" Tracy O ' Brian told the court that she sublet a flat to Shaik.

Shaik told her that it was for his financial director.

A former business associate of Shaik, Professor Themba Sono, told the court that Shaik told business partners that the Nkobi group could bring " political connectivity " to the table.

Zuma intervened when Thomson was hesitant to take Nkobi on as its BEE partner because Mbeki allegedly told them that he had reservations about Shaik and his business ventures.

He said Shaik told him that there was " no way in which he owed that type of money to his companies ".

She told the court that she did not fax the agreement to Shaik.

Singh told the court that an audibly agitated Shaik had phoned her from the golf course to tell her to tape hearings by the parliamentary standing committee on public accounts when Chippy Shaik was being questioned about the arms deal.

Shaik denied any attempt to bribe Zuma for protection and told the court that he did not know why Thétard wrote the note setting out the bribe agreement.

After being granted his reprieve, Shaik told reporters in a press conference that he was grateful and intended to use the options made available to him.

" In October, it failed in its bid to force the court to allow a live broadcast of the proceedings of the Schabir Shaik trial.

The Schabir Shaik trial was one of the most important court trials in post-apartheid South Africa.

The formal part of the trial ended shortly after the defence counsel asked the court to consider the possibility that Shaik had sought a bribe of R500, 000 ( US $ 77, 000 ) a year from Thompson-CSF without Zuma's knowledge.

The court concluded that Shaik and his companies had not shown that the High Court improperly exercised its discretion to determine the amount to be confiscated nor that the order confiscating both the shareholding and the dividend was " disturbingly inappropriate ".

# IPO Africa: Shaik faces 2004 high court trial

Shaik said that it was a mistake and that he had his auditors fix it in subsequent financial years.

Schabir Shaik, the financial advisor to the president of the African National Congress party Jacob Zuma, was found guilty of organising a bribe on behalf of Thales.

The fraud charge related to testimony by Ahmed Paruk, Shaik's auditor, that Shaik held a meeting with him and Shaik's financial manager, where it was agreed that false journal entries be made in order to alter Nkobi Holdings ' financial statements.

Though Shaik claimed that his financial dealings were legitimate, on 30 May 2005, the Durban High Court handed down its final judgment.

Shaik, who was Zuma's financial advisor at the time, knew that Zuma could never afford to repay the sum of the loans on his salary.

Meanwhile, Shaik and Zuma wanted to establish a new venture, Nkobi Bank, to act as financial advisor to a bidding consortium on any large-scale public-or private-sector project.

Shaik demanded an immediate response to this “ extremely delicate matter ” from Thétard, but Thétard failed to respond and by 19 October, Shaik in his role as Zuma ’ s financial advisor, attempted to stop all construction on Nkandla, prompting Zuma to tell his contractors to ignore Shaik ’ s orders.

By late 2000, Shaik knew that the South African Revenue Service ( SARS ) and the Scorpions would be watching all financial transactions made between him and Zuma, so the international division of Thomson-CSF sent an encrypted fax to Nkobi Holdings detailing a “ service provider agreement ” which updated the contract signed between Nkobi Holdings and Thomson-CSF for the delivery of the Corvettes.

" To prove this charge, the State gave evidence of all the financial transactions between Shaik and Zuma.

" She also testified that Shaik arranged financial affairs for Zuma, managed his bank accounts on the computer, and discussed his financial situation with him.

The State's next witness was KPMG forensic auditor Johan van der Walt, who testified for several hours that the payments made by Shaik to Zuma " sometimes threatened the financial existence of the whole group.

Shaik said that the trust was in financial difficulty in 2000 and the donation was urgently required for them to be in a position to give bursaries for the next year.

The shareholding went through various permutations subsequently, however Shaik was at all relevant times a director of, and exercised effective control over, all the corporate entities within the Nkobi group.

While most reference books have his full name as " Sabu Dastagir ", research by journalist Philip Leibfried suggests that was his brother's name, and that Sabu was in fact Selar Shaik Sabu or Sabu Francis.

Shaik was put on trial for fraud and corruption at the Durban High Court from 11 October 2004.

There have been several accusations of Shaik violating the terms of his parole-including staying at Thanda Private Game Reserve for three nights in June 2009.

After Shaik's brother Chippy was suspended from the Department of Defence for his involvement in a corrupt arms deal, Schabir Shaik was arrested in 2001 for the possession of secret documents, after which investigators found that he was involved in corrupt dealings with Zuma as well as fraud.

Judge Squires sentenced Shaik to two terms of 15 years for corruption and one term of 3 years for fraud, to be served concurrently.

Shaik did not expect to be paid back, however, as he was buying influence with Zuma, which was used to win government contracts for his company, Nkobi Holdings.

Fortunately for Shaik, his brother, Chippy, was in charge of arms acquisition at the Department of Defence.

In June 1996, Shaik held a meeting to tell his directors that they must gear up to bid for the electronic defence system needed to guide and protect South Africa's newly acquired corvettes.

Zuma was given more loans to facilitate the deal for Shaik and to help Nkobi receive more government contracts.

Alan Thétard, then one of Thomson-CSF ’ s directors, met with Schabir Shaik in Durban on 30 September 1999, during the course of which it was agreed that Thétard would give Shaik money to cover Zuma ’ s debts in exchange for Zuma ’ s protection from the commission investigating the arms deal, and ongoing support for any future Thomson-CSF deals with the South African government.

At this point, Zuma was in desperate need for money as the bribe was going to cover the continued construction of his Nkandla development, yet Thétard has not transferred any money to Shaik thus far.

Zuma wrote a cheque for R1 million to his contractors, the payment of which was stopped by Shaik.

As the year progressed, the relationship between Shaik and Zuma had attracted more attention, and by October 2000, South Africa ’ s leading corruption prosecutor, Judge Willem Heath, formally asked President Thabo Mbeki for a proclamation allowing him to investigate the arms deal.

In their efforts to prove this charge, the State led a number of witnesses to show, as explained by Downer, that Zuma was " on retainer for Shaik.

At the end of the testimonies for the first charge, Downer pointed out they need not prove that Zuma did anything out of the ordinary to help Shaik as " you can corrupt a politician by paying him to do something he is paid to do every day.

For the second charge of corruption against Shaik, the State proved that Shaik had solicited a bribe from French arms company Thomson for Zuma.