A Shaiky start to 2010

By Richard Kaplan

As the old year ended, Schabir Shaik was again spotted shopping in one of death row’s supermarkets. In the new year, he will presumably continue with this terminal preoccupation until he is struck down by a sudden surge of blood pressure.

And while his good friend Jacob Zuma has ascended to high office, Schabir is left damning the luck of the judicial lottery that gave him Hilary Squires instead of Chris Nicholson. For it was Judge Squires who sentenced him to 15 years in prison while Judge Nicholson embarked on a brief but bewildering foray into political commentary that scuttled the Zuma trial and prematurely removed Mbeki from power.

Unfortunately for Zuma, Shaik’s refusal to heel and obey the dictates of his parole conditions means that we are periodically reminded both that he is not yet dead and that there are unresolved issues concerning a possible corrupt relationship. Ho hum, this is of course old hat and seemingly of little concern to the ruling party and the vast majority of the electorate who voted Zuma and the ANC into power.

Perhaps this is not merely an absence of morality but a more sanguine view of political influence peddling with a preference to vote for “our thieves rather than yours”.

After all, in Africa, we have a long history of thievery by politicians starting with the Europeans, who between them unashamedly stole the whole continent. In the more recent past, the Nationalist Party stole numerous wards during elections by gerrymandering and manipulating the rural vote and while in power they happily established slush funds in Swiss bank accounts to run their covert operations.

Next to this, the odd kick-back of a car or fraudulent travel voucher looks like small fry and indeed, Transparency International placed South Africa 55th out of 180 on its Corruption Perceptions Index for 2009. This makes us less corrupt than India, Greece, Italy, China, Brazil and Russia but trailing Botswana who came in at 37 with a comparatively respectable score of 5.6 out of 10.

We are in the top third of the class, albeit a rather poorly performing class. But do we pass? Unfortunately not. We score 4.7 out of 10 with a score of less than 5 signifying a highly corrupt country. The class failures start with the Czech Republic as country number 52 with a score of 4.9, and a full 138 countries or 77% score less than 5 out of 10.

As these countries are all run by politicians, the obvious and alarming implication is that, worldwide, politicians are unfit to hold public office. But unfortunately, no one as yet has come up with a suitable alternative for governing countries other than these greedy, narcissistic bottom feeders.

Closer to home, as the year ends, we are left with Shaik demanding “a fucking pardon” from his erstwhile friend the president while our ex head of Interpol and chief of police tries to explain why the gifts he received from Glenn Agliotti do not constitute bribery. And most disturbing, by government’s own admission, corruption has permeated the civil service.

Despite an avowal to root it out, in practice the ANC has welcomed proven culprits back into its fold. Tony Yengeni is once again a member of the inner sanctum of the party and the rehabilitated travel voucher fraudsters remain happily ensconced in public office.

This willingness of the ANC to forgive and forget, while commendable from a Christian perspective, does create the unfortunate impression that probity in government is optional.

And, oh yes, Happy New Year!

* The Transparency International corruption index is at:
http://www.transparency.org