Ajay Gupta seeks right to cross-examine witnesses
Zuma, Duduzane yet to make their decisions
Gupta family patriarch Ajay will on Friday apply for the right to cross-examine witnesses who have made allegations of state capture against him and the family.
Former president Jacob Zuma will decide on Friday whether he will join Ajay in applying for the right to crossexamine former deputy finance minister Mcebisi Jonas, ex-ANC MP Vytjie Mentor and former government communications boss Themba Maseko.
His son Duduzane has not yet indicated whether he will apply for this right, but last week confirmed that he was willing to testify. The Gupta legal team, which includes senior counsel Mike Hellens and Dawie Joubert, on Tuesday met with state capture commission chairperson Raymond Zondo to confirm that Ajay wanted to challenge the evidence given by Jonas, Mentor and Maseko.
But will doing that force Ajay Gupta to take the stand himself? As yet, the inquiry has no clear guidelines.
Advocate Vincent Maleka, who is part of the state capture inquiry’s legal team, on Monday made it clear that any person who sought to cross-examine inquiry witnesses must be prepared to take the stand themselves. He’s urged Zondo to impose conditions on implicated parties who have been given the “privilege” of crossexamining witnesses, conditions that could include assurances that they testify and “provide a version that can be tested”.
Inquiry insiders say Maleka and his team believe that not imposing such conditions would be “deeply unfair” to witnesses who face cross-examination, without the assurance that those attacking their evidence will face similar questioning. It’s understood that Ajay Gupta is not opposed to giving evidence, but is reluctant to return to South Africa because of uncertainty over whether he is facing criminal prosecution or not.
The Hawks in February described Ajay Gupta as a “fugitive from justice”, but declined to provide his lawyers with the warrant they claimed to have for his arrest. Given these complications, the inquiry may be asked to facilitate him giving evidence remotely.
Ajay Gupta has previously denied Jonas’s claims that he met with him at Saxonwold in October 2015, and tried to bribe him into taking then finance minister Nhlanhla Nene’s post.
Jonas admitted during his evidence to the inquiry that he could not discount the possibility that the Gupta brother he had met with was Rajesh, not Ajay. But he said he was later able to identify the correct brother when shown pictures.
Fana Hlongwane, a close associate of the Guptas and Duduzane, has also disputed Jonas’s account of his alleged Gupta meeting – and formally applied for the right to cross-examine him.
Duduzane Zuma has backed up Hlongwane’s account. In an interview with BBC last year, he said: “Mr Jonas was not offered a bribe by the Guptas. I did meet them. I was present. There was no such thing that took part.”
‘‘ Mr Jonas was not offered a bribe ... I did meet them. I was present