WILL former President Jacob Zuma go to prison!
On Thursday, 13 July the Constitutional Court rejected an application to overturn the Supreme Court of Appeals (SCA) ruling on the parole of Zuma.
This means that the former president must return to prison.
Zuma, however, is in Russia for medical treatment.
Mzwanele Manyi, spokesman for the Jacob Zuma Foundation, confirmed in a statement Friday, 14 July, that Zuma was in Russia for medical treatment. The former president left South Africa for Moscow earlier this week.
Manyi said: "He went there for medical check-ups. He will be returning to the country once the doctors have completed their treatment."
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The Supreme Court in Pretoria had, in December 2021, reviewed and set aside former correctional services commissioner Arthur Fraser's decision to release Zuma on medical parole.
The commissioner's office then tried to appeal the ruling in the SCA but was unsuccessful; the application was dismissed in November 2022.
Now the Constitutional Court has rejected this request as well.
The Constitutional Court dismissed an appeal by the commissioner's office, which Zuma had also, himself, applied to intervene in, out of hand.
The apex court said the action did not have sufficient prospects of success.
This means that the SCA's decision stands and in terms of that ruling, Zuma must therefore return to prison.
Zuma was sentenced to 15 months in prison in July 2021 for contempt of the Constitutional Court after refusing to comply with a request to appear before the Zondo Commission.
The former president spent only two months in prison and was then released on medical parole after Fraser overruled the Medical Parole Advisory Board's (MPAB) recommendation that the former president did not qualify for it.
In July 2021, shortly after Zuma entered Estcourt Prison to begin his 15-year sentence, violent riots erupted, accompanied by looting and the destruction of public infrastructure.
The Department of Correctional Services spokesman, Singabakho Nxumalo said on Thursday, 13 July in a statement that the department is seeking legal advice and would comment further in due course.
ActionSA leader Herman Mashaba said he believes that Zuma should not try and avoid accountability and return to prison, as ruled by the Constitutional Court on Thursday, by fleeing South Africa to seek medical treatment in Russia.
"It is extremely suspicious that a day after the Constitutional Court ruled that President Zuma must return to the Estcourt Correctional Centre to complete his sentence, it emerged that he had gone to Russia to seek medical attention," said Mashaba.
"ActionSA calls on the Constitutional Court's ruling to be upheld, and that South African law enforcement takes the necessary action to ensure that Zuma does not escape accountability.
"Zuma cannot be treated any differently from any other South African, repeatedly frustrating our legal processes and undermining our constitutional democracy. Our judicial system is one of the last remaining independent bodies upholding South African law and therefore, no one should be allowed to undermine it."
