The Independent Uganda: You get the Truth we Pay the Price
In a day of high drama, police on Wednesday morning raided the Johannesburg home of the Gupta business family, which is accused of overseeing a web of corruption in Zuma’s government.
Police said three unidentified people had been arrested in investigations into “Vrede Farm” — allegations that millions of dollars of public money meant for poor dairy farmers were syphoned off by the Guptas.
Local media reported that Zuma had been pushing for an resignation deal that included his legal fees to fight multiple criminal charges — but he denied the allegations in his resignation speech.
One case against him relates to 783 payments he allegedly received linked to an arms deal before he came to power.
Other graft allegations have centred on the three Gupta brothers, who are accused of unfairly obtaining lucrative government contracts and even being able to choose Zuma’s ministerial appointments.
The political wrangling of recent weeks plunged South Africa — the continent’s most developed economy — into confusion over who was running the country, with last Thursday’s annual State of the Nation address cancelled at the last-minute.
– Decline of Mandela’s party –
Zuma was scheduled to stand down next year after serving the maximum two terms since coming to power in 2009.
In local polls in 2016, the ANC recorded its worst electoral result since coming to power in 1994 with Mandela at the helm as white-minority rule fell.
Ramaphosa, 65, must revive the economy and crack down on what he has admitted is rampant government corruption if he is to boost the party’s tarnished reputation before a tricky election next year.
He is a former trade unionist and Mandela ally who led talks to end apartheid in the early 1990s and then became a hugely wealthy businessman before returning to politics.
Zuma’s hold over the ANC was broken in December when his chosen successor — his former wife Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma — narrowly lost to Ramaphosa in a vote for the new party leader.
