November 17, 2013
Produced by Frank Ferro
We investigate the plight of thousands of South African drug mules that are used as decoys to facilitate the trafficking of drugs in Brazil; while others are used as cocaine couriers for global drug syndicates. This in the pretext of the soon to be released, high profile drug mule Tessa Beetge who is expected to serve the remainder of her 8-year sentence for drug trafficking on parole. Special Assignment conducts an exclusive interview with Beetge in a Brazil jail, ahead of her release date. It was an emotional time for her as she recently lost her mother, Marie Swanepoel, after a short illness.
We also attended the funeral of Marie Swanepoel in a Styensburg a deep rural town in the Eastern Cape to where she had relocated to prepare for her daughters homecoming. Swanepoel was remembered as an unassuming quiet woman who gathered the evidence that got the former wife of the State a Secutity Minister, Sheryl Cwele and her co-accused convicted to a 12-year prison sentence for drug dealing.
In the Special Assignment interview, Tessa Beetge forgives Sheryl Cwele and her co-accused Frank Nabolisa a gesture she feels she had to do, so she could move on with her life. She also speaks about the regret she has for not being there for her two daughters when she was jailed in Brazil for drugs. Beetge also laments the fact that her mother was never able to forgive, Sheryl for what she had done to the family after Sheryl recently asked Marie for her forgiveness.
We also investigate the challenges South African drug mules face once they are out on parole, with no documents, money or a place to stay, seen by the Brazilian Authorities – as “illegal zombies”. According to the Brazilian Prison Authorities, South Africa leads the ranking in the numbers of mules arrested for drug trafficking. A serious problem which they say the South African Authorities have shown little interest in combating as the numbers of mules sent to Brazil continue to increase.
Brazil has also expressed grave concern in South Africa’s scant interest in signing a prison transfer agreement that will see their citizens serving their sentences in South African jails.
Lastly we go undercover in cracolandia (crackland) – a run-down part of Sao Paulo where smoking crack cocaine is not criminalized and is openly smoked in full view of the police. It’s a bleak place where hundreds of crack addicts walk around, wrapped in filthy blankets smoking the addictive drug which has devastated most Brazilian cities. We were hoping to find some recently paroled South African’s that had made cracolandia their home. But we were caught in the midst of a police raid that saw violent clashes between the police and the drug dependents of cracolandia.
What kind of a country is Brazil for South African’s out on parole and for those in prison what are the conditions like for them in jail?
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