13 Nov 2019

 A case in which one ‘Prophet’ Bonang Ngwenya, is accused of intent to defraud the state continues today before Magistrate Odirile Mokgatle and the prosecution is expected to call the last witnesses.

‘Prophet’ Bonang, who identifies himself as Neo Tanka, is accused of forgery of a national identity card as well as a driver’s license and attempt to apply for a national passport.

On November 12, the prosecution led by Sub Inspector Edwin Supang, called Ms Josephine Gower, the woman that the accused purportedly claimed to be his mother.

However, when she took the witness stand, Ms Gower disputed that she was the mother to the accused as he would like the court to believe. 

“He is not my son and he very well knows it. Even the DNA test conducted indicated as much,” she said.

She indicated that she only got introduced to the accused person while she was on a business trip in Francistown.

“One man by the name of Jomo informed me that there was a young boy by the name of Bonang who was very good at assisting people with life problems. So I insisted on meeting him and we exchanged numbers because I wanted to first discuss with my husband that we engage his services,” she said.

She said after agreeing with her husband, they invited the accused person to Jwaneng where he stayed with them for some years before he moved out. 

She said all along, she treated the accused as she would her child because of his age.

She said even after he moved out of her house, they maintained their relationship and the accused kept visiting. 

Ms Gower said she later had a case of her own of falsifying identity documents which was brought before the courts of law which resulted in her deportation to South Africa where she originated.

She said from henceforth, she never had anything to do with the accused until the police called her to inform her that there was someone with suspicious documents claiming to be her son.

During cross examination however, the accused said at no stage did he  claim to be the son of Ms Gower. 

“I still maintain that one Margaret Tanka is my mother, not Ms Gower. So if Ms Gower says that she is not Margaret Tanka then I never claimed she is my mother,” he said.

However, Ms Gower indicated that when she falsified her documents in the case that she was found guilty, she used the names Margaret Tanka. 

“So I can safely say that I once used the names Margaret Tanka as mine. Margaret is my other name and Tanka is the surname of the man I was in a relationship with at the time,” she said.

She also indicated that the identity number that appeared for ‘mother’ in the Omang application by the accused was the same number that was allocated to her in her forged identity card, and said she could not state how the accused got hold of the other supporting documents he used to apply for his identity card as she was in South Africa by then. Ends