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Former President Jacob Zuma appears on the Zondo commission.
PHOTO: Sharon Seretlo, Gallo Images
- Former President Jacob Zuma filed a 530-page request to challenge Supreme Court Vice President Raymond Zondo’s refusal to recuse himself.
- Zuma says his perception of Zondo’s bias against him is based on the fact that the investigation did not investigate his claims that foreign and apartheid spies had tried to kill him.
- The state’s arrest investigation seeks an order from the Constitutional Court requiring Zuma to appear before Zondo to answer questions.
Former President Jacob Zuma has accused the state’s capture investigation of failing to investigate his claims that foreign and apartheid spies have been trying to kill him, and says this ruling confirms his suspicion that Supreme Court Vice President Raymond Zondo is biased. against him.
“If the president had bothered to investigate my claims, he would have discovered that I had been selected and appointed by the Chief Justice to preside over a political project,” Zuma states in a 530-page challenge to Zondo’s refusal to recuse himself.
He says he believes that this political project “is being carried out through the commission.”
Last month, Zuma tried and failed to persuade Zondo to recuse himself, after claiming that the state’s capture investigation had carefully selected his witnesses from among people who were unhappy with his decisions to fire them or who were determined to speak ill. of the ANC and its party leadership.
He began the review of Zondo’s dismissal of his disqualification case the same day the investigation filed its request to compel Zuma to appear before Zondo, in January and February of next year, to answer questions about his mandate.
That request, which Zuma does not object to, will be released on December 29.
Zuma’s challenge to disqualification is not an urgent case, so it will not be heard before his next appearance discussed before the investigation or on March 31 of next year, which is when Zondo is due to deliver his final report to President Cyril Ramaphosa .
However, the latter case can be used as a basis for the former president to refuse to answer any of the investigation questions.
In his attempt to force the disqualification of Zondo, Zuma has rejected any suggestion that any decision by Zondo to resign as chairman of the investigation in matters involving him and his family would collapse the investigation, as “irrational and irrelevant.”
“He [Zondo] I would have been free to continue investigating other people involved and matters that are not directly relevant to me and my family. “
Zuma further maintains that his perception of Zondo’s bias against him is based “on the objective fact that the commission simply ignored the extraordinary accusations I made about the manipulation of our democratic system by foreign agencies working with domestic ones.”
Zuma claims that it was after he appeared before Zondo in July last year, and detailed how he had been the target of various apartheid and foreign intelligence plots to politically destroy and kill him, that “I realized that the president’s attitude was such that he was neither impartial nor independent. “
In my opinion, he was determined that my presidency be characterized by state capture, corruption and fraud.
During that July 2019 evidence, Zuma claimed he had learned of various plots to kill him, including a planned suicide bombing at a Maskandi concert and efforts to tamper with his plane.
He also referred to two intelligence reports, the existence of which he says the Zondo Investigation has not investigated, “in which he made it clear that my political influence in the country must be eliminated.”
According to Zuma, the investigation was “in essence the perfection of the political project that began long ago and was aimed at eliminating my influence on South African politics.”
“In my appearance before the commission, I specifically set out the political context within which I believe the commission was established, which plunged the president into a political controversy and, therefore, into a position that is inconsistent with the central mission of power. judicial”.
During Zuma’s request for Zondo’s disqualification, evidence leader Paul Pretorius SC stated that commission investigators were investigating Zuma’s claims.
But Zuma said that Pretorius’ statements were “vague” and “incoherent and lacking in meaning to reassure me that they were taking me seriously.”
Zuma continues to insist that he and Zondo were friends, despite the latter claiming otherwise.
In challenging Zuma’s claims that he and Zondo had a “close personal relationship,” the former president says the vice president of the Supreme Court “transformed himself into a witness in my dispute, from being an impartial and fair judge, leaving himself disqualified to preside over the dispute. getting involved. “
