wfn.org | Boesak Jailed For Six Years, Despite Tutu's Plea For Mercy

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29-March-1999 
99126 
 
    Boesak Jailed For Six Years, 
    Despite Tutu's Plea For Mercy 
 
    by Noel Bruyns 
    Ecumenical News International 
 
EAST LONDON, South Africa- Allan Boesak, former clergyman and leading 
campaigner against apartheid, has been sentenced in Cape Town to six years 
in prison by the Cape High Court for fraud and theft of 1.3 million rand 
($210,000 at current exchange rates) in the 1980s that was meant for 
victims of apartheid. 
 
    Sentencing Boesak, Judge John Foxcroft ignored a plea for mercy by an 
even more famous church opponent of apartheid, Archbishop Desmond Tutu. 
 
    Handing down the sentence on March 24, Judge Foxcroft said that Boesak 
had been a senior churchman in a position of trust, and, alluding to 
Boesak's contribution as a leading activist in the anti-apartheid struggle, 
added, "I know of no reason in law why a person who has done a great deal 
of good for his country should be exonerated and not be punished for common 
law offenses." 
 
    Boesak had played an important role in opposing oppression and 
injustice in South Africa and ridding the country of the hated apartheid 
system, he said.  He did not doubt that Boesak enjoyed international 
standing, and had been honored as a theologian. 
 
    Boesak is familiar to many U.S. Presbyterians, having served as the 
preacher for the 1984 General Assembly in Phoenix, and also as the preacher 
for the dedication of the Presbyterian Center in Louisville in 1988. 
 
    Judge Foxcroft refused an application for leave to appeal.  But Boesak, 
aged 53,  is still at liberty, on his own recognisance, pending an 
application by his counsel, Mike Maritz, to petition the Chief Justice of 
South Africa to overturn his conviction. 
 
    On March 17 the court found that Boesak had misappropriated donor funds 
channeled through the anti-apartheid non-governmental organization, the 
Foundation for Peace and Justice (FPJ), of which he was director. 
 
    Judge Foxcroft sentenced the ex-pastor of the Dutch Reformed Mission 
Church and former president of the World Alliance of Reformed Churches to 
two years for stealing $41,500 from a donation made by U.S. pop singer Paul 
Simon to the Children's Fund set up by the FPJ and two years for defrauding 
the trust by concealing the full $110,000 that Simon had donated. 
 
    Judge Foxcroft ordered that these two sentences run concurrently. 
 
    Boesak also received a two-year sentence for stealing $122,000 donated 
by the Swedish International Development Agency (Sida), and another two 
years for stealing more than $48,000 to pay deposits on two houses and pay 
the debts of his second wife, Elna. 
 
    Boesak declined to take the witness box during his trial which began in 
August last year. But after the sentencing, he told supporters on the steps 
outside the court that he could not have travelled overseas to campaign for 
sanctions against the apartheid regime if he had had to stay in the country 
to keep a check on how donor funds were being used by the FPJ staff. 
 
    Boesak's bookkeeper at the FPJ, Freddie Steenkamp, was given a six-year 
prison sentence by Judge Foxcroft last year after pleading guilty for his 
part in the fraud and theft. 
 
    Archbishop Tutu said he was "distressed" by the sentence given to 
Boesak. Retired Anglican Archbishop of Cape Town, Nobel Peace laureate and 
chairman of the recently concluded Truth and Reconciliation Commission, 
Tutu was speaking in Atlanta. 
 
    "I am deeply distressed at the conviction and sentencing of Allan 
Boesak.  He played a leading role in the struggle against an evil system," 
Archbishop Tutu said in a statement.  "I submitted an affidavit to the 
court asking that he be spared jail." 
 
    Archbishop Tutu said he "respectfully" disagreed with the judge, but 
the issue was in the hands of the court. 
 
    Last year South Africa's justice minister, Dullah Omar, a friend of 
Boesak, caused controversy when he went to the airport to welcome Boesak on 
his return to South Africa from the United States to face prosecution. 
Critics claimed it was improper for a justice minister to welcome so 
publicly and enthusiastically someone who was being investigated by the 
judicial system for serious crimes. 
 
    At the time, Omar told the media he would not apologize, adding that 
"there were people 
who during the apartheid years had to handle money, but did not dare to 
keep proper public records because of security police scrutiny." 
 
    South African Broadcasting Corporation television news quoted the state 
prosecutor, J.C. Gerber, saying that further court cases were expected 
concerning the Foundation for Peace and Justice. 
 
    Meanwhile, the South African Council of Churches (SACC) issued a 
statement in response to the verdict calling for "an overall assessment of 
the courts and sentencing."  SACC said, "We do not believe that anyone who 
defrauds should go unpunished" but that the verdict "gives the impression 
that there is one law for white people and another for black 
 
    It also said the verdict gives the impression "that punitive justice is 
the only option" adding that compensation in the form of community service 
rather than jail time would be of more value to South Africa. 

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