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- Former ANC councilor Andile Lungisa has warned President Cyril Ramaphosa to stop “attacking” former President Jacob Zuma.
- Lungisa was released on probation Tuesday after serving two months of a two-year sentence.
- He was greeted by ANC leaders, including NEC member Tandi Mahambehlala and Supra Mahumapelo.
“Stop your attacks on former President Jacob Zuma for national unity,” former ANC leader Andile Lungisa warned President Cyril Ramaphosa on his first day out of prison.
Lungisa, who served two months of a two-year sentence for assaulting a Nelson Mandela Bay councilor, said party leaders should tell Ramaphosa to stop prosecuting his predecessor.
“What we are witnessing every day is an attack on President Zuma. Every corner is an attack on Zuma. It is the responsibility of the comrades who are sitting here, also on that side, to say to the acting president, ‘Comrade Ramaphosa, the attack on President Zuma must stop now.’
READ | Zuma attorneys face misconduct complaint over Zondo commission ‘strike’
The former president added to his legal troubles when he organized an “exit” in Zondo’s commission on the capture of the state after the president refused to recuse himself at Zuma’s request.
Zuma also faced charges of fraud and corruption, dating back to the so-called gun business of the 1990s.
Supreme Court Vice President Raymond Zondo indicated that he would file a formal criminal complaint against Zuma for fleeing the judicial investigation last month.
Flanked by ANC leaders Supra Mahumapelo, Des van Rooyen, Tandi Mahambehla and Eastern Cape provincial leader Mlibo Qoboshiyane, Lungisa said he did not want a civil war to break out in the country.
Lungisa said:
“We need to maintain national unity, where we are saying, a person who is a former president, a former leader, we have to make sure they don’t harass. We give them space with their own families, with their own grandchildren without interrupting them.”
Lungisa made these comments at a press conference shortly after his release.
The Department of Correctional Services (DCS) said he had been released on probation as of December 1.
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“This placement on probation means that Lungisa will serve the remainder of the sentence in the community corrections system, in which he is expected to meet a specific set of conditions and will be subject to supervision until the sentence expires,” Singabakho said, DCS spokesperson. Nxumalo.
The Eastern Cape High Court in Makhanda granted Lungisa bail on September 25, pending the outcome of his request for permission to appeal his imprisonment to the Constitutional Court, News24 previously reported. However, he chose to remain in jail to end the programs he had started, in contradiction to his maintaining his innocence and his reasons for going to the Constitutional Court to appeal his sentence.
Shortly before his incarceration, Lungisa, an ally of ANC Secretary General Ace Magashule, requested that national party officials address “a long-pending matter that has to do with the alleged money that has to do with the alleged use for the campaign to be president of the ANC “.
Lungisa said that the CR17 campaign occurred while Ramaphosa was officially speaking out against ANC members buying and using money to influence the results of the ANC’s Nasrec elective conference.
He said his next task would be to mobilize communities against a common purpose: “liberating the economy from the minority.”
He added that a special conference should be held before the party’s national general council with the participation of community leaders to discuss economic transformation.
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