Zuma’s latest defiance will cost taxpayers thousands of Rands

The gloves were off at the Commission of Inquiry into State Capture on Monday, where Deputy Chief Justice and commission chair Raymond Zondo made it clear he was done playing nice with ex-president Jacob Zuma.

After yet another no-show for a scheduled appearance, Zondo announced he and his team were headed back to the Constitutional Court – only now, he said, they would be moving for an order to have the defiant Zuma jailed.

The commission has cost taxpayers more than R700 million since it was established and Zuma’s latest chicanery could push the figure up by hundreds of thousands of rands, with some senior counsel charging more than
R100,000 a day to argue cases in court.

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But, say analysts, going back to the country’s apex court is the right move.

“Any other route involves a lot of delaying tactics around reviews, etc. This gets the jurisdiction to deal with the defiance of Zuma in the right forum and in the right way,” Accountability Now’s Paul
Hoffman said.

Hoffmann believed the commission had, up until now, treated Zuma with kid gloves, to an extent.

“But they’ve run out of space, time and runway,” he said.

Legal expert Professor Pierre de Vos said Zuma’s absence would hurt him more than the commission.

“In a criminal situation – where the protection offered to accused persons is much more stringent than in a commission – the court has said if you decide not to testify on your own behalf, adverse inferences can be drawn from this,” De Vos explained,

“And while this is not a criminal trial – and depending on how credible and cogent it believes the evidence against Zuma is – the commission is permitted to take his refusal to testify into account when weighing up that evidence.”

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Zuma was scheduled to take the stand this week, but again refused to. This despite the Constitutional Court having last month ordered him to comply with the commission’s instructions.

And Zondo said the commission took his conduct “very seriously”.

“It would be a pity if anybody did this but that it was done by a former president – someone who twice stood before the nation and took an oath he would uphold the constitution of the republic and protect it – is a great pity,” Zondo
said.

– bernadettew@citizen.co.za

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