JOHANNESBURG (AFP) — A weekend newspaper cartoon depicting the head of South Africa's ruling ANC, Jacob Zuma, unbuckling his trousers allegedly to rape justice has sparked the ire of the party and its allies.
The Sunday Times cartoon showed Zuma, who is fighting to have his corruption case thrown out of court, pulling open his trousers while the ANC and its political allies pinned down a blindfolded woman labelled as the "Justice System."
"Go for it, boss," ANC secretary general Gwede Mantashe was quoted as saying in the cartoon by Jonathan Shapiro whose pen name is "Zapiro."
South African newspapers on Tuesday carried angry reactions from the ANC and its allies, the South African Communist Party, the ANC Youth League and the COSATU labour federation, all featured in the cartoon.
The groups slammed the cartoon, saying that it "borders on defamation of character."
"The cartoon rubbishes the collective integrity of the alliance and constitutes yet another continued violation of the rights and dignity of the ANC president," said the allies in a joint statement.
The COSATU said the cartoon implied, and sought to reinforce, the view that Zuma was a rapist despite having been found not guilty of a rape charge in 2006.
The ANC and its allies have recently launched verbal attacks on the judiciary over Zuma's corruption trial, calling its judges "reactionary" and "politicians."
A high court is scheduled on Friday to decide whether Zuma's corruption charges will go ahead.
COSATU secretary general Zwelinzima Vavi, an admirer of the cartoonist, said he was "shocked, devastated" by the allegedly offensive art work.
But Zapiro, one of the nation's best known cartoonists, was on Tuesday unrepentant.
"I am angry at them, I am outraged...at what Jacob Zuma is trying to do to the justice system and constitutional principles along with his team of lawyers and his political allies," he said in an interview on SA FM.
"The central message (in the cartoon) is that Zuma is about to, poised to, trying to rape justice system with the help and complicity of his political allies."
Various commentators have insinuated that the cartoon attacked Zuma's moral values, insulted the ANC and its allies as well as the nation's judiciary.
Copyright © 2009 AFP. All rights reserved. More »
