EFFORTPOST Jacob Zuma, the Nkandla Residence and Fire Pool Drama

Greetings Dramatards!

So to continue with our Jacob Zuma dramasaga, last time we were with Jacob Zuma, he had cucked the r*pe charges against him, and cucked Thabo Mbeki out of leadership of the ANC (african National Congress if u guys ever wondered), all within the span of one year. He was always an influential politician within the ANC, but between 2005 - 2006, he had meteoric rise to power, and basically shocked a lot of people when he would attain presidency of the Republic of South Africa, from 2009 to 2018.

In his nearly 10 years of reign, he would cause chaos and anarchy wherever he went, and would the most corrupt president in all of recorded RSA history. He would enable a top-down culture of supreme nepotism, and tender-kidnapping for state projects. He enabled the Indian family, the Guptas to state-capture entre fricking industries into their influence of total control and corruption. If there are 3 words synonemous with Zuma, it would be corruption, corruption and corruption.

There are enough stories of Zuma's presidency to fill a 1000 Longposts, but today we will be focusing on the famous Nkandla Residence and "Fire Swiming Pool"

WHAT IS NKANDLA?

Nkandla is a small town in the uThungulu district of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. It consists of about 115,000 inhabitants (mostly Zulus), spread relatively sparsely over a large area. Nkandla is a REALLY rural area and is in the top five of the poorest places in KwaZulu-Natal province - Poverty is prevalent, with 44% unemployment. In summary it's a backwater in the middle of nowhere.

But when people of SA talk about Nkandla, they are in fact specifically talking about the most infamous mega-mansion Nkandla Homestead which prez Jacob Zuma had built himself with government money which he had shamelessly and openly syphoned off from taxpayers and funds meant for uplifting poor black South Africans. The compound is situated on Nxamalala Farm, where President Jacob Zuma was born and raised.

The location of Nkandla itself is most ironic and poetic. Zuma built his mega Homestead in one of the poorest areas in the entire nation, with the very tax-funds meant for that district, that were meant to build homes for those applying for RDP homes for the Underprivileged https://www.sassagrants.co.za/how-to-apply-for-rdp-housing

Surrounded by styffling poverty and worklessness, and STILL supported by the people who lived adjacent to the Nkandla Homestead in sinkhouses and shantytowns. Looking at an areal photo of the Nkandla Residence and its surrounding squalor is like some kind of Metaphor for RSA under Jacob Zuma's leadership.

And the rural location was specifically chosen to be secret and away from prying eyes. Notice this picture again?

Like many of the Indigenous Homelands of RSA, a lot of tribal lands had large autonomy from the SA government, and rule their homelands with many exceptions from the constitution of SA, this created many parallel govenrments, in which policing and law did not always apply as would be legal in SA cities. So many tribal leaders could be bought by the Zuma family to overlook unsanctioned and unregistered building with the most easy of bribes.

The Zulu King Misuzulu kaZwelithini, administers KwaZulu-Natal's traditional lands on behalf of the state for the benefit of its occupants, and he and Zuma were thick as thieves, literally.

https://www.news24.com/News24/Zuma-doesnt-own-Nkandla-compound-20121005

WHAT IS NKANDLAGATE:

During Zuma's presidency, the homestead would be the subject of a major public controversy, sometimes referred to as Nkandlagate.

https://www.theelephant.info/features/2017/03/10/south-africa-nkandla-the-house-that-jacob-built

"If you have only just returned from deep space, or have never heard of South Africa, Nkandla is the president's private home in KwaZulu-Natal Province. It is controversial because public funds to the tune of over R246 million (about $17 million) were used to give the homestead an alleged security upgrade."

"But the story of Nkandla, now described by one commentator as ‘a monument to corruption,' began in 2009 when a newly elected President Zuma, who has been reported to have been fairly impecunious at the time, decided to build a permanent rural home for his family. However it would take years for the scandal to mature fully."

