Zuma case set for 25 August

[sox63]

I seriously doubt the case will get that far

Can a president pardon himself?

Cant see how JZ can make this case go away (legally and ethically). Unless he can convince the ConCourt his rights been encroached upon, he has to answer the charges.

If he works out a deal with the NPA, as recently suggested, he wont be able to take office, as he will have to plead guilty. But his camp has come out and said, there will be no plea bargain.

So, the way I see it, it has to go to court.

 

[JungleBoy]

this is Africa, the word accountability does not exist within the ranks of government officials.

Isn't France or Italy that has such a law that a sitting president may not be tried?
So what's Africa got to do with it?

 

[Albereth]

When?

When Louis Luyt took him there for not applying his mind to the whole rugby story.

 

[Sly21C]

Let's hope the ANC doesn't win the elections with a 2 thirds majority, because if they do, then they have the power to change the constitution, and therefore change the part were Zuma (as president) will be immune from prosecution.

I don't think the running of the country will be affected if Zuma spends most of his time in court, he appears to me like the crouwd pleaser and he will do whatever Mantashe, Nzimande and Vavi tell him to do. A part of me thinks that Nzimande, Vavi and Mantashe will be the real presidents of this country, Zuma is just good at dancing and singing.

I also think South Africa will be a laughed at a lot by the world. Investors will be put off by this and then the so called developmental state that Mantashe and Nzimande seek will not be realised.

 

[Sly21C]

Isn't France or Italy that has such a law that a sitting president may not be tried?
So what's Africa got to do with it?

I read somewhere last year that Italy has that law, the current Italian president was accused of being corrupt and he changed the law somehow to suit himself, but atleast that hasn't affected Italy negatively, well, from where I am sitting.

 

[OnryO]

Somebody that has a court case pending or spend time in jail, should not be able to run for president!

 

[Blaze786]

+1 But this is SA here the ANC don't follow the laws the rest of us have to follow, they have an abridged version. It's like we can't steal, murder, rape, etc. But for them it's if you do rape someone take a shower, etc.

 

[NameOfBeast]

“the morals is buggered.”

Cant see how JZ can make this case go away (legally and ethically). Unless he can convince the ConCourt his rights been encroached upon, he has to answer the charges.

If he works out a deal with the NPA, as recently suggested, he wont be able to take office, as he will have to plead guilty. But his camp has come out and said, there will be no plea bargain.

So, the way I see it, it has to go to court.

Well, I agree not ethically, but certainly legally he can; Alistair Sparks wrote about this yesterday:

TWO months ago, my long-time friend and colleague, Barney Mthombothi, editor of the Financial Mail, made a startling prediction in his Editor’s Note column about how he believed the African National Congress (ANC) was going to get Jacob Zuma off the hook of his corruption case.

Having rejected President Kgalema Motlanthe’s insistence that Vusi Pikoli’s dismissal as national director of public prosecutions was his own decision as simply not credible — he is a “deployed cadre” who “has finally discharged a crucial part of his mandate as a stop-gap president” — Barney went on to offer his prediction about the future course of this tawdry affair.

“Now that the decks have been cleared,” he wrote, “here’s what’s going to happen. Motlanthe, acting on instructions from Zuma, and probably advised by one of his many sidekicks, will appoint a believer or loyalist to succeed Pikoli. The new incumbent, smitten with joy at his good fortune, will do a perfunctory assessment of the Zuma case, after which he will announce with all fanfare that Zuma has no case to answer. Case closed.

“I’m happy to be proved wrong. I doubt it. It’s a perfect opportunity to kill the case once and for all. They are not going to let it pass.”

All of which puts me in mind of one of the late Helen Suzman’s anecdotes from her encounters with officialdom during apartheid’s darkest days. She had gone to the pass office in Johannesburg’s Albert Street to protest a particularly egregious case of injustice. As she outlined the details to an official, whom she described as “one of those rare old-school civil servants” who seemed stolid but sympathetic, she vented her outrage at the whole wicked system. “Where is the morality in all this?” she fumed.

“Mrs Suzman,” the old man replied in his fractured English, “the morals is buggered.”

http://www.businessday.co.za/Articles/TarkArticle.aspx?ID=3481979

 

[JungleBoy]

Somebody that has a court case pending or spend time in jail, should not be able to run for president!

Why not? He hasn't been found guilty of a crime. The accused does not have to prove his innocence. As far as he is concerned, he is an innocent man until such time that the allegations are proven true. What would happen if he withdrew from the election race only to be acquited later?

 

[Flanders]

What would happen if he withdrew from the election race only to be acquited later?

Then he would just have the plug pulled on the current president and step in when it suits him. He would have his little "mini-me" right there beside him, rubbing its grubby little paws. Sound far-fetched? When it comes to these buffoons, nothing is far-fetched.

 

[OnryO]

Why not? He hasn't been found guilty of a crime. The accused does not have to prove his innocence. As far as he is concerned, he is an innocent man until such time that the allegations are proven true. What would happen if he withdrew from the election race only to be acquited later?

And if he is found guilty, what then.