On 23 August 2021, bullets hailed down on the motionless body of Babita Deokaran, the whistle-blower who courageously agreed to testify in an alleged fraud investigation related to a R300 million tender for personal protective equipment (PPE) in the Gauteng health sector. This tragedy brought to life the dangers faced by whistle-blowers in South Africa. Given the fact that corruption has played a key role in the contraction of the South African economy by 1,5% and led to an investor strike, we need more whistle-blowers to come forward, as Babita Deokaran, Angelo Agrizzi, Nomvula Mokonyane, and Athol Williams did. 

According to Transparency International, corruption is rampant in South Africa, as the country only scored 44/100 on the Corruption Perceptions Index in 2020, warranting further analysis of the phenomenon. To be frank, South Africa has been rapidly deteriorating on this index with each passing year. Despite the establishment of commissions, new procurement rules, and political commitments by the President, corruption continues apace.

At a book launch co-hosted by Defend our Democracy and the Centre for Sustainable Transitions, a panel of experts discussed the importance of understanding corruption, the role of whistle-blowers in exposing corruption, and the phenomenon of state capture. During this event, Anatomy of State Capture was also launched. This 427-page book sought to conceptualise and synthesise the origins, development, and manifestation of state capture in the country. The book explained the foundations for understanding state capture, provided an explanation on how the looting of state coffers was accomplished, discussed the maintenance of legitimacy and its human costs, and provided an explanation of how weakened accountability can endanger a nation. Moreover, it dealt with how state capture mirrored the global patterns of corruption. This book is indeed a meaningful contribution by academics, policy makers, and journalists and the authors have made a meaningful contribution to this pressing issue, which is robbing the state of legitimacy, demoralising the general public, and forcing investors to flee our shores, which results in greater impoverishment.

Works such as Anatomy of State Capture have been painstaking compiled, claims substantiated, and evidence sought to ensure that it reflects the most accurate reflection. It follows in the steps of other great scholarship on the subject. Think here of Pieter Louis Myburgh’s erudite Gangster State: Unravelling Ace Magashule’s Web of Capture, Jacques Pauw’s explosive The President’s Keepers: Those Keeping Zuma in Power and Out of Prison, Robin Renwick’s insightful How to Steal a Country: State Capture and Hopes for the Future in South Africa, or the illuminating The Bosasa Billions by James Brent-Styan. 

Despite the overwhelming evidence presented in these tomes, the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) has been slow to act. Perpetrators walk free, safely ensconced in the knowledge that the NPA has been gutted by venal political elites who put party interests before country. The act of prosecution in South Africa seems to be motivated by political considerations and not criminality itself or legality. The recent resignation of Hermione Cronje, Head of the Investigative Directorate at the NPA, underscores the sad truism that those within the system seeking to make a difference, are increasingly frustrated by the lack of action and choose to leave … to the detriment of the country.

What international experience has reinforced, is that state capture is intimately linked to the issue of longevity of political power. It is only when a political party – which has been entrenched in corruption for so long – actually faces electoral defeat, that real hope emerges. In political defeat, the incumbent rot is jettisoned as cadre deployment ends and tenderpreneurship is given a bloody nose. The recent local government elections suggested that the country’s long-suffering citizens are prepared to turn their backs on a self-serving, incompetent, and ruling political class. It is hoped that this will be realised in the next general elections. We owe selfless heroes like Babita Deokaran nothing less.