"At this point –in the run-up to the 2009 election –observers had written off Zuma's political career. Meanwhile Zuma's supporters claimed their man's legal problems were the result of political meddling by his rivals including president Mbeki. Proving he still had grassroots support, Zuma managed to garner enough votes in the ANC to propel him to be elected the party's president in December 2007 at the national conference in Polokwane, Limpopo, polling 2,329 votes against Mbeki's 1,505. Zuma's supporters saw his charismatic popular touch as a refreshing contrast to Thabo Mbeki, who was seen as a rather aloof president.

He was acquitted of r*pe, but despite the fact that he had always denied charges of money-laundering and racketeering, stemming from a controversial $5billion arms deal signed in 1999, the corruption cases against him proved harder to slip out of."

"Meanwhile, according to South Africa's Sunday Times newspaper, a dossier compiled by a former Public Works Department deputy director general (equivalent of an undersecretary), contained invoices showing that state money had been used to pay for things such as thatching, meranti (a rare wood) and aluminium doors and window frames, tiles, paint, plastering, air-conditioning and other unexplained extras."

NKANDLA DISCOVERED WAY BACK IN 2009, BUT DIDN'T START CONTROVESY:

https://www.theelephant.info/features/2017/03/10/south-africa-nkandla-the-house-that-jacob-built

===============(from TheElephant article - this artice tells the story better than I ever can in my own words)

A month after Zuma ascended to the presidency of the country – reports by investigative journ*lists Mandy Rossouw and Chris Roper in the Mail & Guardian newspaper pinpoint the date to between May 18 and 29 – a security assessment was carried out at Nkandla and by the end of August 2009, construction had begun.

The story of how Rossouw (who died in 2013) and Roper (who went on to become editor of the M&G) accidentally stumbled on the Nkandla story is now the stuff of legend among South African journ*lists.

Rossouw was out interviewing residents of the town of Nkandla about what it was like to have the president as a neighbour. With Roper she drove in November 2009 to the president's residence to take some photos to illustrate the story and it was then that they noticed some construction and heavy earth-moving machinery. According to Roper in a piece he wrote after Rossouw's death, ‘Mandy's interest was piqued, and she inveigled our way into the site office, a small, meltingly hot prefab building with three car wrecks abandoned outside. There was our first evidence of the extent of what Nkandla was destined to become, both as a large complex and as a massive story: Architectural drawings taped to a wall, showing extensive development plans.'

Rossouw's story reported that the expansion to the existing compound would cost the taxpayer R65 million (about $4.5 million). At the time, upgrades to the compound included a private military hospital and parking lot, a visitors centre, the helipad installation and, according to the M&G's investigative report, a two-storey house and guest house.

Before they published the story, the journ*lists contacted the government for comment and the first reaction was evasiveness. Writes Roper: ‘Our conversation with them reads like a dress rehearsal for the following four years of obfuscation and spin.

Initially, the government said that it had no record of such a development and no hand in any of Zuma's personal property endeavours. However, in a statement released just before the story was published, they changed their tune slightly, saying: ‘The Zuma family planned before the elections to extend the Nkandla residence, and this is being done at own cost. No government funding will be utilised for the construction work.'

===============( end of TheElephant article)

https://mg.co.za/article/2013-12-04-the-day-we-broke-nkandla

"The Mail & Guardian accidentally stumbled on the Nkandla development in November 2009. I was on a story with journ*list Mandy Rossouw, interviewing residents of Nkandla about what it was like to have a president as a neighbour. Ostensibly, I was the photographer, but really I was along because I owned a vehicle capable of handling the atrocious conditions of some of the rural roads."

"Looking back four years ago, I can't honestly say I would have predicted that it would take this long for South Africans to begin to find out the truth of Nkandla. Four years of stalling must be some sort of spin record. As we left Nkandla in 2009, I stopped to take a final photo of an abandoned corrugated iron shop, emblazoned with faded and tattered ANC posters showing a beaming Zuma. On the side of the shack, someone had graffitied the hopeful words: “Come World Cup, Come My Guest.” I'm not sure whether the guests ever came to Nkandla, but certainly the world's attention has."

