David Klompas’s Reviews > The President's Keepers: Those Keeping Zuma in Power and Out of Prison > Status Update

"Only after Zuma has looked after himself comes the small little problem of governing the Republic and its millions and millions of hungry, uneducated and jobless voters who are looking to him for salvation and deliverance."

After trying to read this book twice, I am simply unable to read any further. Pauw makes some important claims in his book, but it feels very long winded. My appetite for Jacob Zuma is so thin that I have lost interest in the technicalities of the topic.

Pauw invokes a Business Day report from last year that tally's the startling changes Zuma has made to one of the government's highest executive bodies. The most important change Zuma made was to the office of Deputy President way back in 2009 when he sacked Kgalema Motlanthe and raised Cyril Ramaphosa to the office.

This to me is a stern warning against placing too much trust in Ramaphosa's presidency.

After a recent realisation that Pauw's book makes fair commentary on Plato's Republic, I now understand that Zuma's main issue - at least in Plato's eyes - would be that he doesn't fit the definition of a "Philosopher King".

Pauw reminds us that corruption has been part and parcel of Democratic South Africa long before Zuma's rise to the presidency.

Lindiwe Sisuloo, as minister of intelligence, had some shady dealings. We must be weary of such people.

"Under [the reign of individuals such as Richard Mdluli], crime has spiralled, thugs have walked free, prosecutions and convictions of organised criminals have disintegrated, tax collection has dropped and state revenue has decreased."

"Under [the reign of individuals such as Richard Mdluli], crime has spiralled, thugs have walked free, prosecutions and convictions of organised criminals have disintegrated, tax collection has dropped and state revenue has decreased."