President Thabo Mbeki and former Deputy President Jacob Zuma have been ordered by ANC leaders to suspend their bitter feud and lead the party out of its crisis.

The relationship between South Africa’s two most powerful politicians has deteriorated badly since Mbeki fired Zuma as deputy president of South Africa in June.

This was after Judge Hilary Squires had said Zuma had a “generally corrupt relationship” with businessman Schabir Shaik, who was found guilty of fraud and corruption.

Zuma has since been charged with corruption and has been mobilising support within the ANC and its allies with a view to discrediting his trial or stopping it from proceeding.

Since then, ANC leaders and members have been at each others’ throats, raising fears of permanent division.

On Monday, members of the ANC’s 25-member national working committee gave Mbeki and Zuma four days to come up with a proposal to restore party unity.

On Friday, the two men briefed the national working committee on their efforts to heal the divisions before they proceeded to table their proposals to the party’s full national executive committee (NEC).

Yesterday, the two leaders issued a joint statement committing themselves to working together to solve the impasse.

“We have started a process of intensive interactions between ourselves, to develop a practical approach to these issues in a manner that would best serve the interests of the movement and the country as a whole,” said Mbeki and Zuma in their joint statement yesterday.

But, even as the ink was drying on the statement, Zuma launched a fresh offensive against the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA), which has charged him with two counts of corruption.

Zuma issued an ultimatum on Friday demanding the Scorpions return all documents seized from his premises by Monday or face court action.

Zuma’s threat followed a Johannesburg High Court judgment against the NPA, which ruled against the Scorpions’ raids on the office and home of Zuma’s lawyer Julekha Mahomed.

Another Zuma lawyer, Michael Hulley, confirmed on Friday that Zuma was considering launching an application to force the Scorpions to drop charges against him on the grounds that the raids had jeopardised his right to a fair trail.

It is not clear how Zuma’s legal challenges against the Scorpions would affect his talks with Mbeki, but the two have agreed to work together to find ways of bringing unity to the party.

They are expected to report back to a special NEC meeting about the progress they have made in resolving differences between their supporters. No date has yet been set for the special NEC meeting, but the party said yesterday it would be held “as soon as possible”.

The party’s NEC took an unusual step yesterday when it ordered its members, including the Youth League and Women’s League, to refrain from discussing the stand-off.

The ANC also appealed to its Cosatu and SA Communist Party allies to “themselves respect this decision and await the outcome of decisions that will be taken by the NEC at its specially convened meeting”.

ANC secretary-general Kgalema Motlanthe yesterday acknowledged that the Zuma affair had been “the most serious challenge the ANC has faced” since the party came to power in 1994.

He admitted that the ANC had been criticised by its alliance partners for failing to provide leadership on the matter.

“One of the criticisms has been that the ANC is laid back, it has not given leadership,” he said.

He said both Mbeki and Zuma had been called upon to heal the divisions because they are the “head of the movement”.

Motlanthe said Mbeki and Zuma had to ask themselves difficult questions about whether they wanted to leave a legacy of presiding over the party’s self-destruction.

In a joint presentation to the party’s NEC on Friday, both Mbeki and Zuma said: “It is understandable that there should be pain within the movement regarding the difficulties faced by our [the ANC’s] deputy president.

“There will also be anger among cadres who hold the perception that the deputy president is being victimised, as there will be among those who have silently watched events unfold, awaiting the movement’s collective wisdom so that they can make disciplined interventions among our members and society at large.

“Precisely because of this pain and anger, it is critical that the leadership should rise above the fray and find mature ways of dealing with the challenges.”

While there has been agreement on setting up Mbeki’s proposed commission of inquiry to investigate an alleged political conspiracy against Zuma, the two leaders have, however, agreed to refer the matter for further discussions with the ANC’s alliance partners.

Mbeki and Zuma agreed that there should be respect for the rule of law, including “respect for institutions of state mandated to carry out law-enforcement and judicial functions”.

Zuma’s supporters have been in the forefront of criticising the judiciary and the NPA’s Scorpions unit for treating Zuma “unfairly”.

The statement is also seen as an attempt to stop Zuma supporters from making further calls for Mbeki to interfere with the judicial process by withdrawing charges against Zuma.

One of the most remarkable aspects of the agreement between Mbeki and Zuma is one that binds the two leaders to “prevent the abuse of state institutions for personal material gain or personal agendas. This implies that these institutions should respect the rule of law. It is also necessary to pursue the continuing transformation of these institutions within the framework set out in the Constitution.”

This could be an important concession to Zuma supporters who have been accusing Mbeki of using state machinery such as the NPA to tackle Zuma and other opponents.

And, as if in reference to Zuma and the charges he is facing, the statement said the ANC and its allies should be at the forefront of the struggle against corruption.

With acknowledgements to Wisani wa ka Ngobeni, Xolani Xundu, Moipone Malefane and the Sunday Times.