Zuma and his d isrespect for the law must be dealt with

IN THABO Mbeki: the Dream Deferred, Mark Gevisser says former president Thabo Mbeki was worried that his successor, Jacob Zuma, vied for the ANC presidency as “a strategy to avoid prosecution” on his 783 charges, including corruption and racketeering.

Moreover, adds the biographer, Mbeki was “worried that Zuma and his backers had no respect for the rule of law and the South African constitution”.

Examples abound in this regard and the most important is Mbeki’s recall, which constituted a bloodless coup because the governing party’s national executive committee, dominated by Zuma backers, had stopped him from continuing with his constitutional responsibility.

As the 2009 general election approached with no end in sight to Zuma’s case, some among his backers called for a political solution. Business Unity South Africa (Busa) president Sipho Pityana, who has crossed