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Ziyaad Hoorzook: A Fall Guy to be Slayed at the Altar of a  Greylist? 

By Iqbal Jassat 

An important question for civil society organisations who are concerned about violations of human rights and abuse of power in regard to the case against a 35 year old South African Muslim, Ziyadh Hoorzook, is to pointedly ask: Who is driving his prosecution? 

Some may argue that to do so would be discredited as being “conspiratorial”. 

However the fact that Willem Els of the Institute of Security Studies (ISS) has been publicly gloating at Hoorzook’s arrest and clamouring for his conviction, does not make it far-fetched to assume that. 

In a recent report in the Israeli-aligned SA Jewish Report, Els is quoted as saying: “If they can bring down this case and successfully prosecute this guy, it will demonstrate to others out there that there will be consequences for these acts because terror funding has been criminalised in our legislation.” 

The framing of this narrative without interrogating America’s unilateral listing of individuals and groups as “terrorists” in the absence of due process, is neither fair nor untenable. 

The inescapable reality selectively ignored by Els and his Zionist allies, is that the US at the stroke of a pen, disregards fundamental legal requirements including AUDI ALTAREM PARTEM, to slander and criminalise a host of Muslims and Islamic institutions. 

Surely ISS ought to know that this latin phrase speaks to the right of any party – in this case “Al Sadaqah” – to a fair hearing. 

The charges levelled at Hoorzook for making a donation to Al Sadaqah, a Syrian-based humanitarian organisation, is unfairly framed as “financing terror”, but pertinent to the case yet absent from the charge sheet is the fact that the group cited did not have its day in any US court. 

Unless South Africa abides by  legal precepts underpinned in our constitution, our security cluster will be running around like headless chickens in pursuit of America’s illegal, immoral and discredited “War on Terror”. 

If the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) is faithful to the constitution and the Bill of Rights, it ought to drop this case and apologise to Hoorzook. 

There is no imperative for our criminal justice system, nor our judiciary to unquestionably legitimise America’s illegal listings. 

The absurdity of Hoorzook’s case is best illustrated by the indignity suffered by Nelson Mandela, whom the US had added to the “terror list” during the 1980s. The same fate of Al Sadaqah was also the experience of the African National Congress (ANC). 

Mandela’s name was only removed a few days before his 90th birthday in 2013. In the intervening period apartheid was abolished, Mandela was democratically elected president of South Africa and went on to be awarded the Noble Peace Prize. 

Ironically the political situation in Syria has undergone dramatic changes following the toppling of the Assad regime, resulting in yesterday’s “terrorists” as per US listings, becoming today’s government in close contact with the US. 

Many groups including Hayat Tahrir al Sham await their turn to be delisted from the arbitrary terror lists to be “legalised” in US eyes. 

Thus in keeping with Media Review Network’s stance, we reiterate that Ziyaad Hoorzook is being positioned as the political fall guy by the NPA to get South Africa off the global financing greylist.

Els in fact has made clear that South Africa needs Hoorzook to be jailed in order to have the country removed from the greylist.

SABC reported the ISS saying that the successful prosecution of terror financing case against Ziyadh Hoorzook “will pave the way for South Africa to be removed from the Financial Action Task Force’s greylist”.

A fall guy to be slayed at the altar of a greylist, is a widely held perception in Muslim circles.

And as one person commented on social media: “Hoorzook is being used as a distraction to appease the US and local Zionists whilst the NPA continues to pussyfoot over charging South Africans serving in the Israeli Occupation Forces in contravention of the Foreign Military Assistance Act.”

Iqbal Jassat

Executive Member

Media Review Network

Johannesburg

South Africa

Iqbal Jassat
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