It will be another Christmas behind bars for the killers of murdered billionaire Wandile Bozwana, as the Gauteng High Court, Pretoria is scheduled to sentence the four on January 26.
This month, after a long leave, Judge Papi Masopa returned to court to conclude the trial that has been dragging its heels since Bozwana’s murder in October 2015.
Health issues pertaining to one of the defence advocates prevented the trial from concluding last week.
Prosecutor Jeniffer Cronje has asked the court to impose the highest sentence possible. She argued that Bozwana’s murder was well planned and orchestrated.
Bozwana was gunned down at the Garsfontein offramp, off the N1, in Pretoria, in October 2015.
The accused – Sipho Patrick Hudla, Robert Mutapa, Mamelodi businessman Vusi “Khekhe” Mathibela and Bonginkosi Paul Khumalo – have denied that they had any part in Bozwana’s murder or the attempted murder of his business partner, Mpho Baloyi.
Baloyi, who was driving at the time, was also hit by a bullet, but she managed to drive to a nearby business premises and summon help. Bozwana died in hospital shortly afterwards.
Earlier, Judge Masopa had turned down an application by the four accused for a discharge.
It is claimed that Mathibela’s co-accused acted on his instructions to kill Bozwana.
The prosecution’s case is that all four accused were at Sandton City at the same time as Bozwana and that they had followed his movements.
Video footage from the mall was presented to the court. One of the accused was identified as “watching” Bozwana and Baloyi while they shopped and had their nails done at a salon.
While the footage is unclear, a facial recognition expert testified that he could identify some of the accused via their body language and clothes.
Footage also showed that Mathibela was present that day at the nearby Nelson Mandela Square, which he did not deny. He and the other accused, however, maintained that they knew nothing about the incident and had not followed Bozwana and Baloyi to Pretoria.
They asked the court to acquit them, as there was no direct evidence linking them to the assassination. The court could not produce witnesses who could identify the shooters, although one witness did see a gunman from afar firing at the vehicle.
There was also no DNA evidence that linked the accused to the crime.
Cellphone experts who analysed their phones, however, found that three of the four accused’s phones were, at some stage, in the vicinity of the incident that day.
While the experts could testify only that the cellphone towers had picked up the handsets belonging to each accused, it could not be established who had been holding the phone.
The court convicted the four last year, after none of them took the stand to testify in their defence. While Mathibela called a witness to testify that he often shopped at Sandton City and it is thus not out of the ordinary that he was there on the day Bozwana was killed, that did not take matters further.
The court concluded at the time that all four accused were involved in the murder.
While the sentencing proceedings in January will conclude the lengthy court case, matters are far from over, as counsel acting for Mathibela has made it clear that he would appeal his client’s conviction. It is not known whether the other accused will follow suit.
Bozwana’s widow, Tsholofelo Bozwana, earlier told Independent Media that she wanted her husband’s killers to be brought to book as soon as possible. She said it was the only way she and her family could start the healing process.
While not a shred of evidence was presented to court about the motive for the murder, his widow said in a witness impact statement to court that her husband was busy with a business venture at the time.
“He created businesses that contributed to unemployment and supported the greater communities in the North West and around Pretoria.”
Mrs Bozwana said that when he was murdered, Bozwana had launched a company to loan money to companies that were awarded contracts but did not have the capital to start the projects. The company was due to start operating before the end of 2015.
Pretoria News