I hope Cosatu will soon publicise the details of the uMsholozi Trust Fund, the defence account being set up by the labour federation to assist in the imminent court case of former deputy president, Jacob Zuma.

I want to donate to the fund, and quite a lot of my friends are equally keen to help uMsholozi.

I was among the first people to call upon Zuma to step down and let a judicial commission probe the allegations of corruption made against him.

I stated that on radio, the same night Bulelani Ngcuka made noises about prima facie bits of evidence and unwinnable cases.

My rationale was always that uMsholozi must not allow even a whiff of suspicion to taint the exalted office of the presidency, and that an inquiry should be instituted immediately to probe the veracity of the allegations.

I never hopped on the popular bandwagon whose riders long ago convicted Zuma of imagined wrongdoing.

Zuma an 'unlucky target'

Indeed, I still believe uMsholozi has been an unlucky and defenceless target of armchair prosecutors, judges and character assassins of the worst kind.

He asked to have his day in court shortly after Ngcuka's accusation and his agents released to the media the 35 questions, verbatim, which the Scorpions wanted to ask Zuma.

The whole thing smacked of political orchestration of the most satanic kind.

Even by the time Zuma was finally charged, a number of cartoonists and commentators implied that he welcomed his day in court with hesitation.

This country with its constitution and Bill of Rights envied by much of the west, with an assumed sense of parliamentary fair play, this very country for which uMsholozi dedicated all his life has already found him guilty, even before the courts have as ked him to plead.

The media are 'sensationalists'

The media are an unspeakable lot of sensationalists, with some on television playing a rather poor local version of Britain's Sky News. Some papers lack originality so much that they are miniature lickspittles of the Washington Post during the hey day of Watergate.

I have no doubt that there is not one judge in this country who does not have an opinion, one way or the other, on the guilt or innocence of Zuma.

A fair trial for the man seems impossible, never mind the saintly, angelic garb in which our judiciary is often robed.

Yes, the ANC Youth League and Cosatu, with the baby communists in tow, were all out of order to cast aspersions on the person of Judge Hilary Squires.

They personalised their attacks and ended up playing the man and not the ball. The attacks came after the Shaik judgment and smacked of sour grapes.

Yet is it hitting Squires below the belt to point out his Rhodesian connections, that he was a cabinet minister in the illegitimate Ian Smith regime?

Zuma, then an MK commander, plotted alongside Joshua Nkomo's Zipra forces to end white minority rule, at a time when Squires was in the Smith regime.

Surely KZN Judge President Vuka Tshabalala should have known this background before appointing Squires?

A political matter

These factors make Squires' involvement in the Shaik case a political matter, and honest jurists should accept that the nature of the judge and the accused in the trial - Shaik had been a courier for the ANC, under Zuma's command, during the struggle - meant the struggle was continuing unfairly in the courts.

Now Zuma is being denied the services of advocate Willem Heath, who has stated publicly that he does not believe there is any watertight case against Zuma.

Heath has been drafted in as a state witness, although his ties to Zuma were known to the Scorpions before they reached their decision. How "fair" can Zuma's trial be, in the circumstances?

I am neither a supporter of the ANC nor a member of Cosatu but I am determined to make a contribution to Zuma's defence fund.*1

I am convinced he is a victim of glaring Machiavellian skulduggery within his own political ranks, being knifed by the very people he helped to liberate and put in the important positions they occupy.

The tragedy of Jacob Zuma is exactly the same as that of Nomzamo Winnifred Madikizela-Mandela.

They shook the tree most vigorously, but as soon as the apples of liberation began falling to the ground, Zuma and Madikizela-Mandela were discarded very shamelessly, then shunned and chased away by those who benefited hugely by their efforts.

Jon Qwelane's column is published each week on News24, courtesy of Jon Qwelane and the editor of Sunday Sun, which originally carried the article.

With acknowledgements to Jon Qwelane and News24. 

*1 One can wonder whether Thales will make a contribution.

A contribution might even be considered for SDP offset credits.

At least the criterion of causation will unchallengable.

It would also be for defence.

And also for BEE [black expedited enrichment], (gives one an extra 10%).