Protect us from the public protector

No single person encapsulates the decaying, downward slide of South Africa into corrupt, crime-ridden failed status as does our suspended public protector, Busisiwe Mkhwebane.

Appointed as someone to watch over the interests of ordinary South Africans, she has spent much of her time helping to protect – and run interference for – former president Jacob Zuma and the network of people involved in the state capture project.

She has also focused on those supposed enemies of that faction. In the process, she has proved herself to be spectacularly inept at legal matters, having been handed repeated smackdowns by numerous courts, right up to the Constitutional Court.

ALSO READ: R140 million in legal fees spent on defending Mkhwebane over 5 years

She has become a vexatious litigant, fighting cases even when there is little prospect of success. So bad has she been at this that she has had a number of punitive orders for costs issued against her. This, naturally, has made her some sort of martyr in the same quarters who revere Zuma.

But the bottom line – her bottom line – is that she has spent more than R158 million of your, taxpayer, money in tilting at these legal windmills.

Parliament is currently deciding whether she it fit to hold office. Our view: No, she is not. We, South African citizens, need protection from her.