Stalemate: Why the ANC cannot act against corruption

There has been a definite change in the national mood over the last couple of weeks.

South Africans, battered after a decade of grand corruption and mismanagement by the ANC government, are again faced with the bile-inducing prospect of a new generation of cadres feasting at the trough of public procurement, their contracts lubricated by proximity and access, executed under the guise of opportunity and advancement.

Revelations around alleged corruption related to the awarding of tenders to politically connected individuals involved in the highest political office in the land – the presidency – and the highest bureaucratic official in the governing party, that of the secretary general.

It has led to enormous anger and frustration, compounded by the fact that more than two years after Jacob Zuma’s corrupted leadership was removed, no-one implicated it grand corruption has been charged, never mind sent to prison. Both the political and criminal justice system is broken. It rewards corruption and fraud with impunity and wealth.

In this week’s edition of Friday Briefing Freedom Under Law’s Nicole Fritz writes that there are enough mechanisms to deal with graft, while executive director of the Council for the Advancement of the South African Constitution, Lawson Naidoo, argues for a new way to combat corruption. I attempt to explain why the ANC cannot and won’t act against corruption: everyone has dirt on everyone else.

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Best,

Pieter du Toit

Assistant Editor

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