While the average South African might see the sentencing of Jacob Zuma to imprisonment as a triumph of the rule of law, I have a suspicion we are being led by the nose into another political pantomime.
It is unlikely that Zuma will spend more than six months actually locked up, so from the perspective of a career criminal this must be the deal of the decade. Who wouldn’t trade a few months banged up in exchange for being able to stay shtum about where the loot is?
While inside, Zuma will polish his political halo and don the Mandela mantle so he can emerge as the people's hero who bravely fought his oppressors and is ready for another chance to play Robin(g) Hood.
If the judiciary had any mettle they would bring him before a criminal court to answer the raft of charges laid out before the Zondo commission. He would have the right to silence, of course, but there is enough evidence for any reasonable court to put him away for at least a few years, rather than a few months.
Bernard Benson, Parklands
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