JOHANNESBURG MAY 19, 2017 (CISA) –South African Council of Churches (SACC) has warned that corruption is turning the country into a “mafia state.”
“We have come to recognize that South Africa may just be a few inches from the throes of a mafia state from which there may be no return, a recipe for a failed state,” Bishop Malusi Mpumlwana, Secretary General SACC said in a statement.
SACC is an inter-denomination grouping that brings together about 36 member churches and organizations including the Anglican Church and Dutch Reformed Church.
Bishop Mpumlwana was speaking May 18 during the release of the findings of SACC investigation into graft.
According to the report the ruling African National Congress (ANC) had ignored corruption complaints and whistleblowers were terrified of their own government due to intimidation.
“We have come to learn that what appears to be chaos and instability in government may well be a systematic design of the madness that ills our governmental environment – a chaotic design,” said Bishop Mpumlwana, adding SACC would share its findings with the ANC rather than the police or judiciary.
President Jacob Zuma has in past weeks faced calls to resign from within his own ruling African National Congress (ANC) party and the opposition amid a slew of scandals that prompted street protests and credit-rating downgrades.
Among the scandals that have rocked President Zuma’s presidency are allegations of influence-peddling by wealthy friends of the president and the misuse of public funds to renovate his private home.
The nation’s anti-graft watchdog, in a report released in November 2016, called for a judge to investigate allegations of influence peddling in Zuma’s government.
A court has also ordered him to give reasons for firing his widely-respected finance minister in April.
