Family and favour at the court of Jacob Zuma
Jacob Zuma’s role as both state and party president is significantly underpinned by those who pay court to him on the basis of personal loyalty, patriarchal fealty and hope for personal gain, his formal authority buttressed by political patronage and protection which extends to those close to him. However, Zuma combines his role of tribal patriarch with that of his role at the head of a shadow state, his ‘family’ extending beyond close relatives to include business associates with shady connections. Zuma is an accidental president who ascended to the office because he was not Thabo Mbeki. He may not be any more inclined to cohabit with the morally dubious than his predecessor (who, notoriously, shielded Chief of Police Jackie Selebi from investigation for linkages to organised crime). Nonetheless, it is difficult to believe that a man deemed by a court to have been in a corrupt relationship with Shabir Shaik (eventually sentenced to 15 years imprisonment for offences committed in connection with the notorious 1998 arms deal) and who was facing some 783 criminal charges involving fraud, corruption and racketeering would have secured the presidency had he not been able to place himself at the head of a ‘coalition of the aggrieved’ who wished to bring Mbeki’s rule and influence to an abrupt end. That this coalition was broad-based is generally accepted, receiving strong backing not merely from the organised left within the Tripartite Alliance but ethnic support from within the ANC of his home province. But in addition, he received strong support from black business interests. Mbeki may have been the chief champion of BEE, but his challenger received support from a motley group of business players, some of whom switched their support from Mbeki to Zuma when they identified him as the rising man; from established business persons from KwaZulu-Natal who had long been close to him; from those who had lost out or had felt disadvantaged under Mbeki; and not least, from major figures within the Indian business community (again, significantly rooted in KwaZulu-Natal). In addition, he was backed by powerful figures within the ANC who had either been convicted of criminal offences (such as Winnie Madikizela-Mandela) or who were under investigation for criminal acts, some of these for alleged involvement in tendering scams (such as Ngoako Ramathlodi and Angie Motsheka) (Southall 2009). In Zuma, powerful elements within the party saw a man who would not be overly troubled by ethical or legal concerns when it became time to cash in their cards for supporting him in his conjoined struggle for political survival and to stay out of jail. The evidence laid before the court in Shabir Shaik’s trial of Zuma’s heavy
The coming crisis of Zuma's ANC: the party state confronts fiscal crisis
Rising state expenditure threatens to outstrip the South African government's ability to pay. This danger is merely a symptom of and challenge to the predatory characteristics of the ‘party-state’ erected by the ruling African National Congress (ANC), notably as they are exhibited under the presidency of Jacob Zuma. The ANC government is increasingly looking to an oil and gas bonanza to avoid a ‘fiscal cliff’, while Zuma himself is driving a nuclear power future which threatens to bankrupt the economy. The latter strategy conforms to the party's greater disposition to corruption and patronage. Key parastatals have become headed by Zuma cronies; family and friends have been awarded government favour; and Zuma's personal interests intrude upon the governance of parastatals, the South African Revenue Service and the functioning of constitutionally protected agencies such as the office of the Public Protector. The Zuma government's repudiation of accountability highlights an official drift to secrecy. However, the increasing limitations of ANC economic policy combine with growing discontent in society to place the party's political hegemony at risk – but Zuma's presidency has compromised the ANC's capacity for internal reform.
Circulars of the Sharī'a Courts in the Sudan (Manshūrāt el-Mahākim el-Sharī'a fi Sūdān) 1902–1979
An excellent documentation of the twentieth century history of the Sharī'a in Sudan is contained within the Judicial Circulars which have been issued from the office of the Grand Qadi from 1902–1979. During the colonial period and in the post-independence period the Circulars provided a unique means for modifying the adapting Sharī'a law in the Sudan, drawing on opinions of the Hanafī and Mālikī schools of juristic interpretation. These Circulars and Memoranda are, in fact, basic to an understanding of the practice and application of the Sharī'a law in the Sudan. It is with these Circulars that I began my study of Sharī'a law and it is because of their importance that they were translated for my own work and in the hope that they may shortly be offered to students of the law of the Sudan who lack proficiency in the Arabic language.