A South African judge on Wednesday rejected former President Jacob Zuma’s plea to remove lead prosecutor Billy Downer from his upcoming corruption trial, reported Reuters.
On Wednesday, Pietermaritzburg High Court Judge Piet Koen canceled the appeal on the grounds that Zuma’s attempt to remove the prosecutor “lacks reasonable prospects of success”.
Zuma’s lawyers had been appealing an earlier ruling rejecting his attempt to have lead prosecutor Billy Downer taken off the corruption case.
“The application for leave to appeal and all related applications … are all dismissed,” Koen said in court. “The criminal trial shall proceed.”
The former South African president had accused Downer of bias. His lawyers have accused Downer of leaking confidential case information to the media and being a witness in a separate case against the former leader by the opposition party, the Democratic Alliance.
Zuma’s lawyers’ efforts to have the prosecutor removed have delayed the start of Zuma’s corruption trial, which is set to begin on April 11.
Zuma’s trial began in May 2021 after a number of postponements as his team of lawyers tried hard to have the charges dropped. He faces 16 charges of fraud, corruption, and racketeering related to the purchase of fighter jets, patrol boats, and equipment from five European arms firms.
Zuma’s lawyers still have time to make an appeal with the country’s Supreme Court of Appeal, which could further delay the corruption trial.
The former South African president was overthrown from the post of the president in 2018 amid wide-ranging allegations of corruption during his nine-year-long presidential tenure.
Last year in June, Zuma was sentenced to 15 months in prison for contempt of the Constitutional court after ignoring orders to present before a corruption inquiry commission probing allegations of corruption during his presidential tenure from 2009 to 2018.
His imprisonment last year sparked riots in the country in which more than 300 died. There was an estimated $1.7bn damage in property losses.
In September, the former South African president was released from prison on medical parole. After three months, the courts declared the parole invalid and ordered him to return to prison.
