Graft: SA’s head is on the Block
The arrest and subsequent release on bail of ANC chairman and finance MEC in the Northern Cape John Block, along with fellow senior party and government leaders, is cause for concern.
Our country seems to be heading towards becoming a failed state with ever-increasing speed.
It is not so much that we believe that Block, social development MEC and deputy ANC provincial secretary Alvin Botes, and ANC MP and provincial treasurer Yolanda Botha are guilty of allegedly receiving payments and benefits from property company Trifecta Holdings in exchange for their influence in securing hugely profitable leases for the company.
We are alarmed by the three’s insistence, along with their supporters, that the charges are politically motivated, with the aim of settling internal party disputes and rivalries.
If Block’s contention is true, it would mean a senior ANC leader believes a government he is a senior member of uses state machinery to settle party squabbles.
If Block is wrong, it means the ANC has entrusted its leadership to men and women who have used political office to feather their own nests as they dispense patronage. Either way, the people of South Africa suffer.
The ANC cannot continue pretending that the rot within the party is a figment of its opponents’ imagination.
If it does, it will continue to see its reputation obliterated. We would not have cared if it were not taking the country with it on its path to self-destruction.
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