Zondo says Parliament and ANC will allow state capture to happen again

Chief Justice Raymond Zondo said Parliament and the African National Congress (ANC) allowed state capture to happen and he doubted that Parliament was capable of stopping another Gupta-style looting of the state coffers.

Zondo delivered the keynote address at News24’s “On the record summit” in Sandton on Thursday.

The chief justice said various questions arose in the context of what he called the “Gupta Zuma state capture.”

“One of them is why Parliament did not stop this. The evidence that was led at the commission was quite clear, that Parliament had all the powers to stop it. But it did not stop it, because the majority party in Parliament did not want to stop it,” he said.

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Zondo said opposition parties had tabled motions for the establishment of inquires to look into the allegations about the Gupta’s influence on former president Jacob Zuma, but the ANC did not allow this.

“A number of times opposition parties tabled motions of no confidence in the president as a way of wanting to stop this, but of course the majority party would have none of it.”

“Another question that arises in the light of what happened, namely the failure of Parliament to prevent state capture, is whether, if for some reason the Guptas were to be back and they would not be in jail and they would be free in South Africa, they started all over again, Parliament would act differently from the way they acted before.

“That is if they were again, that is the Guptas, have a president, who is president of the majority party and over whom they have the kind of influence they had with the previous head of state, would Parliament be able to act differently? I doubt that they would,” said Zondo.

Zondo said the evidence that was presented to the State Capture Commission by both the national chairperson and the president of the ANC was clear.

“Members of the majority party are not expected or should not vote or support a motion of no confidence in the president of the country who is their president or the president of their party,” said Zondo.

“If that is so, it’s unlikely that the majority would act differently and therefore Parliament would differently. And the question arises, does that mean we are at risk that what happened to us as a country which saw us losing billions of rands could happen again at some stage and Parliament would not be able to prevent it?”

Zondo said these are matters that South Africa must consider “for our country, for the sake of our children and our grandchildren. We need to ask ourselves the question, do we know how we would prevent another state capture that is similar to Gupta-Zuma state capture.”  

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