President Jacob Zuma says he continued where former presidents Thabo Mbeki and Nelson Mandela left off.

JOHANNESBURG - President Jacob Zuma says he wants South Africans to decide for themselves how he has fared as president, saying he has done quite many things.

Zuma was speaking in an exclusive interview with news channel ANN7 on Monday evening.

The president says he continued where former presidents Thabo Mbeki and Nelson Mandela left off.

“I introduced quite a number of new departments. We’ve been talking about rural development. And I thought talking about it and not doing anything was not helping. It was, therefore, important to focus and I established a department; I also worked on establishing another one which was [the Department of] Performance Monitoring and Evaluation.”

The president says there are countries that want to influence South Africa - that regard him as the enemy.

Zuma has once again warned that those calling for an inquiry into state capture and using the term to play politics will regret it, saying the inquiry will go after everyone involved in corruption.

The president recently approached the High Court in Pretoria to review a recommendation in the Public Protector’s State of Capture report, which said the Chief Justice must appoint a judge to head the commission of inquiry.

The president argued that only he has the power to appoint the judge.

Zuma says he will establish a commission of inquiry but has clarified that it won’t just look at the Gupta family.

“There is going to be a commission of inquiry with a broad kind of terms of reference that will cover everything because we don’t want to leave anything [out].”

The president has a message to those using the term state capture for political reasons.

“They might regret, in fact, they will regret. That’s the point I’ve made because it’s not going to be choosy. It’s going to go to those who have done wrong things.”

He says he has fought corruption, adding that if he is corrupt, the commission will expose him too.