Justice should not be an emotional subject. That is why no one should argue with Justice Minister Penuell Maduna who, although he allowed himself to be misinterpreted, was technically correct when he said the arrest of Tony Yengeni had no legal connection with the arms deal.

"Even if (Yengeni) might have promised people things', he could not have made such a promise, as the decision on the arms deal was an executive decision, and Tony Yengeni is not a member of the executive," Maduna maintained.

And while it will continue to trouble Yengeni that justice is still meted out mostly by white people when the accused is usually black, it may help him to know that this will continue to be the case for a long time in SA. And he can rest assured that the white-controlled media will report his alleged crimes to saturation point.

Thank goodness Yengeni stole the thunder before Monday's meeting of the ruling party's national working committee (NWC) and decided on his own, "for the sake of the ANC", to resign as chief whip.

One can only imagine what a field day the "pack of pesky (press) dogs" would have had once again this week had the NWC had to take the action itself.

The ANC, too, was correct in pointing out that Yengeni will remain innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. But other questions remain.

The truth is that some of us hoped for something more inspirational from the ANC leadership on Monday.

The man whose job was to whip into line the country's most important political decision-makers belongs to the party South Africans voted overwhelmingly into power. The allegations that have been made against him have something of the feel of a movie script about them.

That drama, however, was not at the forefront of some people's minds. Gnawing at us was something along the lines of what President Thabo Mbeki said in the case of Mpumalanga Premier Ndaweni Mahlangu that what some would like to see is the ANC crucifying Yengeni.

Yet that was not what we were asking for. Far from it. Our logic goes something like this.

When the President appointed Bulelani Ngcuka as national director of public prosecutions, he expected him, swiftly and decisively, to build strong cases against SA's foremost criminals, apprehend them, and let the courts take care of the rest. Ngcuka is protecting the integrity of our criminal justice system.

In the same way, the ANC appointed Yengeni so he could whip into line the majority party's parliamentarians to make sure they take the right decisions timeously and protect the integrity of the legislature.

It appears that while Ngcuka has been painfully building a positive image for the country's criminal justice system, Yengeni, on the other hand, has been selfish and pathetically personal.

Nothing wrong with enjoying the good things in life, it must be said. But when there are doubts about how they have been acquired, and one is called upon to explain these doubts, the interests and integrity of the legislature are at stake.

Yengeni has undermined the credibility of the most important decision-making house in the land. He frowns at its watchdog committees dealing with financial accountability and ethics. And he has created a sense of dread in the house among his colleagues so they feared being even remotely critical about the arms deal invited sulphuric fire from the chief whip.

Those who dared to, knew about associated risks. As one MP put it: the experience would feel like "running through an area knowing there are limpet mines all over, and you could lose a limb or die even."

Now, stripped of the power to intimidate or even fire, as he tried to do to Andrew Feinstein, Yengeni vents his anger at the "racist bigots" the Scorpions who built a case around him.

Will the ANC ever sanction him for undermining Ngcuka's intelligence and impugning his integrity by implying his men are a bunch of no-gooders hell-bent on racist-motivated vengeance?

If Yengeni can make such remarks, who shouldn't? Will the ANC ever sanction him for withholding information from Parliament only to flout it through newspaper advertisements and let him sit in the same chamber as if nothing happened?

Whatever the unified face that the ANC has come to present on the Yengeni case, a lot of people in the party's ranks, including MPs, continue to believe that this is a case that could have been handled better.

Worse still is a fear that the Merc stories are merely a stench emanating from a grisly mass grave where the corpses of truth and honesty lie buried, sacrificed on the altar to senior politicians' power, ambition and greed.

And as more and more evidence is unearthed on Yengeni and scores of others involved in the arms procurement, Maduna's pronouncement will not only fall on deaf ears, but will not be helpful either. Certainly not to government, the ANC, nor to SA Inc.

The ANC president has an obligation to to provide SA with decisive leadership. He and the other ANC leaders cannot afford to fail the majority of South Africans who in fact did look around in the last election, but showed by the nearly two-thirds majority they gave on a platter, that they still believe in Mbeki and the ANC. What are the 89year-old ANC's politics about, if not about those people. History will be the judge.

Mvoko is Senior Political Correspondent at Business Day.

With acknowledgment to Vuyo Mvoko and Business Day.