SCA ruling against Zuma sends ‘conflicting’ messages

The Supreme Court of Appeal (SCA) ruling on Monday against former president Jacob Zuma’s medical parole has brought conflicting messages, according to attorney Mpumelelo Zikalala.

Zuma and the department of correctional services’ (DSC) appeal against the setting aside of his medical parole was dismissed with costs by the High Court in Pretoria.

“Former corrections commissioner [Arthur] Fraser’s medical parole decision was unlawful for at least two reasons,” said Democratic Alliance leader John Steenhuisen. “First, it was taken against the recommendation of the Medical Parole Advisory Board not to grant medical parole to Mr Zuma.

“Second, it was taken for an ulterior purpose not permitted by section 79 of the Correctional Services Act and Regulations [which govern the granting of medical parole], and not rationally connected to the purpose of medical parole or the information before the commissioner.”

In August last year, Fraser ordered Zuma’s release from prison, less than two months after the former president was jailed for contempt of court.

SCA decision ‘partly good and partly misdirected’

Zikalala said SCA’s decision was “partly good and partly misdirected” – or incorrect.

“They say he must go back to prison, and then they say when he is back in prison DCS will be the one which decides how the time he spent outside prison should be treated.

“DSC has no power to impose sentences but it has the power to preside over the sentences imposed by courts,” said Zikalala.

“If the court says the department must decide what to do [with Zuma] they are then adjudicating their powers to correctional services to see for themselves what to do with Zuma and that is incorrect.

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“The court … on saying he must go back to jail, I think they made a mistake.”

DSC spokesperson Singabakho Nxumalo said the department had noted the judgment and would study it fully to clarify a way forward within the requisite timeframe.

Zuma ruling: IRR exploring legal avenues

The Institute of Race Relations (IRR) is exploring legal avenues in light of the SCA’s ruling.

“If there was any doubt the DCS, having unlawfully released Zuma in the first place, would let him off the hook no matter what thereafter, then such doubt was put to rest when the DCS released a ‘media statement to the effect that Mr Zuma had completed his sentence’, which, as the SCA put it, was a ‘premature’ decision, ‘not validly made’,” said the IRR’s Gabriel Crouse.

“The SCA seems to have said the DCS broke the law by letting Zuma out, but is allowing the DCS to fix this by letting him out again. I am not a lawyer, so I am looking for someone to tell me how that makes sense.”

He added: “In the past, if you insulted judges or refused to testify, then a court could throw you in prison through a special process [without ordinary trial], but once you say sorry or go testify properly, the court can release you again.

“The SCA seems to have made a new rule that says purging your contempt makes no difference to the court anymore. But I think the SCA is supposed to apply the rules to Zuma, not make up new rules.”

Steenhuisen said Zuma was imprisoned for contempt of court “so serious it constituted a near-existential threat to the authority of the judicial system”.

“It is a terrible indictment on President Ramaphosa that he not only failed to speak out against this egregious decision to medically parole Mr Zuma, but that he openly welcomed it.

ALSO READ: Court rules Zuma’s medical parole was unlawful, orders his return to prison

“The president’s ulterior motive has become clearer with the benefit of hindsight.

“It was not only an attempt to placate the Zuma faction of the ANC for the sake of ANC unity, and to avoid another frenzy of mass destruction as happened in KwaZulu-Natal in July last year, after Mr Zuma was convicted.

“It was also aimed at stopping the president’s own smallanyana skeletons from tumbling out the Phala Phala closet.”