While the State Security Agency (SSA) continue with their fight to keep copies of The President’s Keepers off the shelves in the country, people in support of the book have been circulating it in the form of a PDF on social media. The controversial book, by veteran journalist Jacques Pauw, was released last month and lays bare President Jacob Zuma’s state capture – and exposes a rather compromised South African government. Paux attempts to explore the ‘shadow mafia state’ and all the parties involved. The SSA has threatened to go to court to have parts of the book banned. Some local writers have called for the hacked PDF version to be deleted in support of Pauw, however, he has asked people to read it instead if they cannot afford to buy the book.
In a post on Facebook Pauw has said:
THOSE FREE PDF COPIES OF THE PRESIDENT’S KEEPERS…
I have been inundated with requests from people who want to pay me for the free PDF copies of The President’s Keepers that they downloaded from the internet. I am not going to accept any money. This is my take: if you have a PDF copy and can afford to buy a book, please do it. Erase the PDF and buy a book or the kindle version. If you can’t find a book now, read the PDF but you should still order a book. If you cannot afford a book, go for it and read it. You have my blessing. This is not about money. It is about your support that is going to enable us to legally lock horns with SARS, the State Security Agency and whoever else drags us to court. We face the potential of a multitude of legal challenges, both criminal and civil. If you read the book, you will realize that it is a tried and tested strategy of the State to legally worn out their enemies. This might well be another of those cases. It was incredibly brave of Nasionale Boeke and Tafelberg to publish this book, and we have already incurred substantial legal costs in the run-up to publication. It has the potential to be massive. According to the SSA, it will start this week when they bring an urgent application to remove the book from the shelves. We are not intimidated. We are printing even more books. Just Exclusives Books has ordered another 15,000 copies. There will be books available. You can order so long if you can’t find a copy right away.
