Jacob Zuma and French arms manufacturer Thint have been granted leave to appeal *1 against a Supreme Court of Appeal (SCA) ruling upholding controversial search and seizure raids.

Both the counsel for the National Prosecuting Authority and Zuma's advocate Kemp J Kemp confirmed during a lunch break at the Constitutional Court on Tuesday that moments before the hearing began, they were informed in chambers that an appeal against the raids would be heard *2.

Zuma said his right to a fair trial and his constitutional "right of access to the court" had been violated and he was seeking to appeal the SCA's November 8 ruling.

Thint on Tuesday questioned why it had been targeted for a search and seizure raid in the investigation against Jacob Zuma, saying it had already been summonsed and handed over "massive amounts" of documents to the National Prosecuting Authority.

Thint's advocate Peter Hodes said: "The documents were handed to the Scorpions in 2001."

Hodes said a Thint company employee had even helped gather material from a computer.

About 93,000 documents were seized in early morning raids on Thint, Jacob Zuma and Zuma's lawyer, Michael Hulley, on August 18, 2005, as part of a corruption investigation against Zuma.

The parties want the documents back, arguing that the warrants were too broad and were an invasion of their constitutional right to privacy.

The court heard that there was no statute determining exactly what should be in a search warrant, and Hodes argued that no case had been made to Transvaal Judge President Judge Bernard Ngoepe, who issued all the warrants.

"The judge issuing a search warrant is not a rubber stamp, a case has to be made out for it," he said. Without this, there would be "gentle ransacking".

He said the State had had the benefit of a "general ransack persuant to a defective search warrant".

Hodes said the June 2005 warrants had told the investigators searching Thint premises that "you go and look. If you find anything you like, good luck to you."

However, Justice Zak Yacoob questioned whether the fact that the warrants referred explicitly to convicted Durban business Schabir Shaik did not make it clear to the searcher what was being looked for.

"You don't need much imagination to work out what was wanted," said Yacoob.

"There was no case made out for the warrants. We contend that it (the search warrants) would be unlawful," said Hodes.

Hodes questioned the content of the Thint warrant, saying that the inclusion of tax evasion charges faced by Zuma on the Thint warrant was "totally unacceptable".

With acknowledgements to Sapa.