Former South African president Jacob Zuma received a remission from President Cyril Ramaphosa on Friday, averting a decision that might have sent him back to prison. Zuma served barely two months of a 15-month prison term in 2021.
In July 2021, Zuma was sentenced to prison for disobeying a court order to show up for a corruption investigation.
After two months, he was released on medical parole; nevertheless, a court ruling upheld by the constitutional court concluded that this was an unconstitutional action. This week, the director of South Africa’s prison system was scheduled to reveal whether he would go back to prison. That choice looks to be irrelevant after Friday’s remission.
After Zuma was imprisoned in 2021, there were violent protests that resulted in over 300 fatalities, and there were worries that if he were released from prison again, there might be additional unrest.
In 2021, Zuma was detained at the Estcourt Correctional Facility in his native province of KwaZulu-Natal (KZN). According to Makgothi Samuel Thobakgale, national commissioner of South Africa’s correctional services, Zuma appeared there for roughly an hour on Friday morning.
He was subjected to “administrative processes” before the remission took effect.
Prisons officials will keep in contact with Zuma, as they do with other offenders released under the remission process, the commissioner added.
The country’s biggest opposition party, the Democratic Alliance, said in a statement that it was planning a legal challenge against the decision to grant Zuma the special remission.
A spokesman for Zuma’s foundation said that Zuma was at home consulting his legal team and that a statement could be issued later.
Zuma, 81, retains a loyal following in KZN and within parts of the governing African National Congress (ANC) party led by his successor Ramaphosa. He denies corruption allegations against him and has cast himself as the victim of a politically motivated witch-hunt by a faction in the ANC.
In a separate case still before the courts Zuma has pleaded not guilty to charges including corruption, fraud, racketeering and money-laundering over an arms deal in the 1990s.
