South Africa President Jacob Zuma
Politicians are indeed a rare breed. Thankfully, though, not all of them are given to contradictions in their pronouncements and actions.
For there are, among them, people who still uphold the highest ideals of integrity, common decency and the purest motives of serving their compatriots.
Locally, Messrs Burchell Whiteman and the late Seymour ‘Foggy’ Mullings come easily to mind as among the group of politicians whose integrity is beyond question.
Unfortunately, politics across the globe has been, and still is populated by individuals with whom one could easily draw parallels to the pigs in George Orwell’s allegorical novel Animal Farm.
“All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others,” they told their comrades as they cemented their stranglehold on power over their master’s farm, which they had seized in an overthrow.
Essentially, the pigs were making it clear that power and privilege belonged to a small elite.
Our recollection of the pigs’ decree was prompted by South African President Jacob Zuma’s address to the ruling African National Congress (ANC) a few weeks ago.
“The ANC must continue to lead in ending corruption in the state, the private sector and amongst our own members,” President Zuma told the party during celebrations to mark its 103rd anniversary.
He also encouraged the party’s members to rededicate themselves to “the core values of the ANC, which include discipline, selflessness and constructive criticism”.
Had that charge been issued by late South African President Nelson Mandela, or Bishop Desmond Tutu we would have had no quarrel. But coming from President Zuma, it rings hollow. For this is the same Mr Zuma, whom an anti-corruption watchdog last year accused of unethical conduct in relation to the use of £13.7 million of State funds in the refurbishing of his private home.
For those whose memories are short, President Zuma’s home was outfitted with a swimming pool, amphitheatre, visitor centre, cattle enclosure and chicken coop built as part of what was said to have been a State-funded security upgrade.
Add to that the reality that this sprawling homestead sits in President Zuma’s political stronghold of KwaZulu-Natal, regarded as one of South Africa’s poorest provinces, plus the fact that the majority of South Africa’s black population still live in poverty, and you can understand the bitter taste that this display of opulence has left in the mouths of a people who have suffered for too long.
What is most unfortunate is that Mr Zuma still occupies the presidency of the ANC, an organisation that prides itself in correcting the socio-economic differences flowing from South Africa’s colonial and apartheid eras. It is also an organisation that enjoyed widescale support here in Jamaica, particularly during the period when Mr Mandela and his colleagues were in prison.
However, given the quality of the organisation’s leadership now, President Mandela must be rolling in his grave.