador’s leader, accusing him of crimes against humanity Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele on Sunday proposed carrying out a prisoner swap with Venezuela, suggesting he would exchange Venezuelan deportees from the US his government has kept imprisoned for what he called “political prisoners” in Venezuela. In a post on X, directed at Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, Bukele listed off a number of family members of high-level opposition figures in Venezuela, journalists and activists detained during the South American government’s electoral crackdown last year. “The only reason they are imprisoned is for having opposed you and your electoral fraud,” he wrote to Maduro. “However, I want to propose a humanitarian agreement that
ECONOMIC WORRIES: The ruling PAP faces voters amid concerns that the city-state faces the possibility of a recession and job losses amid Washington’s tariffs Singapore yesterday finalized contestants for its general election on Saturday next week, with the ruling People’s Action Party (PAP) fielding 32 new candidates in the biggest refresh of the party that has ruled the city-state since independence in 1965. The move follows a pledge by Singaporean Prime Minister Lawrence Wong (黃循財), who took office last year and assumed the PAP leadership, to “bring in new blood, new ideas and new energy” to steer the country of 6 million people. His latest shake-up beats that of predecessors Lee Hsien Loong (李顯龍) and Goh Chok Tong (吳作棟), who replaced 24 and 11 politicians respectively
Young women standing idly around a park in Tokyo’s west suggest that a giant statue of Godzilla is not the only attraction for a record number of foreign tourists. Their faces lit by the cold glow of their phones, the women lining Okubo Park are evidence that sex tourism has developed as a dark flipside to the bustling Kabukicho nightlife district. Increasing numbers of foreign men are flocking to the area after seeing videos on social media. One of the women said that the area near Kabukicho, where Godzilla rumbles and belches smoke atop a cinema, has become a “real
‘WATER WARFARE’: A Pakistani official called India’s suspension of a 65-year-old treaty on the sharing of waters from the Indus River ‘a cowardly, illegal move’ Pakistan yesterday canceled visas for Indian nationals, closed its airspace for all Indian-owned or operated airlines, and suspended all trade with India, including to and from any third country. The retaliatory measures follow India’s decision to suspend visas for Pakistani nationals in the aftermath of a deadly attack by shooters in Kashmir that killed 26 people, mostly tourists. The rare attack on civilians shocked and outraged India and prompted calls for action against their country’s archenemy, Pakistan. New Delhi did not publicly produce evidence connecting the attack to its neighbor, but said it had “cross-border” links to Pakistan. Pakistan denied any connection to
RSS