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By Karyn Maughan and Jeremy Gordin
Jacob Zuma's rape trial has become too hot to handle. His defence team have indicated that, if Deputy Judge President Jeremiah Shongwe took the bench at 10 o'clock on Tuesday morning - as the judge president of the Transvaal division, Bernard Ngoepe, said he would - they would seek his recusal, as happened with the judge president himself.
Earlier Judge Ngoepe told a packed court that Deputy Judge President Phineas Mojapelo - who was widely publicised as the judge who would hear the case against Zuma - was not prepared to do so "for personal reasons".
 
Next in line to hear the case, he suggested, would be Deputy Judge President Shongwe.
If the defence applies for Judge Shongwe's recusal and succeeds with their application, it is not known who will hear the case against 63-year-old Zuma.
On Monday, before recusing himself in a bombshell announcement that left even Zuma visibly shocked and clenching his jaw, Judge Ngoepe made it clear that a case "of such a high profile" person would be heard in his division in terms of seniority.
The Star understands that Zuma's legal team have "difficulties" with Judge Shongwe's suggested appointment, apparently because of certain personal reasons, which have not been specified, and also because Judge Shongwe had been involved in a Zuma matter related to his forthcoming corruption trial.
Judge Ngoepe explained on Monday he was not recusing himself because he had issued the controversial search warrants used by the Scorpions to search the premises of Zuma's attorneys.
He said the argument that he had made a prima facie judgment about Zuma's credibility did not hold water.
But even though Judge Ngoepe denied that Zuma's fears were well founded, he said he believed Zuma would continue to "hold his fears despite all my explanations". Therefore he had decided to step aside and let another judge handle the matter.
He stressed that he was not affording Zuma special treatment.
In addition to seeking Judge Shongwe's recusal - if he indeed took the bench on Tuesday morning - Zuma's lawyers have also indicated that they would be asking for a two-week adjournment of his trial to allow them to consider evidence that they received from the state at the end of last week.
The evidence is believed to include 17 000 telephone-record entries and a psychologist's report.
In September 2003, then Pretoria High Court judge Shongwe refused an urgent application brought by Zuma to see the famous "encrypted fax" that implicated him in corruption in the arms deal.
The hand-written, encrypted fax was later central to the prosecution of Zuma's former financial adviser, Schabir Shaik, on charges of fraud and corruption.
Judge Shongwe struck the matter off the roll - due, he said, to its lack of urgency.
He instructed Zuma to pay the legal costs of the respondents - the National Director of Public Prosecutions, the National Prosecuting Authority and the Scorpions.
Zuma's defence team on Monday sought Judge Ngoepe's recusal on the grounds that he had issued search warrants in August to the Scorpions for the search of the offices of Zuma's attorneys in Johannesburg and Durban.
Stressing that Zuma's defence team did not believe that there were allegations of actual bias against Ngoepe, Zuma's advocate Kemp J Kemp said Zuma had "an apprehension that my Lord may not look at his case in the same way as he would look at the case of another accused because of certain past events".
Judge Ngoepe went on to compare the importance of Zuma's rape trial to that of the Rivonia trial, in which Nelson Mandela was convicted of treason, the trial of the killers of Chris Hani, and Mandela's divorce from Winnie Madikizela-Mandela.
- This article was originally published on page 1 of The Star on February 14, 2006
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