He was admitted to Estcourt Correctional Centre in his home province of KwaZulu-Natal on Wednesday. Police had warned that they were prepared to arrest him if he did not hand himself in by midnight. Zuma, 79, was handed the jail term last week after he failed to attend a corruption inquiry. The sentencing sparked an unprecedented legal drama in South Africa. Zuma refused to hand himself in on Sunday and a deadline was imposed of midnight on Wednesday (22:00 GMT) for his arrest. In a short statement, the Jacob Zuma Foundation said the former president had "decided to comply with the incarceration order" and hand himself in to prison authorities. His daughter, Dudu Zuma-Sambudla, later wrote on Twitter that her father was "en route [to the jail] and he is still in high spirits".

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South Africa has never seen a former president jailed before. Jacob Zuma was sentenced on 29 June for defying an instruction to give evidence at an inquiry into corruption during his nine years in power. Businessmen have been accused of conspiring with politicians to influence the decision-making process while he was in office. But Jacob Zuma has repeatedly said that he is the victim of a political conspiracy. Though he was forced out of office by his own party in 2018, 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 Jacob Zuma's palatial home in an effort to prevent his arrest. Similar crowds gathered before he handed himself in on Wednesday.

He has also repeatedly said that he is the victim of a political conspiracy. He has testified only once at the corruption inquiry into what has become known as "state capture" - meaning the siphoning off of state assets. In a separate legal matter, Zuma pleaded not guilty last month in a corruption trial involving a $5bn (£3bn) arms deal from the 1990s.