Following an agreement between the parties, Judge Francis Legodi granted an order setting down time frames for the filing of further affidavits in a number of interlocutory applications which are to precede the DA's main application.

These will include an application by Zuma's lawyers against the DA for security for costs, which will probably only be heard early in August.

Time frames were also laid down for the filing of further court papers in an application by defence contractor Dr Richard Young to intervene as a party to the application, and in the DA's application to force the NPA to hand over documents which led to its controversial April 2009 decision.

The documents sought by the DA exclude confidential submissions Zuma made to the NPA.

Papers in these applications will have to be filed by 21 August, after which they will be set down for hearing as soon as possible.

The DA filed the application for a judicial review of the decision to withdraw fraud, corruption, racketeering and money laundering charges against Zuma early in April.

DA leader Helen Zille maintained that the NPA decision was "political stage management disguised as legal procedure" and that the NPA had caved in to political pressure and had "thrown the law-book out of the window".

"Zuma has not been acquitted. Only a court of law can do that. Only a court of law can examine and cross-examine the evidence that the [National Director of Public Prosecutions] submitted in mitigation of the decision to drop the charges.

"And only a court of law can determine whether the decision itself was lawful or not.

"The DA believes a judicial review is the only way to ensure that justice takes it course," she said at the time.

The DA contended in court papers that the decision was not rational and was in fact unlawful and unconstitutional.

The NPA has maintained that the DA did not have the legal standing to bring the application and that the decision not to prosecute Zuma was not reviewable.

Sapa

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