It's not as if we weren't warned. We knew when we rewarded Zuma with the highest office in the land that the man was damaged goods. We averted our eyes from reality and hoped against hope that somehow the beauty or burden of office would make him change his ways. He hasn't. He won't. He's forever an accident waiting to happen. And we squirm each time.
Two things have dogged Zuma in his political career and have come to define him in the eyes of the public: sex and money. One always follows the other, like night follows day. No sooner had the country been dragged, not for the first time, through the tawdry tales of his sexual escapades than his messy financial affairs made an inconvenient return. It was money, or the lack thereof, that thrust Zuma into the grateful embrace of one Schabir Shaik, the financial adviser turned benevolent moneybags. The association has done them a power of good. Zuma has confounded sceptics to be president; Shaik, after a brief detour in prison, is now out of jail, free to enjoy his spoils.
One can predict almost without the benefit of any prior knowledge that Zuma's finances, if accurately disclosed, would reveal a can of worms. After all, money was the reason behind his first brush with the law. It is the reason for his reluctance to disclose, and why his lawyers have now been called in, probably to massage the numbers.
It's a bit disingenuous for his office to claim that the law is unclear on the matter. Zuma is the fourth person to occupy the position since the law was passed and all his predecessors have complied without fail. As president he needs to set an example. He should not to be dragooned into complying. Law makers should not be law breakers.
Zuma has not only had a whiff of corruption about him; he's also blissfully ignorant of most things. Ignorance of the law, however, is no defence. For Zuma, ignorance has not been a hindrance to his progress. In fact ignorance was part of the romance of his candidacy. Unlike the scheming, pipe-smoking, donnish incumbent at the time, Zuma was seen as a simple man of the people, a breath of fresh air. He was malleable, so his promoters believed. He could thus be trusted to utter whatever he was required to.
Now there's inertia and paralysis at the very heart of government. And Zuma's minders are now becoming decidedly impatient. The people who fought against all odds to get him elected don't believe they're getting their pound of flesh. I don't think Zuma is capable of delivering what they want, though. While there's an understandable desire to get the economy working for everybody, there's no appetite in the party for a command economy. Ask Julius Malema.
There's no doubt the recent sex scandal has damaged Zuma's standing in the party. The loss of left-wing support, his strongest base, though not terminal, could leave him in a precarious position.
It would be a mistake however to, as some have been whispering, remove Zuma from office before he's completed his term, just as it was wrong to recall Thabo Mbeki. The outcome of a democratic election is a solemn pledge between the electorate and those who've won its favour, which should be annulled only by another election. Removal of a head of state by any other means is nothing but a coup d'état.
The accident that is the Zuma presidency should be allowed to run its course. As we made our bed, so we must lie on it. If anything, it may alert us to the dangers of being reckless in choosing our leaders.
Ranking the Analysts 2009
