By tomorrow it will all be forgotten, overshadowed by a budget widely expected to be paradoxically insipid and alarming. But at least for today, it’s worth dwelling on the return of the profligate son.

Well, his most recent return. Jacob Zuma’s triumphant march through the arrivals hall at OR Tambo on Saturday, accompanied by a small rent-a-crowd that apparently accepts IOUs, was his second return from Cuba in a couple of months.

In early December it was reported that he had travelled to the island for medical treatment apparently related to an alleged 2014 poison plot and memory loss, or what doctors refer to as “entrenching the victim narrative while laying the groundwork for evading prosecution”. By Christmas, however, he was back, attending a chess tournament in Mandeni...