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Sout
h African prosecutors said they will reinstate corruption
charges against the country's former deputy president Jacob Zuma if
the judge in his trial refuses to grant them a postponement and
strikes the case from the roll.
“It would be in the best interest of the accused for a
postponement to be granted,” said Makhosini Nkosi, a
spokesman for the National Prosecuting Authority told reporters
outside the Pietermaritzburg high Court in the eastern
KwaZulu-Natal province today. If the case is struck from the roll
prosecutors could re-open investigations against Zuma.
There would be no fixed timetable for the case to be brought to
closure, Nkosi said. A few hundred Zuma supporters have gathered
outside the court buildings singing and dancing, watched over by
dozens of police officers who cordoned off the area.
Prosecutors had asked judge Herbert Msimang on September 5 to delay
the trial until at least October 15 to give them more time to
prepare a final indictment against Zuma. Msimang will start
announcing his decision from 10 a.m. local time. That indictment
will include new evidence from documents seized from Zuma, his
lawyers and his co-accused, Thint Holdings Southern African and
Thint Ltd.
Zuma, 64, is accused of trying to secure a bribe from the
companies, South African units of Thales SA, Europe's largest
military electronics maker, in exchange for protecting them from a
probe into arms purchases by the state. Zuma denies any wrongdoing
and says the charges are part of a political conspiracy against
him.
Lawyers for Zuma had argued for the case to be dropped, saying
their client's constitutional rights to a speedy and fair trial
have been compromised because of the long delay in bringing charges
against him. Zuma has been under investigation for six years.
Zuma is a leading contender to succeed Thabo Mbeki as president in
2009. He was fired by Mbeki is June last year after a court
convicted his financial adviser, Schabir Shaik, on corruption
charges. The court found Shaik had tried to secure bribes for Zuma,
made payments to him, and described their relationship as
“generally corrupt.”
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