Business must repudiate the call made by Business Unity South Africa chief executive, Jerry Vilakazi, for a special "political solution" to ANC President Jacob Zuma's legal problems. If it doesn't, it will be complicit in condoning an abuse of power and undermining the Constitution.
Vilakazi has been quoted as saying: "This matter [of Zuma] must be brought to closure so that the country can proceed with certainty of political leadership. If it requires a political solution, let a political solution be found".
In expressing these sentiments, Vilakazi were adding his voice to a chorus led - indeed, misled - by the ruling party and its alliance partners in the South African Communist Party (SACP) and the Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu).
They have proposed various political "solutions", ranging from the Constitution being amended to give him some form of amnesty or immunity from prosecution to the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) being pressured to drop the charges against Zuma.
Reports that Zuma's legal team is meeting with the NPA in an attempt to have the charges dropped, so close to the Pietermaritzburg High Court's expected ruling on Friday, are profoundly disturbing.
If the NPA agreed to drop the charges, it would create the perception that it had capitulated to political pressure, setting a precedent that powerful politicians deserve special treatment.
It is not beyond the realm of possibility that Zuma will pressurise the NPA to drop the charges against him in return for a guarantee that there will be no purge of NPA officials once he becomes State President.
Any political solution or special deal would prevent the law from taking its course, and violate a sacred constitutional principle; namely, that all citizens are equal before the law.
That is why it is particularly nonsensical for the ANC's chairperson of Parliament's justice committee, Yunus Carrim, to talk of finding a political solution that is "legally and constitutionally tenable".
His statement reminded me of what used to be said about "Christian National Education": that it was neither Christian, nor national, nor educational. In the same way, a "legally and constitutionally tenable" political solution would be illegal, unconstitutional and untenable.
The central committee of the SACP has claimed that the continuation of Zuma's trial poses a threat to political stability in that it "unduly raise[s] the political temperature...in a manner that can negatively affect...stability...and democracy".
This statement is political blackmail pure and simple. It is Zuma's supporters who are raising the political temperature and threatening action that would cause political instability.
This statement - and far fierier ones by the ANC Youth League - is also nothing less than "incitement of imminent violence", which the Bill of Rights exempts from the provisions on freedom of expression.
The bottom line is that once the rule of law is breached and certain individuals are placed above the law, then you have real political instability and anarchy, because constitutional democracy loses its anchor; it floats adrift.
Furthermore, a political solution would strip two vital democratic institutions of their authority and legitimacy: namely, the judiciary and the NPA. It would dent confidence in public institutions, thus heighten political risk and potentially deter foreign investors. And it would sacrifice the Constitution on the altar of the ruling party's own narrow political interests - in fact, the interests of its ruling clique.
In sum, a political solution would begin to unstitch the fabric of constitutional democracy; and a Constitution is not something that can be darned or patched or temporarily repaired.
Business needs to take the long view in this matter: what seems to be a convenient solution now would, in time, prove disastrous. For this reason, I believe that business should actively reject a political settlement for Zuma rather than enthusiastically endorse it, as in some quarters it is currently doing.
In that sense, like any other citizen, albeit a corporate citizen in this case, business has an activist role to play in defending democracy. Business is not exempt from our national priority of defending the Constitution.
I believe that constitutional democracy can take root in South Africa . But it depends on every one of us - individually and collectively - claiming our rights as citizens and standing up to the abuse of power when we see it; before it is too late, and before we no longer have the democratic freedom to do so.
That is why business needs to take its role as a corporate citizen seriously, and it should start by rejecting the call for a political solution to Jacob Zuma's current difficulties.
This is an extract from a speech by Helen Zille, leader of the Democratic Alliance, to a business breakfast in Cape Town, September 10 2008
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