Zuma's Woes: 3 Wives, 1 Fiance and an Out-of-Wedlock Child
NAIROBI, Kenya Feb. 8, 2010— -- Sex scandals involving powerful men like Tiger Woods and John Edwards have dominated American headlines last few weeks. But halfway around the world in South Africa, President Jacob Zuma is embroiled in his own sex scandal, complete with "baby mama drama."
In Zuma's case, however, the question isn't whether he cheated on his wife -- but his wives.
The president has three first ladies, and soon to be a fourth, but it's not the fact that he's married to several women at once which has outraged the country. It's the revelation that Zuma, 67, has fathered an out of wedlock child.
The baby girl, now 4 months old, is Zuma's child with the daughter of a political ally and friend, who is also a power player in the 2010 World Cup preparations. The mother is not one of his wives, or even the woman he is engaged to, and that is what many South Africans find objectionable.
"Polygamy is not uncommon in Africa," Sebastian Spio-Garbrah, an Africa analyst for New York-based policy think tank Eurasia Group, tells ABC News. " But what South Africans seem to be saying is 'we are fine with the fact that he has three wives, we are fine with that. But if he has another child, it's a sign he is unable to control his passions."
What started as attacks by the South African political elite, which has never really accepted Zuma, a man with limited education and a populist swagger, quickly took hold with the masses as well. As criticism grew last week, opposition politicians called for the president to go to "sex rehab," calling him the "gigolo president" among other unflattering characterizations.
South Africa's largest financial daily newspaper, Business Day, questioned whether Zuma was taking his job seriously.
"If the president is unable to respect social boundaries such as those created through marriage, how can he be trusted to respect the boundaries erected in terms of the national constitution's checks and balances?" the paper asked.
When the child was first revealed, the Zuma administration refused to comment, calling the matter a personal issue. By the weekend a public apology was issued.
