Former President Jacob Zuma's Legal Team Says ANC Benefited from Arms Deal, Not Zuma

• Former President Jacob Zuma's bid to prove his innocence in the arms deal case has led him to implicate other organisations he claims are the guilty parties
• Zuma's has so far allegedly written to the Nelson Mandela Foundation as well as his party, the African National Congress
• Zuma says that he did not actually benefit from the arms deal procurement but the true beneficiaries were the ANC and other organisations

Former President Jacob Zuma has tasked his legal team with sending letters to the African National Congress and the Nelson Mandela Foundation to request documents in relation to the arms deal procurement.

Zuma's legal team believes that these documents will be necessary for his defence in his upcoming arms deal corruption trial, according to TimesLIVE. They have requested a batch of records relating to the procurement of weapons in the late 1990s and early 2000s.

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Thusini Attorneys allegedly wrote a letter to ANC treasurer-general Paul Mashatile on 20 July, according to a report by News24.

The letters state that the ANC's financial statements, evidence from the Seriti Commission of Inquiry, all point to the ANC as the genuine benefactors in the arms deal transaction.

Zuma's lawyers say an affidavit they have discovered indicates that in addition to the ANC benefiting from the arms deal, former presidents Nelson Mandela and Thabo Mbeki were also benefactors.

Zuma is motivated to prove that he did not benefit in any way from the procurement and understands that his decision to seek this information to prove his case may be used against the ANC by opposition parties.

"But he believes that it is fraud and money laundering that the true financial beneficiaries of the transactions in the strategic defence package did not involve him, yet he is implicated," read the letter.

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Former President Jacob Zuma threatens to implicate organisations in arms deal corruption trial

Briefly News previously reported that through his legal representation, former President Jacob Zuma has alluded that he will be naming and implicating prolific organisations as well as well-known foundations in his arms deal corruption trial that is set to begin next week.

His foundation, the JG Zuma Foundation, has stated that Zuma's legal representation has written to the anonymous foundations who profited from the arms deal contract to detail how they benefited, according to SowetanLIVE.

According to the publication, Mzwanele Manyi, Jacob Zuma's foundation spokesperson, has refrained from naming the organisations and foundations that will be implicated.

Zuma's corruption trial begins on Tuesday and his legal team is anticipated to advocate the removal of State Prosecutor Billy Downer from the case.

Source: Briefly News