How Jacob Zuma Was Disgraced Out Of Office As South Africa President

MICHAEL AKINOLA

Embattled Jacob Zuma resigned as President of South Africa on Wednesday, reluctantly heeding orders by the ruling African National Congress (ANC) to bring an end to his nine scandal-plagued years in power.

In a 30-minute farewell address to the nation, 75-year-old Zuma said he disagreed with the way the ANC had shoved him toward an early exit after the election of Cyril Ramaphosa as party president in December but would accept its orders.

“I have therefore come to the decision to resign as president of the republic with immediate effect,” Zuma said.

“Even though I disagree with the decision of the leadership of my organization, I have always been a disciplined member of the ANC.”

The ruling party had said it would vote him out on Thursday.

“No life should be lost in my name. And also the ANC should not be divided in my name,” Zuma, who has been in power since 2009, added.

His resignation came just hours after police raided the luxury home of the Gupta family, Indian-born billionaire allies of the president who have been at the centre of corruption allegations against Zuma and his circle for years.

Zuma and the Guptas have always denied wrongdoing.

With Zuma’s departure, Deputy President and former tycoon Cyril Ramaphosa is expected to be sworn in as President Thursday.

The ANC, which replaced Zuma as party leader in December with Ramaphosa, ordered him to step down as president on Tuesday.

When he failed to resign on Wednesday, it announced that it would back an opposition motion in parliament to force him out.

His resignation ends the career of the former anti-apartheid resistance fighter, who has four wives, a sharp tongue and a decades-long history of entanglement in scandals that polarised Nelson Mandela’s “Rainbow Nation”.

The ANC hailed his decision to go.

“This decision provides certainty to the people of South Africa at a time when economic and social challenges to the country require an urgent and resolute response,” said the ANC’s deputy secretary general, Jessie Duarte.

Zuma is the most colourful and controversial president South Africa has had since white-minority rule ended in 1994.

He has been a politician of nine lives, surviving a series of scandals which would have surely ended anyone else’s career.

He was facing his ninth vote of no-confidence in parliament before he left office.

For many years, it was unwise to write Zuma off: His Zulu name, Gedleyihlekisa, means the one who smiles while grinding his enemies.

Background of Jacob Zuma’s Resignation

Zuma’s tenure has been marred by years of corruption scandals.

The private life of South Africa’s embattled President Jacob Zuma, who resigned after intense pressure from his own party, was as colourful as his political career.

Early Years of Jacob Zuma

A proud traditionalist, he was fond of swapping tailored suits for full leopard-pelt Zulu warrior gear, engaging in energetic ground-stomping tribal dances during ceremonies in his village.

At party rallies, he was often the first to break into tuneful song.

The son of a domestic worker, he had “a very strong appeal” to the working class and the poor, said Sdumo Dlamini, head of the Confederation of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu), an ANC ally.

“He is a people’s person and he has grown through the ranks of the working class. He knows the suffering of the ordinary folk.”

Born on April 12, 1942, in Nkandla, a rural hamlet in KwaZulu-Natal province, Mr Zuma’s extraordinary journey inspires his loyal grassroots supporters.

Popularly referred to as “JZ”, the uneducated youngster rose through the ranks of the then-banned ANC, serving a 10-year stint as an apartheid-era political prisoner on Robben Island along the way.

After fleeing into exile, he became the party’s feared head of intelligence, charged with dealing with traitors and informants.

At Mandela’s memorial service in 2013, he was loudly booed by ordinary South Africans in front of world leaders.

Corruption in Jacob Zuma’s Government

Now aged 75, the former herdboy who fought in the anti-apartheid struggle, clung on to the presidency for as long as he could, despite a string of scandals.

He survived by building a network of loyal African National Congress (ANC) lawmakers and officials, and by trading on the party’s legacy as the organisation that ended white-minority rule.

Among the stains on his presidency which ended when he resigned on Wednesday (Feb 14) was the perception that he fostered a culture of government corruption.

He is also accused of having led the country into a quagmire of low growth, huge debt and record unemployment.

He stood down as ANC party chief at a conference in December but refused a party request to stand down as head of state a week-and-a-half ago, prompting his party to recall him.

As leader of the late Nelson Mandela’s ANC party, which has won every election since South Africa became a democracy in 1994, Zuma easily won a second five-year term in 2014.

When he took the reins of the ANC in 2007 in a party putsch against ex-president Thabo Mbeki, Zuma inherited a movement riddled with divisions.

Tensions have only deepened as the ANC has been accused of losing its moral compass.

As criticism of his reign mounted, Zuma maintained a cheerful public facade, often chuckling when allegations against him were repeated.

But he was significantly weakened as increasingly senior ANC figures criticised him in public.

He was forced into a humiliating climbdown in 2015 after firing a respected finance minister and appointing a man widely seen as a stooge.

As the national rand currency went into free fall, Zuma bowed to pressure and re-appointed Mr Pravin Gordhan, an admired former finance minister, to the crucial post.

In a tussle that symbolised his tenacious grip over the ANC, Zuma fought on and finally got the finance minister of his choice in March 2017 when Mr Gordhan was ousted in a midnight reshuffle.

In 2016, Zuma agreed to pay back some of the public money spent on his private residence at Nkandla – backing down in the face of a stinging Constitutional Court rebuke.

He has also been accused of corrupt dealings with the Guptas, a wealthy family of Indian origin, and allegedly granted them influence over his cabinet appointments.

That scandal also reached a climax on Wednesday when elite corruption police arrested several people at the Gupta compound in Johannesburg.

Zuma’s tense relationship with his deputy president Ramaphosa came to a head this month when the movement to recall Zuma from the presidency gained momentum on the week he was due to deliver a key parliamentary speech.

The event was postponed as Zuma and Ramaphosa tried to thrash out a transition deal to ease out the embattled head of state.

During Zuma’s time in power, South Africa was rocked by increasing social unrest over the failure to provide housing and basic services to the poorest in society.

Zuma is also still fighting a court order that could reinstate corruption charges against him over 783 alleged payments linked to a multi-billion dollar arms deal in the 1990s.