A rare event slipped past most of the western media this week: a member of South Africa's political elite dared to acknowledge the elephant in the corner (that the governing party has been studiously ignoring): former deputy president Jacob Zuma's total unsuitability to succeed Thabo Mbeki as president.
It helped that this figure was none other than Bishop Desmond Tutu, a hero of the anti-apartheid movement, which will ensure that he has enough political capitol to ride out the criticism his remarks will doubtless generate.
Delivering the Harold Wolpe Memorial lecture in Cape Town, Tutu articulated what many in South Africa and the wider world no doubt think "that the most dignified, most selfless thing, the best thing he could do for a land he loves deeply is to declare his decision not to take further part in the succession race [for the presidency]."
Zuma's bid to succeed Mbeki once looked destined to fail. In the last six months he has been tried and acquitted of raping the daughter of a friend, and still faces a trial for corruption.
However, Zuma is now staging a pretty remarkable comeback, with the help of a band of loyal Zulu supporters, whom one suspects are putting tribal loyalties ahead of the nation's best interests.
He was acquitted of rape, though in the course of the trial it was revealed that he had not used a condom when having sex with a woman he knew to be HIV positive, showering afterwards to prevent infection. This incident took place when Zuma was the head of the National Aids Council, supposedly spearheading the fight against AIDS in one of the worst-affected countries in the world.
His trial for corruption appears to be on the brink of collapse before it even begins. If it does collapse, it will leave Zuma with a chance to campaign for the presidency next year.
Tutu criticised Zuma for failing to reign in his supporters, who vilified the woman he was accused of raping during his trial and threatened her life.
"I for one would not be able to hold my head high if a person with such supporters were to become my president, someone who did not think it necessary to apologise for engaging in casual sex without taking proper precautions in a country that is being devastated by this horrendous HIV/Aids pandemic."
Intervention such as Tutu's is particularly welcome in a country where the governing party faces a decimated opposition, allowing the leadership to get away with expressing some appalling viewpoints and following them through with policies.
For example, the ANC's health minister Manto Tshabalala-Msimang, told a British journalist that her government was purchasing German submarines instead of desperately-needed AIDS drugs because: "you see what Bush is doing – he might invade!"
President Mbeki has also aroused much domestic and international ire, by claiming that the HIV virus does not cause AIDS, and for failing to do enough to tackle the disease at home.
Tutu's comments then, should serve as a wake-up call, not only to the utterly-discredited Zuma, but to many of his ANC colleagues who are content to dwell in blissful ignorance as their country is ravaged around them.
