Chaos as ANC Disrupts Council

CARRIED AWAY: ANC councillor Kuthula Mamba dances with a makeshift AK47 during a rowdy meeting in the Civic Centre yesterday. 

ANC councillors chanted slogans, banged on desks and dumped documents on the floor of the city council chamber.

Their undisciplined actions saw yesterday’s meeting disrupted for hours as they objected to the draft budget.

It contains increases for rates, water and electricity.

Speaker Dirk Smit was unable to control the meeting.

Things became heated as ANC councillors accused the Speaker of ignoring opposition councillors.

At the centre of the chaos was the 2014/2015 draft budget set to go out for public comment.

The ANC refused to vote on the budget after Mayor Patricia de Lille presented it to council.

De Lille said the draft would have an operating budget of about R28 billion and a capital budget of just over R6bn.

The city was proposing a 6 percent increase in rates, 7.6 percent for electricity, 8 percent for water and sanitation and a 5.9 percent hike for solid waste.

De Lille said they were smaller than last year’s hikes.

After hours of what some councillors called “pandemonium”, the draft budget was approved by 132 of the 142 councillors present.

ANC councillors said they were unable to decide on the draft as they had not had an opportunity to go through the documents.

ANC chief whip Xolani Sotashe said that according to the Municipal Finance Management Act, the yearly budget had to be accompanied by the necessary documents.

“We have not received any draft resolutions and if the council wants us to apply our minds, then the documents should have been issued to us 72 hours before,” Sotashe said.

Smit explained that it was a draft budget which would go out for public comment once the council had voted on it.

He had taken legal advice which said a decision could be made on the draft budget.

ANC councillors then protested loudly, shouting that correct procedure was being flouted. Smit was unable to bring the meeting to order, leading to an adjournment of nearly two hours.

Chanting and singing from the ANC benches continued and members later threw the draft budget documents on to the floor in the middle of the chamber.

Sotashe said Smit had misled the council as he had not sought the advice of the city’s lawyer.

“We spoke to the lawyer and he said the Speaker did not ask him for legal advice. Mr Speaker we are expressing our disgust.

“This is not a DA council, this is a multi-party council,” Sotashe said.

Smit ruled that the meeting would continue despite the ongoing interruptions.

De Lille appealed to councillors to continue with the business of the day saying “we are bordering on ill-discipline and abusing the rules of council”.

The meeting eventually carried on without further disruptions, but many DA councillors said the ANC’s actions were part of their electioneering.

http://www.iol.co.za/capetimes/chaos-as-anc-disrupts-council-1.1653522#.Uw9azOOSzJF

SO YOU DON’T NEED WHITE’S?

So you have never needed whites??

So some brain dead limp wristed African moron wrote a letter this week that was published on the News24 website about how they don’t need white’s and never have and that white’s are to blame for all the bad things in Africa??

This is really rich coming from a a new generation of blacks that is more obsessed with western lifestyle than the whites have ever been? You love flashy cars, well they were invented by white folks and without them you would still be walking around on foot, and what about your obsession with fashion and clothes? Without the white folks you would still be in loin cloths! You say that we brought the idea of war to Africa? I suppose Shaka and Dingaan and the boys held tea parties to solve their issues? No! You simple minded twat! They slaughtered people who got in their way – its the African way!

You say white homosexuals brought HIV/AIDS to your people? Is that why as much as 80% of the black population in Africa is HIV Positive? Strange that it has not reached such epidemic proportions in the white population? It is because we have something you will never have – self control! All industry in Africa was started by white people, the same industry that generates the billions of rands that supports the useless black bastards that have no interest in working. The only industry you had was sitting on a rock in the veld scratching your nuts while you keep an eye on your dads starving cows! You survive on a small minority of white peoples tax money and without them you would literally starve to death.

But hey, next time you get sick or contract a deadly sexually transmitted disease don’t go see a doctor, no go visit a witch doctor and let him throw some leftover oxtail bones for you, I mean really doctors as you know it are a white thing? Sell your car and start walking, get rid of all your money because that is also a white thing? For that matter fire the entire parliament and go back to your tribal chiefs and let them send you out to fight other tribes for land, that way we can sit back and watch you die, and dont forget not to use guns because they are a white thing, only sticks and stones and spears allowed! Lets face it, without us you are completely fucked!! We generate the tax money that keeps you alive and we maintain the economy that would not last a week without us and our white money!

I really am not adverse to the idea of all the whites leaving Africa so go ahead and get your leaders to expel us from the continent because left to your own devices without white people to maintain everything you would destroy the country and yourselves in short order. Then we could return and do what we white folks do – rebuild, create, improve and make a good life for all. You don’t need white’s is about the stupidest thing I have ever heard, just look around in Africa and you will see that Africans cant look after themselves – no they require white people to look after them.

http://nubbi.wordpress.com/2013/03/13/so-you-dont-need-whites/

State Coffers Bled

Nearly R1-billion lost through fraud in the public service has not been recovered.

Government departments have managed to get less than R1-million back into the state's coffers.

The Public Service Commission has found that the public service lost R932.3-million to financial misconduct in the 2010-2011 financial year.

According to the commission, misconduct relates to theft, mismanagement, misappropriation and abuse of funds, fraud, corruption and gross negligence.

North West - where fighting between rival factions in the ruling ANC is rife - was the worst offender.

Financial misconduct by public servants cost the province R 673 821 980.45, but the authorities managed to recover only R 4 530.00

Limpopo, which had several departments placed under administration by the cabinet, performed much better than North West.

Financial misconduct cost it R 16 123 114.64 - but only a measly R 1 367.37 was recovered.

Figures for the 2011-2012 financial year show that the cost of financial misconduct has dropped dramatically to R230-million but cases monitored by the commission rose to 1243 - up from 1035 the year before.

In 2011-2012, departments in Gauteng misused R14-million of public money.

Only R 27 000.00 has been recouped to date.

Gauteng flushed away R 18 463 258.00 and recovered a mere R 4 259.00

Public Service Commission member Mike Seloane said the drop can be attributed to two factors.

"The systems are becoming effective or departments are simply not declaring financial misconduct. There are departments that have declared no financial misconduct," he said.

The commission will launch an inquiry into the reasons for the low rate of recovery of misused public money.

In addition to financial misappropriation, the commission observed that efforts to deal with the problem were being frustrated by political heads of department.

It expressed displeasure at the "reluctance by departments to disclose fully the financial misconduct cases".

And it noted that there were "no concrete plans to ensure that money lost to the state was recovered fully".

The report detailing the latest national financial misconduct figures is expected to be published and presented in parliament in August or September.

Our Thieves

Helen Suzman Was Against Apartheid

The DA has the right to blow its own trumpet about the role it played in history. But it has no right to insult the intelligence of our nation.

The Democratic Alliance last week launched its "Know Your DA" campaign, aimed at educating people about the party and the role it played in the anti-apartheid struggle. As the face of this campaign to claim its stake in the struggle for liberation, the party chose Helen Suzman, the MP of the DA's first predecessor, the Progressive Party, who used her tenure in Parliament to condemn apartheid.

Yet, not content with the role its beloved ancestor played as a lone opposition voice against the National Party for 13 years, the DA sought to exaggerate its role in history. It appropriated the image of former ANC president Nelson Mandela, the face of the anti-apartheid struggle, placing him with Suzman on the campaign pamphlet. 

The DA's campaign document vandalises and vulgarises the ANC logo and compares Africa's oldest liberation movement with the apartheid government. It mischievously draws parallels between post-1994 tragic events, which this government swiftly condemned and acted on, with the apartheid regime's deliberate brutality and institutionalised criminality against the black majority.

The DA has the right to blow its own trumpet about the role it played in history. But it has no right to insult the intelligence of our nation through factual misrepresentation, distortion and lies.

To equate Suzman's role in the anti-apartheid struggle with that of Madiba, by publishing the picture of their friendly embrace, is an act of great desperation and political fraudulence. There is no denying that Suzman played a particular role in opposing apartheid as a member of Parliament. Nor is there any denying that public opinion about her role in an unrepresentative system was as divided as opinion has been on Margaret Thatcher since her recent death.

The indisputable fact is that Suzman served in a discredited political system, which was declared a crime against humanity by the United Nations. Her participation in such a system legitimised an unjust order and made her complicit in the horrors it unleashed. Michael Morris, in Apartheid: The Illustrated History, eloquently describes her as a "token in itself of the political complacency of the bulk of white society". 

Parliamentary transcripts

Because of her participation, on behalf of the affluent minority white constituency of Houghton, she often found herself conflicted and speaking with a forked tongue on issues of principle. For this she drew the ire of true revolutionaries. For instance, in his message to the ANC's external mission in 1971, Oliver Tambo, then ANC president, chastised Suzman for being "in favour of change – but determined to prevent change".

In 1970, the ANC had said clearly: "Suzman has neither the mandate nor authority to speak on behalf of oppressed masses of South Africa."

Scrutiny of her parliamentary activism shows that hers was not the cause the oppressed masses shared. She supported some controversial Bills, including those that limited the rights of black South Africans, purportedly because – as she was fond of saying – they "represented a step in the right direction". 

Hansard, the parliamentary transcripts, reflects her vigorous push in 1973 for an increase in social welfare – for whites. 

Suzman threw her weight behind the Nats's counter-revolutionary campaign of the late 1960s and early 1970s, the objective of which was to weaken African countries' stance against apartheid. During her brief visit to Zambia in 1970, Suzman voiced her full support for official diplomatic contact between apartheid South Africa and African countries, with a view to ending economic sanctions. As Tambo said: "Suzman and lesser agents of colonialism have turned Africa into a veritable hunting ground for stooges and indigenous agents of racism."

During her visit to the British House of Commons in 1989, Suzman arrogantly reiterated to the international media: "I am against disinvestment and sanctions. I totally support Mrs Thatcher on this issue." 

Negative part of Suzman's history

Suzman did not only dedicate her energy to protecting the economic interests of the white minority by rejecting international calls for disinvestment. She also used her influence to block international financial donations to the liberation movements to help sustain their anti-apartheid programmes. In 1970, she opposed the decision by the World Council of Churches to grant $200 000 to liberation movements.

