Zuma sentenced to 15 months in jail for cotemtny pf court will hand himself to police at his home Nkandla
In what is being hailed as one of the most significant legal decisions in South African history the Constitutional Court has jailed disgraced former President Jacob Zuma for 15 months for contempt of court.
Zuma has five days to hand himself in to police.
Failing this, Police Minister Bheki Cele is ordered to do whatever necessary to ensure Zuma goes to jail.
This is a first time a former South African president has been sentenced to imprisonment,
Not even leaders during the apartheid era suffered such punishment.
Zuma defied a Constitutional Court order to appear before the Zondo Commission into state corruption.
He had earlier walked out of the commission, refusing to appear again if Deputy Chief Justice Raymond Zondo, whom he claims has close familial ties with him, recuses himself.
sub head Accuses state of politically motivated camapaign
Zuma accuses the state of mounting a politically motivated campaign against him.
Zuma faces corruption charges in the KwauluNatal High court involving five billion euros misappropriated before he was president
He has rounded on the Constitutional Court saying it behaved like an apartheid institution
Acting Chief Justice Sisi Khampepe, reading the 7-2 majority judgment, regretted that Zuma “has elected to make unmeritorious, vituperative remarks calculated to impugn the integrity of the judiciary called his remarks
She said it would serve no purpose to impose a suspended sentence on Zuma in the hope of getting him to comply because that would only give him further reason to delay.
She awarded unitive costs against Zuma.
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Even the Constitutional Court judges could not agree
The ex-president’s spokesman Mzwanele Manyi say if the nine Constitutional Court judges could not agree on a ruling, it was surely not possible for a layman to accept it.
He would not comment on the whereabouts of Zuma who was not in the Constitutional Court and said a more comprehensive response to the judgement would be made later
Split judgements are commonplace in the Constitutional Court and even the minority judgment agreed that Zuma was guilty of contempt of court.
The ANC military win Umkhonto We Sizwe has sent members to Zuma’s at Nkanadla and vowed to protect him from arrest.
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Daughter says he is in good spirits
Zuma’s daughter Dudu Zuma Sambudia says he has spoken to her father since the judgment and found him him in good spirits.
He plans to hand himself to police at Nkandla and members of his family will accompany him to Gauteng, which is currently closed to outsiders because of stricter COVID 19 lockdown restrictions imposed this week.