Justice Khampepe pulls no punches in slamming Jacob Zuma

Recalcitrant, egregious and insidious.

This was how acting Chief Justice Sisi Khampepe described former president Jacob Zuma and his conduct of late, in the no-holds-barred ruling the Constitutional Court handed down yesterday finding him guilty of contempt of court and sentencing him to 15 months behind bars.

He refused to take the stand at the Commission of Inquiry into State Capture, despite the court having previously ordered him to do so.

ALSO READ: Zuma guilty of contempt: Seven scathing quotes from ConCourt’s majority ruling

Khampepe’s bruising majority judgment honed in on the public statements Zuma – who paints himself as the target of political conspiracy – has issued in recent months, attacking the Constitutional Court and the judiciary.

“Never before has the judicial process been so threatened,” Khampepe said.

The court noted Zuma opted out of participating in proceedings. Khampepe said Zuma had “once again squandered an opportunity to follow and respect this country’s legal processes which guarantee all citizens fairness and equality before the law”.

Of the court’s decision to sentence Zuma to direct imprisonment, Khampepe said the alternative – a suspended sentence – would be “both futile and inappropriate”.

“Coercive committal, through a suspended sentence, uses the threat of imprisonment to compel compliance. Yet, it is incontrovertible that Mr Zuma has no intention of attending the commission, having repeatedly reiterated that he would rather be committed to imprisonment than cooperate with the commission or comply with the order of this court,” she said.

The public had “an equally important, if not more acute, interest in a functioning judiciary than in Mr Zuma’s testifying before the commission”.

Khampepe also highlighted concerns that if Zuma’s conduct was allowed to go unpunished, this could embolden other like-minded individuals.

However, she went on, the court could not send him to jail for two years – which is what the commission had asked it to do.

The commission’s rationale was rooted in the sentences prescribed for offences under the Commissions Act and its regulations.

But, said Khampepe, the matter at hand was one of contempt of court and she instead sentenced him to 15 months.

“He owes this sentence in respect of violating not only this court, but to the nation he once promised to lead,” she said.

Zuma was also slapped with the costs of the suit.