Much has been made of Mandela's "friendship" with Suzman, including her visits to him on Robben Island and the negotiations she facilitated for his release. But in 1969, during Suzman's visit to the island, Mandela maintained that political prisoners should be released, just as the Afrikaner rebel Robey Leibbrandt was released despite his treachery during World War II. Suzman's response was to echo the condition the Nats gave to Madiba for his release: that until he had renounced violence she could not ask for his release. 

Suzman opposed the use of arms by the liberation movement to defend the defenceless masses against a criminal and barbaric regime, but she seemed not to mind the apartheid regime replenishing its arsenal. As the regime escalated its violent attacks against opponents, including murder, banishment, persecution and harassment, Suzman stood with the Nats in endorsement of British arms sales to the murderous South African state. The resumption of arms sales to South Africa was against UN Security Council resolutions of 1963.

Today, Helen Zille has the audacity to paint the ANC and the deliberate acts of criminality and institutionalised violence perpetrated by the Nats with the same apartheid brush. 

Revolutionaries could not trust Suzman because of her double agenda, inevitably, given her compromised position as a supporter of human rights serving in a system guilty of gross human rights violations. As Joe Slovo, then chairperson of the South African Communist Party, said in 1983: "Mrs Suzman and I may both be against apartheid but we are certainly not both for liberation."

After her death on January 1 2009, the ANC, despite its clashes with Suzman during apartheid, said it "remembers and respects the contribution of Suzman towards the demise of apartheid". 

As a movement rooted in the ancient African traditions of ubuntu, which teaches us never to talk ill of the departed, the ANC did not mention the negative part of Suzman's history. 

Today, because of the reckless political posturing of her successors, we are forced to reflect on this painful part of our history. We would have preferred that she be left to rest in peace.

Moloto Mothapo is the ANC's ­parliamentary spokesperson

http://mg.co.za/article/2013-04-26-00-suzman-was-against-apartheid-but-she-was-not-for-liberation

We can learn from Zimbabwe's Flourishing Farms

By Max du Preez

It is something many South Africans do not want to hear and would probably find hard to believe: Zimbabwe’s radical land redistribution has worked and agricultural production is on levels comparable to the time before the process started.

What is more meaningful is that the production levels were achieved by 245 000 black farmers on the land previously worked by some 6 000 white farmers.

I got this information from a new book, Zimbabwe Takes Back its Land by Joseph Hanlon, Jeanette Manjengwa and Teresa Smart.

Hanlon is a senior fellow at the London School of Economics and had written many books on southern Africa, especially Mozambique. Manjengwa is the deputy director of the London School of Economics and Smart is a visiting fellow at London University. The book’s findings came as a surprise to me. I was under the impression that most of the farms taken from white farmers were occupied by squatters or cronies of president Robert Mugabe and were largely lying fallow.

Not so, say the authors.

Mugabe cronies own less than 10 percent of the land. Many of the small farms (a few hectares) make a profit of about R90 000 a year while some of the more commercial-sized farms have turnovers of more than R1 million.

The authors also state that it is widely estimated that new farmers take a generation to reach full production, so the new farmers can be expected to raise their production significantly in the next decade.

All this information is relevant to us in South Africa. Land reform is just as emotive an issue and important to development here as it was in Zimbabwe.

But land redistribution has been painfully slow here, partly because of budgetary constraints and partly because of bureaucratic incompetence and corruption.

It would be a huge mistake to argue that, if forced, land redistribution without compensation has worked in Zimbabwe it should also be done here in South Africa.

Zimbabwe’s land processes seriously undermined stability and the economy for more than a decade. Millions of Zimbabweans fled the country and sought refuge in South Africa and other neighbouring states.

A similar undermining of our economy and stability could have a more serious impact on South Africa and could lead to great suffering and conflict, indeed to a fatal blow to our far more modern and sophisticated economy.

A radical disturbance of the equilibrium in South African commercial agriculture would have dire consequences for food security and could lead to dangerous social upheaval, even a low-level civil war.

There is another crucial difference. With few exceptions, white farmers were only established in Zimbabwe from the early 20th century onwards, most of them British and most of them arriving after the end of World War II. The man who led the white Rhodesian government after the Unilateral Declaration of Independence, Ian Smith, farmed land given to him by the colonial authorities after evicting the indigenous owners.

Most white South African farmers are Afrikaners whose forebears arrived in the coutry from France, Belgium, the Netherlands and Germany between 1652 and the early 1700s.

They lost all loyalty to a foreign “motherland” within a few generations and eventually came to regard themselves as indigenous people. REALLY!!!

Many Afrikaner families even had a slave woman from the late 17th or early 18th century as materfamilias. In the Western Cape, it is not uncommon to find a family on the same farm their ancestors had occupied 300 years ago, and elsewhere in the country a century or more ago.

Most dispossessed white Zimbabweans emigrated to South Africa or the UK. That is not an option open to more than a handful of white South African farmers.

Another difference is that, unlike Zimbabwe, we have a constitution protecting private property ownership and the rule of law. Even if the government appropriates land, it still has to pay some compensation.

But this doesn’t mean we can’t learn lessons from the Zimbabwean experience.

The first is that most new black farmers can actually farm successfully and commercially if given enough time and help. There are far too many South Africans who believe the opposite.

The second is that an ambitious land redistribution programme can play a large role in alleviating poverty and providing employment and dignity to large numbers of marginalised people.

The conventional wisdom among most academics, economists and political analysts in South Africa is that urbanisation is the answer to poverty alleviation and the successful provision of education and skills training.

Too many leaders in agriculture agree with this view and declare that smallholder farmers simply undermine the potential of available agricultural land.

Zimbabwe and the experience of Ethiopia and other countries in the last two decades are proof that they’re dead wrong.

We urgently need to throw old, conventional thinking overboard and tackle our problem with more vigour.

http://www.iol.co.za/mercury/we-can-learn-from-zim-s-flourishing-farms-1.1508335#.UYC5E6Kos7g

Freedom Day

Freedom day???

So it is freedom day? Mwahahahahahahahahahaha !! Well Mr. Zuma you and your cronies can shove your stupid holiday up your ass!!

I mean really – what is it that I am free to do? Lets see, I am free to be unemployable simply because I am white, regardless of my skill set or political affiliations I am free to remain unemployed simply because you and your cronies are black supremacists who don’t like me simply because I am white. And you justify this action by holding me responsible for something my great grandfather may or may not have done?? Well Mr. Shit for brains, I think you need to be held responsible for what is happening now! Instead of coming after me and my people for something you imagine we did wrong decades ago? Why don’t you man up and stand for the horrible crimes you have and still are committing!! I will tell you why – because you are a yellow bellied coward!

Our youth is free to become dumber and dumber because you and your collection of fools cant even deliver text books to their schools, you are causing decades of suffering by making our youth almost as stupid as you? They will become a generation of small Zuma’s that cant do anything for themselves, a generation of fools that will just sit and wait for a handout. Handouts that will soon start to dry up because the biggest fool of them all – that would be you Mr. Zuma is making it difficult for the people who pay tax to remain employed?? You really are a dumb shit!!

We have the freedom to be raped and tortured in our homes without any chance of the police or government coming to our rescue! We are facing genocide and still you deny it and claim that all is well in South Africa? So in other words you consider that fact that we have a higher murder/death rate than any war zone in the world to be normal? Well all that proves is that you are a savage of the worst kind who should be taken outside and unceremoniously shot in the head for the good of the people. And before I forget we also have the freedom to defend ourselves against this racial genocide without the help of any firearms!! Well guess what? You failed! We still have weapons, some legal, some illegal and we have become more vigilant and are ready to kill your followers when they come for us! You say the attacks on us are becoming less? No they are not, we are just not reporting it anymore, it is much less trouble to just kill them and get rid of the evidence than deal with your retarded police officials.

We are free to drive on your dangerously un maintained roads as long as we pay a fortune for the “privilege” of doing so? For that matter we are free to do anything we want as long as you can pocket some money out of it? You are a warlord and a thief! So do me a favor and take your freedom day and shove it where the sun don’t shine, because it is nothing but lies and we don’t need it. What we will will celebrate is that we will always be free, because we are a proud nation and we know we are free to defend ourselves against idiots and savages – not because anybody says so but because it is our God given right to do so – remember the source of your greed is going to run out soon whereas the source of our determination will never run out and will outlast you all because it is eternal and divine and has withstood all before you and will still be around long after you have become a distant memory!

So go ahead and celebrate your “freedom day” while your own people starve and die in the violence that you have created, and know this if the picture of you with a shower on your head does not please you, I am pretty sure that future generations of your own people will depict you with horns and a tail.

Shane's Blog

http://nubbi.wordpress.com/2013/04/27/freedom-day/

AN OPEN LETTER ON THE STATE OF THE NATION

Letter to President JG Zuma by Revd Canon Barney Pityana

20 February 2013

Dear Mr Zuma

I write this letter with a simple request: that you resign from all public office, especially that of President and Head of State of the Republic of South Africa.

I am, of course, aware that you have been re-elected President of the African National Congress, the majority party in our National Assembly. I am also aware that, in terms of our electoral system, that allows the ANC to present you as a candidate to the National Assembly and use their majority therein to put you in office, without much ado. It would also appear that by its recent vote the African National Congress has expressed confidence in your leadership. You can then understand that I am taking an extraordinary step, and I can assure you one that has been carefully considered, in asking for your resignation.

Our country is in shambles, and the quality of life of millions of ordinary South Africans is deteriorating. Confidence in our country, and its economic and political system, is at an all-time low. There is reason to believe that ordinary South Africans have no trust in your integrity as a leader, or in your ability to lead and guide a modern constitutional democracy that we aspire to become. That, notwithstanding the fact that our Constitution puts very minimal requirements for qualification as a public representative including the highly esteemed office of President and Head of State, and Head of the Executive. What is clear, at the very least, is that the President must have the means and the inclination to promote and defend the Constitution, and uphold the well being of all South Africans. I have reason to believe that, notwithstanding the confidence that your party has placed on you, you have demonstrated that you no longer qualify for this high office on any of the counts stated above.

