A political life probably ruined for $135,000 and a wig. The president of the National Assembly of South Africa, Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula, was arrested last Thursday in the framework of investigations for corruption and money laundering that allegedly occurred when the veteran politician, 67, was serving as Minister of Defense, a position which he held for seven years, from 2014 to 2021.
Mapisa-Nqakula, who categorically denied the charges and had, thanks to her position, prevented the search of her house days before, is accused of accepting cash bribes and gifts from a contractor transporting military equipment. According to the police investigation, the former deputy and one of the figures of the party in power, the African National Congress (ANC), received up to eleven payments for a total amount of more than two and a half million rands, about 135,000 dollars (125,000 euros). ), between the years 2016 and 2019. He also agreed to pay about 100,000 more euros, although he ultimately did not receive this last amount.
Mapisa-Nqakula's arrest is a blow to the ANC's chin at the worst possible time. The ruling party, which has always held power in South Africa since the first free elections in 1994, faces in two months the closest elections in recent years. Immersed in an unstoppable decline in popularity, the party to which the Nobel Peace Prize winner and the country's first black president, Nelson Mandela, belonged, could obtain, according to polls, for the first time less than 50% of the votes in the presidential elections. on May 29. It rains in the wet, too: the president of South Africa, Cyril Ramaphosa, came to power in 2018 with the promise of stopping the corruption unleashed by his predecessor, Jacob Zuma, during nine years at the head of the government.
Although Mapisa-Nqakula insists on his innocence, it will not be easy for him to reverse his situation. The prosecution report gives specific details of the alleged criminal demands of the former head of Defense and provides information on the place and day on which the bribes were delivered. Even add surreal brushstrokes. According to the papers, in February 2019, Mapisa-Nqakula received an unidentified person in a booth at the international airport who gave him an envelope with about 14,000 euros and a peculiar gift: a wig of the best quality.
Increasingly surrounded by police investigations, Mapisa-Nqakula was arrested last Thursday after voluntarily surrendering at the police station in the Lyttelton neighborhood, on the outskirts of Pretoria, and a day after resigning from her position as head of the Assembly. The South African Prosecutor's Office, which announced that it plans to accuse another person in the same case, although it did not give more details, announced that it does not oppose the release on bail of the former minister. While investigations are underway, the case has been postponed until June 4.
In a statement, the veteran activist, who fought against apartheid from exile, had stressed hours before being arrested that she was resigning from her position "due to the seriousness" of the accusations leveled against her and to "protect the image" of the CNA.
“I have made this conscious decision to dedicate my time to focusing on addressing the recently announced investigation against me by our country's law enforcement agencies,” he said, but insisted that his step aside in no way means acceptance. of the blame. “My resignation is in no way an indicator or admission of my guilt regarding the allegations that have been brought against me.”
The Mapisa-Nqakula case adds to years of corruption scandals around the ANC party, which in 2021 saw even its leader for years, former president Zuma, go to prison. For South African analyst and writer Nomavenda Mathiane, the Zulu leader was just the tip of the iceberg. “Zuma was not acting alone, the problems within the ANC are systemic and part of the party's corrupt DNA is still there,” the South African analyst explained to this newspaper.
