Distinguished legal collosus, Advocate Dali Mpofu SC, has been the subject of a massive debate in South Africa. His decision to grant former President Jacob Zuma his legal assistance earlier this year, was met with a crescendo of noises from various quarters in society, the argument was that he had before professed his belief that Zuma was a crook who deserved to be in jail, but somehow saw it convenient to represent him.
However, those with legal expertise argued in his favour that, it was his constitutional obligation to offer his legal assistance regardless of who they are, this argument was premised on the principle of audi alteram partem which allows people to be presumed innocent until proven otherwise and most importantly to be granted the chance to say their side of the story.
For legal reasons, Advocate Mpofu is within his right to represent whoever he so wishes. Quite curiously but interesting, is the fact that at recent times, Mpofu has been the go-to guy for those who are believed to belong in the Radical Economic Transformation (RET) brigade.
He has represented Zuma, suspended Secretary-General Ace Magashule, public protector, Advocate Busiswe Mkhwebane in various matters. Albeit Mkhwebane is not a politician, there is a parroted narrative within the South African political sphere, that she shares the RET ideals, which is why she has for ad infinitum persued President Cyril Ramaphosa’s allies.
Mpofu has been in and out of court at recent times representing Zuma, on virtually every legal matter the latter faces.
And earlier this morning, he was at the Pietermaritzburg High court, where Judge Koen handed a ruling on Zuma’s special plea submission demanding the recusal of state prosecutor Billy Downer from the Arms deal matter over alleged leaking of sensetive documents as well as not having a title which qualifies him to be partybto the matter.
However, Koen delivered a hammer blow to Zuma by ruling that Zuma’s submissions had no basis in law and were actually based on innuendos and hearsay.
In the meanwhile, a debate ensued on twitter, some indicating that Advocate Mpofu was actually misleading Zuma by giving him bad legal advice, as he has been on a losing streak for quite some time.
I am convinced the EFF’s Dali Mpofu is planted by someone to destroy the entire RET network. He destroyed Busisiwe Mkhwebane, Ace Magashule and he is doing the same to Jacob Zuma. #DaliIsUseless
— Goolam (@goolammv) October 26, 2021
Some even went further to cynically argue that, Mpofu seems to be a hired gun planted into the RET brigade to destroy its network. This because, the aforementioned three people have been losing cases at an alarming rate, and the common denominator is Advocate Mpofu.
An inference can made that indeed RET proponents have not really had their best of luck in courts, which has greatly benefitted the CR faction, but to suggest that Mpofu was possibly planted into the RET network to cripple it, is downright far-fetched and utterly irrational.
It may appear as if he's losing,some may doubt he's intention and approach.
Whenever Dali Mpofu takes a stand to represent a client,just know he's fighting the cruel system.
He faces unrepentant and stubborn apartheid judges,he may be losing but he's exposing them.#JacobZuma pic.twitter.com/Qmm5Oi70Km
— Azania (@azania1023) October 26, 2021