Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula sits in the dock of court eight at the Pretoria Magistrate's Court. Photo: Delwyn Verasamy
The National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) is gunning for a 15-year minimum jail sentence for former National Assembly speaker Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula, who faces multiple corruption charges for allegedly soliciting and receiving bribes totalling R4.5 million.
The stiff sentence the state wants to impose on her was revealed in the charge sheet submitted by advocate Bheki Manyathi, the lead prosecutor in the case, and the Investigating Directorate’s (ID) deputy director of public prosecutions.
The ID is the NPA’s graft-busting and prosecutions division.
Mapisa-Nqakula is accused of soliciting and receiving more than R2.5 million over 11 payments between December 2016 and July 2019 from a former South African National Defence Force contractor, named in the charge sheet as Nombasa Ntsondwa-Ndhlovu, who has turned state witness.
The charge sheet added that the former speaker solicited R2 million from Ntsondwa-Ndhlovu in September 2018 but the contractor did not pay the alleged bribery request. This was during the senior ANC member’s nine-year tenure as defence minister, which ended in 2021.
On Thursday, the former speaker, who unceremoniously resigned from her post on Wednesday, made her first appearance in the Pretoria magistrate’s court. This was after handing herself over for arrest, ending a nearly three-week fight with the NPA that included a failed high court challenge to block her arrest.
Mapisa-Nqakula has pinned her hopes of being acquitted of the 12 corruption charges and one of money laundering on a mysterious wig which the police seized as evidence during an ID-led raid on her Johannesburg house on 19 March.
She was adamant in court on Thursday that even if the state secured a conviction against her, her age — 67 — meant she would not be jailed, but rather serve her sentence at home.
Mapisa-Nqakula made her assertions in the bail application affidavit she submitted to the court, which was read out by her legal representative, advocate Graham Kerr-Phillips, who asserted that the NPA had a “weak case” against his client.
These claims were rejected by Manyathi, who said that, as an officer of the court, he would not “mislead” the judiciary by enrolling a matter that the NPA was not confident it could successfully prosecute.
In the charge sheet, Manyathi stated that Mapisa-Nqakula’s alleged crimes fell within section 51 of the Criminal Law Amendment Act “in that the offences involve amounts of more than R500 000”.
The Act “makes provision for the imposition of minimum sentences in respect of serious offences”, with a corruption conviction of more than R500 000 in value carrying a mandatory 15-year prison term.
According to the charge sheet, the former speaker allegedly received her first bribe of R700 000 in December 2016 after Ntsondwa-Ndhlovu’s defence logistics company, Umkhombe, received more than R180 million, in two contracts, in February and August of that year.
“On or about November 2016, the accused allegedly requested the late secretary of defence, Dr Sam Gulube, to approach Nombasa and request her to pay her R300 0000. Nombasa handed R300 000 in cash to the late Gulube a few days later at his residence,” the state alleged.
It added that Mapisa-Nqakula met the contractor at Johannesburg’s OR Tambo International Airport, where “it was agreed that all future engagements would be directly between the accused and Nombasa”.
But on Thursday, the former speaker hit back at the NPA, stating in her affidavit that it relied on one witness and had no evidence to corroborate its claims — arguing there was no case against her.
“It is quite clear that the evidence against me comes from the [state witness], a single witness, an informer and an accomplice,” she charged.
During the 19 March raid at her home, the police seized a wig believed to have been given to Mapisa-Nqakula in February 2019, along with R300 000 in cash.
Mapisa-Nqakula disputed that her hair accessory could be evidence more than five years after the alleged bribery.
“I don’t know why that wig, out of many that I have, was chosen [to be seized],” she stated, adding that she would not interfere with the state’s case.
“My release on bail cannot prejudice the public. If there were a conviction, which I [doubt], it will result in a non-custodial [jail] sentence,” she added.
“The evidence is with the state. I will have no effect on the investigation during the trial. I have no interest to interfere with the state’s case. I embrace the legal system.”
Manyathi said the prosecution was well prepared and would arrest another suspect when the former speaker returned to court.
“I am the lead prosecutor and I know the case. It is simply not the case that the state is relying on the evidence of a single witness,” he charged. “There is ample independent evidence that it corroborates [the alleged bribes]. I stand here to say that the case is not weak.”
Mapisa-Nqakula was released on bail of R50 000 and is set to return to court in June.