Sars summonses the former deputy president to find out more about income he might not have fully declared

While Jacob Zuma waits to see if he is to be recharged with corruption, he is being investigated by the taxman.

This emerged after his Durban attorney, Michael Hulley, went to the Durban magistrate's court on Wednesday to deal with a summons served by the South African Revenue Service (Sars) on the controversial former deputy president.

It is understood that the summons was served by Sars because it has questions about the completeness of Zuma's disclosure of his income, and because he failed to submit a tax return.

The lawyer apparently disclosed to the court that agreement had been struck with Sars that the information it sought would be furnished by early April.

Hulley said the summons involved a request for further information relating to a recent tax return, which had, he conceded, been filed late. But he would go no further.

"We have no comment," Hulley said yesterday. "We consider Mr Zuma's tax affairs to be private and so there is nothing to say."

Some members of Zuma's inner circle suspect that there is a connection between these queries and the National Prosecuting Authority's continuing investigation into Zuma's relationship with Schabir Shaik, who has gone to jail for fraud, and into Zuma's alleged relationship with Thint, the French arms manufacturer, from which Zuma is alleged to have accepted a bribe facilitated by Shaik.

"I said we are not going to comment, and I am certainly not going to comment on the motivations of Sars," Hulley said.

"You cannot fairly ask me whether I, or we, think that Sars is 'harassing' Mr Zuma. Some people would say that Sars harasses everyone. That's their job," Hulley said.

During Shaik's trial in 2005, an unflattering picture of Zuma's financial affairs was painted by the prosecution. Hilary Squires, the presiding judge, commented that Zuma's finances seemed to be in a bit of a mess.

After Zuma was charged in 2005, Scorpions special investigator Johan du Plooy said in an affidavit, related to the search and seizure raids on Zuma's home and the offices of his attorneys, that the Zuma investigation had been extended to include allegations of fraud and tax evasion.

This extension was based on allegations that Zuma had not declared money allegedly received from Shaik, or from Shaik's companies, as income in the form of bribes, to Sars and parliament.

Yesterday the taxman also refused to comment on the latest investigation: "Because of the confidentiality provisions of section 4 of the Income Tax Act, no official of Sars may disclose any information regarding the tax matters of a taxpayer," said Adrian Lackay, a Sars spokesperson.

In September, during Zuma's trial in Pietermaritzburg on corruption charges, Kemp J Kemp, Zuma's counsel, said the state had applied for a postponement because it wanted to make "a different case with different evidence" against Zuma - and it needed time to do so.

He was referring to the possibility that Zuma would have additional charges of tax evasion brought against him in the wake of the massive KPMG forensic audit into his financial affairs.

Zuma said during the Pietermaritzburg trial that the "investigation into tax offences and into defrauding the revenue service and others that had been raised in the application for the search warrants" served to demonstrate "the absolutely cynical abuse" of the justice process by those intent on discrediting him.

The search warrants were those issued for the search and seizure raids of December 2005.

This would be tense year for Zuma even without the Sars summonses.

The main issue is whether the National Prosecuting Authority will recharge him with corruption. Judge Herbert Msimang struck the case off the roll last year.

Whether this will happen is, in turn, dependent on the outcome of Shaik's constitutional court appeal. In addition, the Scorpions are trying to get hold of evidential documents from Mauritius.

Also due before the supreme court of appeal is the state's appeal regarding the search and seizure warrants ratified by Bernard Ngoepe, the judge president of the Transvaal, at the end of 2005.

Two high courts - those of Durban and the Witwatersrand - found the warrants to be invalid and that the documents seized by the Scorpions from Zuma's home and from the offices of his attorneys were therefore inadmissible as evidence. The NPA has appealed against these findings.

With acknowledgement to Jeremy Gordin, Fred Kockott, Karyn Maughan and Sunday Independent.