By Paul Hoffman 

While secure peace, sustainable progress and shared prosperity remain the goals of good governance everywhere, it is undeniable that these desirable qualities do not flourish in any society in which endemic grand corruption has taken root and goes unchecked.

It was acknowledged by the President himself that the ANC, then the majority party, was “accused number one” before the Zondo Commission of Inquiry into Allegations of State Capture.

The commission’s report, released in 2022, indicates this was an accurate assessment of the situation, one that requires urgent attention via the enforcement of South Africa’s international treaty obligations which specify independent anti-corruption machinery of state, and by implementing the binding Glenister litigation rulings of the Constitutional Court. These decisions require Parliament to create a body outside the control of the executive to deal with corruption. That body must be, according to the ConCourt’s findings, specialised, trained, independent, adequately resourced and secure in its tenure of office.

South Africa has no such body.

On the contrary, SA remains in breach of its obligations under the United Nations Convention against Corruption treaty (and similar treaties at the African Union, Southern African Development Community and Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development) even though the ANC, on its own, no longer enjoys majority status in Parliament.

It is largely because of its tolerance of grand corruption that the ANC has lost popular support. It is not legally possible to effect the reforms necessary to create the “body outside the control of the executive” if the ANC and the Government of National Unity do not accept that the establishment of such a body is a necessary precursor to dealing with the endemic corruption which remains as a virulent cancer on all efforts toward peace, progress and prosperity in SA.

Cavalier disregard

What was announced in last week’s State of the Nation Address (Sona) about countering corruption was completely underwhelming. It showed a lack of commitment to the rule of law, an unwillingness to honour solemn treaty obligations and a cavalier disregard for binding court decisions that have never been properly implemented by the government.

Here is all that was announced on the topic of corruption during Sona 2025:

“We want a nation that is free of corruption.

“Last year, we established the Investigating Directorate Against Corruption as a permanent entity within the NPA dedicated to investigating and prosecuting high-level corruption cases.

“We will ensure that the directorate is fully resourced and has access to the information that it needs to prosecute State Capture cases and hold those responsible to account.

“We are establishing a world-class digital forensics lab to support the investigation of complex corruption and financial crime with cutting-edge tools and expertise.

“We are making steady progress in the implementation of the recommendations of the State Capture Commission, including signing into law several legislative reforms.

“The Special Investigating Unit and Asset Forfeiture Unit report that over R10-billion has been recovered in State Capture-related cases.

“This year, the Department of Justice and Constitutional Development will report on the review of the anti-corruption architecture by the National Anti-Corruption Advisory Council.

“This is expected to streamline legislation, eradicate the duplication of mandates and foster greater cooperation between law enforcement agencies.

“We will finalise the whistle-blower protection framework and introduce the Whistle-blower Protections Bill in Parliament during this financial year.

“This year, we will strengthen South Africa’s system to combat money laundering and terror financing with further legislative and system improvements.

“To secure our removal from the international Financial Action Task Force greylist, we have made significant progress in addressing the weaknesses identified in our law enforcement system, with 16 out of 22 action items fully addressed.

“We want a nation that is at peace with the world.”

The President would also like to see the economy expand at 3% per annum, a rate that is roughly double what the experts anticipate. Achieving it requires business confidence, fresh local and foreign investments, and new jobs, jobs, jobs. None of these felicitous developments will take place while the country remains in the debilitating and offensive grip of grand corruption with those named and shamed by the Zondo Commission enjoying impunity, seemingly indefinitely. The loot of State Capture is measured in trillions, not billions. Past efforts at recovery of that loot, while commendable, are puny.

Warning ignored

The President has been advised that his new Investigating Directorate Against Corruption (Idac) does not pass constitutional muster, not by a long way. Before he signed it into law Accountability Now wrote to the President to warn urgently against assenting to the Bill. He ignored the communication and signed anyway.

The Scorpions of old were, structurally and legislatively speaking, identical to the new Idac, both being creatures of an ordinary statute located within the programme of the Department of Justice that is known as the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA). The NPA itself is not a body outside executive control — the minister of justice has final responsibility over it and the director-general of justice is the accounting officer of the NPA. To suggest that the new Idacis a permanent body is to ignore the fate of the Scorpions. If permanent status is desired, Idac does not cut the mustard.

The President has clearly forgotten that his deputy minister of justice in the last Parliament, John Jeffery, conceded that Idac was no more than “a stopgap measure”. The President may also have forgotten that when he was first introduced to the idea of a Chapter Nine anti-corruption body by the IFP chief whip in Parliament in March 2019 he found the idea “refreshing” and worthy of “mulling over”.

Perhaps more importantly, the President has never explained why his Cabinet, when instructed in August 2020 by the National Executive Committee of the ANC to urgently establish an independent and permanent stand-alone anti-corruption body, simply ignored the instruction.

While the President gave the impression during Sona that the Department of Justice had control of processes around the National Anti-Corruption Advisory Council, it was at his instance that Nacac was established and it was on his desk that the report of Nacac, submitted 11 months ago, was lost, or at least languished for months, before being referred to the department of justice.

Member’s Bills

The President, during his Sona, also ignored the presence in Parliament of two Bills, private member’s Bills introduced by the former shadow minister of justice, Glynnis Breytenbach. These Bills are aimed at achieving compliance with the relevant treaty obligations and the rulings in the Glenister litigation that, to quote Deputy Chief Justice Dikgang Moseneke and Justice Edwin Cameron, who so ruled in March 2011:

“ Our law demands a body outside executive control to deal effectively with corruption.”

This finding was confirmed by Chief Justice Mogoeng Mogoeng in November 2014 in the last Glenister case:

“Corruption is rife in this country and stringent measures are required to contain this malady before it graduates into something terminal. We are of one accord that SA needs an agency dedicated to the containment and eventual eradication of the scourge of corruption. We also agree that the entity must enjoy adequate structural and operational independence to deliver effectively and efficiently on its core mandate.”

The President has been in office in the Cabinet either as deputy president or as president since 2014. He has ignored the treaty obligations and the court findings that oblige SA to have independent corruption busters. So lacklustre is the President’s showing over the years that it came to the point at which former Chief Justice Raymond Zondo warned, in November 2023, that drastic and urgent steps are required to counter corruption.

There was nothing urgent and nothing drastic in the President’s Sona announcements about countering corruption. The government is on a dwaalspoor with Idac. Nacac is obliged to have regard to the court decisions quoted above and to the treaty obligations of SA.

The President would have done well to endorse the Breytenbach Bills and to accelerate their passage through Parliament; the fact that he has not, does not bode well for the peace for which he prays, the progress he preaches and the prosperity he promises.

His dilly-dallying with Idac and Nacac, if it goes on too long, will surely precipitate public interest litigation that will embarrass him. He should seriously reconsider his position on countering corruption. DM