ZUMA’S LITIGATION CHICKENS COME HOME TO ROOST, AS COURT ORDER STRENGTHENS THE INDEPENDENCE OF THE NATIONAL PROSECUTING AUTHORITY AND ENDS SHAUN ABRAHAM’S TENURE AS NATIONAL DIRECTOR OF PUBLIC PROSECUTIONS.

CASAC WELCOMES ITS VICTORY IN THE HIGH COURT, BUT RULE OF LAW IS THE BIG WINNER.
CASAC welcomes the ruling from the North Gauteng High Court today declaring that President Zuma’s R17m inducement to get then National Director of Public Prosecutions (NDPP) to vacate his office was unlawful.

Speaking in Johannesburg, CASAC Executive Secretary Lawson Naidoo said:

“In a carefully constructed judgement that skilfully joins the dots between a number of important legal cases, including the ‘spy tapes’ and Nkandla cases, once again President Zuma has been found to have acted unlawfully and in breach of his constitutional obligations. Clearly, his legal chickens are now coming home to roost”.
Naidoo added: “The losers are President Zuma, Mxolisi Nxasana, and Shaun Abrahams, but the real winners are the constitution and the rule of law. Once again, we must grateful for the independence and quality of our judiciary in South Africa.

CASAC noted with concern the announcement from the Presidency that the judgment would be appealed even though the President had yet to be given a full briefing on the decision. This is a further example of precisely what the Court noted has been “…the broader pattern of the President’s conduct in litigation, of defending what ultimately turns out – on the President’s own concession – to have been indefensible all along, banking on any advantage that the passage of time may bring”. [at para 88 of the judgment].

In addition, to the important findings about the unlawful settlement between the President and Mr Nxasana, CASAC welcomes the order of the court to declare certain provisions of the National Prosecuting Act unconstitutional because, in essence, they give the President excessive power over the suspension of the NDPP and the extension of his or her tenure in office.

“The flaw in the NPA Act has been exposed by President Zuma’s conduct in recent years, and the court has now moved to recognise that the impugned provisions are in fact unconstitutional. The institutional independence of an institution that the court reminded us is central to constitutional democracy is now strengthened and the country should celebrate this fact and anticipate a brighter future in which the current culture of impunity is brought to an abrupt end”.