As President and Head of State you should take responsibility for the lamentable state in which our society finds itself. This prevailing toxic and amoral environment must surely have something to do with the manner in which you assumed office, by trampling down on all semblance of the rule of law, and corrupting agencies of state. We are constantly reminded of the truth of Shakespeare’s words: “Some rise by sin, and some by virtue fall”  (Measure for Measure II.2) The result is that we are in a Macbethian world where there is absence from the moral landscape of this dear land of ours any sense of positive good, any sense of personal involvement in virtue, loyalty, restraint. As a result we are in the morass of paralysis of moral power as a society. I believe that we are justified in exclaiming with Marcellus in Hamlet 1.iv “something is rotten in the state of Denmark.” And so we say “All is not well.”

As citizens we need not ask of our President and Head of State any more than the practice of virtue. To live a virtuous life is to express the goodness of and the possibilities for good in human living. These have at times been expressed as the cardinal virtues: temperance, courage, prudence and justice. For that the leader must lead by example, be a person of common wisdom, and understand the environment of her/his operations enough to serve the people and be driven by a desire to govern well.

There is no place in this for exploiting the high office for personal gain or benefit, or using state resources to buy loyalty, or to elevate party or family above the public good. Without this radical prescription of service our democracy is hollow, becomes a dictatorship of the Party, until the next elections when the voters once again get coaxed to vote for The Party! The personal attributes of a leader are an important assurance that our democracy is in good hands: excellence in virtue, truth, trust, wisdom, insight, discernment, and sound judgment.

That cesspit of a-morality is to be found in the prevalence of rape in all its brutal forms, in the disregard for loyalty – how does one explain that a close friend of Anene Booysen ‘s brother in Bredasdorp is one of the suspects of her murder. You yourself know only too well that a daughter of a close friend and comrade of yours accused you of rape! Though, happily, you were acquitted of the charge, the stench of disloyalty and taking advantage of unequal relations remains. South Africans live in fear, they are angry; they are poor (and getting poorer) and burdened by debt. What could be alleviating poverty, like social grants and social housing, is failing in practice because the poor have what is due to them pocketed by corrupt officials, and instead suffer the indignity of living life as beggars in their own land. Whether it be from marauding criminal gangs, or crime syndicates that appear to operate with some impunity, or the elderly terrified of their own grandchildren, or neighbours who cannot be trusted, or girl schoolchildren who are at the mercy of their teachers who may rape or abuse them, or corruption and theft from public resources by government ministers and public servants, or failure to meet the basic requirements of schooling most notably school textbooks not being delivered on time, or citizens who die in our hospitals because there are no doctors , or no medicines, or the thousands who dies on our roads, or protesters like Andries Tatane in Ficksburg, or the Marikana 46, or those murdered by the Cato Manor police death squad in extra-judicial murder, South Africans live in fear. Are we effectively in a police state? This situation is the direct result of the failure of public policy.

Besides the social and moral breakdown that engulfs our society, the economic woes for ordinary South Africans are not abating. Social inequality has widened since the end of apartheid – and that is something to be ashamed of. The extent of escalating unemployment in our country is surely nothing to be proud of, and poverty that has become endemic, almost irreversible, that haunts our every being cannot be gainsaid. The gaping disparities between rich and poor is a sad indictment on a party that has been in government since the onset of our constitutional democracy. The inadequacy of policy is attested to by the succession of downgrades by rating agencies, and the despair of the poor expresses itself in incessant demonstrations throughout the length and breadth of our country.

South Africans are angry, and they have every reason to be so. There is evidence that your party and government no longer have the intelligence, ideas or initiative to take bold, radical and necessary steps to arrest this slide into oblivion. Besides just being without the intelligence to change the course of history, evidently your Party and government do not even have the inclination preoccupied as it is by a relentless programme of self-enrichment. Not even the otherwise promising National Planning Commission Report will solve the challenges we face because it is too little too late, lacks specificity and is without urgency or determination. Yes, we also have the promise of a multi-billion rand infrastructure development spend that is bound to end up in failure no less than the ignoble defence procurement debacle, based on the prevailing rector of corruption in government. Why, because there are already signs that this initiative has become the target of looters and thieves, many of whom with the full knowledge of the political elite in your party and government. This failure of government is also to be seen in the lamentable e.toll saga, in the handling of the farmworkers demands and essential decision-making in the highest office in the land: the appointments of the Chief Justice, of the Head of the NPA, in government by demands rather than by policy and principle, The picture that emerges is one of lack of leadership that is courageous about things that matter. Yes, we see it in the majority of appointments you make that, with notable exceptions, are lackluster and mediocre. These include appointments to cabinet, Provincial Premiers, and even political appointments to diplomatic service, and a gradual erosion of the independence of significant institutions like the judiciary by blatant political interference. These are nothing but an insult to the intelligence of South Africans.

Notwithstanding all this, there is a sense that this country is without an imaginative, transformative chief executive. Instead, where serious matters, as in the outrageous use of state resources to build extensions to your private home amounting to some R206m (if we accept Minister Thiulas Nxesi’s assurances, which no reasonable South African should!), you indulge us in the art of equivocation. Is it true that every room in the Nkandla Zuma Estate has been paid for by the Zuma family? Or is it that every room now occupied by the member of your family has been so paid for? You and your ministers so often address us with this double sense of the absurd, and obscured meaning to cover the truth. There is widespread use of state resources as a piggy-bank to meet the demands of your office or for electioneering or other forms of state patronage. Ministers like Tina Joemat-Peterson seem to labour under the belief that it is the responsibility of their office to make the resources of their offices to be available to the President at his beck and call. What about the Guptas, citizens of India who have managed to ingratiate themselves and wormed themselves into the very heart of this nation. The benefits are obvious: they get to summon ministers to their compound and issue instructions; they manipulate the cricket governing council with disastrous results; and the paper they publish has access to large resources from state agencies for which no other newspaper was ever invited to tender. Yes, we are in the midst of a new Infogate Scandal! It can only be in a ‘banana republic’ where foreign elements can succeed so easily. I wonder where else is that happening, and what about the security of the state? That would definitely never happen in India.

At the centre of this is a President who lacks the basic intelligence (I do not mean school knowledge or certificates), who is without the means to inspire South Africans to feats of passion for their country and to appeal to their best humanity. I mean being smart and imaginative, and being endowed with ideas and principles on which quality leadership is based. Our problem as a country begins by our having as head of state someone devoid of “the king-becoming graces’ to establish “virtuous rule”. It therefore sounds very hollow when you protest that as President you deserve respect. I wholeheartedly agree that the office of Head of State must be held with respect. But I submit that you are the author of your own misfortune. There is hardly any evidence that you are treating your high office with the due respect you expect of others; to bestow on the highest office in the land dignitas and gravitas is your duty. No wonder that there was a time that international observers were overly concerned about the unfinished business of criminal investigations against you, and of course, that little matter you are so proud of, your many wives and innumerable progeny – as one with potency to sow his wild oats with gay abandon. In your language this is about your culture. Besides there are far too many occasions of gratuitous disregard for the law and the constitution, and unflattering mention in cartoon media, and often your name features in associations with activities that suggest corruption. South Africans have very little reason to hold their President in awe or respect. On top of that the President makes promises he never keeps, and does not even think he owes anybody an explanation. What happened to the gentleman’s ethic, “my word is my bond”! Truth, while never absolute, must be the badge of good leadership.

My counsel to your friends and comrades who seek to protect your reputation by marching onto the Gallery and intimidate the owner of the gallery and the artist of The Spear, or those who are offended on your behalf by the Lady justice cartoon by Zapiro, or the Secretary General of the ANC who summons the Chairman of Nedbank, or the Chief Executive of First Rand for a telling off about the re-branding campaign of the FNB; or the offence caused to some by the decision by AmPlats to restructure its business operations and the threats it was subjected to; or the threats by the General Secretary of the Communist Party and his Stalinist Taliban to legislate respect for the President – none of that would be necessary if you yourself held your high office with a modicum of respect.

Besides these social ills we remain a divided society. We are not just divided by class and wealth (although that is true), or by race, or by gender as the pandemic of violence and brutality against women is the signature tune of our country to our shame; but most alarmingly, the ugly spectre of ethnicity and tribalism that has been accentuated during your Presidency needs to be nipped in the bud. Clearly, you are not the President to campaign against this malady, nor are you interested in operating above the tribal fray as other Presidents have done. Social cohesion clearly is not on your agenda. I do not mean just occasionally dressing down some opposition politician, or pointing fingers at “clever blacks”, or outrage at some indecent racist incidents. I do not even mean a badly organized Social Cohesion Conference or the discredited Moral Regeneration Movement. I mean a coordinated programme of government utilizing the instruments of state and institutions supporting democracy, like the Human Rights Commission, to drive a national strategy of social cohesion. Even universities, once the bastions of civilized life as WEB du Bois puts it, producing an intellectual corps for society that is critical, and independent, are now fast becoming reduced to apologists of failed government policies.

As a critical observer of government and the African National Congress under your leadership, I note that the tenor of government and party is fast drifting towards the conservative, authoritarian, reactionary organization, presiding over a kleptocratic state; and that is intolerant of South Africans expressing themselves. When leaders and governments know that they no longer rule with the consent of the ruled, and without their participation in their democracy they get to be afraid of even their shadows. It often takes on the persona of a playground bullyboy whenever it is unable to answer some pretty sharp critical questions about the conduct of government, and about the prevalence of crime and corruption in South Africa, or about false promises. The ANC is getting to take on a semblance of a mafia organization, a Big Brother that syndicates hard dealings against others, isolates and silences critical voices, and uses state patronage to neutralize and marginalize others. One can observe the makings of a totalitarian, fascist regime.

