Minister Masutha must not grant Schabir Shaik ordinary parole
23 February 2015
The Minister of Justice and Correctional Services, Michael Masutha, must deny Schabir Shaik's application to have his medical parole converted to ordinary parole (see report).
This comes after reports this afternoon alleging that the former financial advisor to President Jacob Zuma and convicted fraudster is to request the Correctional Services Minister convert his medical parole to ordinary parole. The reasons for this are not yet clear.
In any event, Shaik was granted medical parole in 2009 because he purported that he was terminally ill. Six years on and Shaik shows no signs of deteriorating health but has been reported to have led quite a robust life since. By making such a request, Shaik implicitly admits that he is in fact not terminal.
We suspected at the time that Shaik was not eligible for medical parole but rather that he was receiving preferential treatment because he was closely linked to the President.