A United Nations diplomat who saw French journalist Sophie Bouillon and her Zimbabwean boyfriend arrested by Johannesburg metro policemen says that she was also ordered by police to produce “mysterious” vehicle documentation.
On Wednesday the Mail & Guardian Online reported that Bouillon’s ordeal had made headlines in media across France.
On Thursday the prosecutor at the Johannesburg Magistrate’s Court dropped all charges against her and her boyfriend, Tendai. She was arrested in Braamfontein on charges of driving without a valid driver’s licence, interfering in an arrest and resisting arrest.
In her account, published verbatim in the French press, she described how she and Tendai were driving through downtown Johannesburg to attend a concert at about 10pm on Friday night when they were pulled over.
The police had refused to accept the validity of her international driver’s licence, saying it needed “a registration number obtainable from a police station”.
When she said she had never heard of such a requirement, she was fined R1000.
Police allegedly became angry when Tendai said they could beat the rap in court. They arrested him, and when he cursed them, assaulted and pepper-sprayed him.
The two were held overnight in Hillbrow police cells.
Bouillon, who won France’s prestigious journalism prize, Prix Albert Londres, last year, said she would now sue the metro police.
A driver who witnessed the arrest, a United Nations diplomat who asked not to be named, said she will assist Bouillon in her court action.
The diplomat told the M&G that she and a friend were stopped behind Bouillon and were also asked for registration papers that she knew nothing of.
“He was quite jovial and I didn’t feel threatened,” she said. “But I eventually realised that he was serious about this mysterious piece of paper.”
She then phoned a UN colleague, who told her the request was bogus. After speaking to the officer, she was allowed to go. Her friend, a University of Johannesburg academic, was listening to the conversation of metro policemen around the car in front of them.
“They made quite a few derogatory remarks about this French woman who was dating a Zimbabwean,” she said. This week Bouillon told the M&G she believed that xenophobic prejudice played a major part in the incident.
“He didn’t like the fact that a white girl was dating a black Zimbabwean,” she said.
Bouillon also describes in her account interactions with a drunk officer in charge of the Hillbrow police station and his xenophobic comments while signing the release papers.
Wayne Minnaar, spokesperson for the Johannesburg Metro Police Department, said police internal affairs had launched a preliminary investigation into the incident and that witnesses would be interviewed.
South African Police Service spokesperson Vishnu Naidoo said allegations against the Hillbrow police would be followed up.