A Cape Town regional magistrate on Wednesday rejected a bid by former Western Cape premier Peter Marais and co-accused David Malatsi for their discharge on two counts of corruption totalling R400 000.
Magistrate Andre le Grange did, however, discharge Malatsi on a third corruption count that he alone faced, after the prosecution conceded a lack of evidence.
Malatsi still has to answer to four fraud and theft charges.
The joint corruption charges relate to payments made into bank accounts of the New National Party — of which Marais was then Western Cape leader — in 2002 by Italian developer Count Riccardo Agusta.
The state claims the payments were bribes to smooth the approval process for Agusta’s Roodefontein golf-estate development at Plettenberg Bay.
Agusta has already paid a R1-million fine after concluding a plea bargain with the Scorpions.
Wednesday’s ruling followed an application by Marais and Malatsi’s lawyers at the end of the state case, in which 45 witnesses were called since the trial started in November 2003.
Le Grange said he was satisfied that there was enough prima facie evidence before him on which a reasonable court could convict the two men.
He said though the arguments raised by Marais’s advocate Craig Webster were ”not without substance or merit”, the court could not ignore evidence that had been led on the timing of events that led up to the payments into the NNP accounts, the evidence of a senior official in Malatsi’s department, Ingrid Coetzee, and the record of Malatsi’s interview with the Scorpions, which implicated Marais.
Discharging Marais, in particular, at this stage would compromise the proper administration of justice.
Marais was clearly disappointed at the ruling, but put on a brave face for the media outside the court building after Le Grange postponed the case to February 22 next year.
With his wife, Bonnita, at his side, he told journalists he respects the court’s ruling, ”though I’ll be lying if I say I’m not shocked”.
”I’ll prove in February that I am innocent and the state is wrong. I’m not down. I’m an eagle: I’ll keep on flying.”
Malatsi also maintained his innocence, but said the magistrate acted fairly in terms of the audi alteram rule.
”He has not heard what I have to say in the matter,” he said. ”I’m not afraid to face the end of this, because in all fairness I believe God is a better judge than any human being.”
This week’s court proceedings have been monitored by an official from the office of Minister of Environmental Affairs and Tourism Marthinus van Schalkwyk, who was New National Party national leader at the time the payments were made.
Also briefly in the public gallery on Wednesday was attorney Norman Snitcher, who acts for Mafia kingpin Vito Palazzolo, who according to one witness in the trial played a key role in the Roodefontein development. — Sapa