I am reminded proudly that it was not always like that. There has been much over time that South Africans can be very proud of. I can think of Josiah Gumede challenging John Dube for the leadership of the NNC in the 1920s where, as Peter Limb puts it in his magisterial study of THE ANC’S EARLY YEARS, the ANC had become miserable and “getting lost in mist and sea of selfishness” (does that not sound familiar?). Dube, it was judged, had become conservative, and associated with ethnic nationalism. What we miss today is that radical urgency that Josiah Gumede introduced into NNC politics, that uncompromising commitment to shape the destiny of the oppressed. Instead we get a party and President preoccupied with ethnic culturalism, and that has no idea about turning the tide of the economic life of the people of this country. There have been other examples as well which led to the ascendancy of Chief Albert Luthuli, and the removal of the likes of AB Xuma and James Moroka. Nowadays a conservative, reactionary tribal leadership is celebrated and lionised but never censured as it continues to keep a Machiavellian stranglehold and power over the organisation.  The ANC is being held captive by reactionary, corrupt forces. The ANC is in danger of being reduced to a tribal club with hangers-on who seek patronage and a hand in the politics of theft. It is exactly such a tribalist sentiment that has caused the Department of Justice and Constitutional Development to drive relentlessly a piece of legislation like the Traditional Courts Bill whose constitutionality is suspect, but which more importantly, clearly undermines the advances this nation has made with regard to the rights of women, and it threatens to introduce a layer of criminal justice that parallels that established by the law of the land. In a land where some 50% of the population is made up of young people and women a leadership is required that trusts the instincts of young people and that radically eschews all forms of sexism and disregard for women. A not dissimilar sentiment especially in the Department of Justice and Constitutional Development must explain the abortive Secrecy Bill, and the secret revival of the National Keypoints Act is surely part of this culture of secrecy.

Besides, our country needs a President who understands democracy, especially that a constitutional democracy functions with checks and balances; that power is always exercised under check, and never in an arbitrary manner. The Head of State must be comfortable with the powers of the Constitutional Court and never to threaten at every turn to subject them to review, and to know that good governance flourishes with the oversight of parliament, and of independent organs of state, and that opposition parties are loyal opposition and patriotic and mandated by voters to champion particular positions in the public sphere. Opposition is of no mere nuisance value. It is the lifeblood of democracy. Some of your utterances suggest that you just do not get it.

I am raising my voice comprehensively now after having promised in 2009 that I shall hold my peace, and give your government a fair chance to perform. I had warned that much of your “victories” in the run-up to Polokwane and thereafter were merely pyrrhic victories. They would yet come to haunt you, I reasoned. Indeed, they have. But now any political analyst will warn that we are on a drift to a totalitarian state, twisted by a security machinery into silence and worse. Those of us who still have voice are obliged to warn against the prevailing trend. One way of addressing this confidence deficit would be for the President and all public representatives to be subjected to a probity test, to declare for public scrutiny their tax affairs, and all matters of conflict of interest. It is also not asking too much to expect that all public officers, including civil servants must express confidence in the system they preside over by sending their children to state schools, and to utilize public health facilities.  This must surely include all public sector unions like NEHAWU and SADTU. Leadership matters. Leadership must be accountable and must be exemplary, and must be inspirational. That is where you fail.

Please spare us another five years under your leadership. Spare yourself any further embarrassment of ineffectual leadership. You will be judged harshly by future generations. I ask you solemnly, resign.

Yours sincerely.

http://tcn.org.za/?p=1416#&panel1-4

Grade 12 Mathematical Literacy Paper

Minister of Basic Education:

Angie Motshekga

The question reads as follows: State whether the following event is certain, most likely or impossible: Christmas day is on December 25 in South Africa.

No wonder education in South Africa has gone down the tubes..........Fire the idiot.....



http://www.politicsweb.co.za/politicsweb/view/politicsweb/en/page72308?
oid=369801&sn=Marketingweb+detail&pid=90389

CAR: How Bozizé Lost His Piece Of Africa

After 10 years in power, the statesman had few friends offering to help to fight off the rebels.

President François Bozizé's family and bodyguards were watching Cartoon Network when I went to meet him at the presidential palace in Bangui a few years ago.

At the time, there were allegations that he had ordered his troops, the Central African Republic army known as FACA, to adopt a scorched-earth policy in the northeast of the country, and I was part of a delegation from the Pan-African Parliament sent to investigate. Bozizé's eyes were half shut and he spoke like an audiotape being played at slow speed.

There had been damning reports from organisations including the International Crisis Group and Human Rights Watch claiming that Bozizé's soldiers had been killing, raping and looting in the area around Birao, a dry, isolated town sandwiched between Sudan's Darfur region and southeastern Chad.

I flew to Birao, much against the wishes of Bozizé's handlers, on a French military plane – the French were still giving Bozizé support back then, and were providing logistics to the FACA as they terrorised the locals. Birao was a burnt-out ruin and most of its residents had fled into the bush to escape government soldiers, many of whom were considerably younger than voting age.

Bozizé was hated in Birao, as he was in many other parts of the Central African Republic. The reasons for this were numerous. In the case of Birao, promises made by successive leaders over the decades, of which Bozizé was only the most recent, tended to be forgotten – schools had no teachers or books, hospitals had no doctors or medicine and roads linking the area to the rest of the country simply do not exist.

To be the president of the Central African Republic, whether one reaches that position through the ballot box or through the gun, for all intents and purposes means ruling over a small, decaying tropical city on the banks of the Oubangui River. Presidential powers barely reach beyond the limits of Bangui.
During almost all of Bozizé's 10 years in office, large parts of the country were out of his control.

 Supporters of former president Ange-Félix Patassé, deposed by Bozizé in a military coup in 2003, together with other anti-government elements – in particular, Michel Djotodia – kept much of the country in a state of more or less permanent revolt.

 


Bozizé had been forcibly trying to remove Patassé from power since 2001, but in those days Patassé was able to rely on the support of troops loyal to Congolese rebel leader Jean-Pierre Bemba, who now awaits trial in The Hague for alleged war crimes in the Central African Republic.

Skirmishes in 2003 turned into large-scale rebellion in 2004 and Djotodia led an alliance of several rebel groups calling themselves the Union of Democratic Forces for Unity. His bush war finally yielded fruit last Saturday, when his most recent rebel alliance, Seleka, entered Bangui, and headed straight for the presidential palace, where Djotodia proclaimed himself president.

During his last year in office, Bozizé could count on very few friends in high places. The French were no longer interested in helping – their troops remained in Bangui only to protect French interests in the Central African Republic, which these days mean French nationals.

Historically, the former colonial power has had a heavy hand in the country, but its main economic interest there – the Areva uranium mine – was mothballed two years ago when the uranium price dropped in the wake of the Fukushima disaster. Bozizé's other erstwhile close friend, Chadian president Idriss Déby, who supported the coup that brought Bozizé to power, did not offer to help fight off this latest menace. As the noose tightened, President Jacob Zuma seemed to be his only remaining friend.

There is much speculation about why this is the case and, chances are, many of the questions surrounding this odd friendship will emerge soon. Despite South Africa's offer to train the FACA, Bozizé always feared that he'd be relieved of power in much the same way as many of his predecessors had been, so he played the dangerous game of keeping his army weak just in case they should decide to turn on him. It was a losing wager. The end came swiftly.

By December last year, the writing was on the wall – Seleka forces had taken over much of the country before the president reluctantly agreed to participate in peace talks held in the Gabonese capital, Libreville. With little left under his control outside Bangui, Bozizé still displayed his arrogance by refusing to negotiate and turning up late at the talks.

When the agreement was eventually signed in January, Seleka had dropped the condition that would have bothered Bozizé the most – the demand that he step down. Instead, a government of national unity was to be formed, with the occupant of the presidential palace remaining unchanged.

Seleka got to name the prime minister and elections were to be held within three years. Bozizé reluctantly agreed to the choice of Nicolas Tiangaye, a prominent human rights activist, as prime minister. But he made no move on one of the other key demands agreed to in Libreville – sending South African troops back to South Africa.

Perhaps if he had done what he had agreed to do, he would still be living in Bangui, and a number of South African families would not be mourning the loss of their loved ones, who died in a country many of them had never even heard of.

David Smith is a director of Johannesburg-based Okapi Consulting. He lived in Bangui where he set up Radio Minurca (now Radio Ndeke Luka), the only independent radio station in the country.

Source

RACIST TORNADO’S????

25th June 2013

So there was a tornado in the free state this weekend that was so bad that people died and property was destroyed, a tragedy in any terms! But once again as soon as the story hit the media there were people ranting and raving about how it affected only black people who live in shacks and never hurt white folks????? You bunch of sick fucktards!!!! It affected anyone who was in its path! And the fact that it affected more black people than white people is because there are so many black people! I suppose that if America or Russia or somebody else for that matter fired a missile into a South African city it would be our fault that more black folks were killed than white folks???

So let me get this straight, we now have lightning that targets black people and tornados that seek out black people?? Well if this is true, surely you cant believe it is our fault? No sir !! Best you start making amends to God, Allah, Buddah, Krishna, Sponge bob, Jah Rastaffarri and however else is out there because it seems they are as tired of your shit as the rest of us! Seriously we are just normal folks, and don’t control forces of nature. So if these forces of nature are targeting you and your people then you have have much bigger problems than a handful of white folks, so better you start consulting with the ancestors, witch doctors or the kungfu panda to protect you from these forces that are gathering against you.

It is actually quite sad that no matter what happens you instantly blame white folks or “apartheid” all it really proves is that you have absolutely no ability to solve or overcome anything – in short you are a bunch of pathetic losers that cant wipe their own asses!! You were handed the keys to the kingdom and all that you have done is turn it into a slum! It is half way through the year and thousands of scholars still have not received the text books they require to get an education, which probably means they will pass this year regardless of how they perform, leaving us with yet another bunch of slackers and dimwits entering the job market next year. And so you will continue rotting this society from the inside and keep blaming the whites and “apartheid” until all the whites are either dead or living in other countries?? But then not even that will stop you, no – then you will blame all your misfortune on the fact that the whites left!!

Get a life you whiney bunch of slackers!!!

http://nubbi.wordpress.com/2012/06/25/racist-tornados/

SHERYL CWELE 's Sentence

Sentence of 12 years’ imprisonment increased to 20 years’ 

imprisonment. 

