Former South African President Jacob Zuma, due back in court today on long-standing arms deal corruption charges, has launched yet another bid to delay his trial by attempting a ‘private prosecution’ of the state’s lead prosecutor.
This effort was announced on Sunday by his foundation, arguing that the state prosecutor is biased against Zuma.
Zuma faces 783 counts on several serious charges, including fraud, money laundering and racketeering arising from alleged kickbacks involved in South Africa’s (SA) controversial late-1990s arms deal.
Zuma’s co-accused is French arms manufacturer Thales, formerly Thint, with whom he is alleged to have agreed to receive illicit payments.
Zuma’s former ‘financial adviser’ was sentenced in 2006 to a 15-year term behind bars on exactly the same charges. He served only 28 months before his release on ‘medical grounds’ in March 2009, two months before then African National Congress leader Zuma was sworn in as SA’s president.
Private prosecution
The Jacob Zuma Foundation said the planned private prosecution was the “only way around” what it sees as the “problem” of the lead state prosecutor in the case, which has been plagued by legal delays instituted by Zuma.
Last month the Supreme Court of Appeal (SCA) dismissed Zuma’s attempts to remove prosecutor Billy Downer from the case, indicating that the application had no merit nor any hope of success.
Zuma has brought similar applications in the court, plus appeals beyond that, in an effort to remove Downer, the prosecutor who knows most about his case. Downer was the lead state prosecutor in the successful prosecution of Zuma’s former financial adviser, Schabir Shaik, who was convicted of assisting Zuma in his alleged corrupt dealings.
Zuma’s failed effort at the SCA last month left no known legal road open to him but to face his accusers to clear his name, as he has repeatedly said he wished to do since being formally charged in June 2005.
The latest bid to halt or delay the trial, say most legal analysts, is doomed to fail.
Zuma’s foundation said that although it would seek a ‘private prosecution’, which South African law allows under specific conditions, Zuma would still be in the court when his graft case resumes today in the Pietermaritzburg High Court.
In what appears to be yet another effort to halt or delay the trial, Zuma’s lawyers are also to approach the judge president of the SCA for “clarity” on its recent ruling in which Zuma’s appeal for “relief” regarding Downer’s right to prosecute the former head of state was dismissed.
Zuma’s foundation described the dismissive SCA ruling as “vague”.
Some leeway
But there seems to be some leeway on that front for Zuma, say legal experts, given the SCA not only dismissed Zuma’s appeal but did so with costs, usually a signal of judicial displeasure.
The SCA also said there was “no reasonable prospect” for such an appeal to succeed in South African law.
Another problem for Zuma in attempting to duck the charges facing him is that for a private prosecution to go ahead, the National Prosecuting Authority, which has successfully argued against Zuma’s efforts to remove Downer, must give his legal team a certificate allowing that.
People close to prosecutors in the case say the chances of Zuma’s legal team obtaining such a certificate, given the legal history of this issue, were “essentially nil”.
The case against Zuma and Thales is expected to run for about two weeks and involves thousands of pages of evidence and prior testimony, with numerous witnesses named, though most are unlikely to be called. BY DAILY NATION