The departmental spokesperson, Singabakho Nxumalo, says after careful consideration, the department has taken a decision to apply for leave to appeal the judgment which has since caused speculation across all political and legal platforms.

He says after carefully studying the judgment, which dismissed the department and former President Zuma's appeal against the North Gauteng High Court's earlier judgment, he believes that another judge could come to a different conclusion.

Nxumalo says the department is considering this course on the basis of the interpretation and application of the Correctional Services Act and other relevant prescripts.

Meanwhile, the spokesperson for the Jacob Zuma Foundation, Mzwanele Manyi, has since welcomed the decision by the department.

Manyi, in his tweet, says this is "a very sober move by Correctional Services". He earlier described the Appeal Court's unanimous ruling over the medical parole of the former president as incoherent.

On Monday 21 November 2022, SCA’s Justice Tati Makgoka read an order which upheld the North Gauteng High Court’s judgment that the decision by the former Department of Correctional Services (DSC) Head, Arthur Fraser, to grant former president Jacob Zuma parole, was invalid in terms of the law. Justice Makgoka dismissed Zuma’s application for leave to appeal to the North Gauteng High Court.

He said Fraser, who granted Zuma parole after he served less than two months of his 15 months jail term, should not have overruled the department’s medical advisory board.

ALSO READ: SCA judgment over Zuma incoherent - spokesperson

In August 2022, Manyi told OFM News that nothing prohibited Fraser to grant Zuma medical parole despite the medical parole advisory board's advice and recommendation that Zuma was not eligible for parole.

ALSO READ: Foundation maintains Fraser was right to grant Zuma parole

The Helen Suzman Foundation, DA and the lobby group AfriForum, amongst others, opposed the Department and Zuma'a appeal and asked the Appeal Court to confirm the Pretoria High Court’s judgment and send the former president back to jail. The complainants, in this case, argued that Zuma received special treatment and was not eligible for medical parole.

In 2021, Constitutional Court judges sentenced Zuma to 15 months imprisonment. This, after he failed to appear before the State Capture Commission of Inquiry, chaired by Chief Justice, Raymond Zondo.

Justice Sisi Khampepe found him guilty of contempt of court and sentenced him as such.

However, Zuma denied that he did not want to appear before the commission. He maintained that he merely wanted Zondo to recuse himself, given the alleged history between the two.

However, following the judgment, the DA party leader and Member of Parliament (MP), John Steenhuisen, says party lawyers have written to the new DCS national commissioner to ensure that former President Zuma is apprehended to serve two more months. The party says he must be handed to the DCS by this week.

ALSO READ: DA demands confirmation of Zuma re-arrest

"The DA sent a lawyer’s letter to the acting National Commissioner of Correctional Services, Mr MS Thobakgale, demanding that he confirms within 48 hours that he will ensure that Mr Jacob Zuma returns to the Estcourt Correctional Centre," Steenhuisen said.

OFM News