In Good Faith
CARMEL RICKARD: Taking sleaze to the courts
There’s an important lesson powerful men have to learn when they run to the law to protect what they call their reputations — it’s called Democracy 101
When his rape accuser, known to the public as Khwezi, died last week, President Jacob Zuma may well have been relieved. His less than circumspect sexual behaviour had recently resurfaced as a public issue and with Khwezi gone, he might hope for one fewer front on which to fight the many battles of his imploding office. But while sex-related scandals have taken a back seat to claims of other forms of corruption in Zuma’s life, across the Atlantic, US presidential hopeful Donald Trump is having to deal with the fallout of his own sleaze. Both men spend a fortune on lawyers. In Trump’s case that fortune may be his own; Zuma’s legal fees, however, come from SA’s public purse and inevitably affect its shrinking size. And though both men appear addicted to litigation, their tastes differ in the finer details.
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