African National Congress deputy president Jacob Zuma is spending most of this weekend in close consultation with his bevy of legal advisers, plotting their next move in preparation for his corruption trial, which gets under way in the Pietermaritzburg High Court on Monday.

Zuma’s attorney, Michael Hulley, confirmed on Friday that the legal team, led by advocate Kemp J Kemp, was meeting Zuma for extensive briefings at the weekend. “We have been in consultations and I am taking instructions as we speak, we will meet on Saturday and Sunday to work out the finer details of everything ahead of Monday,” he said.

Zuma will also make whistle-stop appearances at a host of solidarity gatherings arranged as part of efforts to drum up support when he faces two counts of corruption on Monday.

Elaborate and detailed security arrangements, involving the police and tripartite alliance leaders, have been put in place to ensure that Monday’s hearing goes ahead without any embarrassing hitches.

Alliance bigwigs are keen to prevent a recurrence of the defiant behaviour seen in previous Zuma court appearances, such as when sections of the crowd burnt T-shirts emblazoned with President Thabo Mbeki’s image.

Hulley confirmed that Zuma’s defence team would be serving an affidavit on the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) and would lodge it with the Pietermaritzburg high court either late on Sunday or Monday morning to argue against the NPA’s request to have the trial postponed.

“Our affidavit serves two purposes. Firstly, it will oppose the NPA’s application to have the matter postponed yet again, and secondly, we will also ask the judge to issue a release in terms of the legislation and make an order setting the matter aside,” Hulley said.

Zuma’s lawyers will argue that the corruption trial be set aside as his constitutional right to a fair trial has been compromised because of the state’s failure to produce a final indictment despite having investigated Zuma for over six years. Hulley said this application was in line with provisions in the Criminal Procedure Act.

The Zuma corruption trial has been characterised by legal wrangling between his legal team, lawyers acting for French arms company Thint SA and Zuma’s former financial adviser Schabir Shaik on the one hand, and the state on the other.

Among these are the various challenges to search warrants granted by Transvaal judge-president Bernard Ngoepe to the NPA last year. Shaik is also taking his fraud and corruption conviction to the Supreme Court of Appeal.

The delays caused by the various legal slanging matches partly explain the NPA’s request last week for the court to postpone the matter until at least February next year. Hulley said the NPA had failed to follow the correct procedures in its investigation of Zuma.

The challenges to warrants which have since been declared illegal cannot be the basis for a further delay as these were part of the normal processes to which all accused persons are entitled, he said.

But far more important than the legal wrangling are the political implications of another delay in Zuma’s trial.

Zuma’s political backers were this week crisscrossing the country to make the case that the delays are proof that the trial is part of a wider “conspiracy” against the former deputy president.

Zuma himself will top the bill at this weekend’s 85th anniversary of the South African Communist Party. His closest allies say he will use this opportunity to create momentum for Monday’s court appearance.

With acknowledgement to Karima Brown, Vukani Mde and Business Day Weekender.