FILE: Former President Jacob Zuma standing with his successor President Cyril Ramaphosa, they are entangle in a legal fight. PICTURE: GCIS
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0 JOHANNESBURG: Legal teams representing Mr Ramaphosa and his predecessor appeared before a full bench of the Joburg High Court on Thursday afternoon.
The Council for the Advancement of the South African Constitution (CASAC) said it’s completely confident that South Africa’s president, Mr Cyril Ramaphosa will receive the urgent interdict against former president Mr Jacob Zuma’s private prosecution.
Judgement has been reserved in the urgent interdict application by Mr Ramaphosa regarding his private prosecution by former president Mr Jacob Zuma.
Mr Ramaphosa is seeking urgent relief from the court after Mr Zuma charged him with being an accessory after the fact in the case against state prosecutor Billy Downer and journalist Ms Karyn Maughan.
The former president has accused Mr Downer and Ms Maughan of leaking his confidential medical records in the arms deal case.
Meanwhile, weighing in on the court proceedings, legal analyst Mr Mpumelelo Zikalala says prospects of success are slim for the President.
“If there are avenues to deal with this process at a later stage, what warrants the jumping of the queue, the dealing with this matter on an urgent basis, just because you are the President, that’s what the court is going to say and say this matter is not urgent, go to court on the 19th and be able to ventilate your matters then,” he said.
However, Mr Lawson Naidoo, Casac’s executive secretary believes the charges levelled against Mr Ramaphosa are meant to delay the start of Mr Zuma’s fraud and corruption trial.
“The issue is that former president Zuma seeks to raise an attempt to stall his trial, which could and should be properly raised during the trial itself. This is an abusive court process, abuse of legal process because there seems to be very slim ground on which to pin any criminal charges against President Ramaphosa,” he said.
Mr Naidoo also said there’s no explicit from the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) on whether the private prosecution has been approved.
“It does not seem that there was ever such a consideration given by the National Prosecuting Authority so it cannot be said that a noll prosequi certificate has been properly obtained from the NPA to allow this private prosecution to proceed. And I think it needs to be clear that a nolle prosequi should only be issued after the NPA has considered the matter and decided not to prosecute,” he added.
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