Lawyers for Jacob Zuma and the state will meet in the next few weeks to try and prevent further delays in his possible corruption trial, the National Prosecuting Authority said on Tuesday.
NPA spokesperson Tlali Tlali said the meeting would determine the dates by which each side would have to file papers and responding papers.
How to deal with indictments and interlocutory applications would also be discussed.
”It’s any other pre-trial matter that has the potential of causing a delay,” said Tlali.
”Between now and the 15th of August we are going to agree on the principles that are going to manage the process.”
Judge Chris Nicholson said on Tuesday he would decide next month on Zuma’s bid to have a corruption case against him dismissed.
The case is the biggest obstacle to Zuma succeeding President Thabo Mbeki after general elections next year, almost certain to be won by the African National Congress, but any delay increases the chance that he could already be in office before any trial starts.
”The court is going to reserve judgement in the main application. The judgement will be given on the 12th of September,” Nicholson said.
Nicholson set a December 8 start date for Zuma’s corruption trial in the event that he fails to have the charges dismissed.
But analysts said it was possible that a trial might be delayed for months, even years, as he would be able to turn to the appeals court and then South Africa’s highest court, the Constitutional Court.
Zuma denies the charges of corruption, fraud, money-laundering and racketeering, but says he will step down if convicted. The ANC wants all charges to be dropped.
After Tuesday’s proceedings, Zuma told supporters outside the court in his powerbase KwaZulu-Natal province: ”If the case goes to trial, it is going to be long because I will call witnesses. Maybe the truth will come out when the case has started.”
A long trial could overlap with the general election, risking increased political instability.
Delays possible
”It’s unimaginable that Zuma’s trial will have concluded by election day in 2009. The last appeal might well stretch even beyond a one-term Zuma presidency, which would end in 2014,” said political scientist Keith Gottschalk of the University of the Western Cape.
The ANC-dominated Parliament may also move to prevent Zuma being prosecuted when he is president, said Aubrey Matshiqi, a political analyst at the Centre for Policy Studies.
”It is possible that we will be faced with a situation where our head of state is facing criminal charges, but … we cannot rule out the possibility that the ANC majority will be used to pass legislation according to which a sitting head of state cannot be prosecuted,” Matshiqi said.
Zuma’s strong links with trade unions worry some investors, who see Mbeki’s policies as more pro-business, but they are also concerned about continuing uncertainty.
The ANC leader is accused of taking 783 bribes totalling R4,07-million over a 10-year period. Most of the alleged payments were connected to his former financial adviser Schabir Shaik, now serving 15 years in prison for corruption.
Zuma is also accused of soliciting a R500 000 bribe from French arms group Thint relating to a massive arms deal arranged by South Africa in the late 1990s.
Charges against Zuma were dropped in 2005 for technical reasons, although Mbeki fired him as deputy president. Prosecutors renewed the charges shortly after Zuma beat Mbeki last December to win the ANC leadership.
His supporters say the case is a conspiracy by Mbeki loyalists aimed at derailing Zuma’s political ambitions.
”Our [ANC] president is a target of a political conspiracy and we are convinced that this conspiracy is led by our state president,” Julius Malema, leader of the ANC’s militant youth league, told scores of Zuma chanting supporters outside the court.
‘Clean slate’
Earlier, the court heard that there was nothing wrong with the decision to charge Zuma with fraud and corruption.
State advocate Wim Trengove, SC, told the court that the decision by National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) acting head Mokotedi Mpshe to re-charge Zuma in 2007 should be viewed independently from the move to charge him in 2005.
”The current decision [by Mpshe] was a decision that was taken on a clean slate,” Trengove told Nicholson in the state’s opposition of Zuma’s bid to have the decision to prosecute him declared unlawful.
Zuma was charged in 2005 but that case was struck from the roll in 2006. He was re-charged in December 2007.
His lawyers are saying the charges should be dropped because the state did not offer him the opportunity to make representation when it decided to charge him again. The Zuma camp argues that the Constitution guarantees the right to make representations when the NPA reverses a decision.
But Trengove told the court that Zuma should not even argue about the decision to charge him in 2005, because that case was scrapped from the court roll by Judge Herbert Msimang in 2006.
He quoted a recent Constitutional Court ruling to back up this statement, but was questioned about it by the judge.
The case he cited from was the recent judgement handed down by the Constitutional Court that upheld the state’s letter of request to seek documents from Mauritius in its case against Zuma.
Trengove replied that this view came from Constitutional Court judges, to which Nicholson replied: ”And far be it for me to challenge people on such Olympian heights.”
Zuma made a low-key arrival at the court just before 10am on Tuesday, smiling and glancing at his watch as bodyguards accompanied him into court. About 20 photographers and fewer television cameras than Monday snapped pictures of him wearing a grey suit and silver tie. — Reuters, Sapa