Mark Thatcher quits SA
2005-01-13 18:16
Cape Town - Mark Thatcher left South Africa on Thursday after pleading
guilty in a Cape Town court to charges linked to an alleged coup
plot in oil-rich Equatorial Guinea, a move which ended travel
restrictions imposed on him.
Local photographers saw the son of British former prime minister
Margaret Thatcher, who had to surrender his passport and remain in
Cape Town after his arrest on August 25, go through immigration at
Cape Town's International Airport.
Thatcher's lawyers were unavailable for comment, but he arrived
at the airport just before a scheduled flight for London.
His mother in a statement released in London expressed her
"delight" at the deal which freed her son's movements. Thatcher's
Texan-born wife and two children are in the United States.
Earlier in the day, the 51-year-old businessman, was fined R3m (just over $500 000) and given a
four-year suspended prison term after the plea bargain in which he
admitted to an unwitting role in the alleged putsch plot.
Thatcher has promised to pay the fine by Saturday, with the
judge warning that if he failed to pay by then, he would be jailed
for five years.
Thatcher was arrested at his Cape Town villa on charges of
contributing $275 000 to help finance the suspected plot to
overthrow longtime Equatorial Guinea leader Teodoro Obiang Nguema.
He allegedly put up the cash to purchase a helicopter to fly
opposition leader Severo Moto, currently living in exile in Spain,
to Malabo once Obiang had been deposed.
Thatcher's lawyers have repeatedly denied that he helped
bankroll the plot, saying the funds he paid were an investment in
an air ambulance venture for west Africa.
On Thursday, he pleaded guilty to contravening section two South
Africa's Regulation of Foreign Military Assistance Act which
prohibits the "recruitment, use or training of persons ... or
financing or engaging in mercenary activity".
- AFP