Durban – Former president Jacob Zuma was hurt by the booing of the ANC's senior provincial leaders in KwaZulu-Natal following his last court appearance at the Pietermaritzburg High Court earlier in May.
Amid reports that Zuma will not address his supporters if there was a repeat of last week's booing of party leaders, Zuma's spokesperson Vukile Mathabela said that he was not aware of these reports and Zuma had not taken kindly to the booing.
"He has said before that when his supporters are here, they are here to support him and not other things. As a leader of the ANC he was hurt quite a lot by the booing incident because even though it's a democracy and people have a right to express themselves he doesn't want such things to happen at an event that is held in his name," Mathabela said.
Nkosentsha Shezi, chairperson of Zuma's supporters, the Radical Economic Transformation forces, said that although Zuma understood the nature of democracy where people sometimes expressed their views even through booing, the former head of state would prefer people to respect other speakers when they came to support him.
"We all know president Jacob Zuma is a welcoming figure for everyone, a uniting figure for all people, it is within his nature to not want a repeat of the booing that took place last week because he is a man of order and he is a man of principle," Shezi said.