Strategy in hand to get Zuma off hook?

The National Prosecuting Authority and lawyers for President Jacob Zuma are considering a plan to ensure that it will be many years before the country’s first citizen gets to have his day in court, claims City Press. It says the plan emerged after Advocate Kemp J Kemp conceded at the Supreme Court of Appeal last week the decision by former prosecutions boss Mokotedi Mpshe to drop the 783 corruption, money-laundering and racketeering charges against Zuma was ‘irrational’ and should be set aside. Kemp told the court Zuma wanted an opportunity to make fresh representations if the NPA decided to charge him again – news that left the justices unimpressed. This will leave the matter in the hands of National Director of Public Prosecutions Shaun Abrahams, thought by many to be firmly in the Zuma camp. City Press says it has learnt from sources within the security cluster that Abrahams informally met several of his colleagues in the wake of Kemp’s concession. A plan to entertain Zuma’s representations is allegedly being shaped. This will continue the war of attrition that Zuma has waged with the country’s courts for more than eight years over the spy tapes saga, says the report. It notes the NPA is expected to allow Zuma to make his representations, which the prosecutions authority will entertain. During this process, the NPA is also expecting legal challenges from the DA, which brought the initial application to have the charges reinstated against Zuma, as well as from civil society organisations. These, the sources reportedly said, would be vehemently defended. Thereafter, the sources said, Zuma would apply for a permanent stay of prosecution, which Abrahams would be expected to grant. NPA spokesperson Luvuyo Mfaku said it was ‘highly impossible’ that Abrahams would have been co-operating with such a strategy.

Full City Press report

A different take on the way forward is offered in a Sunday Times report. It claims Zuma’s detractors are plotting a last-ditch attempt to remove him following his SCA concession. The paper suggests Zuma’s legal strategy has revived plans to force the President to step down after several attempts within the ANC in Parliament failed. ANC national executive committee members who are known backers of Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa said they hoped the eventual SCA judgment would force Zuma to resign. This is premised on a decision of the ANC’s 2015 national general council that leaders who were charged with criminal offences should step aside to prevent dragging the name of the ANC through the mud. This was the basis on which former Deputy Minister of Higher Education Mduduzi Manana was made to resign after he was charged with assaulting a woman at a Johannesburg nightclub. Now Zuma’s detractors say it should be no different for him. ‘He doesn’t want to go to jail.’ The report says an ANC NEC member confirmed that the developments at the SCA allowed for a fresh attempt from within the ANC to remove Zuma from office.

Full Sunday Times report (subscription needed)