President Jacob Zuma was driven through the wind-swept streets of Cape Town in a bullet-proof security vehicle ahead of his State of the Nation address yesterday.

Streets around the parliamentary precinct were cordoned off, with large barriers erected to hold back the expected crowds, which were nowhere to be seen.

Zuma was greeted by saluting navy and army officers and led into parliament by a cavalcade of police motorcycles and military men on horseback.

Before delivering his speech, Zuma walked up the red carpet outside, waving to onlookers. Heavily armed police officers patrolled the area ahead of his arrival, while a helicopter circled overhead.

Journalists, used to covering the annual event, complained of being harassed by police officers who had ordered them to remain within a roped-off enclosure.

Before Zuma arrived, a burly police officer ordered a journalist to stop an interview with an MP.

"This is no place for small talk," the police officer said. "You don't loiter here. Go do your interview somewhere else."

Earlier, another policeman warned a journalist who had stepped outside the enclosure to escape the heat that she should "watch out".

"Get behind the rope," he said. "And don't laugh at me. You don't want to see my bad side."

Co-chairman of parliament's Press Gallery Association, Joylene van Wyk, said journalists had been treated like "animals".

"We are not animals. We know how to do our jobs," she said.

"We walk these cobblestones every day and now we get treated like this."

In one area outside parliament, about 10 people stood with their eyes fixed on the red carpet inside the precinct, behind a boom gate and a metal detector.

Asked if they were interested in the arrival of the MPs, a woman among them said: "I'm just waiting for them to let me cross the road."

A man said: "They made me close my shop early. When I can cross here, I'm going home."