President Jacob Zuma has applied for leave to appeal a court ruling that 783 corruption charges against him must be reinstated, the Presidency said late on Monday.

Zuma gave five reasons for his decision and felt strongly that the High Court in Pretoria had erred in several respects, his office said in a statement.

These included its holding that the National Director of Public Prosecutions was not entitled to terminate a prosecution on the basis of prosecutorial misconduct and the abuse of the prosecutorial process.

Zuma said the court was mistaken in finding that former National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) head Mokotedi Mpshe acted impulsively and irrationally when he decided to drop the corruption case against him.

“The court erred in finding that Mpshe was subjected to undue pressure which deprived him of the time and space to properly apply his mind to the matter,” the Presidency said.

The NPA on Monday said it would also appeal the high court's ruling.

After a seven-year battle by the Democratic Alliance, the court ruled on April 29 that the decision to discontinue the prosecution against Zuma should be reviewed and set aside.

On April 6, 2009, Mpshe said transcripts of telephone conversations between then-Scorpions boss Leonard McCarthy and former NPA boss Bulelani Ngcuka, showed political interference in the decision to charge Zuma.

The charges were formally withdrawn in the High Court in Durban on April 7, 2009.