THE SUPREME COURT OF APPEAL OF SOUTH AFRICA JUDGMENT 
 Case No: 671/11
In the matter between: Reportable 
SHERYL CWELE First Appellant 
FRANK NABOLISA Second Appellant 
and 
THE STATE Respondent 
Neutral citation: Sheryl Cwele & another v The State (671/11) [2012] ZASCA 155 
(01 October 2012) 
Coram: MPATI P, HEHER and PONNAN JJA and SOUTHWOOD and 
ERASMUS AJJA 
Heard: 16 August 2012 
Delivered: 01 October 2012 
Summary: Drug offences – cocaine – dealing in in contravention of s 5 (b) of 
Act 140 of 1992 – appeals against convictions dismissed – 
sentence – appellants engaging services of courier or ‘mule’ – 
sentence of 12 years’ imprisonment increased to 20 years’ 
imprisonment. 2
_______________________________________________________________________ 
ORDER 
_____________________________________________________________________ 
On appeal from: KwaZulu-Natal High Court, Pietermaritzburg (Koen J sitting as court of 
first instance): 
1 The appellants’ appeals against their convictions are dismissed. 
2 The sentences imposed by the trial court are set aside and replaced with a sentence of 
20 years’ imprisonment in respect of each appellant. 
3 In respect of the second appellant the sentence is antedated to 6 May 2011. 
_______________________________________________________________________
JUDGMENT
_____________________________________________________________________
MPATI P (HEHER and PONNAN JJA and SOUTHWOOD and ERASMUS AJJA
CONCURRING):
[1] The two appellants were charged in the Pietermaritzburg High Court, before Koen J, 
sitting with an assessor, with contravening section 5(b), read with sections 1, 13(f), 17(e), 
18, 19, 64 and Part II of Schedule 2 of the Drugs and Drug Trafficking Act 140 of 1992 (the 
Act), viz dealing in dangerous dependence-producing drugs (count 1). In the alternative, 
they were charged with contravening s 18(2)(a) of the Riotous Assemblies Act 17 of 1956, 
read with s 5(b) and other relevant sections of the Act, viz conspiracy to deal in dangerous 
dependence-producing drugs. Two further charges (counts 2 and 3) were preferred against 
the appellants, but these were not persisted with by the State after it had closed its case, 
conceding that no evidence existed for a return of a verdict of guilty on the two counts. 
Accordingly, no further reference will be made to them. 
[2] The appellants were convicted as charged on count 1 and were each sentenced to 
12 years’ imprisonment. With leave of the trial court the first appellant now appeals against 
her conviction, while the second appellant appeals against both his conviction and the 
sentence imposed on him. In their original heads of argument counsel for the State gave 3 notice that they would argue before this court that the trial court should have imposed 
terms of imprisonment of 15 years in respect of each appellant. However, they later filed 
supplementary heads, giving notice that they would argue, at the hearing of the appeal, 
that the sentences imposed on the two appellants be increased to 20 years’ imprisonment. 
[3] The evidence adduced by the State was largely uncontested. For convenience I 
shall refer to the first appellant, Ms Sheryl Cwele, as ‘Sheryl’ and to the second appellant, 
Mr Frank Nabolisa, a Nigerian national resident in this country, as ‘Frank’. The evidence of 
the witness Ms Charmaine Moss (Charmaine) may be summarised as follows. During 2008 
Sheryl, with whom she had become friends, approached her and mentioned that she 
(Sheryl) had worked overseas a number of times in 2005, but that she now held a 
permanent position with the Hibiscus Coast Municipality. Sheryl informed her that she had 
been contacted again to work overseas and that she had been directed by ‘the Lord’ in her 
dream to offer ‘work’ to her. When Charmaine showed interest in the offer Sheryl advised 
her that a firm in Sandton would secure the work for her and that she would be paid R25 
000 for the two weeks that she would be overseas. Her airfare would also be covered. 
[4] It appears that arrangements were duly made but, on a certain Monday morning 
during May 2008, when Charmaine was on her way to the airport to travel to 
Johannesburg, Sheryl telephoned her and told her not to depart that Monday as they were 
still waiting for her visa. Reference was made by Sheryl during the telephone discussions 
to her brother, Frank. In answer to an enquiry as to why her brother was involved Sheryl 
responded that he was one of the partners in the firm that organised the overseas work. 
Eventually, on Wednesday of that week Charmaine travelled to Johannesburg, where she 
met Frank, who showed her a computer printout of her air ticket, but told her that she could 
not depart on the Thursday because he did not want her to travel alone. He informed her 
that they were waiting for the arrival of another lady who already worked overseas and that 
the agency had incorrectly booked them on different flights. He promised, however, that 
she would definitely leave on the Saturday. On the Friday, at approximately 19h00, Frank 
collected her from friends with whom she had been staying in Johannesburg and took her 
to an area which she described as ‘very scary’, where he booked her into a place that he 
referred to as his friend’s hotel. She became nervous and started to ask him questions 
such as where she was going to work; what kind of work she was going to do and who was 4
going to meet her at the airport in Turkey? He told her he would ask his sister to contact 
her. At some stage he slapped her face, accusing her of asking too many questions. That 
evening he took her out to dinner and later dropped her off at the hotel and undertook to 
take her to the airport the next day. 
[5] Back at the hotel she tried to contact Sheryl by telephone. She was unsuccessful 
because Sheryl’s mobile phone was switched off. She was able to contact Sheryl on 
Saturday morning and told her that Frank had said she should ask her (Sheryl) what she 
was going to do in Turkey. Sheryl advised her that there was nothing serious, that she 
should not speak to anyone and that she would be required to bring back a packet for 
Frank. But by then Charmaine had already lost interest in the overseas engagement – she 
had decided the previous evening that she would no longer go overseas. Since she knew 
of the availability of courier services to courier parcels from one country to another she 
became suspicious and decided that she would go back home. Frank picked her up from 
the hotel at approximately 10h00 on the Saturday morning and drove her to the airport, 
where he purchased a flight ticket for her to return to Durban, which she did. She had no 
further contact with Sheryl. Frank telephoned her once and enquired how she was. She 
told him that she was back at work. 
[6] It is common cause that the charges that the two appellants faced before the trial 
court followed upon intensive investigations by South African authorities into the arrest and 
subsequent imprisonment, in Sao Paulo, Brazil, of another lady by the name of Ms Tessa 
Beetge (Tessa). Tessa was arrested at the Sao Paulo Airport on 13 June 2008 for drug 
trafficking, when two packets containing 9.25 kilograms and 1.025 kilograms of cocaine 
respectively were found in her luggage. A special agent in the Brazilian police, Jean Carlos 
de Bortole, testified that Tessa’s air ticket reflected that she had come to Sao Paulo from 
Lima, Peru, and was in transit, on her way to Johannesburg. She received a sentence of 
seven years and nine months’ imprisonment. It is not in dispute that the substance found in 
Tessa’s luggage was cocaine, a dependence-producing drug, the unlawful sale or 
possession of which is punishable by law in South Africa. 
[7] Tessa’s mother, Ms Susanna Swanepoel (Ms Swanepoel), testified that at the time 
of her arrest in Brazil, Tessa, a divorcee with two minor daughters, had been living with her and her husband at their home in Margate. During May 2008 she received information 
from Tessa that Sheryl had, via short message service (sms), offered her (Tessa) work 
overseas. Knowing that Tessa and Sheryl had been neighbours while the former was still 
married, Ms Swanepoel expressed a wish to speak to Sheryl before Tessa could go 
overseas. A meeting was then arranged at Sheryl’s office in Uvongo, KwaZulu-Natal, which 
Ms Swanepoel attended, with her husband and Tessa, during the morning of 12 May 2008 
and where Sheryl told them that Tessa would be going to London to do administrative work 
for two weeks; that all her flights and accommodation would be paid for; and that she would 
be collected daily from her hotel, which was one of the best hotels in London, and taken to 
work and back. Sheryl assured them (Tessa’s parents) that they should not be concerned. 
Ms Swanepoel testified further that while they were still in Sheryl’s office Sheryl instructed 
her personal assistant to telephone a person by the name of Frank, whom she presumed 
was from a travel agency, and to enquire whether the travel arrangements had been 
finalised. There was no reply and Sheryl said she would contact this Frank later. Thereafter 
Sheryl told them about her travels overseas and that the reason for her offering the 
opportunity to Tessa was because she was tired of travelling overseas. She told them that 
Tessa would be paid £1 000 for the work she was going to do. These assurances put Ms 
Swanepoel and her husband at ease and they were happy to allow Tessa to go on her first 
ever trip overseas. 
[8] On 14 May 2008 Tessa telephoned Ms Swanepoel at about 11h00 from Sheryl’s 
office and informed her that she had to leave for Durban immediately – she had been 
requested by Sheryl to meet her at her office. Tessa was to fly to Johannesburg from 
Durban that evening. Ms Swanepoel’s husband fetched Tessa from Sheryl’s office and 
they (Ms Swanepoel and her husband) took her to the airport in Durban later that 
afternoon. Ms Swanepoel saw, in Tessa’s possession, an Hibiscus Coast Municipality 
envelope with the words ‘For Tessie for her air flight’ written on it and containing R500. 
Sheryl had also given Tessa a warm coat which she referred to as ‘a good luck coat’. 
Because Tessa’s flight would arrive in Johannesburg at about 12 midnight Ms Swanepoel 
suggested that she telephone Sheryl and find out who would pick her up in Johannesburg. 
Tessa informed her that she would be met at the airport by Frank. Before she departed for 
Johannesburg Tessa handed to her mother Sheryl’s business card. 6
[9] Ms Swanepoel testified that on 20 or 21 May 2008 Sheryl advised her over the 
telephone that Tessa had arrived safely at J F Kennedy Airport and gave her a telephone 
number on which she could contact her (Tessa). It appears that it did not strike her as odd 
that Tessa, who was supposed to work in London, had now arrived at J F Kennedy Airport. 
After trying unsuccessfully to contact Sheryl when Tessa was due to return home, Ms 
Swanepoel eventually received a telephone call from Sheryl who reported that Tessa 
would arrive in Johannesburg on 4 June 2008. But Tessa did not arrive on that date and 
Ms Swanepoel was thereafter again unsuccessful in her attempts to call Sheryl. She 
eventually received a telephone call from Tessa at around 12 midnight on Friday, 13 June 
2008. Tessa reported to her that she had been arrested in Sao Paulo for drug trafficking. 
Ms Swanepoel had earlier, after 4 June 2008, called and spoken to Tessa while the latter 
was in Peru, using a number from which Tessa had called her even before the lastmentioned date. Tessa had reported to her, as a reason why she had not returned home, 
that there had been excuses that flights were full. After she had received the news of 
Tessa’s arrest Ms Swanepoel called Sheryl, who promised to call her back the next 
morning. Sheryl indeed called her as promised and told her that the Brazilian Embassy 
