Winnie Mandela appeals conviction

PRETORIA – The feisty ex-wife of South Africa’s former president Nelson Mandela, Winnie Madikizela-Mandela, went before a high court yesterday to appeal her five-year sentence for fraud and theft.

Madikizela-Mandela, the former president of the African National Congress Women’s League (ANCWL), was convicted in April last year on 43 charges of fraud and 25 of theft totalling one million rand. Her lawyer, Ishmael Semenya, told the Pretoria high court she was only trying to help her clients when she obtained fraudulent bank loans for them by creating ficticious ANCWL employees.”The only thing she was trying to do was a valiant attempt to create a credible system for people to obtain financing that would not otherwise be able to approach a bank,” Semenya told the court.”There was an attempt to address a very critical social need.She tried to do social good and there was no attempt at self-enrichment.”The charges against Madikizela-Mandela and her fellow-accused, broker Addy Moolman, also pertain to Moolman arranging for premiums to be deducted from the loan applicants’ bank accounts for non-existent funeral policies.Semenya argued that Madikizela-Mandela did not receive a fair trail and that the magistrate had made a “credibility finding” against her before she even testified.But he added that if the appeal against her conviction was unsuccessful, Madikizela-Mandela’s entire sentence should be suspended because “if you have an applicant who’s a great-grandmother this (imprisonment) is not a proper thing.”Moolman was convicted alongside Madikizela-Mandela and was sentenced to seven years in prison, of which two were suspended.Both are out on bail pending the outcome of the appeal.Madikizela-Mandela, 67, known as the “Mother of the Nation” for her role in the anti-apartheid struggle, married Nelson Mandela in 1958, six years before the apartheid government jailed him for 27 years.The couple separated in 1992 two years before he became South Africa’s first democratically elected president and divorced in 1996.- Nampa-AFPHer lawyer, Ishmael Semenya, told the Pretoria high court she was only trying to help her clients when she obtained fraudulent bank loans for them by creating ficticious ANCWL employees.”The only thing she was trying to do was a valiant attempt to create a credible system for people to obtain financing that would not otherwise be able to approach a bank,” Semenya told the court.”There was an attempt to address a very critical social need.She tried to do social good and there was no attempt at self-enrichment.”The charges against Madikizela-Mandela and her fellow-accused, broker Addy Moolman, also pertain to Moolman arranging for premiums to be deducted from the loan applicants’ bank accounts for non-existent funeral policies.Semenya argued that Madikizela-Mandela did not receive a fair trail and that the magistrate had made a “credibility finding” against her before she even testified.But he added that if the appeal against her conviction was unsuccessful, Madikizela-Mandela’s entire sentence should be suspended because “if you have an applicant who’s a great-grandmother this (imprisonment) is not a proper thing.”Moolman was convicted alongside Madikizela-Mandela and was sentenced to seven years in prison, of which two were suspended.Both are out on bail pending the outcome of the appeal.Madikizela-Mandela, 67, known as the “Mother of the Nation” for her role in the anti-apartheid struggle, married Nelson Mandela in 1958, six years before the apartheid government jailed him for 27 years.The couple separated in 1992 two years before he became South Africa’s first democratically elected president and divorced in 1996.- Nampa-AFP