Jacob Zuma's rape accuser had reacted to her alleged sexual assault in a manner “entirely consistent” with that of a rape victim, a clinical psychologist has told the Johannesburg High Court.

Dr Merle Friedman also revealed that she was never asked to question the 31-year-old complainant about any of the sexual abuse she claimed to have suffered as a child or adult; or its impact on her.

“It wasn’t part of my brief,” Friedman told Zuma’s counsel, Kemp J Kemp SC, this morning.

Kemp then quizzed her about whether she had asked the complainant about her “entire” sexual history during the two hours they spent together. “Not her whole sexual history, enough to give me a sense of where she was coming from,” Friedman said.

A black-suited Friedman took 15 minutes this morning to detail her impressive resumé as a local and international authority on post traumatic stress disorder – the same disorder which she claims the complainant has shown symptoms of.

Friedman then proceeded to lead the court through her psychiatric evaluation of the complainant for the next 20 minutes. Testifying that she had been approached by the State to evaluate the reaction of Zuma’s accuser during and after the alleged rape, as well as its subsequent impact on the complainant, Friedman said she had interviewed the woman on two occasions shortly before the scheduled start of Zuma’s trial in February.

Addressing the issue of why the complainant could have “frozen” during the alleged rape, Friedman stressed that the woman had seen Zuma as a “protector”and “father figure”. She further pointed to recent psychological literature and argued that it was outdated to believe that flight or fight responses were the only possible reactions to a rape attack.

She went on to explain what she described as the complainant’s “confused SMSes” in the hours following the alleged rape and her failure to describe the incident as a rape in these SMSes as being the result of her inability to face what had happened.

“It was too difficult for her to name what had happened as rape,” she said.

Addressing the impact of the alleged rape on the complainant, Friedman said she had shown no signs of being depressed or abusing any substances and, if given the appropriate psychological counselling, could recover from what had happened to her.

According to Friedman, the complainant had told her that, as a result of what had happened to her, she had had extreme reactions to people asking her “are you sleeping”. “I feel like screaming, I can’t stand that,” she told Friedman.

The complainant, who had also indicated to Friedman that she didn’t think she could live through her alleged rape and subsequent pre-trial ordeal, had also told her that she wished to leave the country.

About 200 pro-Zuma supporters gathered outside the High Court this morning, reading from the Bible and praying. The protesters compared the woman who has accused Zuma of rape to Delilah, the woman who betrayed Samson to the Philistines.

In his cross-examination of Friedman, Kemp said that Friedman had described the trance-like phenomenon experienced by the complainant as bearing the features of a dissociative state. He asked Friedman to describe the trance she had observed with the complainant.

Friedman said the dissociative episode experience of the complainant put her out of touch with reality “to some extent” in that she was not able to decide what she needed to do.

This, however, did not mean that she was non-functional, as she had managed to get to work the following morning.

Kemp questioned Friedman about the fact that she had handed in a full report on the post traumatic stress disorder that the complainant had allegedly suffered as a direct result of the No 2 incident, after only two consultations with the woman.

“I had two sessions with her and that’s what I was given. I did an evaluation of the traumatic episode, her response to it and the impact that it had on her,” Friedman said.

Kemp further questioned Friedman on her assumption that the complainant’s description that she had “frozen” during the rape was a “normal” response.

“Let me put to you this: where are the statistics that show the majority of women freeze,” Kemp asked.

“Of course they are available, and certainly in my experience,” Friedman said, quoting from an academic work which she had in front of her on the witness stand.

Kemp disputed this, saying that shouting for help or resisting were also normal responses.

“I am the trauma specialist, and so often things we would regard as normal responses are not.

“In a traumatic event, when you are completely overwhelmed, people cannot respond,” Friedman said.

Kemp then referred to the complainant’s earlier history, referring to one incident when she was 13 and had allegedly climbed into bed with a man who lived in the family home. She had apparently had no idea that he would try something sexual with her.

“She’s asleep when she suddenly becomes aware that he’s on top of her and he’s naked. He tries to penetrate her and she wriggles away and tells him to stop. And then he stops. She told him to stop while he was penetrating her,” Kemp said.

Friedman agreed that while this had happened, it was not the first rape experience the complainant had suffered.

Kemp then said another person called Charles had raped the complainant and that time she had pointed a gun at him.

“She’s quite happy to resist him,” Kemp said.

“I would question this, she cannot say exactly what happened then, because she went into a dissociative state,” Friedman said.

“But a gun is resisting,” Kemp said.

“But it’s still dissociation,” Friedman maintained.

Kemp then referred to another attempted rape incident in which the complainant had said she pulled the duvet cover around her when a young man allegedly tried to rape her.

A church minister walked in on the alleged rape.

“Is it not a lesson that if you summon the pretence of someone, the rape stops.”

Friedman responded: “I don’t necessarily know the conclusion that a complainant reads into it.”

With acknowledgement to Karyn Maughan, Gill Gifford and Cape Argus.