Legal principle of finality fact demands that Jacob Zuma's rescission application dismissed as an abuse of processFormer president Jacob Zuma. Picture: LULAMA ZENZILEapplication to rescind the Constitutional Court’s order finding him guilty of contempt and sentencing him to 15 months’ imprisonment is a classic. The application was filed on July 2 after the former president had refused to participate in the two court applications brought against him by the Zondo commission.
The contempt of court judgment was a strong rebuke against Zuma’s disregard and general disdain for the rule of law, and his continued attacks on the courts. While a legitimate legal process, Zuma’s latest attempt to evade accountability for his actions has a particularly cynical flavour to it. It is trite that judgments of the Constitutional Court are final, and no appeal is possible. The rescission application is an attempt at an appeal through the back door.
It is for this reason that judgments are only ever rescinded in the rarest of circumstances and on very narrow technical grounds. What Zuma is attempting here is radically different. It amounts to an attempt to get the court to reconsider its finding of guilt and the imposition of direct imprisonment as a sanction. Plainly, that is not the purpose of a rescission application. Zuma wants to have his cake and eat it.
Zuma has also failed to show any error or procedural irregularity that taints the judgment. Instead, he claims he was acting on the basis of bad legal advice, but even so that does not rise to the level of an error justifying an order for rescission to be granted. It does not disclose a good faith explanation for his actions, nor does it show that his defiance of the court order of Jan. 2021 compelling him to respect a summons from the Zondo commission was for good cause.
Source: Law Daily Report (lawdailyreport.net)
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