Chief of Interpol Indicted

Stefanie Rumple: 1/18/08/ 4:43 pm/ Chief of Interpol Indicted/Global Crime

On January 13^th, 2008, Jackie Selebi, the president of Interpol, the international crime fighting organization, was asked to resign following his indictment in his home country of South Africa on charges of corruption. Mr. Selebi, who is the Chief of Police in South Africa, is alleged to have taken bribes totaling some $175,000 USD from his long-time associate and friend, confessed drug smuggler Glenn Agliotti. Agliotti has been implicated in the 2005 murder of Brett Kebble, a South African mining tycoon and business rival of Agliotti; it is alleged that Selebi was helping him avoid prosecution in exchange for the bribes. Last week as investigators closed in on him, Mr. Selebi had the leader of the special investigating unit, the Scorpions, arrested. However, he has been released following the successful indictment of Selebi. Jackie Selebi and Glenn Agliotti are both longtime associates of Jacob Zuma, the man recently selected to replace Thado Mbeki as leader of the African National Congress, the traditional start for a successor to the presidency of South Africa. Whether this will help Selebi or hurt him remains to be seen, as Mr. Zuma has recently also been indicted on charges of fraud, money-laundering, racketeering, and corruption.

This story reads a little like a gangster movie, and the more you read about it, the more that similarity is revealed. The corruption so rife within an emerging world power has far-reaching effects; after all, Interpol is the International Police. What other bribes might Selebi have accepted while in power? What deals might have been brokered under the table, so to speak, by someone with this much power and this little conscience about using it for his own ends? South Africa has one of the highest crime rates in the world; small wonder when this was the man responsible for policing the country. That a man like Jacob Zuma, facing such serious charges, could at the same time be poised to capture the Presidency in the next election in 2009, seems counter to any notions of a structured and regulated state. I wonder which came first; the corruption in the government or the street crime that tears apart the daily fabric of their lives.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/7178494.stm

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/7186024.stm

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/7030458.stm

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/01/12/AR2008011202405.html