SOUTH Africa's tumultuous politics were plunged into further disarray yesterday when the country's Supreme Court of Appeal overturned an earlier high court judgment and ordered that Jacob Zuma, leader of the governing ANC, face trial on multiple charges of corruption, fraud, racketeering, money laundering and tax evasion.
The on-again, off-again soap opera of Mr Zuma's prosecution, in connection with the country's multibillion-pound arms deal with British and other western European weapons manufacturers, has been a consuming national preoccupation for more than fi
ve years.
Each instalment of the drama has resulted in huge repercussions. A ruling in favour of Mr Zuma last September by Pietermaritzburg High Court judge Chris Nicholson led immediately to the toppling from power of then president Thabo Mbeki, who has been vindicated by the latest judgment. Kgalema Motlanthe, who is loyal to Mr Zuma, was appointed interim president to keep the seat warm in anticipation of a Zuma triumph at the general election in late March or early April.
But now five Supreme Court judges, in a devastating 39-page ruling, have said Mr Nicholson's ruling that Mr Mbeki had interfered politically in the charging of Mr Zuma by the National Prosecuting Authority was "gratuitous", "unfathomable" and based on no evidence, only on supposition. The judges also trashed Mr Nicholson's arguments for dropping charges against Mr Zuma as "dangerous," "unfounded," "overstepping the mark" and "irrelevant".
Reading the judgment before television cameras inside the Supreme Court in Bloemfontein, Judge Louis Harms said: "The trial judge (Nicholson] failed to comply with basic rules of procedure. Judgment by ambush is not permitted."
The immediate effect of the overturning of the Nicholson judgment is that the 16 charges against Mr Zuma, 65, relating to the reception of bribes worth hundreds of thousands of pounds, are reinstated. A spokesman for the National Prosecuting Authority, popularly known as the Scorpions, said it would seek a date for him to stand trial.
However, the ANC said Mr Zuma remained the party's choice to run for president. "The judgment will not affect the decision of the ANC that Zuma be the ANC's presidential candidate for the 2009 elections," it said.
But the idea of the ruling party going into an election led by a man with serious criminal charges hanging over him will cause huge concern both domestically and internationally. The value of the rand fell immediately after the Supreme Court ruling, reflecting international investors' concerns about a prospective Zuma presidency.
Steven Friedman, the director of the Centre for the Study of Democracy at the University of Johannesburg and Grahamstown's Rhodes University, said: "There are misgivings among voters, including within the ANC, about the situation. This will enhance misgivings."
Another consequence of Mr Nicholson's judgment was an acrimonious split in the 97-year-old ANC, with senior members leading a breakaway –eventually named Congress of the People (COPE) – which is expected to eat into the main party's two-thirds majority when the country goes to the polls. "What was tragic (about the judgment] was the opportunistic way the ANC abused it to settle its internal political battles," COPE said yesterday.
A major fear now is that the election, scheduled for some date between 25 March and 15 April, will be marred by violence as passions rise.