Basically it would take 4 years for the public to notice and care, and by that I mean the main ANC-voting bloc public to notice and care , as 4 years on from the 2009 election, Zuma had shown himself to be as incompetent as he was corrupt, and the honeymoon phase of the normie voters for the ANC, has passed and the lack of progress for RDP homes for poor homeless SA residents, the decaying services and infrastructure, and the awareness of the Guptas mafia, had made many black south africans less willing to overlook Zuma's crimes and corruption, and consequently "Old News" like the exposing of the Zuma family's Nkandla Homestead began to gain traction.

PUBLIC OUTCRY OVER SECURITY EXPENSES:

https://www.news24.com/News24/Zuma-doesnt-own-Nkandla-compound-20121005

The disclosure of Nkandla and its exorbitant expenses , especially the cost of security began to gain traction. The department cited the ministerial handbook's rules allowing spending on the president's “private” residence.

The handbook defines a private residence as a “privately owned house” and says only R100 000 worth of security-related upgrades may be made to office bearers' private residences; the rest should be for the politician's account. (from the taxpayers money to safeguard the president) Over R200,000,000 has appeared to be allocated by the department. The National Key Points Act - also cited to justify the spending - also requires the owner of the property to pay for security out of his own pocket, unless the minister of police orders otherwise.

INVESTIGATION BEGINS INTO THE NKANDLA HOMESTEAD:

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/oct/08/jacob-zuma-investigation-plans-home

=====(From the Gaurdian article)

Jacob Zuma, the president of South Africa, is facing an official investigation and public outcry over plans to upgrade his private residence and build a nearby town, dubbed "Zumaville", at a cost of millions to taxpayers.

Anger was surging on Monday over the 238m rand (£16.62m) renovations of Zuma's rural home in Nkandla, KwaZulu-Natal province, after it was revealed that Nelson Mandela and other former presidents' homes had received substantially less from the state. This followed controversy over proposals for a 2bn rand town, the first to be built since the end of apartheid, two miles (3.2km) from the Zuma homestead.

"Nkandlagate" could not come at a worse time with violent strikes threatening to spread from mining to other industries and focusing attention on the gap between haves and have-nots. Zuma, 70, faces a tense re-election battle within the governing African National Congress in December.

=======

Our boi Jacob Zuma had made a big part of his image that he would visit poor areas and shanty shack townships and talk about the inequality experienced between black and white south africans. He would be popularized by this frequent tactic, black peeps believed he was taking their suffering in poverty seriously, like Burgerland presidents visiting the aftermath of Hurricane victims.

====(continued from Gaurdian article)

Earlier this year, Zuma said: "I have paid visits to a number of areas where you can't believe that you are in South Africa. Why should I see that, as the president of the country, not even of the ANC, and think that I could sleep peacefully when I know there are people who live in things you can't even describe as a house?"

Those words are being thrown back at him, with some observers comparing his hometown patronage to some of Africa's least democratic leaders. "He's behaving like a monarch rather than the president of the republic," said Aubrey Matshiqi, a research fellow at the Helen Suzman Foundation. "It makes me think of the king of Swaziland or Jean-Bédel Bokassa [self-crowned emperor of the Central African Republic]."

Upgrades to Zuma's private residence, which have soared to 238m rand from an estimate of 6.4m (£447,821) two years ago, include a helipad, underground living quarters with about 10 air-conditioned rooms, a medical clinic for the president and his family, houses for security staff, air force and police units, underground parking, playgrounds and a visitors' centre.

Zuma – who shares the property with his four current wives and their children – previously said he would meet most of the bill, but government documents revealed he will pay 5%.

==============(end article)

So basically he would be paying only 5% of the whole budget for the fricking Nkandla residence.

Opposition partied began hammering Zuma and his closest allies in parliament.

