On the evening of July 7 former president Jacob Zuma was taken into custody to begin serving a 15-month prison sentence imposed on him the previous week for contempt of the Constitutional Court. The sentence was imposed after the commission of inquiry probing allegations of state capture, chaired by deputy chief justice Raymond Zondo, argued before the court that Zuma should be jailed for defying the same court’s order that he appear and testify before the commission.

Due to the amount of deliberate misinformation and general confusion out there about how these events came to pass, it is important to set out key facts...