Zuma must pay his own Nkandla debt: DA

The Democratic Alliance on Sunday demanded that President Jacob Zuma pay back the money spent on his Nkandla homestead and nobody else.

"The DA rejects the notion that any person can pay back any portion of the R246 million public funds used for upgrades at... Nkandla, other than President Zuma himself," DA MP James Selfe said in a statement.

Selfe was reacting to a report in the Sunday Times that KwaZulu-Natal tycoon Philani Mavundla offered to raise funds and settle Zuma's Nkandla "debt".

"The DA challenges President Zuma to reject this offer made by Mavundla and any other offers to pay back the public funds which he is personally liable to pay back," he said.

"Jacob Zuma as the President is charged with maintaining and upholding the Constitution of the Republic and must abide by it. [He] must lead and take full responsibility for his actions that saw the abuse of public funds at Nkandla."

In March, Public Protector Thuli Madonsela found that Zuma had derived undue benefit from the upgrades and recommended that he pay back a portion of the money.

Zuma declined to do so, and instead waited for the outcome of another investigation by the Special Investigating Unit.

The SIU blamed Zuma's architect Minenhle Makhanya for inflating the costs of the Nkandla project, and filed a civil claim against him for R155m in the Pietermaritzburg High Court on August 11.

Makhanya has hired high profile lawyers to contest the case.