State capture cost ruling a burden, says Zuma
• Former president suggests in court bid that Ramaphosa was wrong not to appeal judgments
Former president Jacob Zuma has suggested his successor, Cyril Ramaphosa, was wrong not to appeal the State of Capture report judgments, which order Zuma to personally pay the estimated R10m in legal fees attached to the cases.
Zuma says he believes the High Court in Pretoria is unfairly “punishing me” for seeking to challenge former public protector Thuli Madonsela’s State of Capture report, despite his continued belief that he was correct in doing so.
“I would have liked to intervene way before the application for leave to appeal was withdrawn by the Office of the President of the Republic of South Africa. That I do not agree with the withdrawal of the application for leave to appeal by the current president is not relevant for present purposes,” Zuma states in an affidavit filed at the high court.
Being forced to pay the legal costs of the State of Capture cases “poses a significant financial burden on me personally”, he states. The High Court in Pretoria found that Zuma should be held personally liable for the state capture costs because he had “recklessly” litigated. Zuma denies this.
He strongly suggests that he believes there are grounds for Ramaphosa to challenge the State of Capture report, but adds: “I am advised that it would be improper for me to now second-guess the decision of the president in this regard”. Zuma has applied for the right to appeal the two State of Capture judgments — which concern his aborted bid to block the release of the report and his later failed bid to review the report — in his personal capacity.
He has denied that his legal challenges to the report were driven by personal interests, because Madonsela implicated him, his son Duduzane Zuma and his friends the Gupta family in wrongdoing. Instead, he had “serious concerns about the constitutionality and/or lawfulness of the remedial action imposed by the public protector”, particularly her order that he should not appoint the judge who would preside over a judicial inquiry into state capture.
According to Zuma, he felt that this remedial action amounted to a “usurpation and/or undermining of the president’s constitutional powers and functions” and a “violation and/or trespassing of the separation of powers doctrine”.
He believes Madonsela was wrong to “impose remedial action before the investigation was complete” and accuses her of exercising powers in her report that “I believed she did not have”.
“An incorrect impression was created that I was either delaying or avoiding the establishment of a commission of inquiry. That has never been my intention,” he says.
Zuma maintains that he decided to act on Madonsela’s remedial action and establish an inquiry into state capture — after earlier indicating that he would appeal a judgment endorsing that remedial action — “for certainty in the country and in order to avoid the perception that I was preventing the establishment of the commission for my personal interests”.
Former president Jacob Zuma is back in court on Friday to face corruption charges. But it could be years before he actually pleads to the case against him.
That is because Zuma intends to seek a stay of his prosecution until such time as the legal disputes over whether the state will fund his defence are finalised.
There is clear precedent for the state supporting such requests in several high-profile cases, including the murder trial of the apartheid-era policemen accused of killing activist Nokuthula Simelane.
Their case was postponed so that they — supported by Simelane’s sister Thembisile Nkadimeng — could challenge a decision by former police minister Fikile Mbalula not to fund the costs of their defence. They won that challenge earlier this week.
The state also agreed to the postponement of the case against former Hawks Gauteng head Shadrack Sibiya and investigator Leslie Maluleke — who are facing charges with former Hawks head Anwa Dramat over the alleged illegal rendition of a group of Zimbabweans — so that they could challenge a decision that they should not receive state funding of their defence. They were successful in that challenge, which delayed their trial since 2016.
As a consequence of these cases, it may be tough for the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) to oppose an application or request by Zuma that his Fikile Mbalula
case be postponed pending resolution of his fees dispute.
Prosecutor Billy Downer had indicated that the state would be ready to proceed with its case against Zuma in November 2018.
Prior to the former president’s crisis over legal fees, his lawyers said he would challenge the decision of national director of public prosecutions Shaun Abrahams that he should go on trial. And, if that failed, he would seek a permanent stay of prosecution on the basis that the case against him was part of a plot to neutralise him politically.
Zuma’s biggest challenge, at least for now, is that the uncertainty over his legal fees funding has left what remains of his defence team unclear whether it will get paid for representing the former president, either in his trial or in his battle for continued state funding.
It is understood that Zuma’s lawyer, Michael Hulley, last week wrote to President Cyril Ramaphosa seeking clarity on whether the state would fund Zuma’s legal costs pending the outcome of legal challenges to his defence funding. As yet, the president has not responded.
Ramaphosa has, however, indicated that he will not oppose applications by the DA and the EFF to challenge the deal on legal fees concluded between then president Thabo Mbeki, the state attorney and Zuma shortly after he was first charged with corruption.
Instead, Ramaphosa said he would provide an “explanatory affidavit”.
Meanwhile, the French company accused of bribing Zuma wants the case against it to be dropped and has filed representations to the NPA.
The NPA confirmed having received these representations on Thursday.
Thint’s representations will now need to be considered by the NPA to determine if they have merit‚ a process that could cause further delay in the prosecution of Zuma.
The arms company stands accused of offering Zuma a R500‚000 a year bribe to protect it from any investigations linked to SA’s multibillion-rand arms deal.
Zuma’s former financial adviser, Schabir Shaik, was convicted of facilitating this allegedly corrupt deal.
UNCERTAINTY OVER HIS LEGAL FEES FUNDING HAS LEFT… HIS DEFENCE TEAM UNCLEAR WHETHER IT WILL GET PAID