each of racketeering and money laundering, all related to the 1999 Arms Deal and to Zuma's relationship with Shaik. The case was enrolled in the Pietermaritzburg High Court. Zuma pleaded not guilty when the trial began on 26 May 2021. As of October 2022, the trial was scheduled to resume in late January 2023. Zondo Commission Testimony At the instruction of the Public Protector and high court, in January 2018 Zuma established the Zondo Commission to investigate fraud, corruption, and state capture in the public sector in South Africa. Zuma was scheduled to testify before the commission for five days in mid-July 2019, and on Monday 15 July he opened his testimony by claiming that the commission was part of a decades-long "character assassination" conspiracy against him. He denied the veracity of several other witnesses' testimony and questioned the appropriateness of the phrase "state capture", which he said was used to discredit him. If the whole state had truly been captured, he argued that the commission should investigate the judiciary and Parliament as well as the executive branch of government. After the hearings, Zuma addressed supporters who gathered outside the commission's offices in Johannesburg. Before the end of the third day of testimony on Wednesday 17 July, chairperson Ray Zondo adjourned proceedings so that the commission could meet with Zuma and his lawyers in order to discuss Zuma's grievances about his treatment by the commission. On the morning of Friday 19 July, his lawyer announced that Zuma would "take no further part" in the commission's proceedings and would consider court action. Zuma felt that he had been treated like an accused criminal rather than as a witness and that he had been relentlessly cross-examined – though the head of the commission's legal team pointed out that his cross-examination had not yet begun. Later that day Zondo announced that they had come to an agreement: the commission had acquiesced to Zuma's demand to furnish him with specific allegations in advance, and Zuma would provide written statements in response. Contempt of court In subsequent months, Zuma appeared reluctant to cooperate with the commission, and he did not provide further testimony before it. Zuma had been scheduled to resume testifying in the week of 21 September 2020, but his legal team wrote to the commission saying that he would not appear – for medical reasons, because he was seeking legal advice about his