Legal expert Melusi Xulu has poured cold water on the latest bid by Nandipha Magudumana to have the Bloemfontein High Court declare her arrest in Tanzania and subsequent deportation to South Africa unlawful.
Dr Magudumana was arrested last month, alongside convicted murderer and rapist Thabo Bester in Arusha.
Bester escaped from the Mangaung Correctional Centre last May, in a staged suicide which allegedly involved assistance from employees of the facility.
Magudumana is now facing charges that include aiding and abetting a convicted criminal with the matter expected to be heard by the court on Thursday.
Xulu says that Tanzania’s immigration laws provide for illegal immigrants to be deported.
“The Tanzanian Immigration Act says in section 14(2a-c) that if you are illegal in that country, or you’re a prohibited immigrant, the minister can deport you. So, the question is, was she arrested unlawfully by Tanzania? Was she an illegal immigrant in Tanzania, and if the answer is no, then she was arrested lawfully in Tanzania. Then it turned out that there was a warrant of arrest in South Africa, and that’s how she was brought to South Africa, so that she can face the alleged crimes that she committed, amongst them aiding Mr Bester, to escape from prison,” explains Xulu.
Xulu says if they can’t prove that, that was an unlawful arrest, there would be no prospects of success for the bid.
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