The recently unveiled manifesto of the EFF includes its plans for countering serious corruption. It proposes to convert the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) into a chapter 9 institution, to cut the executive out of responsibility and accountability for the countering of serious corruption.

All our chapter 9 institutions enjoy constitutionally guaranteed independence and their reporting line is to our multiparty parliament, where it can be expected that a higher degree of accountability is possible, especially when kleptocrats and other well-connected players are under scrutiny by the criminal justice administration.

The EFF plan is not sufficiently radical. Here’s why.

The NPA has had no real investigative capacity since the demise of the Scorpions in 2009. The Hawks, a mere police unit, are insufficient to the task of investigating serious corruption. In its final 2014 incarnation it has proved incapable of successfully investigating the “big fish” in the pool of corruption in SA. Without successful investigations, no successful prosecutions can possibly be achieved.

The other objection to the EFF manifesto plan is that the NPA has been gutted in the process of state capture. According to its post-Zuma leaders, it is infested with what they call “saboteurs” whose main function is to see to it that the politically well connected continue to enjoy the impunity that has been the order of the day since the demise of the Scorpions.

The EFF should reconsider its position and fall in line with the other major opposition parties that prefer to retain the NPA and set up a new chapter 9 anti-corruption commission, free of the baggage of the NPA and better equipped than the Hawks. This could lead to success in preventing, combating, investigating and prosecuting the serious corruption that is strangling the life out of SA.

Paul Hoffman SC
Director, Accountability Now