would contact her, which never materialised. 
[10] During September/October 2008 Ms Swanepoel visited Tessa at the prison where 
she was held in Brazil. She was accompanied by her nephew, Mr Richard Olsen. She 
returned with some of Tessa’s clothes and other belongings, which included her mobile 
phone, two sim cards (one from Peru and the other from Colombia), a suitcase (which was 
not the one she left with) and a South African sim card. These were handed to her by the 
prison authorities in Brazil. Back in South Africa Ms Swanepoel went through Tessa’s 
diaries and, having obtained her password, she downloaded all the data messages (emails) that were exchanged between Tessa and Sheryl. She also went through all the 
messages exchanged between the two through sms and wrote them down – Tessa had 
given her PIN number for her mobile phone to Ms Swanepoel when the latter was in Brazil. 
All this information was taken by Ms Swanepoel to the police in Cape Town and thereafter 
to the offices of the Scorpions in Cape Town, together with another mobile phone that 
Tessa had left behind at home when she went to Johannesburg. 7
[11] On 18 June 2008 Sheryl telephoned Ms Swanepoel during the afternoon and 
enquired as to whether she knew a Richard Olsen, to which Ms Swanepoel answered in 
the affirmative, stating that Olsen was her nephew. Sheryl then remarked that she did not 
like to speak to strangers. Whilst she was in Cape Town Ms Swanepoel enquired from 
Sheryl, over the telephone, about certain names, including the name ‘Frank’. Sheryl replied 
that she did not know the names and stated further that she had not known that Tessa had 
been in Colombia or Peru. 
[12] Tessa’s boyfriend, Mr Hendrik Claassen, also testified and confirmed certain of the 
evidence of Ms Swanepoel in relation to a work opportunity in London offered to Tessa by 
Sheryl. He had accompanied Tessa to Sheryl’s office in Uvongo, where the work 
opportunity was discussed. Another witness was Lieutenant Colonel Izak Ludick who was 
the investigation officer in the case, appointed as such by the Director of Public 
Prosecutions on 6 January 2010. He visited Tessa in prison in Brazil and obtained her 
password from her so as to gain access to her e-mails. He subsequently compiled a record 
of e-mails exchanged between Tessa and Sheryl, which was handed in at the trial as 
Exhibit “H”. Its admissibility in evidence, in terms of section 15 of the Electronic 
Communications and Transactions Act,1
 as a true record of e-mails exchanged between 
the two was formally admitted by both appellants. 
[13] The appellants did not testify. They made certain formal admissions, one being the 
following: 
‘Accused No. 1 [Sheryl] deposed to an affidavit in support of her application to be released on bail. 
At these proceedings, the Court complied with the provisions of section 60(11B)(c) of the Criminal 
Procedure Act, 1977. 
Accused No. 1’s affidavit (Exhibit “E”) is admissible in evidence in these proceedings.’
In that affidavit Sheryl alleged that she got to know Frank through an old acquaintance, 
Nikkie, with whom she had worked for two years at Medscheme in Johannesburg until 
1
 Electronic Communications and Transactions Act 25 of 2002. 8
1999. In the course of one of their many discussions Nikkie told her that she was in a 
relationship with a man called Frank, who was a millionaire, and that she and Frank would 
visit her in Port Shepstone to discuss business. That visit eventually came true and from it 
a good relationship developed between her and Frank, to the extent that they called each 
other ‘my brother’ and ‘my sister’ respectively. Early in 2008 she received a telephone call 
from either Frank or Nikkie, who told her that Frank ‘was experiencing problems with his 
company’ as it had a predominantly African staff; and that Frank wanted to employ white 
persons, preferably females, to head his company and who would help him communicate 
well with white business. Frank therefore sought her assistance to refer to him people that 
she trusted. 
[14] Sheryl alleged further that subsequently she told Charmaine, whom she had 
befriended previously, about the offer. Charmaine had apparently expressed a desire to 
move to a better job – she had complained about money at the massage parlour where 
she was employed. She expressed an interest in meeting Frank in Johannesburg and, 
because the ‘job’ had a prospect of taking her overseas, she quickly got her travel 
documents in order. Subsequently and on a certain day she (Sheryl) received a telephone 
call from Charmaine who told her that she was back from Johannesburg and that she did 
not like the business there. A meeting was then arranged and the two met at a coffee shop 
where Charmaine only told her that she had been treated badly in Johannesburg. It 
appears that thereafter the friendship between the two became frosty. 
[15] As to Tessa, Sheryl averred in her affidavit that the former is her friend who had 
been her next door neighbour. She said when they met in 2007 Tessa informed her that 
she was living with her parents and that her mother was very strict and did not want her to 
leave home to live elsewhere, especially in Johannesburg. I consider it necessary to quote 
the following relevant paragraphs from the affidavit: 
‘13.15 When Nikkie or Frank (I am not sure exactly who was it although I think it was Nikkie), 
indicated that Frank needed Whites to work in his firm, I connected Tessa to Nikkie. 
13.16 Tessa then said I should speak to her parents and never mention that she was going to work 
in JOHANNESBURG but in LONDON. She feared that if she were to approach the parents herself 9
they would refuse. If I did not intervene her parents would not agree. 
13.17 I did intervene as planned and the parents agreed because they trusted me. 
13.18 . . . 
13.19 After Tessa had left for JOHANNESBURG Frank phoned. He was furious and he stated that 
Tessa could not head his company as she had only standard seven and not matric. He was then 
going to find her another position. I was surprised that Tessa had lied to me about her academic 
qualifications. 
13.20 Later on Frank and Tessa phoned and said Tessa was going overseas to do the work. This 
was a bit of a surprise for me because Frank had dubbed Tessa useless. 
13.21 Thereafter Frank kept me updated about the various places Tessa would go to and I, at one 
stage, jokingly said I was jealous. 
13.22 There was a lull of some sort when I heard nothing about Tessa. I then asked Frank where 
Tessa was and he said she was overseas. 
13.23 Thereafter Tessa started communicating and said she was in South America and had found 
a French boyfriend and was going to Peru. She was looking for other work and if people phoned for 
references I should say she was my PA and earned R10 000. She said I should not disclose to 
Frank that she was looking for other work because she was still employed by him. 
13.24 Subsequently she communicated with me and I could detect that she was really confused 
either because of depression or of something I did not know. 
13.25 She repeated her story about being my PA and so on and suddenly when I asked her what 
she was actually doing, she said she was waiting and fed up; she wanted to come back home. 
13.26 I then told her that she should not talk to people as she would end up getting into trouble. I 
said this because I detected confusion in her conversation and because of the fact that she wanted 
me to give a false reference. 
13.27 I then communicated with Frank and expressed my deep concern that a person who had left 
her parents through me appeared to be stranded in a foreign land. 
13.28 Frank told me that he was trying to make contact with her but was failing to do so. His 
telephone could not connect and the e-mails he was sending were bouncing back. 
13.29 . . . 
13.30 Because I wanted Tessa to get out of a desperate situation I told Frank to send whatever he 
wanted communicated to Tessa to me so that I could forward it to Tessa. 
13.31 He obliged and I then served as a conduit pipe between the two of them. 
13.32 . . . 
13.33 I later on learnt that Tessa had been arrested for drugs. 
13.34 I was devastated because I never imagined that Tessa could be associated with drugs. I did 
not know how I could face her parents thereafter.’ 10
[16] This statement by Sheryl is of course evidential material but is untested. Much of it, 
particularly the part relating to the communication between her and Tessa while the latter 
was abroad, is confirmed by the contents of data messages (e-mails and sms texts), 
records of which were handed in to court as Exhibits ‘H’ (e-mails) and ‘J’ (sms texts) 
respectively. The appellants formally admitted the contents of each of these exhibits as a 
true record of data messages exchanged between Sheryl and Tessa ‘at the times and on 
the dates specified’ and that they were admissible in evidence in terms of the provisions of 
s 15 of the Electronic Communications and Transactions Act. They also admitted, formally, 
Exhibit ‘F’ as a true record of landline calls made by Sheryl from her office telephone to 
Frank’s two mobile phones and to Tessa. The dates, times and duration of the calls were 
admitted as having being correctly reflected in the record. 
[17] In the trial court the State initially succeeded in its application to introduce into 
evidence the contents of Exhibit ‘R’, viz transcripts of a number of communications made 
through Frank’s two mobile phones and which were intercepted or monitored over the 
period 29 April to 16 June 2008. The appellants’ objection to the admissibility of the 
evidence was later upheld and the evidence excluded on the ground that it had not been 
established that the source from which the transcripts were made was the original 
recording. Proof of the authenticity and reliability of the transcripts was therefore found to 
be lacking. In this court counsel for the State urged us to reverse the decision of the trial 
court relating to the admissibility of this evidence. It was also argued, on behalf of Sheryl, 
that there is no reason why the contents of Exhibit ‘R’ should not be considered by this 
court. Her counsel contended that without Exhibit ‘R’ there is even less evidence against 
Sheryl. In the view I take of this matter, and as will appear later in this judgment, it is not 
necessary to revisit the point. 
[18] In the summary of substantial facts attached to the indictment it is alleged that prior 
to the events in question the two appellants ‘entered into a conspiracy in terms of which 
they would import cocaine from beyond the borders of South Africa’ and that at all material 
times they ‘acted in execution of a criminal conspiracy and/or common purpose to commit 
the offences mentioned in the indictment’. I agree with counsel for the appellants that there 
was no direct evidence of the conspiracy or of an agreed arrangement between the 11
appellants, nor was there any admissible evidence of interaction between them which 
directly evidences such conspiracy and thus the agreement. In the absence of direct 
evidence implicating the appellants the State’s case rested on circumstantial evidence. 
Recognising this fact the trial court posed the question whether the appellants’ guilt was 
the only reasonable inference to be drawn from the proved facts. It answered that question 
in the affirmative. 
[19] In S v Reddy & others 1996 (2) SACR 1(A) this court said the following regarding 
the assessment of circumstantial evidence: 
‘In assessing circumstantial evidence one needs to be careful not to approach such evidence upon 
a piece-meal basis and to subject each individual piece of evidence to a consideration of whether it 
excludes the reasonable possibility that the explanation given by an accused is true. The evidence 
