South Africa’s Appeal Court has reserved judgment in the matter as Zuma’s counsel seeks to take the eight-year legal battle all the way back to the beginning.

President Jacob Zuma and the National Prosecuting Authority appealed a High Court decision last year that dropping the charges against Zuma was irrational.

At the start of proceedings yesterday, Zuma’s counsel Kemp J Kemp made the shock admission that the decision by the then prosecuting authority head  Mokotedi Mpshe was based on the wrong statute.

Mpshe found that there were political motives for trying  Zuma on the charges relating to the 1999 arms procurement deal by the African National Congress government

However Kemp maintains that if the court  accepts this, the prosecution authority has to have an opportunity to make the correct decision.

This would put the matter into the hands  of the existing prosecution authority director Shaun Abrahams.

Constitutional law expert Pierre de Vos says Zuma’s making another bid to get corruption charges dropped and he’s confident he’ll get a sympathetic ear from Abrahams.

The Democratic Alliance , who took the matter to the High Court, says it will resume its legal battle if Zuma manages to dodge further court action.

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The opposition Democratic Alliance  has warned it’ll fight any attempt at shielding the president from having his day in court.

Last month, the High Court in Pretoria ruled the National Prosecuting Authority was wrong seven years ago to drop criminal charges against President Jacob Zuma.

The ruling was a victory for the official opposition, which asked the court to review the  decision by Abrhamas’ predecessor to withdraw the charges against Zuma.

The High Court found that Mokotedi  Mpshe breached a cardinal legal rule by not continuing with prosecuting with the charges that stem from an arms procurement deal in 1999.

Judge Aubrey Ledwaba found that the decision taken to drop corruption charges against Zuma was irrational.

He further ruled that the matter needed to be reviewed.

The National Prosecuting spokesperson Luvuyo Mfaku says they’ve been studying the decision.

Their head Shaun Abrahams will address the nation with the final decision.

Head of the Democratic Alliance Federal Executive, James Selfe says the judgment was a unanimous decision of a full bench. It’s difficult to conceive that those judges would believe that a different court would come to another conclusion.

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