Schabir Shaik as he leaves a shop in Durban. Photo: Felix Dlangamandla

Convicted fraudster Schabir Shaik yesterday denied having assaulted a Durban journalist, saying she had accidently hit herself in the face during an altercation at a local golf course.

Sunday Tribune journalist Amanda Khoza claimed she was grabbed by the throat and slapped once on each cheek by Shaik at the Papwa Sewgolum golf course at the weekend.

She has laid a charge of assault against him at the Sydenham police station.

“I didn’t hit anyone. She (Khoza) proceeded to take a photograph of me (with her cellphone),” Shaik said in a telephone interview with the Daily News from his home in Morningside.

“I tried to pull it away from her, and when she pulled back, she hit herself on the face.”

He said Khoza had not identified herself when she had approached him on the golf course on Saturday.

According to a report in yesterday’s Sunday Tribune, Khoza and her colleague, Charmel Bowman, had gone to the golf course in Reservoir Hills with a freelance photographer after receiving a tip-off that Shaik was playing there.

The Tribune reported that Shaik, without warning, grabbed Khoza by her throat and slapped her right cheek.

Khoza shouted to the photographer to take a picture. She was still standing, shocked in disbelief, when Shaik hit her other cheek, shouting, “who sent you, how do I know that you are not a terrorist?”

The other men in the party then went after the photographer, hit him and grabbed his camera, the Tribune reported.

Shaik was released on medical parole, on the grounds that he was gravely ill, in March, 2009, after serving two years and four months of a 15-year sentence for bribery and corruption.

The Sunday Tribune report said Shaik had lashed out at Khoza in a “fit of rage” after being confronted.

But, said Shaik, “if you get a tip-off, it is your duty to contact the parole officer to find out if I am supposed to be outside. You can’t come and infringe on my privacy”.

He said he used his cellphone to phone his “parole officer”, who told Khoza that he was allowed out between 12pm and 6pm. “I have earned these hours with good behaviour,” said Shaik. “I went from two hours, to four hours and now I get six hours.”

Shaik said he was also allowed two hours every day during the week at any time of his choice.

He said that while freedom of expression was good, “she (Khoza) should have investigated first before coming to confront me. I would never hit a man, let alone a young girl”.

Shaik also said he was still ill and this incident had added to the stress of his hypertension, for which condition he said he was on chronic medication. “I have a wife and children. I have a life to live, I’m trying to keep fit and it’s all part of getting my health back.

“Only God knows when I will die. I’m 54 years now and not the man I used to be, but I am healing.”

Sunday Tribune editor Philani Mgwaba said yesterday that he expected the matter to be thoroughly investigated.

He said there were witnesses to the incident.

Mgwaba said Khoza had laid an assault charge against Shaik on Saturday night and “now we just have to wait for police to proceed with the investigation”.

Department of Correctional Services spokesman, Manelisi Wolela, said commenting on the incident would be speculative. “Once there are police documents, we will be able to comment specifically on the matter,” he said yesterday.

Speaking generally, Wolela said if there was concrete evidence of any parole conditions broken by a convicted person, the conditions were usually reviewed.

“Such conditions include good behaviour while out on parole, and depending on the seriousness of the parole rule being broken, the necessary measures are taken with the ultimate being the person being brought back to a facility,” he said.

The DA’s spokesman on correctional services, James Selfe, yesterday called for a full inquiry into the alleged assault of Khoza and for Shaik’s parole to be revoked.

If such an investigation corroborated the Tribune’s report, then “Shaik’s parole can and should be revoked in terms of section 75 of the Correctional Services Act”, Selfe said in a media statement.

“Mr Shaik has violated his parole conditions in the past, and assault would clearly constitute a further breach of these conditions.”

In an interview, Selfe said he planned to take this matter to Parliament, depending on the reaction of Correctional Services Minister Nosiviwe Mapisa Nqakula with whom he was scheduled to meet today. “This is not anything personal against Schabir, but if any parolee undermines the system, action needs to be taken, otherwise the parole system will lose its credibility,” he said.

KwaZulu-Natal police spokeswoman Brigadier Phindile Radebe said she could only confirm that a charge of assault was being investigated by police.