In a heated courtroom exchange at the Pretoria High Court, National Assembly Speaker Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula’s urgent application to interdict the state from arresting her ignited a legal showdown, with judgment reserved until April 2.
Advocate Reginald Willis SC, representing Mapisa-Nqakula, revealed that the speaker opted not to file a replying affidavit, seeking an interim interdict to prevent her arrest pending the outcome of her initial application.
Graft allegations
Willis alleged that the state’s refusal to guarantee non-arrest prompted this move, despite earlier hopes that launching the first application would dissuade authorities from pursuing her.
Central to the debate was whether Mapisa-Nqakula, facing graft allegations of over R4-million, should receive special treatment to avoid arrest.
Willis argued vehemently against what he perceived as an unjust targeting of his client, emphasising her rights as a citizen while challenging the lawfulness of a search and seizure conducted without her legal representation present.
“If this is how the speaker of parliament is the second most influential individual in our constitutional democracy,” Willis said.
“If this is how she is treated, then the rest of us in this courtroom better not get our hopes too high as to our constitutional rights being afforded any legitimacy,.
Interdiction unwarranted
Despite assurances from the state not to arrest Mapisa-Nqakula until the court’s ruling, advocate Graham Kerr-Phillips countered, asserting that the speaker’s urgent interdiction was unwarranted and constituted an abuse of process.
Kerr-Phillips contended that Mapisa-Nqakula’s attempts to influence the terms of her prosecution set a dangerous precedent and underscored the need for judicial restraint.
Judge Sulet Potterill, presided over the contentious proceedings, questioned both sides on matters of urgency, legal precedent, and the alleged leaks of case information to the media.
The defence argued that such leaks jeopardised Mapisa-Nqakula’s reputation, while the prosecution maintained that the urgency of accessing case materials before formal charges undermined the justice system’s integrity.
Urgency of the interdict disputed
The state’s advocate, Makhosi Gwala, disputed the urgency of the interdict, calling it an abuse of process and rejecting comparison to Zuma’s private prosecution case, emphasising the danger of setting precedent.
Gwala dismisses the need for pre-charge access to dockets and warns against dictating the National Prosecuting Authority’s processes.
He denied allegations of information leaks and claimed that media coverage had already harmed Mapisa-Nqakula’s reputation.
“The law knows no positions,” Gwala said.
