Just another African President?

There must be a gene in the blood of African politicians — with only a few exceptions, and including the military rulers — that causes them to get drunk with power. Intoxicated, they are unable to find the door on which is boldly written, “Exit”.

Defining themselves by the size of their dwellings and the sleekness of their limousines, they — almost without exception — grab, eating with both hands. To cling on to power, they steal the people’s verdict at the polls, intimidate opposition, gag the media, buy those citizens who are buy-able, arrest and detain those who prove irrepressible … and hope that they will forever remain untouchable and invincible.

If I am not making references to equally greedy and terrible presidents in other parts of the world, it is because of “dzi wo fie asem” (to wit: minding my own business) I am more worried by the extent to which the greed and power drunkenness of African rulers have a direct correlation with the unacceptably high levels of poverty and squalor which have become the norm for the ordinary people of the continent.

Events in South Africa since Mr Jacob Gedleyihlekisa Zuma ascended the presidency give me cause to fear for the future of the Rainbow Nation, and confirm my little theory about African heads of state.

On February 12, 2015, President Zuma was expected to deliver the State of the Nation Address to the South African Parliament.

Just outside Parliament (according to a report in New Africa magazine), a member of the opposition Democratic Alliance and some supporters of the party were arrested by the police. Water canon was used against other supporters of the party.

Within the Parliament building, mobile phone signal was jammed, preventing journalists from reporting live on events in the House. No sooner had the President begun his address than a member of the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) party rose on ‘Point of Principle’ to ask him (President) when he would pay back the money which the state had spent on his (president’s) personal residence. Another minority party, the Democratic Alliance (DA) has expressed worry that the ANC majority in Parliament “has become a blunt tool to use to protect President Zuma and cabinet ministers from accounting for their actions”.

Last year, the country’s Public Prosecutor ordered Mr Zuma to repay part of the US$20 million which the state had spent on upgrades to his private residence, putting in a swimming pool and an amphitheatre — in a country where water, electricity and textbooks for schools are in short supply.

In March 2014, a journalist was forced by the police to delete pictures of Zuma's convoy from his camera, and two photographers were detained by the police when photographing Zuma's Johannesburg home.

I am not about to go into Zuma’s private life. The number of wives he has (four currently, though he has been married six times) and the number of times he has been a father (approximately 20 children) are not issues this article is interested in: that is Zuma’s private life.

It ceases to be a private affair, however, when this lifestyle begins to take a toll on the national purse.

In the 2009-2010 budget, the presidency was allocated the equivalent of US$1,902,240 for "spousal support”. This prompted an alarmed public to begin suggesting that only Zuma's first wife should receive state support. For now, with the ANC in a seemingly unassailable majority, there is very little to worry about. But for how much longer?

Results of the last general election in 2014 show that the politics of South Africa is undergoing a noticeable transformation.

The ANC won the election hands down, taking 62.15 per cent of the total votes. The ANC is still huge (like the elephant), but while its share of the votes fell by only 3.75 per cent , the DA’s votes increased by 5.57 per cent. Even though the DA party still relies heavily on white and mixed race voters, it received the backing of 750,000 black Africans — many of them poor — in the last election. The ANC is increasingly reliant on its rural base outside of KwaZulu-Natal.

The main trade union movement, COSATU, with its 1.8 million strong membership, once gave its undivided support to the ANC. In the run up to last year’s elections, the largest of the unions — the 340,000 strong metalworkers union (NUMSA) — broke with this tradition and refused to campaign for the party. The union accused the ANC of having “become dysfunctional and incapable of defending working-class interests”.

At a conference of COSATU in 2010, its general secretary, Zwelinzima Vavi, said his stomach “has been turned by the new ANC elite who are spitting on the faces of the poor” with their displays of wealth, “often secured by dubious means”. So how does all this concern me, a Ghanaian? It is just so that it would not be said that Africans were not able to manage their own affairs!

What causes the impunity in African politics? The answer lies in the bubble in which President Zuma lives. He says his party “will hold power until the second coming of Jesus Christ”.