On the eve of the first anniversary of President Thabo Mbeki's inauguration as successor to Mr Nelson Mandela, parliamentarians took stock yesterday of his achievements or, as the opposition Democratic Party saw it, his incipient megalomania.
The debate was opened by Mr Mbeki. At the centre of his exposition was a categorical rejection of the notion of a "minimalist state" favoured by white-led opposition parties. A "minimalist state" in contemporary South Africa amounted to "a call to protect the power of the powerful and to perpetuate the disempowerment of the powerless", he declared.
Mr Mbeki outlined measures he had taken to implement policies aimed at redressing the discrimination suffered by the historically disadvantaged sectors of society.
One was to amalgamate the Offices of the President and Deputy President in a single entity known officially as "the Presidency", but referred to scathingly as the "imperial presidency" by the Democratic Party.
The Democratic Party leader, Mr Tony Leon, labelled Mr Mbeki's administration a "Market-Leninist" government. "It pays obeisance to the market and to new world economic order, and yet it seeks complete political control of every aspect of life and every nook and cranny of our society", he said.
Mr Leon attacked Mr Mbeki for his refusal to publicly condemn President Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe for conniving at the invasion of white-owned farms by black "war veterans".