==========(The Gaurdian article continued)

But opposition politicians have seized their chance to hammer Zuma's credibility as a former Zulu herd boy still in touch with ordinary people. Lindiwe Mazibuko, parliamentary leader of the Democratic Alliance (DA), said: "The DA has learnt that thousands of people living on the outskirts of Nkandla, in villages like Babanango, Kataza and Ebizimali, are still without the most basic services. Yet 2bn rand will be spent on a multi-purpose centre a few kilometres away from President Zuma's homestead."

She added: "How can a leader ask the country to make sacrifices, and tighten belts in hard times, when he leads such publicly-funded extravagance? This impoverished region of the country needs clinics, hospitals and decent classrooms. He has decided to build them literally in his own backyard. President Zuma's behaviour upends the very concept of social justice which is written into our constitution."

Political commentators have also excoriated the president. Justice Malala wrote in the Times of South Africa: "On Friday we had the incredible spectacle of the minister of public works, the until-then-relatively-credible former trade union leader Thulas Nxesi, making a complete butt of himself as he tried to defend the fact that taxpayers' money is being used to build the president a 238m rand palace in his home village, Nkandla.

"When journ*lists cornered Nxesi he then revealed that, actually, we are judging the president from a middle-class viewpoint. I think the country is going to the dogs when we start saying that looting the state is part of African culture, which is basically what Nxesi was saying."

=========(end)

NKANDLA IS EXPENSIVE:

https://mg.co.za/article/2012-10-08-00-nkandla-security-dwarfs-that-of-other-presidents-homes

One of the sticking points for journ*lists and the public hammering the Zuma family, was that their security costs at Nkandla dwarfed the security budget of all previous presidents, including Nelson Mandela and De Klerk combined.

Anyways a long chain of slippery officials all denied any knowledge in the long path towards Nkandla, and many refused to cooperate with investigations as they feared reprisal from the Zuma cult.

https://mg.co.za/article/2012-10-07-de-klerk-denies-nkandla-style-benefits

"When De Klerk retired, the government paid for a security guard's hut on the pavement outside his Pretoria apartment. The newspaper also established that government paid for the construction of an office for former president Thabo Mbeki at his retirement home in Riviera, as well as a room for his secretary, a reception area and an area for his security staff.

https://www.theelephant.info/features/2017/03/10/south-africa-nkandla-the-house-that-jacob-built

"The Madonsela report showed that the R246 million was eight times the money spent securing two private homes for South Africa's first democratic president Nelson Mandela, and more than 1,000 times that spent on the home of FW de Klerk, South Africa's last apartheid-era president"

THE BIGGEST CONTROVESY OF THE NKANDLA RESIDENCE - THE INFAMOUS FIREPOOL!!!

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/africaandindianocean/southafrica/10483595/Security-swimming-pool-lands-South-Africas-Zuma-in-hot-water.html

By 2013 with formal investigations underway to determine how much public funds had been used to build the Nkandla residence, one sticking point of r-sluration was when Thuli Madonsela, the country's public protector, inquired as to the purposes of the various extra infrastructure, and asked how these building were supposed to add to security of the Homestead as it all obviously looked like recreational buildings and shit.

He would ask Zuma and his family what the purposes of the cattle kraal and houses for relatives were, and how they contributed to the safeguarding of the president, as that is what Zuma had stated the funds were used for when he syphoned them.

But the MOST infamous moment came when Thuli Madonsela asked about what the purpose of the swimming pool was, something he and the court clearly expected Zuma to just admit was recreational, and built using public funds, and that Zuma would just let it slide and go over the accounting onwards.

BUT OOOOH NO.

Our boi Zuma went full r-slur, and stated that the obvious swimming pool, was an emergency water reservior Firepool, meant for dousing the grass roof homes in the Homestead under emergencies. Of all the bold faced lies of the Zuma family, this was the most shameless and r-slurred, and MEMEABLE!

