A London businessman told the Schabir Shaik trial today that even though he did not know at first who Jacob Zuma was, he was quickly made aware of Shaik's dealings with the deputy president.

John Dover was the first overseas witness called by the State in Shaik's trial.

Dover told the court that his company, Symbol Technologies, invented the hand-held scanner. He came to South Africa in 1997 to work as a general manager for Symbol South Africa.

In the beginning of 1999, when South African drivers started converting their licenses to the credit card format, Symbol developed a reader for the credit card that it hoped to sell to the law enforcement agencies. As a result, the company met with Prodiba, which was making the cards, and arranged a marketing meeting in May 1999.

Dover said the initial plans were that Nkobi Holdings would buy into Symbol SA. According to a letter handed to court, Shaik was "most anxious that this be completed in the shortest possible time-frame".

Dover said in the first or subsequent meetings that he had with Shaik, he became aware of Shaik's links with Zuma.

He, however, seemed unfazed by this.

"Most of the South African companies we dealt with had (political) influence because of South Africa's history."

He said it was later decided for legal and financial reasons that Nkobi would not buy into Symbol SA.

Yesterday, forensic auditor Johan van der Walt could not be shaken on his testimony on an alleged French bribe.

It did not matter which of Zuma's debtors was to be paid with the alleged bribe, the fact remained that the money had found its way to Zuma through Shaik, was his point.

In general tempers seemed a bit frayed from early in the morning.

Shaik swore at a policeman who barred him from parking in front of the court. No mention was made this morning of the incident.

But once Judge Hilary Squires entered the court it was at their professional, and sometimes icy, best that Shaik's counsel, Francois van Zyl SC, and Van der Walt squared up.

Van Zyl centred his attack around an allegation that Van der Walt had been influenced by the Prosecuting Authority in coming to the final conclusion in his report.

Van Zyl said he was, so to speak, "painting by the numbers provided by the National Prosecuting Authority".

"I deny that," KPMG director Van der Walt said.

He told the court he led a team of between three and eight members, including three chartered accountants, in the investigation, but denied they were influenced by the advanced stage of the Scorpions' own probe.

For the rest of the day Van Zyl focused on Van der Walt's evidence about Zuma's Nkandla homestead development.

Shaik has pleaded not guilty to two charges of corruption and a third of fraud. One of the corruption charges relates to R1.2 million in payments allegedly made to Zuma as part of what the State has described as a "general corrupt relationship".

The other is an allegation that Shaik had solicited a bribe of R1m from French arms company Thint for Zuma.

The trial continues.

With acknowledgements to Estelle Ellis and the Cape Times.