Hours after former president Jacob Zuma filed a notice to appeal the ruling revoking his medical parole and ordering him to go back to prison, the Department of Correctional Services (DCS) said it will also be appealing Judge Keoagile Elias Matojane’s ruling.
The DCS doesn’t want Zuma back in prison.
Earlier on Wednesday Judge Matojane ruled: “The decision of the first respondent [Mr. Arthur Fraser at the time] to place the third respondent on medical parole, taken on 5 September 2021, is reviewed, declared unlawful, and set aside.
“The medical parole decision is substituted with a decision rejecting the third respondent’s application for medical parole.”
After Zuma’s lawyers filed the notice for leave to appeal the ruling, the DCS announced that it was doing the same.
“The DCS will be appealing the judgment handed down by the Gauteng Division of the High Court, Pretoria, on the medical parole placement of Former President, Mr. Jacob Zuma,” said the department.
“Having carefully studied the judgment, DCS is convinced that another court may arrive at a different conclusion.
“DCS is of the view that the court sadly misinterpreted the Correctional Services Act and erred in declaring the decision of the national commissioner to place Mr. Zuma on medical parole to be unlawful and setting it aside.
“We will outline the grounds of appeal in the papers that we will be filing in court in due course.”
The 79-year-old former president was jailed in July on a 15-month sentence for contempt of court after he refused to return to testify at the Judicial Commission of Inquiry.
The inquiry, which was probing allegations of state capture, corruption, and fraud in the public sector including organs of state, is better known as the Zondo Commission or State Capture Commission.
Zuma was released on medical parole after serving two months of his sentence.
The Democratic Alliance, the Helen Suzman Foundation and AfriForum successfully challenged the lawfulness of Zuma’s medical parole in the high court.
