FORMER SOUTH AFRICAN LEADER SEEKS CORRUPTION TRIAL DELAY
▶ Deadly riots have taken place since Zuma was jailed for contempt of court this month
The long-running corruption trial of former South African president Jacob Zuma resumed online yesterday, after violence broke out across the country when he was jailed in an unrelated case.
Zuma faces 16 charges of fraud, graft and racketeering related to the purchase of fighter jets, patrol boats and military gear from five European arms companies in 1999, when he was deputy president.
He is accused of taking bribes from one of the companies, Thales, which has been charged with corruption and money laundering.
Wearing a dark suit and red tie, Zuma said nothing while his lawyer Dali Mpofu called for the trial in the Pietermaritzburg High Court to be postponed until the former president could appear in person.
Mr Mpofu said Zuma had not been able to properly consult his legal team after handing himself over to authorities on July 8 to start his sentence for contempt of court.
Lawyers for the state have opposed the move to secure a postponement, calling it “another delaying tactic”, court papers showed.
The judge announced that proceedings would be adjourned until today.
The trial started in May after several delays, as Zuma’s legal team tried to have the charges dropped.
He has denied wrongdoing. Zuma’s lawyers have also called for the lead prosecutor, Billy Downer, to recuse himself from the case over allegations that he is biased against the former president.
On June 29, Zuma, 79, was found guilty of contempt of South Africa’s senior court after he failed to appear before a corruption inquiry related to his time as president. He was jailed a week later.
Looting and rioting has since erupted in areas such as Gauteng province and his home region of KwaZuluNatal.
More than 200 people have been killed in the violence.
Many of those who died in the rioting were crushed during looting sprees in malls and shops.
More than 2,500 people have been arrested on suspicion of theft and vandalism and order was only restored after 2,500 troops were sent to assist police.
The unrest was widely considered to at least partly be a response to the his 15-month jail sentence.
Sipho Seepe, a fellow at the University of Zululand in KwaZulu-Natal, said there could be further violence after yesterday’s hearing.
“People will be watching the behaviour of judges.
“If they feel justice is not done, they will protest,” he said. Zuma’s supporters gathered in front of the court during previous hearings.
The former president and his backers have dismissed scrutiny of his conduct while in office as politically motivated and gave warnings that his jailing would spark unrest. But they deny being behind the recent turmoil in the country.
Zuma, once referred to the “Teflon president”, has been seeking to overturn his jail sentence.
He was detained after disobeying a Constitutional Court order to give evidence before a judicial panel investigating corruption during his time in power.
He stepped down as president in 2018 after a nine-year tenure. He cast himself as the victim of a politically motivated witch hunt in his attempts to evade prosecution for more than a decade.
Protests that started on July 9 escalated to violence, with people committing arson and looting in several provinces, including KwaZulu-Natal.
President Cyril Ramaphosa said yesterday that South Africa had already begun to recover from the unrest.
“But we are not only rebuilding our country after the destruction of the past week.
“We are rebuilding after the devastation of decades of dispossession and exploitation,” Mr Ramaphosa wrote in his weekly letter to the nation.
“We need to fundamentally transform our economy and our society, deepening our efforts to create employment, lift millions out of poverty and ensure that the country’s wealth is shared among all its people. The events of the last week are a stark reminder of how deep the problems are and how far we still have to go. These events must propel us to act with greater purpose and speed.”
He said the violence was planned by people who wanted the public to fall for “crude propaganda designed to turn them not just against the state, but against each other”.
More than 2,500 people have been arrested on suspicion of theft and vandalism during unrest in South Africa