Former South African President Jacob Zuma, 81, briefly appeared in prison on Friday before being immediately released as part of sentence reductions announced by the government the same day, the prison administration said.
For Mr Zuma, who was convicted of contempt in 2021 and spent two months behind bars before being released on medical parole, “the decision was made” to go “to Estcourt Correctional Centre” in Zulu country (east), said the chief of prison services, Makgothi Samuel Thobakgale.
“He arrived at six o’clock this morning and was put into the system” before being “underwent a remission procedure” and released an hour later, he added to the Pretoria press.
These reduced sentences for “nonviolent convicts” were approved by President Cyril Ramaphosa due to prison overcrowding in the country, the Justice Department said in a statement. They should enable the release of more than 9,000 prisoners in the country.
Last month, South Africa’s highest court affirmed that Mr Zuma should be returned to prison to serve his 15-month contempt sentence and rejected an appeal seeking his pardon.
Mr Zuma was convicted in June 2021 for adamantly refusing to answer a commission investigating corruption during his presidency (2009-2018). His arrest a few days later sparked several days of unrest that killed more than 350 people.
Mr Zuma was ousted from the country’s presidency in 2018 on charges of corruption and he still faces criminal charges on multiple counts. At the time of the ANC in exile, Mr Zuma was once the feared intelligence chief whose middle name Gedleyihlekisa means in Zulu ‘he who laughs by destroying his enemies’. “. He spent ten years at Robben Island Penitentiary alongside Nelson Mandela.