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South Africa: Zuma Blasts Mbeki
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Cape Argus (Cape Town)
11 December 2007
Posted to the web 11 December 2007
Wendy Jasson da Costa
Cape Town
With five days to go to the ANC's national conference, Jacob Zuma has gone for the jugular, laying bare all the shortcomings of President Thabo Mbeki's administration.
In a thinly veiled attack on his rival for the ANC president's position, Zuma on Monday used an International Human Rights Day lecture at Wits University to highlight crime, education, poverty, the abuse of women and children, and the one probably closest to his heart, the abuse of state power.
In a hall filled to capacity, mainly by his supporters, the ANC deputy president said it was important for South Africans to uphold the constitution and ensure that state organs operated under the democratic principles enshrined therein. "These principles must not be abused in any way by anyone," said Zuma.
His followers have always argued that organs of state were being abused to target him, specifically in relation to his on/off fraud and corruption charges.
Zuma on Monday said there should never be a time when the abuse of authority and state power was tolerated or excused. "In the same vein, our citizens need to maintain careful watch to ensure the separation of powers so that the executive can never exercise undue influence over the judiciary and parliament."
One of the many criticisms against Mbeki was that the executive held too much power, while members of the ANC, SA Communist Party and Cosatu have accused him of taking decisions without consulting them.
Zuma said the constitution and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights were essential because history showed that some humans had the "indeterminate and insatiable tendency to undermine and deprive the rights of others".
Taking a dig at Mbeki's policy of "quiet diplomacy" towards Zimbabwe, Zuma said it was tragic that there were world leaders who witnessed repression and pretended that it was not happening or was exaggerated.
"When history eventually deals with the dictators, those who stood by and watched the deterioration of nations should bear the consequences," Zuma said.
On poverty, he said there were "pockets of grinding poverty" that existed just metres away from "rolling opulence" that went unnoticed by the rich.
Zuma's speech, which sounded more like a state of the nation report, also dealt with the thorny issues of crime and HIV and Aids.
He said many lived in fear of violent crime and hid behind security barriers, but that fear was not the natural state of a free people.
Zuma also accused the country's laws of being "user friendly" towards criminals. "In a country where we don't have the death penalty, then the laws must bite."
To applause, Zuma - flanked by Cosatu general secretary Zwelinzima Vavi and businessman Tokyo Sexwale - said that if education was recognised as a basic human right, then it should be free for all and not something that should be bought. He said HIV should be treated as a national emergency.
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Jovial Rantao, political commentator and deputy editor of The Star, will be on standby to answer your questions between 11am and noon on Tuesday.
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