The rape trial of former president Jacob Zuma gets under way in the Johannesburg High Court on Monday with Transvaal Judge President Bernard Ngoepe presiding over it.
Zuma is accused of raping a close family friend and HIV positive Aids activist at his house in Forest Town in November last year — a charge he has repeatedly denied.
About 5 000 people, mostly demonstrators, are expected to make their way to the court on Monday.
Metro Police spokesperson Chief Superintendent Wayne Minnaar said the street in front of the court as well as one heading up to its entrance will be closed to traffic on Monday to make way for the protesters.
He said Pritchard Street — which runs past the building — would be closed between Von Wielligh and Von Brandis Streets.
Kruis Street — which leads up to the entrance of the court building at an intersection with Pritchard — will be closed between President and Pritchard Streets.
Minnaar said the roads will close at 6am and be open to traffic at 4pm.
Zuma spent the eve of his trial addressing a crowd at Olympia Stadium in Rustenburg during a Congress for South African Trade Union’s (Cosatu) listening campaign, during which members were invited to share their views with their leaders.
”Zuma said that he could not speak of the trial but said that the current divisions within the ruling party needed to be addressed,” Cosatu’s general secretary, Zwelinzima Vavi said on Sunday.
”He said that some time the problems facing the party would have to be dealt with.”
He said Zuma had said that hiccups his party, the African National Congress (ANC), was facing, would ”come and go”.
In June, he will stand trial on two charges of corruption relating to his ”generally corrupt relationship” with fraud-convicted Durban businessman Schabir Shaik, in the Durban High Court. – Sapa