Amid a messy pandemic response, a stuttering vaccine roll-out and an anaemic economy, it would have presented a constitutional crisis and the abandonment of the rule of law had Zuma remained a free man this morning. SA would have reached new lows of despair.
But, as he has done so many times before, Zuma folded, right at the last minute. Just before midnight he handed himself over to police at the Estcourt correctional facility to begin his 15-month incarceration for contempt of court.
Unlike the scenario promised by his supporters, and particularly the threats from his son Edward, there was no bloodshed, no second Marikana, and no laying down of lives — Zuma went with a whimper, rather than a bang.
For over two decades Zuma has had the ANC, the alliance and, by extension, the whole of SA dancing to his own destructive tune. His presidency was marked by a wanton disregard for the law and an abandonment of all notions of integrity, decency, transparency and accountability. Zuma, only ever thinking of himself, hauled SA down a truly treacherous road.
Jailing him by no means eradicates the dark shadow of his ruinous tenure, but it does send a powerful message that our lengthy flirtation with impunity, and the abandonment of the rule of law, is over.
Even inside the ANC the temptation by some to shield him this was week was great. But in the end, a special national executive committee meeting on Monday did something the governing party has not done in over a decade: it put the country before the party, and made an unequivocal statement that the rule of law and the constitution had to be respected.
Still, many in the party felt sorry for Zuma. The desire to shield the 79-year old, which had been so instinctive for the vast majority of the party’s top brass for so long, remained — but the NEC’s firm decision crowded out that impulse.
So what will happen now? The fightback by Zuma’s former faction is likely to be swift and vociferous, but it isn’t to be feared: it will mark the last kicks of a dying horse. Zuma’s influence is now officially diluted, and that of his supporters also facing jail could soon follow.
For example, disciplinary charges against suspended secretary-general Ace Magashule will be the next nail in this faction’s now tightly sealed coffin.
Zuma was being used as an experiment by those around him — the lawyers, his family, his dodgy friends, criminal politicians both inside and outside the ANC — to test the limits of SA’s laws, to see how far he could go, thumbing his nose at the constitution.
Since many of his hangers-on were facing their own moment of reckoning, Zuma provided a useful battering ram to test the dam wall of our democracy and constitutional order for weaknesses. We may celebrate now that Zuma is in jail, but the truth is, it was touch and go: SA came extremely close to those cracks being exposed and developing into full blown leaks.
Acting chief justice Sisi Khampepe’s judgment last week, sentencing Zuma to jail for 15 months, marked the first step in bringing this experiment to a screeching halt. After the clock began to tick, Zuma’s resistance became all the more vociferous, with last-ditch legal gambles, hand wringing and conspiracy theories. It was meant to intimidate and threaten.
But behind the scenes, over the past few days Zuma morphed from the wily chess-playing politician to an old and sad man — a chaotic, confused mess, unravelling in full view of the nation on live television.
His incarceration last night sends a strong message to those on whose behalf he sought to break the system: if it can’t be done by a politician who enjoyed the power and influence that Zuma had, it can’t be done by anyone. Zuma failed, and the constitution triumphed.
The importance of this moment can’t be overstated: there are many politicians, tenderpreneurs and state capture enablers who, from today, won’t sleep easy. The system is more durable than they had foreseen, and there is still hope that SA’s institutions can be restored from the dark days they endured during Zuma’s presidency.
The country began its destructive path down this slope in 2009, when Mokotedi Mpshe, then acting national director of public prosecutions, declared that all corruption charges against Zuma would be withdrawn, thereby clearing Zuma’s path to the presidency.
His jailing now frees SA to traverse a different road — one of accountability and the rule of law. It is a powerful ringing bellow by lady justice signifying that gone are the days of impunity and wanton disregard for the law. It is a reckoning.
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