Former South African President Jacob Zuma has handed himself in to police to begin serving a jail sentence for contempt of court, sentenced by the same judge whose Zimbabwe-electoral violence report he blocked in 2013.

His foundation said he had travelled to a prison near to his home in KwaZulu-Natal province late on Wednesday.

Police had warned that they were prepared to arrest Mr Zuma, 79, if he failed to hand himself in.

Last week, he was given a 15-month jail term for contempt of court after he failed to attend a corruption inquiry.

The sentencing sparked an unprecedented legal drama in South Africa, with a deadline imposed of midnight on Wednesday (22:00 GMT) for Mr Zuma’s arrest.

The deadline was imposed after Mr Zuma refused to hand himself in on Sunday.

South Africa has never seen a former president jailed before.

Mr Zuma, 79, was forced to resign in 2018 after nine years in power.

Though he was forced out of office by his own party, the African National Congress (ANC), he retains a loyal body of supporters, especially in his home province of KwaZulu-Natal.

On Sunday, crowds formed what they called a human shield outside Mr Zuma’s palatial home. Similar crowds gathered before he handed himself in on Wednesday.

In February 2013, Jacob Zuma, then president was ordered to hand over the Zimbabwe electoral violence report to a newspaper, the M&G within 10 days. Zuma then quickly appealed against Justice Raulinga’s judgment.

The lengthy saga came to a head when Raulinga revealed that the Justice Sisi Khampepe report had gone “missing”, and disclosed that Rakoatsi had made several unsolicited and unsuccessful attempts to retrieve the report from his custody, in his absence.

In a letter to the appeal court, Rakoatsi rejected any insinuation that he had knowledge of where the report was, or that he had a hand in its disappearance.

Zuma later lost the case at the Supreme Court, in a case that now exposes ZANU PF for terrorism crimes during elections. – Additional Reporting, BBC