South Africa's parliament will vote by secret ballot today on a motion of no confidence on President Jacob Zuma. This was announced by the National Assembly Speaker Baleka Mbete at a news conference in Cape Town yesterday. <br/><br/>President Zuma's party, the African National Congress (ANC) which holds a large majority in parliament welcomed the decision to hold the vote by secret ballot and said it expected the no-confidence motion to fail. The motion, which was introduced by the opposition Democratic Alliance, needs 201 out of 400 votes to succeed. The ANC holds 246 parliamentary seats, but several members have already indicated publicly that they will vote against Zuma. <br/><br/>Criticism of Zuma from within the ANC has grown over corruption scandals and economic woes. Public support for the ANC, which swept to power under Mandela in the first non-racial elections in 1994, also slipped to 55 percent in last year's local polls.

South Africa's parliament will vote today by a secret ballot on a no-confidence motion brought against President Jacob Zuma.<br/><br/>The speaker of the parliament, Baleka Mbete, announced the move to hold a secret ballot this afternoon, ending weeks of speculation for the eighth motion of no confidence against Zuma.<br/><br/>President Zuma, 75, and several of his Cabinet members have been accused of involvement in promoting "state capture exercises" that led to political upheaval, and due to which South Africa was downgraded to junk status by the ratings agency S&P Global in April.<br/><br/>State capture is a type of systemic political corruption in which a government mould state's decisions in favour of private interests.<br/><br/>It refers to the way formal procedures, such as laws and social norms and government bureaucracy are moulded and manipulated by private individuals and firms so as to influence state policies and laws in their favour.