A watchdog’s report into corruption allegations against South African President Jacob Zuma must be published on Wednesday, a court in Pretoria ruled, as demonstrators calling for Zuma to quit gathered in the streets of the capital.
Police used water cannons and stun grenades as they tried to disperse crowds of protesters amid increasingly chaotic scenes. The demonstrations have blocked off many downtown streets and a CNN team also witnessed looting.
The judge at the North Gauteng High Court in Pretoria ruled that the Public Protector must release the so-called Gupta report by 5 p.m. local time (11 a.m. ET) Wednesday.
The judge’s ruling came shortly after Zuma’s lawyer announced the president was dropping his bid to block the release of the report, which could potentially show corruption at the highest levels of his government.
“My instructions are to withdraw the application and to tender costs; my instructions are further not to oppose any costs on the scale, the scale of the costs and we abide the decision of this honorable court in relation to those costs,” lawyer Anthea Platt told the court in Pretoria.
Zuma has always denied any wrongdoing.
But the latest demonstrations in Pretoria and elsewhere will add to the mounting pressure the president is under from South Africa’s political opposition, business groups, civil society and legal quarters to step aside.
‘Zuma must go’
Opposition protesters who gathered in the streets of Pretoria on Wednesday — many wearing the red shirts of the Economic Freedom Fighters — called angrily for Zuma to resign. Some waved signs saying, “Zuma must go.”
Smoke could be seen rising from burning tires in some areas of the capital’s commercial center.
The governing African National Congress said via Twitter that it welcomed the president’s decision to withdraw his attempt to block the report’s release.
The report examines allegations of influence peddling in relation to brothers Ajay, Atul and Rajesh Gupta and Zuma’s government.
South Africans frustrated
The ANC, the party that has ruled South Africa since the end of apartheid, has so far stood by Zuma but suffered significant losses in local elections held nationwide in August, with the opposition Democratic Alliance gaining more than a quarter of the vote.
South Africans are increasingly expressing frustration with rampant corruption and poor public services.
In March, the Constitutional Court ruled Zuma had defied the South African Constitution when he used $15 million in state funds to upgrade his private home. An effort to impeach Zuma following that court’s decision failed to get the necessary votes in Parliament.
A statement released Tuesday by the Nelson Mandela Foundation, founded by South Africa’s late president, called for the ANC to “take the steps necessary to ensure that the vehicle of state be protected and placed in safe and capable hands,” saying “political meddling” had weakened critical institutions.
“South African citizens across the land are speaking out and taking action to express their dissatisfaction,” it said. “The Nelson Mandela Foundation supports the demand to hold to account those responsible for compromising our democratic state and looting its resources.”