"Among the “improvements” made to the home by the Ministry of Public Works using taxpayer's money were: Security fencing around the whole compound, accommodation for the president's security, a helipad, underground bunkers, a chicken run and most questionable of all, a swimming pool actually described as a ‘firepool'– since, it was claimed, the pool was built as a source of water for firefighting."

https://www.facebook.com/news24/photos/a.151737951841/10153660679036842?type=3

Here is a video where Zuma and co. tried to make the swimming pool seem legit, by getting firefighters and generators with hoses to showcase how the firepool acted like a reservior and shit.

However, the extremely obvious fact that it has steps and is a recreational swimming pool is what makes the situation and the lie so fricking absurd and hilarious. The Zuma Fire Pool would be memed that whole year by South Africans. Any time any watertank or swimming pool would be built, we called it a firepool!

You guys need to understand how fricking open and shameless the corruption of Zuma, which was exemplified by the Nkandla Homestead, was to the public. Here is a fricking Youtube video touring Zuma's residence, officially published by an official RSA government Youtube account 7 years ago. The Youtube comments make fun of the situation, with wingucks fighting around:

"He must build a clinic out there for everyone"

However even black SA peeps don't buy the video's BS that gov tax money would be paid back.

"they must honestly take us for fools, you've spent the money, you're not gonna pay it back it's whatever, mara when you try justify why this crib was built, it shows where you are intellectually"

"Fire pool....what a brilliant and innovative idea! Beautiful!!!"

However the wingcuckery for black South Africans and ANC supporters are such, that the sentiment is that they are HAPPY that their black leaders life in opulence as it is symbolic that now black peeps as well may live in luxury after Aprtheid - they fail to however understand that the money used for the riches of Zuma's mega mansion homestead was supposed to have gone to THEMSELVES!

"People must go to jail for this."

"Is that Nkandla before R250m? 😂 I don't see anything worth even half of that!"

Much commentary about the tacky and shitty quality of much of the homestead's many buildings, with many having the sentiment that the place looks mediocre and like shit, for such a vast sum in SA terms.

Here the entire parliament boos and hoos when Zuma bullshits the nation about the contents of his Nkandla Homestead. No seriously watch this Facebook vid.

https://www.facebook.com/watch?v=10154264153904617

MODERN SATELLITE IMAGING AND AREAL PHOTOGRAPHY REVEALS NKANDLA HOMESTEAD TO PUBLIC:

https://ewn.co.za/2013/11/25/Nkandla-New-aerial-photos-revealed

https://htxt.co.za/2016/06/28/new-aerial-view-nkandla

Now throughout all of the official probing and investigation of Nkandla and the finances used to upgrade and build the Homestead, Zuma and co would deny everything, up until proof was gathered by journ*list from unconventional means.

You see places like South Africa do have modern technology and amenities, but we are frequently behind the 1st world with regards to the newest cutting edge technology - usually cellphones models would take about a decade to filter to us, and the same included to having access to things like the latest software, or aerial camera qualities.

But in the timespan from 2009 -2013, the surveyors, cartographers, and GIS specialists had obtained increasingly more impressive satellite imaging viewing software and computers, and Burgerland was nice enough to have open access to their 50mm Topographic satellite image banks.

Enterprising journ*lists would visit places like SA NGI (National Geospatial Institute)

where they could have definitive proof from a bird's eye view of all the buildings, including the infamous fire pool, located within the walls of Nkandla.

Additionally at the same time, specialist planes were carrying out a national topographical areal surveys, and journ*lists beelined to these businesses to ask for photographs of the Nkandla residence.

During this period Google Earth had also become immensely more optimized and useable by poorcels with craptop low end hardware, and so 3rd worlders had increasingly more personal access to satellite images in their own home

https://ngi.dalrrd.gov.za/index.php/online-shop/what-is-itis-portal

And thus Zuma's denials about the extensiveness of the Nkandla Homestead held less and less water, and the public and journ*lists went for blood by 2014.

The Nkandla Residence would play a key role in Zuma's failure to secure party leadership in 2018, when he was ousted by the many enemies he had made in a decade of rule.

Anyways that's all I got, GOOD DAY