By Lehlohonolo Lehana.
The fraud and corruption case against former Sport, Arts and Culture Minister Zizi Kodwa and his co-accused Jehan Mackay has been postponed.
The duo faces charges related to claims that Kodwa received gratifications amounting to more than R1.6 million in return for his influence over multi-million IT tenders for the government.
Kodwa and MacKay appeared briefly before the Specialised Commercial Crimes Court in Palm Ridge on Thursday morning.
They are out on bail of R30,000 each.
Kodwa and his co-accused filed representations to have corruption charges against them dropped.
According to state prosecutor Neville Mogagabe, their representations are currently under review by Andrew Chauke, the Gauteng Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) in Johannesburg.
“The DPP is still applying his mind and therefore requires more time to do the extensive work, when one makes representations and it reaches the office of the DPP.
Kodwa’s lawyer, Zola Majavu, confirmed that the defence has agreed to the DPP’s request for additional time to consider the matter.
“He did confirm that the request for more time is simply to enable him to deal with both [representations] on a once-off basis and the fact that we referred directly to him is not a factor that would have contributed to the delay.
“I have no reason to doubt that the DPP and his team will come through on the date as discussed… but my client’s expressed instruction is simply to say to the court his life is currently hold on,” the advocate added.
Magistrate Philip Venter said, “I am satisfied thus far that every time I have heard a remand application that there is progress being made in a speedy manner. I cannot see that there has been any undue delays at this stage.
“It may happen that before the first of November, your legal representatives may get a communication from the DPP’s office requesting certain further information from you and that information may materially affect the outcome of the representations even favouring you, which may cause another remand to be granted by the court.
“So, I’m not in the habit of marking postponements final because there may be good justification to postpone it again, which means I have to mark it final, and then final, and possibly final again.
“It depends on the motivation behind the applicant for the remand, so that is why I’m not going to agree to making it final, but every time an application is brought for a postponement, I apply my mind, and I assess it on the merits, whether such an application is justified or not, be assured of that, “the magistrate explained.
Venter postponed the case to 1 November.
Kodwa and Mackay are facing corruption charges in terms of the Prevention and Combating of Corrupt Activities Act (Precca) and the Prevention of Organised Crime Act.