SA is becoming a constitutional dictatorship, says Jacob Zuma

Former president Jacob Zuma says SA is moving from a democracy to a constitutional dictatorship.

In a statement released by the Jacob Zuma Foundation on Monday evening, Zuma lamented the decision to dismiss his application to have his jail sentence scrapped. He accused the court of changing its own rules.

“The Constitutional Court in this case somehow found it fitting to deviate from its own rules and it was again another case of the laws and the constitution being bent and manipulated to specifically deal with Zuma,” he said in the statement.

The apex  court threw out the former president’s rescission application on Friday. Zuma had asked the court to set aside his 15-month contempt of court jail sentence, which was handed down in June after he failed to comply with its order to appear before the state capture commission.

His legal team announced on Saturday that it would go the uncommon route of taking the fight to the African Court on Human and People’s Rights.

Taking a jab at the judiciary, Zuma said: “It has never happened that in a dissenting decision of the Constitutional Court that the dissenting judges go as far as accusing their colleagues of acting unconstitutionally.

“It is a very sad day in our history to observe how those we have entrusted with the constitution now consider themselves above the constitution. It is my constitutional right to publicly critique judges the same way they have a right to critique me as a politician.”  

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