Durban : The Schabir Shaik fraud and corruption trial will bring more lessons in accountancy this week, but a new set of witnesses will appear.

On Friday defence counsel Francois van Zyl requested time to double-check his notes, meaning KPMG forensic auditor Johan van der Walt faces only a few more questions after three weeks on the stand in the Durban High Court.

State prosecutor Billy Downer will call Nkobi Holdings' accountant Celia Bester as the next witness to testify about the company's internal accounting structures and cash flow policies. Also expected is Anthony Gibb, who was the David Strachan & Taylor audit clerk when the accountancy firm worked on Nkobi's books.

In bringing his cross-examination of Van der Walt to an end, Van Zyl signalled Shaik would testify that his auditors and accountants were to blame for the allegedly irregular entries in the financial statements.

This was the first indication of how Shaik's legal team intended fighting the charge, which relates to R1,2m allegedly falsely written off by Shaik in the books of Nkobi subsidiary Kobi IT to conceal payments to and on behalf of Deputy President Jacob Zuma.

The Durban businessman has pleaded not guilty to two counts of corruption and one of fraud .

Van der Walt has taken centre stage for the past three weeks as the state's key witness, initially entering as evidence his 250-page report compiled on Shaik's financial position and then facing cross-examination .

Shaik is also being tried for corruption for his alleged role in securing a bribe for Zuma from French arms company Thomson CSF in return for protection in arms deal investigations.

Van Zyl said Shaik's testimony would show that the businessman never intentionally or unwittingly bribed Zuma, but rather the pa yments were support given in the course of friendship.

Given Nkobi's turnover of R23m by last December, Shaik also did not consider the payments as reckless trading and had not intended defrauding investors in writing off the R1,2m.

He had also employed auditors and tax consultants to handle the Nkobi accounts.

Van der Walt countered that assessing a company's financial well-being on the evidence of turnover alone was flawed, as it did not reflect the cash available in the bank.

With acknowledgements to Nicola Jenvey and the Business Day.