ANALYSIS
THE BUFFALO IN THE ROOM: The politics of Pravin Gordhan
Rumours swirled that President Jacob Zuma would use the spurious charges to fire Gordhan in a reshuffle
First the context. As Pravin Gordhan, his deputy, Mcebisi Jonas, and Treasury officials strolled up the grey cobblestones leading to the entrance to Parliament, their look was one of determination. Grim determination. This was not surprising given the political context in which they have been operating. Bear with me while I recount recent events. In exactly one week, Gordhan is due to appear in court on fraud charges relating to his signing off of an early retirement package for Ivan Pillay, an official at SARS. The charges were announced by chief prosecutor, Shaun Abrahams, at a strangely stilted media briefing, where he appeared to be reading like a robot from a prepared (Java?) script. Since Abrahams' announcement, the charges have been laughed off by the legal community. Former senior judges such as Zac Yacoob (Constitutional Court) and Johann Kriegler (Appellate Division, Constitutional Court) and other sharp legal minds such as Paul Hoffman, SC, have publicly torn the charge s...
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