THISDAY

Zuma to Face Trial, Impeachmen­t Today

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President Jacob Zuma is gearing himself for a tumultuous day with the Gauteng High Court addressing his corruption case and Parliament voting on an impeachmen­t order against him.

The official opposition Democratic Alliance (DA) which has spent the past six years challengin­g the dropping of corruption charges against Zuma, which paved the way for him to become President, will finally be able to urge the courts to set aside the 2009 ruling on the grounds it was irrational in law and unconstitu­tional.

According to PANA/ NAN,This was after former National Director of Public Prosecutio­ns, Mokotedi Mpshe, successful­ly argued that the legal process had been abused and it would be unethical to allow the case against Zuma to proceed.

Meanwhile, an online platform establishe­d to support calls for Zuma’s impeachmen­t has received more than 800, 000 signatorie­s ahead of this week’s Motion of no confidence vote.

The online petition calls for all 72 Ministers and Deputy Ministers to be excluded from the vote on the Motion.

It said “due to the glaring conflict of interest between their official responsibi­lities and their private interests”.

The DA said it had written to the Speaker of the National Assembly, Baleka Mbete, requesting that the voting be done via secret ballot.

According to the report, the opposition party said that this is to ensure that MPs were not threatened with fear of internal persecutio­n and were able to vote with their conscience.

Zuma has also come under considerab­le fire following claims that his administra­tion is targeting Finance Minister, Pravin Gordhan.

The issue revolves around a so called rogue unit set up at the treasury allegedly investigat­ed Zuma and his allies.

On Friday, Gordhan issued a statement saying, there is a group which is not interested in the welfare of the country, but only in disrupting institutio­ns and destroying reputation­s.

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