Procedure followed in Zuma’s leave to appeal application is ‘irregular’, court told

Former president Jacob Zuma’s legal team on Monday argued that the procedure adopted by the Pietermaritzburg High Court in Zuma’s leave to appeal application was irregular.

Procedural irregularity

Advocate Dali Mpofu, acting on behalf of the former president, argued that the high court committed an irregularity when it directed the state to submit an answering affidavit in Zuma’s application for leave to appeal.

Mpofu contended that no statute or rule of court made provision for such an affidavit, including the directive that Zuma’s legal team should submit a replying affidavit.

“In my experience, I’ve never seen anything like that,” Mpofu said.

Zuma’s legal team was back in the high court before Judge Piet Koen to challenge his ruling last year that dismissed Zuma’s bid to have state advocate Billy Downer recused from prosecuting the arms deal corruption trial that starts on 11 April 2022.

ALSO READ: Zuma loses special-plea bid to have Downer recused

Zuma does not want Downer to lead the prosecution of his corruption case because he believes the prosecutor lacks the independence and impartiality to oversee the trial.

He has also accused Downer of leaking his confidential medical records to the media, which has been vehemently denied by the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA).

Special treatment

Mpofu insisted that the procedural irregularity allegedly committed by the high court prejudiced Zuma. He claimed that the court’s directive was similar to the “special treatment” Zuma had received from the country’s judiciary.

To back up his claims, Mpofu cited Zuma’s imprisonment for contempt of court by the Constitutional Court last year and the invalidation of his release on medical parole by the Pretoria High Court.

“The applicant, former president Jacob Zuma, is of the strong view that at some point this issue has to be addressed of his case being treated differently from other cases… why would a procedure that is unheard of, to put it crudely, be adopted in his case?

“And it’s not for the first time, we all know that the court can take judicial notice of the fact that he has raised this complaint repeatedly… I have never seen any person, accused or not accused, in respect of whom the law seems to be so over-eager and speedy to summarily deal with him,” Mpofu argued.

READ MORE: Billy Downer didn’t leak medical records, says NPA

Zuma and French arms manufacturer Thales are on trial over the controversial multibillion-rand arms deal struck when Zuma was KwaZulu-Natal’s MEC for Economic Development in the 1990s.

The former president faces 18 charges and 783 counts of fraud‚ corruption, money laundering, and racketeering – while Thales is facing four counts.

The leave to appeal application continues.

NOW READ: NPA questions timing of Zuma’s charges against Downer