Zuma accuses judges of bias in SCA papers

Former President Jacob Zuma, in what Business Day legal writer Karyn Maughan describes as a desperate battle to avoid paying back about R16m in legal fees incurred by taxpayers in his fight to avoid corruption charges, has accused the judges who ordered him to repay the funds of political bias. Zuma has filed papers challenging the 2018 ruling by the Gauteng High Court (Pretoria). He says the courts should ‘never’ criticise or condemn him over his multiple legal bids. Forcing him to pay back the money is an unfair violation of his constitutional rights, he says. ‘I should never be criticised or condemned by the courts for lawfully exercising my constitutional rights,’ Zuma states in an application to appeal against the ruling filed at the SCA. ‘I therefore dispute and deny that I was litigating for the sake of it.’ Zuma is petitioning the SCA for the right to challenge a ruling that he is not lawfully entitled to state sponsorship of his legal costs in his corruption trial, and must pay back the money already spent on such costs. Zuma suggested that the High Court judges were biased. The report notes his comments on the judges come just days after EFF leader Julius Malema launched his owned veiled attack on Gauteng High Court (Pretoria) judges who gave rulings in favour of President Cyril Ramaphosa and Public Enterprises Minister Pravin Gordhan in their respective legal battles with Public Protector Busisiwe Mkhwebane.

Zuma also argues that the High Court failed to uphold his rights to human dignity in its evaluation of the DA and EFF’s case for his funding to be cut, and gave ‘more weight to the political interests of the political parties involved than advancing my constitutional rights’. According to a Times Select report, he strongly denies employing a Stalingrad style of litigation (a phrase coined by his former advocate, Kemp J Kemp, to avoid facing trial). ‘I have not engaged in any litigation strategy intended to avoid accountability,’ he says in court papers. Zuma argues he is legally entitled to state funding of his defence costs because the corruption he is accused of arose from his position in government. He faces charges over his allegedly corrupt relationship with his former financial adviser Schabir Shaik, who was convicted of keeping him on a corrupt retainer to do his bidding. That bidding allegedly included Zuma accepting a R500 000-a-year bribe from French arms company Thales, in exchange for his protection from any potential arms deal inquiry.