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Jacob Zuma’s first speech to the parliament on his election as State President, has the blogeratti bubbling along, full of hope that Zuma will walk the walk, as he has talked the talk quite well since the mandate was handed to the ANC, and thus him in the April elections.

Let me be honest, I believe that Jacob Zuma was corrupted by receiving money from Schabir Shaik. I think it takes mental gymnastics of the first order to presume that someone who is involved and rewarded by government contracts, who then picks up the tab for the deputy president’s entire life for over a decade, as Shaik did with Zuma, doesn’t result in the corruption of the government official.

That said, Jacob Zuma is known as a mediator and an open, if not honest, man. Should Zuma be a success over the next five years, and our country manages to do better than it has thus far under his stewardship of the government and the ANC, a VERY dangerous precedent will have been set, far worse than simply a corrupt African leader.

It will essentially signal to all politicians and power grabbers (Malema?), of all political hues, that corruption on the way to the top is acceptable as long as once you are there you aren’t corrupt and/or you improve things. This will make it harder for the electorate to decide on which people they would like to support in government, because quasi-corrupt politicians will always be able to hold up Zuma as a test case, that even those under suspicion, etc. are capable of leading well.

And that would be an interesting and very dangerous precedent, since it would insinuate that the highest office in the land has almost a baptismal quality on its occupiers – that is simply not true, but a successful Zuma presidency may make such a line of argumentation another tool in the ANC electoral toolbox.

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Filed under: Commentary, Crime, Decision Theory, Politics, Society, Zuma by Andrew la Grange