By Enyichukwu Enemanna
Duduzile Zuma-Sambudla, daughter of former South African President Jacob Zuma, will appear in court on Thursday in connection with her role in the 2021 riots, in which over 300 people were killed, her father’s opposition uMkhonto WeSizwe (MK) party has said.
Considered a controversial figure, she was accused of sharing incendiary social media posts that escalated the civil unrest.
Violence and chaos broke out in the port city of Durban and later spread to Gauteng after Zuma was jailed four years ago in connection with a corruption allegation.
The MK party, where she is a senior member, said on X that she would appear in a Durban court on Thursday, urging loyalists to “mobilise all ground forces to attend in numbers.”
She was last year elected into the parliament under MK.
In response, Zuma-Sambudla said on X, “I have no fear! I will not be intimidated! I have beaten the dogs, now the masters are coming out! We see you!”
This is not the first time her name has been brought up in connection to the 2021 riots, considered one of the bloodiest episodes in post-apartheid South Africa.
Her father resigned from office in 2018 after nine years as president, following corruption-related allegations, which he claimed were part of a political conspiracy.
Three years later, he was sentenced to 15 months in prison for contempt of court after refusing to testify before a panel investigating corruption under his presidency.
His supporters embarked on protests after he surrendered to serve his sentence.
During the unrest, Zuma-Sambudla was outspoken on X, frequently sharing images of the destruction and chaos, accompanied by the caption: “KZN, we see you.”
She often used the phrase “we see you!” throughout the violence.
In one of her now-deleted tweets, she shared a video of someone firing an automatic rifle at a poster of sitting President Cyril Ramaphosa.
In 2022, a spokesperson from the elite police unit Hawks, Brigadier Thandi Mbambo, told local media they were not directly investigating her, but she had been named in statements from sources.
President Cyril Ramaphosa, who succeeded Jacob Zuma in 2018, described the violence as an “attempted insurrection.”
More than 200 shopping malls were looted, and over 150,000 jobs were estimated to have been lost during the unrest, which lasted for several days.
