{"id":10100,"date":"2017-12-29T07:58:42","date_gmt":"2017-12-29T12:58:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/?p=10100"},"modified":"2017-12-29T07:58:42","modified_gmt":"2017-12-29T12:58:42","slug":"south-african-court-delivers-zuma-impeachment-blow","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/2017\/12\/29\/south-african-court-delivers-zuma-impeachment-blow\/","title":{"rendered":"South African court delivers Zuma impeachment blow"},"content":{"rendered":"

South Africa’s top court has found that parliament failed to comply with its duties in holding President Jacob Zuma accountable over a public funding case.<\/p>\n

The ruling said parliament must now set out rules for impeachment proceedings, but it remains unclear whether this will lead to any impeachment.<\/p>\n

The court was hearing a case brought by opposition groups who wanted parliament to be compelled to begin impeachment.<\/p>\n

It relates to Mr Zuma’s use of state funds to upgrade his private home.<\/p>\n

Handing down the Constitutional Court ruling, Judge Chris Jafta said: “We conclude that the assembly did not hold the president to account.<\/p>\n

“The assembly must put in place a mechanism that could be used for the removal of the president from office.”<\/p>\n

But the court said it could not intervene on how parliament determined the mechanism and that it had no power to order an impeachment<\/p>\n

The court awarded costs against Mr Zuma and parliament.<\/p>\n

The court ruling was by majority. Dissenting Chief Justice Mogoeng Mogoeng said the ruling was a clear case of “judicial overreach”.<\/p>\n

Some $15m (\u00a311.1m) in state money was spent upgrading Mr Zuma’s home.<\/p>\n

In March 2016, the court ruled he had ignored a watchdog’s findings and said he must pay some of the money back. The president has reimbursed $631,000, deemed by the Treasury to be “reasonable”.<\/p>\n

Parliament then debated the matter and he survived a no-confidence vote, but Friday’s court ruling said that the procedures it followed were insufficient.<\/p>\n

Mr Zuma has been weakened by a number of corruption allegations and by his recent replacement by Cyril Ramaphosa as head of the ruling ANC.<\/p>\n

Mr Zuma, 75, is scheduled to remain president until general elections in 2019.<\/p>\n

He has faced a number of corruption allegations, all of which he denies.<\/p>\n

Earlier this month\u00a0Mr Zuma lost two court cases in one day<\/a>, both linked to corruption allegations.<\/p>\n

Zuma’s legal woes:<\/h2>\n