Hanse-Himarwa appeal ruling on Monday

A ruling in respect of former Minister of Education, Arts and Culture, Katrina Hanse-Himarwa’s application to be allowed leave to appeal against her conviction in the Supreme Court, will be made public in the High Court on Monday.
On 16 January 2020, High Court Judge Christie Liebenberg, after having listened to submissions and counter-arguments by the former minister’s defence lawyer Barry Roux and Deputy Prosecutor-General Ed Marondedze, said he will hand down the judgement on 3 February at about 10h00.
So come Monday, the former minister’s application to appeal against her conviction will be either granted or dismissed.
Hanse-Himarwa was convicted of corruption and sentenced to pay a fine of N$50 000 in the High Court in July 2019.
She approached the High Court with the urgent application on 16 January 2020, asking the court to be allowed leave to appeal against the corruption conviction in the Supreme Court.
The former minister is fighting only to be allowed the right to appeal the conviction and not her sentence.
In papers presented by her prominent South African defence lawyer, Roux, the former education minister said she is not satisfied with the High Court’s decision of finding her guilty on the charge of corruption.
“The High Court should allow us leave to appeal against the corruption conviction in the Windhoek Supreme Court. The Supreme Court should see whether the approach followed by the High Court was correct during trial and at the time of conviction,” said Roux.
The State representative strongly opposed the application for leave to appeal in the Supreme Court on the grounds that there was no misdirection done by the High Court during conviction.
Hanse-Himarwa, 52, was on 8 July 2019 found guilty by High Court Judge Liebenberg of wrongly and corruptly abusing or using her position as Governor of the Hardap Region to make changes to the original list of mass housing beneficiaries for the benefit of two of her relatives in December 2014.
On 31 July 2019, she was sentenced to pay a fine of N$50 000 or serve a direct prison sentence of 24 months of which 12 months were suspended for a period of five years on condition that she is not found guilty of any offence of corruption or other related criminal offences during the period of suspension.
Hanse-Himarwa during trial apologised to the two victims whose names she removed from the list, the court and the entire Namibian nation for her involvement in the housing allocation corruption scandal.
She stepped down from her position as minister after her conviction.
The evidence presented before court during trial showed that Hanse-Himarwa was indeed the person who, during her tenure as Hardap Governor, gave a directive that the original list of 19 mass housing beneficiaries be changed.
As per her directive, the names of Regina Kuhlman and Piet Fransman were then replaced with that of Christiana Lorraine Hanse and Justine Josephine Gowases - relatives of Hanse-Himarwa.
-NAMPA