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All-out drive for Zuma funds
01/08/2006 16:05 - (SA)
Durban - Fund-raising efforts to ensure that Zuma's legal fees are paid will be "doubled" as more than the previously estimated R12m may be needed.
The board of the Friends of Jacob Zuma Trust will be meeting this week to proceed with fund-raising efforts.
Fund chairperson Don Mkhwanazi said on Tuesday the board of trustees would be meeting in Durban on Thursday to discuss the fund-raising efforts.
Asked whether the R12m previously estimated was sufficient to defend the former deputy president, he said: "If it continues and continues then we will need more than R12m.
"The defence doesn't know how the judge is going to decide (on September 5)."
'Have to double our efforts'
On Monday, Judge Herbert Msimang adjourned Zuma's hearing until September 5 to enable the State to examine his legal team's application for the case to be struck from the roll.
The national prosecuting authority had sought to have the case postponed until February.
"We are still going all out to raise funds. We will have to double our efforts."
In a personal affidavit filed in Pietermaritzburg High Court on Monday, Zuma said he had had "personal, social, economic and trial prejudice" and that he was "effectively unemployed and quite unemployable" as a result of the corruption charges he faced.
Last Saturday, Zuma politely declined to donate to the South African Communist Party's coffers at its 85th anniversary fund-raising dinner, saying: "If you have read the newspapers, you will know that I am unemployed."
Mkhwanazi refused to divulge how much the fund had collected to date, saying he would be in a "position to say that when we have the audited statements".
No money from presidency
He said fund-raising would focus on "those who were not reached" as well as Zuma supporters who held back donations to the fund when Zuma was charged for the rape of an HIV positive family friend. He was acquitted.
"We must go back to them," said Mkhwanazi.
How much Zuma's legal fees have cost him so far is uncertain and in his affidavit he claims the presidency has made no contribution, although he was apparently promised that a portion of his legal fees would be paid by the state.
- SAPA
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