needs to be considered in its totality. It is only then that one can apply the oft-quoted dictum in R v 
Blom 1939 AD 188 at 202–3, where reference is made to two cardinal rules of logic which cannot 
be ignored. These are, firstly, that the inference sought to be drawn must be consistent with all the 
proved facts and, secondly, the proved facts should be such “that they exclude every reasonable 
inference from them save the one sought to be drawn”.’2
The State must therefore satisfy the court, ‘not that each separate fact is inconsistent with 
the innocence of the [appellants], but that the evidence as a whole is beyond reasonable 
doubt inconsistent with such innocence’.3
[20] In her affidavit Sheryl stated categorically that she ‘never knowingly participated in 
any drug trafficking, conspiracy or incitement to deal in drugs as set out in the indictment or 
at all’. Her counsel argued accordingly that although Charmaine’s evidence that Sheryl 
informed her that she was to bring back a packet for Frank from Turkey was not 
challenged, there was no suggestion as to what the contents of the packet would be. The 
sum total of counsel’s submission, therefore, was that there was no evidence before the 
trial court that Sheryl knew what the substance was that Tessa was to bring back into the 
country. As to Frank, his counsel submitted in the heads of argument that the inferences 
which the trial court drew were either a non sequitur to the proved facts or the trial court 
2
 At p 8c-e. 
3
R v De Villiers 1944 AD 493, particularly at 508 –509. 12
overlooked the possibility of other inferences which were equally probable or at least 
reasonably possible. Counsel argued further that in an attempt to explain the facts the trial 
court overlooked inconsistent circumstances, assumed the existence of facts which had not 
been proved and could not legitimately have been inferred. 
[21] That there was an agreement between the appellants that Sheryl would provide 
Frank with white female persons whom the latter could send on missions overseas cannot 
legitimately be contested. Clearly, the approaches by Sheryl to both Charmaine and Tessa 
with job offers came, according to Sheryl’s affidavit, after Frank had asked her to do so. On 
Charmaine’s evidence, which must be preferred over Sheryl’s untested statement, Sheryl 
offered her a work opportunity overseas. She said that Sheryl informed her that a firm or 
company in which her brother, Frank, was a partner, sourced the work overseas. Indeed, 
Sheryl alludes to this in her affidavit where she states that Charmaine ‘was particularly livid 
(excited?) about the fact that her job had the prospect of taking her overseas and she 
hastened to have her travel documents in order’. With regard to Tessa, Sheryl sent her a 
text message on 3 May 2008 instructing her to bring her passport during the afternoon of 
the next day.4
 Another text message sent on 4 May 2008 says: 
‘Plz bring ur passport back at shelly beach.’ 
At 11h32 on 14 May 2008 Sheryl sent the following text message to Tessa: 
‘Please stay ready flights are full, busy trying Holland in Europe. Will get back 2 u!’ 
On 14 May 2008 she again sent a text message to Tessa that reads: 
‘The money is already here in my office u need to go 2 Joburg 2day 4 ur visa.’ 
 And the following message was sent on 15 May 2008 at 8:48pm when Tessa was already 
in Johannesburg: 
‘Frank is the one handling ur trip and is usually very busy but very reliable just relax and enjoy tell 
him 2 bring u books and magazine.’ 
These messages and Charmaine’s evidence clearly show that Sheryl knew all along that 
Tessa and Charmaine would be required to embark on trips overseas and were not going 
to work for Frank in a company in Johannesburg. I agree, therefore, with the trial court’s 
rejection of Sheryl’s version that Tessa was to work in Johannesburg on the basis that the 
4
 The text reads : ‘We’re on our way 2 PMB back 2moro plz bring ur Passport 2moro afternoon. Have a 
grate day.’ 13
‘contents of the sms’s simply do not accord with, in fact contradict her version, that 
Tessa was destined to work in Johannesburg’. 
[22] The next question to be considered is whether Sheryl knew what the purpose of the 
overseas trips was. It is surely significant that the nature of the ‘work’ was never disclosed 
to the state witnesses and Sheryl did not use the opportunity to put an innocent colour on 
the offer. On Charmaine’s version Sheryl told her upon enquiry that she merely had to 
collect a packet for Frank in Turkey. She had also told Charmaine that she would be paid 
R25 000 for the work that she was required to do, that is to collect the packet for Frank. It 
may of course be argued, correctly so, that there was no evidence as to what the contents 
of the packet would be. But one wonders why, as Charmaine also observed, a packet 
could not be sent by courier service which is available internationally, unless, of course, the 
contents were so valuable to the person concerned that he/she would not take the risk of 
the packet getting lost or damaged. As to Tessa, it is important to note that on 2 May 2008 
Sheryl informed her by way of a text message through her mobile phone that she (Sheryl) 
wanted to discuss a business venture with her.5
 She was also informed by Sheryl that she 
would receive R25 000.6
 Sheryl’s counsel conceded before us that Sheryl knew that the 
business venture that was to involve Tessa was unlawful. That concession was wisely 
made, in my view. But counsel persisted with his argument that even though that may be 
so, there was no evidence that Sheryl knew what the substance was that Tessa was to 
bring into the country. 
[23] While she was waiting in Peru for instructions pertaining to her return home Tessa 
showed some frustration. On 6 June 2008 she sent an e-mail to Sheryl saying, among 
other things, the following: 
‘I am ok, chatting to my friends on messenger, waiting for a reply from you and Frank and wanting 
to go home! 
. . . 
Otherwise I am still freezing my butt off in Peru, with Frank that is telling me to wait and wait and 
wait, and then when it’s time to go I am ready and they cancel everything again. 
. . . 
5
 The message reads: ‘Tessa Hi its Sheryl, haven’t spoken 2 u in a long time. I would like 2 talk with [u] 
about a business venture plz indicate how we can meet?’ 
6
 By text message on 19 May 2008 sent at 4:50pm. 14
So has Frank told you when I am leaving??? or don’t you know? . . .’ 
Sheryl responded on 8 June 2008 as follows: 
‘Hi Tess 
 . . . 
Frank told me about the delay which is for your own good really. 
. . . 
I understand you are coming back on Monday/Tuesday? 
Keep well and avoid people who may end up asking a lot of questions. 
See you soon, hang in there. 
Sheryl Cwele.’
She had, on 4 June 2008, sent to Tessa by e-mail, her flight details for her return from 
Lima, via Sao Paulo, to Johannesburg. It would be difficult to understand, if Sheryl was 
unaware of the fact that Tessa was overseas for an unlawful purpose, why she would 
convey to Tessa that the delay was for her own good and that she should avoid people 
who might ask questions. But the question still is whether she knew that what Tessa was to 
bring back into the country was cocaine. 
[24] It is common cause that cocaine was found in Tessa’s luggage at the airport in Sao 
Paulo where she was arrested while on her way back to South Africa. There was no 
evidence of anything else illegal found on her. She had clearly gone overseas to collect 
and bring back something illegal for Frank; he is the one who paid for her flights and 
arranged her accommodation while overseas. That much was conceded before us in 
argument. It is inconceivable that she would thereafter return to South Africa with 
something other than that which she was tasked to collect. For, plainly she did not have the 
financial resources or wherewithal to have concluded a transaction involving cocaine on 
her own in South America. And the complete absence of interest by the appellants at the 
time in the fate of the commodity she was supposed to bring back to South Africa is 
inexplicable. It follows that Tessa was sent to South America by Frank to collect cocaine 
and to bring it back to South Africa. That is the only reasonable inference to be drawn from 
the totality of the proved facts. Frank’s appeal against his conviction must accordingly fail. 
[25] The same applies to the case of Sheryl, in my view. She recruited Tessa and 
worked closely with Frank in arranging her return trip to South Africa. She even assured 15
Tessa that the delay in her travel arrangements was for her own good, an indication, in 
my view, that she had knowledge of the dangers associated with the trip. As has been 
mentioned above, she knew that Tessa was required to bring back something which it is 
unlawful to possess. Tessa was thereafter arrested with cocaine in her possession. The 
inference is irresistible, therefore, that Sheryl knew that the unlawful substance that Tessa 
was required to bring back was in fact cocaine. Neither of the appellants testified. Whilst 
that is their right, it is not without its consequence, particularly in a situation such as this, 
where the evidence adduced by the State calls for a response. Before us it was submitted 
that the unlawful criminal enterprise (which was readily admitted) may in fact have had as 
its goal the smuggling into this country of some other unlawful substance and not cocaine. 
But absent evidence, that, as counsel was constrained to concede, amounted to no more 
than a speculative hypothesis. Sheryl’s false statement in her affidavit that she recruited 
Tessa (and Charmaine) to head Frank’s company in Johannesburg strengthens that view. 
It follows that an agreement existed between her and Frank that she would recruit white 
women to be used by Frank to travel overseas and to bring cocaine back into the country. 
[26] I turn to the question of sentence. As I have indicated above, the State gave notice 
in its original heads of argument that it would seek an increase of the sentence of 12 years’ 
imprisonment imposed by the trial court to 15 years’ imprisonment. After this court’s 
judgment in Keyser v S [2012] ZASCA 707
 that stance changed and an increase of the 
sentence to 20 years’ imprisonment was sought. In Keyser the appellant, a 35 year old 
married man, had been convicted by a regional magistrate of dealing in 6545 grams of 
cocaine in contravention of s 5(b) of the Act and sentenced to imprisonment for 20 years. 
He had been arrested after boarding a flight to Cape Town at the Johannesburg 
International Airport (now OR Tambo International Airport) having earlier arrived on a flight 
from Sao Paulo, Brazil. The sentence of 20 years’ imprisonment was confirmed on appeal 
to the South Gauteng High Court. On further appeal this court, having found the appellant 
not to have been a mere courier, but a willing and informed participant, also confirmed that 
sentence, although it observed that it was ‘undoubtedly a heavy one’.8
7
 Delivered on 25 May 2012. 
8
 Para 30. 16
[27] In the present matter the indictment made reference to the provisions of s 51(2) of 
the Criminal Law Amendment Act 105 of 1997 and Part II of Schedule 2 to that Act (the 
minimum sentence legislation). Those provisions, read together, provide that for a 
contravention of s 5(b) of the Act a minimum sentence of 15 years’ imprisonment must be 
imposed on a first offender if it is proved that the value of the dependence-producing 
substance in question is more than R50 000, or more than R10 000 if it is proved that the 
offence was committed by a person, group of persons, syndicate or any enterprise acting 
in the execution or furtherance of a common purpose or conspiracy. That sentence may of 
course be departed from where the sentencing court is satisfied that substantial and 
