Former ANC president Jacob Zuma has been blue-ticking the incumbent national officials of the governing party since their election at Nasrec in December 2022.
The ANC secretary-general’s office has attempted to seek an audience with the Nkandla-based former party boss, but Zuma has instead chosen to focus on his personal life, leaving Luthuli House with bated breath and hoping for him to agree to a meeting with the party’s top seven.
The first attempt to meet Zuma, according to the party’s administration boss Fikile Mbalula, drew a blank, after the former statesman made an excuse that he was preoccupied with a family bereavement.
When Mbalula tried his luck again, Zuma sent him packing, saying he had too many court cases to focus on than meet the leadership of his party.
Among the cases is one where Zuma is seeking to privately prosecute ANC president Cyril Ramaphosa for his alleged involvement in the failure of the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) boss, Shamila Batohi, to read the riot act to prosecutors who leaked his medical records.
“The private prosecution, we live that to people who are executing this matter. But we are still committed to meeting comrade JZ [Jacob Zuma] as the current leadership,” Mbalula told journalists at Luthuli House on Wednesday.
“We did make contact with him and there was bereavement in the family. From there, he said he is busy with his court cases.
“But we are ready to meet anytime to understand where he comes from in some of these particular issues. I will leave the private prosecution until we meet him.”
Zuma has been a thorn in the side of Ramaphosa, firing shots at him at every political platform he gets to address, while launching further missiles meant to expose the president’s apparent inefficiencies as the head of state.
In recent times, he wrote to Ramaphosa questioning his decision to appoint both Batohi as NPA boss, as well as Chief Justice Raymond Zondo.
On both occasions, he has threatened legal action if Ramaphosa does not reverse the appointments.
Politically, Zuma tried in vain in 2022 to block Ramaphosa from getting a second term when he endorsed former African Union Commission chair Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma for the top post.
Previously at the height of the tit-for-tat with Zondo, who headed the State Capture Commission as chairperson, Zuma refused to appear before the commission in Zondo’s presence.
The former head of state then met his party’s national officials and fingered the Ramaphosa-led ANC of throwing him to the wolves.
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