South African prosecutors are expectedto signal their decision Friday on whether to drop graft charges against theleader of ruling African National Congress (ANC), Jacob Zuma. The NationalProsecuting Authority (NPA) held discussions early this week to shape its nextline of action whether or not to pursue the corruption charges against Zuma.But the breakaway opposition Congress of the People party (COPE) condemned themove, saying it would undermine the country's judiciary. Supporters of Zumamaintain that the graft charges are politically motivated to prevent him frombecoming South Africa's next president.
Professor of international relationsRok Ajulu tells reporter Peter Clottey there are strong indications thatcharges against Zuma would be dropped.
"Thishas been going round for quite some time now and it is a decision which iscertainly being awaited with baited breath from both sides whether you are withthe pro-Zuma faction or the anti-Zuma faction. But the speculation on this forthe whole of last week or so and including the previous week was that it is likelythat the NPA is going to drop charges against Zuma. That obviously has starteda lot of debate and controversy around the mere fact that after seven years oftrying to charge Zuma, they are about to drop the charges. So the controversycontinues, but the speculation is that it is quite likely that the chargesagainst Zuma are going to be dropped," Ajulu noted.
Hesaid there is speculation among sections of the public that the ruling partyhad planted news of the NPA's imminent decision in order to drop chargesagainst Jacob Zuma.
"Thatis one of the interpretations of the announcement, that the charges were beingdropped. Some people saw it as the ANC using it to test the ground. But I don'tquite think so because the representation to the NPA was made public. Andwithin that framework, that argument throughout was that they were asking theNPA to drop the charges because of the political interference, which Zuma hasalways claimed. Now, it comes out according media reports that therepresentations and the latest evidence that was presented to the NPA didindicate and did seem to vindicate Zuma's claim all along that there waspolitical interference," he said.
Ajulusaid there are indications that the charges might be dropped since the NPAseems to suggest that continuing the graft charges would further tarnish thereputation of the agency.
"Theargument is that the NPA has been so much compromised by the interference fromthe executive that they feel that if they go ahead with the charges, it willdamage the reputation of the NPA even further," Ajulu noted.
Hesharply differed from the opposition, which claims that dropping the chargesagainst Zuma would undermine the country's rule of law.
"Thatargument has been put forward by a number of players, including COPE. But Ithink that they are not being honest in this matter because this is not thefirst time that charges are being dropped against a number of political playersin South Africa? legally there are circumstances under which charges are going tobe dropped irrespective of who the players are. It is an election period, andyou must take that with a pinch of salt," he said.
Ajuludismissed as unfortunate remarks that the charges would be dropped to give theruling party and undue advantage ahead of the general election.
"Thefact that the ANC was going to win this election was never in dispute. The ANCsupport base is still too big so, whether the charges were dropped or not wasnot going to in anyway take away part of the ANC victory. The argument that hasbeen posited that COPE has come into the scene and as a result of that, the ANCsupport base would be dented is neither here nor there, since there is nothingof that nature on the ground. Because the evidence so far indicates that COPEwould not be able to dent the support base of the ANC. Because if you lookclosely to the by-election recently held over the last five weeks or so, thereare no indications that COPE was gaining some support as to threaten thesupport base of the ANC," Ajulu pointed out.
Earlierlast month media reports from South Africa suggested that the prosecutingauthority was considering dropping graft charges against the ANC leader.
TheNPA was locked in meetings earlier this week to discuss the possibility ofdropping Zuma's prosecution on graft charges. It is expected to disclose todaywhen it will announce its decision.
TheNPA charges ANC leader Jacob Zuma with graft, fraud, money laundering andracketeering on December 28 2007 eight days after winning the ruling party'spresidency at the Polokwane Conference, beating challenger and former PresidentThabo Mbeki.