Publication: Business Day Weekender Issued: Date: 2006-11-11 Reporter: Carmel Rickard Reporter:

A Few Corrupt Relationships Draw To A Close

 

Publication 

Business Day Weekender

Date

2006-11-11

Reporter
Carmel Rickard

Web Link

www.bday.co.za

 

More than one “generally corrupt relationship" came to a symbolic end in southern Africa this week.

Schabir Shaik heard that he had lost his appeal. Unless his lawyers can turn the case into a constitutional dispute, he will have to serve his 15-year jail sentence. In rejecting Shaik’s argument for his sentence to be reduced, the appeal court said of Shaik’s payments to former deputy president Jacob Zuma that he had “subverted" his friendship with the powerful politician into a generally corrupt relationship of patronage “designed to achieve power and wealth".

The demise of another such relationship is being presided over by the courts in Lesotho. In that case, Lahmeyer, a major German engineering company, has become chief witness against the two high-ranking Basotho officials it is alleged to have bribed in connection with the Khatse dam project.

Lahmeyer was tried in connection with a separate corruption charge some time ago, pleaded not guilty and put up a stout defence.

Convicted, the company took the matter on appeal only to be given an even tougher sentence by Lesotho’s highest court.

This second case began with the company as the accused but, apparently fearing another huge setback to its bank balance and reputation, it offered to help the prosecution by providing evidence such as records of the money it allegedly paid to the two officials.

In a delicious irony, the company has now found itself under a potentially fatal attack from the World Bank. Using the corruption evidence from the first case against the company, the bank this week debarred Lahmeyer from involvement in World Bank development projects for seven years. For a company such as Lahmeyer, which relies on international development work, this is tantamount to a death sentence.

The World Bank says that if Lahmeyer confesses all its sins about previous corrupt practices elsewhere in the world, the debarment period will be halved.

Although Lahmeyer officials haven’t yet announced their response, it’s a case of damned if they do; damned if they don’t.

And there’s a third matter. I’ve always characterised the relationship between former president PW Botha and his supporters as “generally corrupt" *1. As I see it, he corrupted them into handing over their minds, their ability to think independently and their duty to hold leaders accountable. Their blind support corrupted him into thinking himself and his cause invincible. I’m not exactly sure what he offered in return. Perhaps some illusion of security or an apparently noble ideal that fitted with their view of themselves as better than anyone else.

The present government’s praises of him, however muted, and the understated magnanimity of President Thabo Mbeki’s presence at the funeral, show me its generous nature, rather than persuading me that Botha deserved these remarks.

When Botha retired, so did the much-respected editor of the Sunday Tribune in Durban, Ian Wyllie. During a career that began in 1946, Wyllie interviewed Gen Jan Smuts and every prime minister thereafter until his own retirement. You couldn’t find anyone more opposed to corruption. Through the newspapers he edited he fought it; all his journalistic life he wrote and spoke against it and against apartheid that spawned opportunities for corruption and that was in itself a corrupter of people and of rights.

Although we never worked on the same newspaper, we often used to talk about what we could have done together if we had. I loved him dearly as a friend and owe him a great debt as a mentor (thanks to him I can spell “accommodation" and “liaise" and I know what “to eke out" really means ­ as well as many more serious things). Ironically, he died within a week of his old adversary Botha, and their memorials were held on the same day.

Somehow I can hear his voice through the words of the appeal court in Monday’s judgment: “The seriousness of the offence of corruption cannot be overemphasised. It offends against the rule of law and the principles of good governance. It lowers the moral tone of a nation and negatively affects development and the promotion of human rights.

“As a country we have travelled a long and tortuous road to achieve democracy. Corruption threatens our constitutional order. We must make every effort to ensure that corruption with its putrefying effects is halted."

With acknowledgements to Carmel Rickard and Business Day Weekender.


*1       Whatever the sentiment, the logic is nonsense.