ESCAPE OPERATION: Shepherd and Mary Bushiri
Fugitive prophet Shepherd Bushiri and his wife, Mary, were smuggled out of South Africa in a James Bond-style operation.
The Sunday Independent reports that the Malawian couple were issued with diplomatic passports bearing decoy names and given cosmetic facial changes before being flown out of South Africa on their president, Lazarus Chakwera’s, hired jet.
Several diplomatic and military intelligence sources told the paper that Malawian intelligence embassy officials in Pretoria were in on the plan.
They said Bushiri and his wife were fetched from their home in Centurion in a Malawian embassy vehicle ahead of a scheduled 6pm flight as Chakwera wrapped up his meeting with President Cyril Ramaphosa.
They were driven to Air Force Base Waterkloof as part of an elaborate plot that involved senior Malawian and South African politicians and government officials and the alleged exchange of money.
Sources said the rattled Bushiri, who is the spiritual leader of the Enlightened Christian Gathering Church, sought the Malawian government’s help after his lawyers told him he faced a minimum 15-year jail term because the R100 million fraud and money laundering case against him was strong.
However, Ramaphosa’s spokesperson Tyrone Seale dismissed claims that the president worked with Chakwera to help Bushiri evade justice by arranging a decoy state visit and allowing his ministers and officials to co-operate with the Malawians.
“There is no basis to that....This visit was part of a solidarity tour that President Chakwera was undertaking around the region,” said Seale.
“President Chakwera undertook a solidarity tour and it was deemed feasible and safe to undertake the visit physically with the necessary Covid-19 controls in place.”
Meanwhile, Bushiri faces additional charges of rape registered with SAPS in 2018 and another in 2020.
He has maintained that the women were trying to extort money from him.
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