Clearly, Passer-by's interpretation could in theory indicate a deceitful Dewani. The problem is that there could also be a totally innocent explanation. For example, Anni agreeing to Tongo's suggestion to see some real African nightlife.
If Passer-by's point was bolstered by a wealth of other evidence showing Dewani to be guilty then it would be a valid point. Conversely if unsupported by any credible evidence (which is why the case was thrown out), then it can only be "deeply significant" to someone who is clutching wildly for something....anything....to feed their confirmation bias.
Some of you may be temporarily fooled by Passer-by's speculative mining for deceptive intent in Dewanis words but given the rest of the circumstances, the hitman story cannot be believed to be true. Both passes through Gugulethu were enacted by Tongo the friendly tour guide, the man in control of the car. The first time he offered to show them Mzolis, a place recommended by Jamie Oliver and they drove past and did a U-turn. That was when the hijack was first supposed to occur. Then after dinner, helpful Tongo again drove them into the township where his hijackers were waiting, quite possibly at Anni's unwilling, unknowing insistence.
Even if you disregard every other point on our site, the two points below make it clear that there was no agreement between Dewani and Tongo. Passer-by will say that they contain "speculation" but every detail was agreed by all parties; the judge, the defence, and the prosecution. None of the details below are in dispute. Don't take my word for it. Rather see what a senior judge had to say.
http://www.saflii.org/za/cases/ZAWCHC/2014/188.html
Paragraphs below all make it very clear that there was no agreement between Tongo and Dewani.
23.1.71
23.1.78
23.1.79
23.1.86
23.1.87
For further verification, the State and Defence Heads of Argument can also be found on our new "Useful links" page.
TRUE (33)
On the night of the fatal robbery, Zola Tongo made two “passes” through Gugulethu, with the Dewanis travelling in his taxi. The hijacking was supposed to occur on the first pass, however it didn’t eventuate because Qwabe and Mngeni failed to get a ride to the agreed location by the agreed time. After stopping for dinner, the hijacking was re-scheduled and took place later in the evening during the second pass through Gugulethu. Tongo admitted, under oath, that he made no attempt to ascertain whether the money was in the car prior to the first pass through Gugulethu, and since the Dewanis sat in the back of the taxi, Tongo knew with 100% certainty that the money could not be in the cubbyhole. This point is of great importance, given Zola Tongo’s claim that an integral part of the plan was for Dewani to leave an “agreed” R15,000 in the car’s cubbyhole (glovebox) for the hijackers. So despite knowing that the key element of his own version, the price of the hit, was not in place he was content to drive to the hijacking spot anyway. This is solid proof that there was no “agreed” sum, and that this was in fact a robbery/kidnapping operation of which Shrien Dewani had absolutely no knowledge. Paragraphs 23.1.71 and 23.1.78 of the Judgement detail this crucial point, and highlight Tongo’s deception.
True (35)
Shrien Dewani did not even have the allegedly “agreed” R15,000 with him when the car was hijacked. In other words, the “hitman” story alleged that not only did Dewani arrange for the murder of his wife, but he then attempted to short-change the two unknown, armed, dangerous gunmen who were carrying out his wishes, all whilst he was still in the taxi with them, completely at their mercy. His alleged masterplan would also see him ejected from the taxi, alone and with no phone or money, lost in the middle of a township at night.
Passer-by has indeed bolstered it with a wealth of other circumstantial evidence highlighting the extreme unlikelihood that a tourist would visit this Township, including posting links to newspaper articles saying it was rare to see tourists there and pointing out what the millions of other tourists who visit Cape Town do right on their doorstep. A small Barbeque restaurant cannot cater for millions of tourists - if it could, it would move to the Waterfront. All circumstantial evidence could have been used in court: for some reason Dewanifacts thinks if that if my circumstantial evidence was valid, I would have been called as a witness at the trial - which is a rather weird suggestion - ergo, as I wasn't called as a witness the circumstantial evidence isn't valid. I think any rational person would realise the prosecution would/should have invited someone from the Tourism Office to testify some statistics about what percentage of tourists visit which attractions, and then Mzoli himself to testify as to how many tourists he gets on average at his restaurant to work out the unlikeliness of millionaires visiting his restaurant in their first 24hrs in Cape Town.
But Dewanifacts dismisses all this as just 'tourist information' and Dewani himself scoffed at the idea that he took a risk when he corrected the facts of the BBC reporter. In case you missed the posts, that particular Township has averaged a murder every 2.5 days in the last 5 years, and in an article in the Guardian local women said they don't go out at night because it's so dangerous.
There is other evidence where Dewani damns himself.
There were text messages between him and the Taxi driver whilst they were driving around that evening discussing Dewani leaving money in the car for the Taxidriver. We have no idea why he would be sitting in the car with the driver next to his wife texting the driver, we can only speculate. Dewani later alleged it was because the Taxidriver was secretly arranging a surprise for his wife. That surprise may have been a helicopter trip. I have provided detailed information about the helicopter trip, which departs from the Waterfront about 5mins walk from the Dewani's hotel, which has advertising all over the Waterfront and in hotels, and which takes telephone bookings and payment by credit card over the phone. That is all we know - but Dewanifacts
speculates that Dewani was naive enough to think this poor Taxidriver from the Townships had the contacts to do a 'special' trip and illegally land on Table Mountain. This is pure speculation - and it takes us further and further away from the
fact that on the night of the murders Dewani was texting the Taxidriver about leaving money in the car whilst his wife sat next to him oblivious.
Dewani also damns himself by spending 45 minutes alone with the Taxidriver a few hours before the murders, whilst Anni was sunbathing by the pool. Despite being a minute's walk from more than half a dozen banks and cashpoints at the Waterfront, he had the Taxidriver drive a few minutes into 'the Central Business District' (recently renovated: it used to be a no-go zone about 12 years ago, so is very eclectic with many businesses which operated when it was a dangerous area still on a long lease next to trendy boutiques and bars). Then, despite being literally adjacent to several large banks, he changed his money at a 'jewellers' - I'll be told off if I tell you what it's like inside (it will be dismissed as Tourist Information) even though I've been inside: it's a small, pokey, dusty Alladins Cave and looks like a pawnbrokers. They will give you cash for gold and also buy and sell - how shall we put this - 'pre-loved' jewelry. By law they are meant to record transactions, obviously - but obviously they don't and the owner admitted on oath that she forgot to record this one. Apparently she changed the millionaire Dewani's dollars into South African Rand, but there is no record to confirm what took place or whether he traded cash or jewelry or how much money he was given. It's interesting she was adamant it was dollars, which is a bit awkward because he claimed to only have sterling on him whilst accounting for money he took for his holiday. Also at court it came out that her Assistant had made a statement to police saying she had been given gold to take to the back of the shop to turn into rands. Gold? U.S. dollars? Definitely not sterling. Possibly this why it couldn't be done in the branch of First National Bank next door.
http://citizen.co.za/257708/dewani-trial-currency-exchange-store-owner-testifies/I've always found it odd that
he didn't give the Taxidriver the cash for the 'surprise' then. Or, given he was already away from Anni, just asked Tongo to run him round to the tip of the Waterfront so he could pop in for a chat with the helicopter tour operators and pay them himself there and then.
There are, of course, any number of reasons we could speculate why he
might have behaved like this - you'll find them posing as 'facts' on Dewanifacts' blog. But the reality is, we don't know why and all the witnesses in this case are proven liars.
