Former president Jacob Zuma’s lawyers have demanded that the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) disclose whether the judge who had been presiding over Zuma’s criminal trial was himself the subject of investigation by the Hawks.
The claims by Zuma’s lawyers, just a week before they argue his application for a permanent stay of prosecution, have already created a palpable sense of drama around that crucial hearing. They arguably provide a strong indication that the former president and his lawyers are distrustful of the reasons given for KwaZulu-Natal deputy judge president Mjabuliseni Madondo’s exit from the bench.
In a letter dated May 10 and written to former KwaZulu-Natal prosecutions boss Moipone Noko, Zuma’s lawyers said it had come to their attention that Madondo “may have been the subject of intimidation and/or attempts to prosecute him” while he was presiding over the former president’s criminal trial.
Noko has since been moved to the North West province.
The lawyers asked the NPA to answer questions whether anyone in the Hawks — or from the office of national director of public prosecutions Shamila Batohi — had asked that Madondo be investigated.
They have also asked “whether the instruction to prosecute him had emanated from any other source outside the NPA”.
Madondo, through the spokesperson of the office of the chief justice, told Business Day he “only learnt of this allegation [that he was the subject of a criminal investigation]” on Monday.
Spokesperson for the office of the chief justice Nathi Mncube told Business Day it was “the first time he had heard of the allegations”.
The Hawks have categorically denied investigating Madondo, and the judge himself claims he knows nothing about the alleged criminal case against him.
Head of communications for the NPA Bulelwa Makeke confirmed that the director of public prosecutions had received correspondence from Zuma’s lawyers and will respond to them.
Mncube on Monday confirmed that Madondo will not be one of the three judges who hears arguments from Zuma and his corruption co-accused, French arms company Thales, in their application for prosecution against them to be permanently stayed.
“The deputy judge president was never, at any point, appointed by judge president Achmat Jappie to preside over the [Zuma/Thales] matter,” Mncube said, adding that Madondo had simply been “case-managing the matter”.
“After case-managing the criminal matter against former president Zuma and following the filing of papers, judge president Jappie and deputy judge president Madondo decided that given the volume of papers in the matter, it required a full bench to hear it.”
Among the judges that will decide Zuma’s fate are Bhekisisa Mnguni, who was quizzed about his relationship with the Friends of Jacob Zuma Trust founder, the late Don Mkhwanazi, by EFF leader Julius Malema, during his unsuccessful April 2016 interview for the KwaZulu-Natal deputy judge president vacancy.
Judges Esther Steyn and Thoba Poyo-Dlwati complete the panel.
Zuma’s lawyers have already expressed unhappiness over the decision to appoint three judges to hear the application, which they argue is “non-procedural”.
They made it clear that they regard any change in the bench hearing Zuma’s case as “an irregularity and tampering with a panel of an already constituted criminal court”.
“Our view is that the trial court is the duly constituted panel to hear this application and we have not been furnished with any factual or legal reasons as to why this panel has been changed.”
Both Zuma and Thales, the company accused of offering him a R500,000-a-year bribe to protect it from any potential investigations into SA’s multibillion-rand arms deal, are fighting for the decades-old cases against them to be permanently dropped.
In order to do so they need to show that the prosecution against them has been so severely compromised by “undue delay” that they will not receive a fair trial.
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