compelling circumstances exist justifying the imposition of a lesser sentence than the one 
prescribed by the minimum sentence legislation. On the other hand s 17(e) of the Act 
provides for imprisonment ‘for a period not exceeding 25 years . . .’ for a contravention of s 
5(b). 
[28] The trial court accepted the uncontested evidence of Lieutenant Colonel Ludick that 
the cost of cocaine at the time was R20 000 per kilogram, with a street value of R200 per 
gram. The total street value was thus approximately R2 million. Furthermore, I have found 
that an agreement existed between the appellants to use other persons to travel overseas 
and to bring back cocaine into the country. The recruiting of Tessa was in furtherance of a 
common purpose to import cocaine into the country. The provisions of the minimum 
sentence legislation accordingly apply in considering an appropriate sentence. 
[29] In S v Malgas 2001 (1) SACR 469 (SCA) this court, dealing with the minimum 
sentence legislation, said that when considering sentence the emphasis must shift to the 
objective gravity of the type of crime and the public’s need for effective sanctions against it. 
And as to the determination of substantial and compelling circumstances Lewis JA 
explained what was said in Malgas as follows in S v Sikhipha 2006 (2) SACR 439 (SCA) 
para 16: 
‘This court, in S v Malgas, held that in determining whether there are substantial and compelling 
circumstances, a court must be conscious that the Legislature has ordained a sentence that should 
ordinarily be imposed for the crime specified , and that there should be truly convincing reasons for 
a different response. It is for the court imposing sentence to decide whether the particular 
circumstances call for the imposition of a lesser sentence. Such circumstances include those 17
factors traditionally taken into account in sentencing – mitigating factors. Of course these must 
be weighed together with aggravating factors. But none of these need be “exceptional”.’ (Footnote 
omitted.)
And, as Marais JA reminds us in Malgas, a court exercising appellate jurisdiction ‘cannot, 
in the absence of material misdirection by the trial court, approach the question of sentence 
as if it were the trial court and then substitute the sentence arrived at by it simply because 
it prefers it. To do so would be to usurp the sentencing discretion of the trial court’.9
 But an 
appellate court may interfere with the exercise by the sentencing court of its discretion 
even in the absence of a material misdirection when the disparity between the sentence 
imposed by the trial court and the sentence which the appellate court would have imposed 
had it been the trial court is ‘so marked that it can properly be described as “shocking”, 
“startling” or “disturbingly inappropriate”’.10
[30] The trial court recognised, when it considered sentence, that the starting point is the 
15 years prescribed by s 51(2) of the minimum sentence legislation. It then proceeded to 
set out the mitigating factors relevant to each appellant. In respect of Sheryl they include 
the following: She was a 50 year old first offender at the time of the trial and had had no 
previous brushes with the law. She was married with four children aged 25, 21, 19 and 17 
years respectively. She had a stable background and a stable family, with the benefit of 
ownership in a residential dwelling with a value in excess of R1,2 million. She was also in 
stable employment with the Hibiscus Coast Municipality where seven departments were 
under her control. By profession she is a qualified nurse with an honours degree in nursing. 
As to Frank, the trial court considered that he was, at 42 years of age, a first offender. He 
had been married since 1999 and had two children aged nine and four years respectively. 
The trial court also considered as relevant in Frank’s favour the fact that unlike Sheryl, he 
did not put up a false version in his defence, but merely exercised his constitutional right to 
require the State to prove its case against him. Another factor was that by the time the trial 
was finalised he had been in custody for a period of 15 months. 
9
 Para 12. 
10 See fn 9 above. 18
[31] As to the offence, the trial court observed that the appellants were convicted of a 
very serious offence; that the lives of drug addicts are often destroyed by their addiction, 
the effects of which are not normally felt by the addicts only, but also by the members of 
their families and that society therefore ‘needs to be protected [from] those who might 
consider making it their business to import these drugs . . .’. The court, however, did not 
consider these factors to be of an aggravating nature. But as against Frank, the court 
reasoned that the fact that he was responsible for payment of remuneration and arranging 
flights for Tessa and Charmaine and paying therefor, outweighed the mitigating effects of 
him having been in custody for 15 months and the fact that he did not put up a false 
version before the court. With regard to Sheryl, the trial court found that she played a 
lesser role than that played by Frank, although her role was nevertheless important and 
significant. Her prospects of rehabilitation, therefore, appeared to be good, it said. The 
court accepted that ‘similar considerations should possibly also be attributed to [Frank]’. It 
ultimately considered ‘these aforesaid considerations to be sufficiently compelling and 
substantial to permit [it] to deviate from the minimum sentence prescribed by [the minimum 
sentence legislation]’. 
[32] Counsel for the State contended that there was nothing extraordinary about Sheryl 
that called for a lesser sentence than that ordained by the Legislature and that there are in 
fact several aggravating circumstances that the trial court overlooked. These are that 
Sheryl would no doubt have learned, during her studies towards a nursing qualification, of 
the dangers associated with hard drugs; that she put up a false version and shied away 
from cross-examination and that she showed no remorse. In addition, counsel submitted 
that the trial court should have considered as aggravating the fact that Sheryl abused her 
office by using the municipality’s telephone and other resources, such as data message 
facilities, in the commission of the offence. In respect of Frank, counsel argued that the 
time spent in custody while awaiting the finalisation of the trial was of his own making and 
thus should not redound to his benefit. 
[33] It is in my view unnecessary to consider the question whether the trial court 
misdirected itself when it considered the existence or otherwise of substantial and 
compelling circumstances. This is because I consider the disparity between the sentence 
imposed by the trial court and that which this court would have imposed had it been the 19
trial court to be so marked that it can properly be described as disturbingly inappropriate. 
Our courts have frequently expressed themselves on the seriousness of the crime of 
dealing in cocaine, or importing it into this country. In S v Homareda 1999 (2) SACR 319 
(W) Cloete J (Robinson AJ concurring) said: 
‘The type of offence of which the appellant stands convicted has the potential to ruin the lives of 
families in South Africa. 
The aggravating factors are that it was cocaine, and a substantial (although not an excessive) 
quantity thereof – 300 grams – which was brought into South Africa in condoms which he had 
swallowed; and drug trafficking of this nature is on the increase, to such an extent that it has been 
considered necessary to establish a branch of SANAB at Johannesburg International Airport, 
where the appellant entered this country.’11
In S v Jimenez 2003 (1) SACR 507 (SCA) Olivier JA, in a separate concurring judgment, 
made the following comment after having referred to the judgment of Steyn AJ in S v 
Sebata 1994 (2) SACR 319 (C): 
‘To the list of evils enumerated above must be added the devastating effect the addiction to hard 
drugs has on the family, relations, employees and friends of the user. Families fall apart, are 
bankrupted and drained emotionally by the experience of seeing a family member, usually a youth, 
becoming addicted and changing from a healthy, lovely child to a human wreck. . . .’12
And in Keyser Heher JA observed that while the street value of the cocaine in that case 
was materially more than that in Jimenez, ‘more important is the number of lives potentially 
affected by the use of the drug’ and that the appellant ‘must have reconciled himself to 
sowing the seeds of destruction, directly and indirectly, in the lives of a substantial number 
of people, including children’.13
[34] What may be added to these pertinent comments is the fact that in most cases the 
courier or ‘mule’ is caught, while the handler (the real dealer or importer) remains safe in 
the background, to carry on with his/her evil deeds. In the present matter, it was only 
11 At 326h–i.
12 Para 25. 
13 Para 30. 20
through the courage and determination of Tessa’s mother that the real culprits have 
been brought to book. The comments and observations made in the judgments referred to 
above apply equally, if not more, to them and the effects of their deeds on the community 
at large far outweigh their personal circumstances and justify a long term of imprisonment. 
[35] In Keyser a courier who illegally brought into the country 6545 grams of cocaine with 
a street value of at least R2 million was sentenced by a regional magistrate to 20 years’ 
imprisonment, which sentence was confirmed on appeal to the South Gauteng High Court 
and subsequently by this court. In Homareda, a courier, who had pleaded guilty to dealing 
in cocaine worth R90 000, was sentenced by a magistrate to 15 years’ imprisonment. That 
sentence was reduced on appeal to 10 years’ imprisonment. In Jimenez a sentence of 12 
years’ imprisonment for 653,4 grams of cocaine was imposed by a magistrate and 
confirmed on appeal by the Johannesburg High Court and later this court. In the present 
matter cocaine with a street value of more than R2 million was involved. It may well be, as 
the trial court found, that Sheryl played a lesser role in the whole enterprise, but I agree 
with counsel for the State that as a qualified nurse she must have known the dangers 
inherent in the use of drugs. Yet she was a willing partner in the commission of the crime, 
who befriended and preyed on vulnerable women in furtherance of the criminal enterprise. I 
consider that the trial court was correct in treating the appellants equally. 
[36] For all these reasons I am of the view that a term of imprisonment for 20 years is an 
appropriate sentence in the circumstances. The disparity between that sentence and the 
one of 12 years’ imprisonment imposed on each appellant by the trial court is so marked 
that it can properly be described as disturbingly inappropriate. This court is accordingly at 
large to impose sentence afresh. 
[37] In the result, the following order is made: 
1 The appellants’ appeals against their convictions are dismissed. 
2 The sentences imposed by the trial court are set aside and replaced with a sentence of 
20 years’ imprisonment in respect of each appellant. 
3 In respect of the second appellant the sentence is antedated to 6 May 2011. 21
________________________ 
L Mpati 
President 
Appearances 
First Appellant: K J Kemp SC 
Instructed by: 
Ngubane & Partners Inc, Durban 
N W Phalatsi & Partners, Bloemfontein 
Second Appellant: J L C J van Vuuren SC 
 Instructed by: 
Shaun Hamilton Attorneys, Johannesburg 
 Symington & De Kok Attorneys, Bloemfontein 
Respondent: I P Cooke, (with him A A Watt) 
 Instructed by: 
The Director of Public Prosecutions, 
Pietermaritzburg 
The Director of Public Prosecutions, 
Bloemfontein 

http://www.justice.gov.za/sca/judgments/sca_2012/sca2012-155.pdf