South Africa & The Zuma Factor | Start Here

What’s behind the recent looting and rioting in South Africa? And where does former president Jacob Zuma fit in? #AJStartHere with @SandraGathmann looks at the backstory.

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South Africa is dealing with a lot of

problems — the legacy of apartheid,

huge economic inequality, crushing

unemployment

and the most recorded cases of COVID-19

in Africa. But none of that —

except for the pandemic — is new. So why

did things kick off back in early July?

Well, you can’t answer that question

without talking about the former

president,

Jacob Zuma. He was in office from 2009 to

2018,

a time marked by corruption and cronyism

at the highest levels of government.

Zuma was forced to resign in 2018

because of all the allegations against

him.

He’s been fighting them ever since and

denies he did anything wrong,

which brings us to the Zondo commission.

It’s a public inquiry into what’s called

state capture during Zuma’s presidency,

meaning corruption involving the

government and the private sector.

Hundreds of

witnesses have provided lots of details

about what allegedly went on.

President Ramaphosa says the cost of

corruption during Zuma’s time in office

was more than $30 billion.

So that’s some of the backstory. Here’s

how things escalated.

In February this year Zuma refused to

appear before the Zondo commission —

even though he testified before. And then

in June the Constitutional Court

sentenced Zuma to 15 months in prison

for contempt of court.

He was given a deadline to turn himself

in and at the very last minute

he showed up at a police station.

While all that

was going on

hundreds of Zuma supporters, some

carrying weapons,

rallied in KwaZulu-Natal, his home

province.

And for a while there things did get out

of hand.

Over the next week there were more than

300 reported incidents,

including looting and arson across the

provinces of

Natal and Gauteng, where the cities of

Johannesburg, Pretoria

and Durban are. In some places police

failed to control the looting.

People took security into their own

hands, from taxi drivers

to armed vigilantes. President Ramaphosa

was criticised for being too

slow to act. Eventually, after almost a

week,

he sent in 25,000 soldiers — the biggest

military deployment

since the end of apartheid. And that

helped to calm things down.

And now South Africans have been left to

clean up the mess.

Well, some of it appeared to be plain

opportunism.

But a lot of people in South

Africa

are struggling to survive.

The World Bank says it’s the most

unequal country

in the world. Unemployment among young

people stands

at 75% and the pandemic has made

everything worse.

That context, though, doesn’t

necessarily

explain everything that’s happened and

President Ramaphosa suggested there was

actually something else going on.

So that takes it to a

whole other level.

The implication is that Zuma, or people

close to him, had something to do with

the violence.

But right now that hasn’t been proven

and as of July 19

only one suspected ringleader had been

arrested. Now remember

Ramaphosa and Zuma are from the same

political party —

the ANC — which has run South Africa for

almost

30 years, since the end of apartheid. But

the two men now represent

rival factions within the same party.

That’s one theory and apart from

anything else it shows just how

complicated this whole situation is.

What happened has revealed a lot about

South Africa’s problems

and how much work it will take to solve

them. But it’s

also a moment for reflection.

For more on the situation in South

Africa head over to aljazeera.com.

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