ANA reports that an application by the defence to have convicted fraudster Portia Sizani’s case taken on special review was dismissed in the Port Elizabeth Commercial Crimes Court on Tuesday.  

Earlier in March, Sizani, wife of SA’s ambassador to Germany and former ANC chief whip Stone Sizani, was found guilty of 15 counts of fraud and nine counts of money laundering.  She defrauded the Eastern Cape education department out of more than R1.2 million by processing several fraudulent applications for Grade R teaching posts.  Sizani was the Early Childhood Development (ECD) district co-ordinator at the time when she appointed “ghost teachers” and pocketed their pay during 2009 and 2010.  In July, defence advocate Johan Wessels brought the application for special review citing that the defence had been forced to close its case when it was not ready to do so.  However, the magistrate said in his judgment that the court had had to declare the defence’s case closed because it had refused to do so.  Sizani started working for the department as a teacher in East London in 1991 and slowly worked her way up the ranks.  Her husband was the former education MEC and resigned from that position in 2002.

• Read the full original of the above report by Raahil Sain at Independent News

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