Detained South African citizen, CassimJee Bilal, says he is prepared to surrender his vehicle worth R300 000 as surety so he is allowed to attend to his ailing wife who urgently needs to go for surgery of a heart transplant.
Bilal was arrested together with three others for allegedly defrauding a Harare businesswoman, Olga Bungu, of $1 million.
Bilal (28), Henry Radebe (57), Samuel Risimati Baloyi (60) and Sydney Masito Sekgobela (44) were arrested after they allegedly dumped three Iveco trucks at First Lady Grace Mugabe’s orphanage in Harare in February this year.
In his affidavit, Bilal is seeking to be released to enable him to go to South Africa where his wife Nazmeera Ebrahim is in urgent need of undergoing surgery to rectify her heart condition.
She has failed to have the operation because her husband Bilal was arrested in February and has been in Zimbabwe since then.
In his founding affidavit filed together with an urgent chamber application last week, Bilal offered to surrender his Toyota Fortuner vehicle registration number BIL 786 GP, which is valued at R300 000, as security.
He has promised to return for trial in Zimbabwe after his wife has been attended to.
“I solemnly undertake to return to stand trial in this matter and deep in my heart I desperately want to be part of a trial as I am anxious to exonerate myself as I am simply a small casual contract employee caught in a dispute I am not involved in as my mandate was to start and end with the delivery of the three trucks,” reads the affidavit. He said he had been having sleepless nights because of the condition of his wife back in South Africa.
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“The matter of my wife’s heart transplant is very urgent and the sooner it is attended to the better for everyone especially myself as I am unlikely to continue having literal sleepless nights phoning my five-year old daughter endlessly and probably increasing her anxiety,” reads the affidavit. In a supporting affidavit Bilal’s wife’s medical practitioner, Dr Ahmed Rashid Essop, indicated the presence of Bilal was urgently needed for a way forward.
“This unfortunate young lady has been severely ill (and) is on our heart transplant list in the cardiac unit at Milpark,” reads the letter from Essop.
“She has been hospitalised in the intensive care unit on multiple occasions this year, has a young five-year-old child that she is unable to care for and is almost entirely dependent on her husband.”
Added the Essop: “His presence is required urgently back in Johannesburg both for assistance to her and for us to plan her forthcoming heart transplant which has been delayed for the past two months.
“Your help in expediting his return home on humanitarian grounds would be greatly appreciated.”
