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A judge has testified in a Pretoria court how a traffic official tried to elicit a bribe from her after pulling her over for speeding.
“Hello sweetie, are you having a nice day?” the traffic official allegedly asked the judge.
"I was not (having a nice day)," Judge Geraldine Borchers testified in the Pretoria Regional Court on Monday.
Unity Lovely Mahlangu, 46, was accused of trying to get Borchers to pay a bribe on June 26 last year.
She denied guilt.
Knew she had been speeding
Mahlangu apparently didn't realise that Borchers was a judge in the South Gauteng High Court.
Borchers testified that she had been travelling at about 160km/h on the N4 between Pretoria and Bronkhorstspruit when she was pulled over.
According to Borchers, Mahlangu asked her: "Are you happy to pay that (fine of) R800?"
"I said of course I'm not happy, but I have to pay it because I'm guilty."
The court heard how Mahlangu then pointed to her clipboard and asked if she should write down R800.
"Please don't tell me you're asking me to bribe you," Borchers replied.
Colleagues ignored her
"No, but you can pay a R200 fine right here," said Mahlangu, according to the judge's testimony.
"I was very angry and told her she had chosen the wrong person to try that with."
According to Borchers, Mahlangu then said she should just drive away, but the judge refused, and instead insisted on a fine and the name of the official.
"I yelled at her and she yelled at me and then I got out of the car."
Borchers testified that she approached Mahlangu's three colleagues who were standing at a speeding camera, but "they behaved as if I was invisible. They just kept staring at the road."
Case postponed
Borchers then stood directly in front of the speeding camera and threatened to smash it to pieces.
"(Mahlangu) was very upset and trembling at that stage." She handed Borchers a R600 fine.
Jafta Mabena, representing Mahlangu, asked Borchers why she had been driving so fast.
"I was negligent," she replied curtly.
The case was postponed until next month.
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