Thursday, February 14, 2008

South Africa slips further away from freedom.

What has been hailed as South Africa’s most effective police unit is set to be disbanded for investigating high ranking party officials in what is increasingly becoming a one party state. The “Scorpions” are an elite unit of law enforcement agents legally separated from other branches of the regular South African Police Service (and thus, from political influence) and tasked with tackling organized crime and government corruption. Unfortunately for open government they’ve been investigating the wrong people. The Scorpions have been major actors in leveling charges against Jackie Selebi (former commissioner of the South African Police Service and president of Interpol) and Jacob Zuma (President of the ANC and presumably the next President of South Africa). The same ANC that elected Zuma its president doesn’t want to see him go to jail for corruption so in the name of politics it is about to destroy what appears to be the nation’s greatest crime-fighting apparatus.

I believe this move represents the continuing march of a once-great country toward second-rate dictatorship. If Nelson Mandela is half the man my teachers and professors have made him out to be he should intervene as the father of the ANC and put his party back on task before the principles he fought for erode away under the waves of instability his progeny have brought crashing down on his nation.

http://allafrica.com/stories/200802130023.html
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/7220409.stm

1 comment:

Unknown said...

Yeahhhhhhh boiiiiiiiii!!!

But seriously, nice post. Keep 'em coming.