Cape Town – The scheduled legal hearing for former South African President Jacob Zuma, set for Tuesday, August 15, regarding his attempt to remove state advocate Billy Downer from his arms deal corruption case, has been cancelled.
According to Times Live, the legal proceeding was taken off the court’s schedule at the eleventh hour on Monday.
Instead, a virtual case management meeting will be held.
“The matter J G Zuma v the State, which was set down to be heard from 15 to 16 August 2023 at the KwaZulu-Natal Division of the High Court, Pietermaritzburg, will no longer sit as scheduled.”
“Instead, Judge Thoba Poyo-Diwati, will conduct a virtual case management meeting with all parties involved on the dates previously scheduled for the sitting,” The Citizen quoted Lusanda D Ntuli, the deputy director of communications for the office of the Chief Justice, as saying.
The change follows a court ruling in favour of Downer and journalist Karyn Maughan, enforcing a judgment against Zuma’s private prosecution.
Zuma had accused Downer of leaking his confidential medical information to Maughan in 2021.
He was on Friday released from prison on “special remission”.
ALSO READ | Zuma quickly released after reporting to prison
as his medical parole was declared unlawful.
This release is part of a process to avoid prison overcrowding, and he won’t be on parole. Zuma had received a 15-month sentence in 2021 for defying a Constitutional Court order related to a corruption inquiry and was released on medical parole after serving only two months.
Zuma was sentenced in June 2021 after refusing to testify before a panel probing financial sleaze and cronyism under his presidency — but was freed on medical parole just two months into his term.
He started serving the sentence early in July 2021.
His jailing sparked protests that descended into riots and looting that left more than 350 dead in the worst violence to hit the country since the advent of democracy in South Africa.
The following month, he was admitted to hospital for an undisclosed condition before being granted medical parole.
In November last year an appeals court found the release was illegally granted and ordered the now 81-year-old back to the Estcourt Correctional Centre in the eastern KwaZulu-Natal province.
South Africa’s prison service, which had granted Zuma’s conditional release, appealed the decision, but the bid was dismissed by the Constitutional Court last month.
Follow African Insider on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram
Picture: Twitter/@Sli_Masikane
For more African news, visit Africaninsider.com
Compiled by Betha Madhomu
Additional reporting by AFP
