S. African deputy president's aide jailed
 |  Shaik's lawyers are planning an appeal. |
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DURBAN, South Africa -- The former financial adviser to South Africa's Deputy President Jacob Zuma has been sentenced to serve 15 years in prison after his conviction on corruption charges.
The scandal threatens to derail Zuma's chances of eventually succeeding Thabo Mbeki as South African president.
Schabir Shaik was found guilty last week on charges he paid Zuma around 1.3 million rand (almost $195,000) for political favours and brokered a bribe from a French arms firm.
Shaik was also sentenced on Wednesday to three years' jail over one count of fraud, which will be served concurrently.
Shaik's lawyers had asked that he be fined and have said they will appeal.
Zuma made his first appearance in Parliament on Wednesday since Shaik's conviction, fending off demands from opposition parties that he resign.
"This government has been the first government in this country to wage a war against corruption," he told MPs in a raucous question and answer session.
He had entered the parliament to the sounds of members of his African National Congress party singing "We will follow our Zuma," according to AP news agency.
Sentencing Shaik, Judge Hillary Squires said Zuma was aware that Shaik was attempting to procure a bribe for him.
She said Shaik's payments to Zuma were "not payments to a low-salary bureaucrat seduced into temptation."
"These payments over five and a half years were a sustained level of support to allow Jacob Zuma to pursue a lifestyle he could not otherwise afford on his ministerial salary and to a point that it created dependence."
Prosecutors had described the relationship between Shaik and Zuma as "generally corrupt."
Mbeki was expected to decide Zuma's future when he returned from a state visit to Chile on Thursday.
Newspaper reports claimed Zuma was being pushed to resign rather than wait to be removed.
Mbeki's second term in power runs until the end of 2009.
