A South African court has ordered Bellarmine Chatunga Mugabe, the youngest son of former Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe, to pay substantial fines and be deported following his conviction for pointing a toy gun at a person and violating immigration laws.
The ruling was delivered on Wednesday by a magistrate court in Johannesburg, where Mugabe and his co-accused, Tobias Matonhodze, have been in custody since their arrest in February.
According to court proceedings, both men pleaded guilty as part of a plea agreement with prosecutors. However, Mugabe’s immigration offence remains unclear, as details were not fully disclosed during the hearing.
The court heard that Mugabe was fined 400,000 rand (about $24,100) for pointing a toy gun in a separate incident and an additional 200,000 rand for breaching South Africa’s immigration laws.
Matonhodze, on his part, pleaded guilty to attempted murder and additional charges including defeating the ends of justice in connection with the shooting of a worker at a Johannesburg mansion where Mugabe had been staying.
He was sentenced to three years in prison and will be deported after serving his term.
Investigators told the Alexandra Magistrate’s Court that the worker who was shot twice in the back reached a compensation settlement of 250,000 rand, with a further 150,000 rand still to be paid. The firearm used in the shooting has not yet been recovered.
The case has drawn attention due to the involvement of the Mugabe family name, as Robert Mugabe ruled Zimbabwe for 37 years after independence in 1980 before being removed in a 2017 military coup. He died in 2019 at the age of 95.
Authorities have confirmed that deportation proceedings will follow the completion of legal processes in South Africa.
