Former president Jacob Zuma has used his private prosecution against Billy Downer and journalist Karyn Maughan as a basis to again seek the State advocate's removal, leading to the postponement of his corruption case to August.

In the KwaZulu-Natal High Court in Pietermaritzburg on Monday, Judge Nkosinathi Chili ordered that the case, in which Zuma and French arms company Thales are accused, be postponed to 15-16 August, when the former president's lawyers and the State's legal representatives will argue over Downer's continued prosecution of Zuma in the trial.

While Zuma had tried and failed to use Downer's alleged role in the "leaking" of court papers containing a sick note as a basis for his removal in a "special plea" application, he has based his latest case on the fact that he is seeking to privately prosecute Downer and this writer for alleged violations of the National Prosecuting Authority Act. He maintains that Downer's continued presence in this trial will amount to a violation of his rights to a fair trial.

He says: "I believe I can no longer have a fair trial as guaranteed in Section 35 of the Constitution if Mr Downer remains the prosecutor in the matter."

"The evidence is that his overall conduct in relation to my prosecution is inconsistent and incompatible with my right to a fair trial," he states in court papers filed on Monday morning.

Zuma further argues that Downer's efforts to have his private prosecution set aside as an "abuse of process" aimed solely at further delaying his already very delayed trial is further evidence that the career prosecutor is conflicted.

"What is important, however, is the fact that Mr Downer is also personally litigating against me in civil motion proceedings under case number 13062/22P in this court and both he and the NPA (National Prosecuting Authority) still refuse to accept that this is but another ground that constitutes conflict. The conflict is again such that it meets the test of a perception that objectivity (of a prosecutor) is compromised as set out in the NPA's manual on ethics," Zuma argues.

The former president has also sought to blame the NPA and Downer for the delay his latest application has caused.

"This situation is the direct result of the unreasonable and unjustifiable stance adopted by the State and/or Downer himself in insisting on being a prosecutor in this matter when the circumstances and the Constitution dictates otherwise," he states in court papers.

Zuma insists that as soon as he issued a private prosecution summons against Downer, "the NPA should have prevailed on Mr Downer to recuse himself or summarily removed him from the matter".

While both Downer and the NPA maintain that enabling criminal accused to force the removal of their prosecutors through the use of private prosecution could set an incredibly dangerous precedent, Zuma continues to argue that there is no difference between a case pursued by the NPA and a private prosecution.

"The prevailing attitude of advocate Downer and the NPA has been to treat the legal implications and consequence of a private prosecution as being of lesser standing in law or akin to civil proceedings. Such attitude is wholly misguided and erroneous on their part," Zuma says.

Zuma is accused receiving multiple benefits and payments from his former financial advisor, Schabir Shaik, whose business interests the former deputy president then allegedly advanced and protected. The State further alleges that Shaik facilitated a R500 000-a-year bribe for Zuma from Thales in exchange for his political protection from any potentially damaging investigation of the multibillion-rand arms deal.

On Monday, Downer said the State remained ready to begin its case in that trial, which dates back to events that occurred in the late 1990s.