Bowel movement produces glittering results

A FORMER worker at the Oranjemund diamond mine who was accused of stealing more than N$2,2 million worth of diamonds by hiding them in his bowels, pleaded guilty to a charge of theft of rough diamonds on Tuesday.

Despite having pleaded with Judge Annel Silungwe that he should not be given a prison sentence for his crime, Bernardo Ndiweda had to spend Tuesday night as perhaps the first of many in a Police cell following his guilty plea in the High Court in Windhoek. Judge Silungwe cancelled Ndiweda’s bail and remanded him in custody when he postponed Ndiweda’s case to today for sentencing.Ndiweda (47) admitted that he stole 107 rough diamonds from Namdeb at Oranjemund on December 18 2000.The stones, weighing a total of 222,64 carats, were valued at N$2,269 million.In the indictment which Public Prosecutor Orben Sibeya put to Ndiweda on Tuesday, it was charged that he was arrested after an X-ray examination at Namdeb’s personnel control centre revealed “foreign objects” in Ndiweda’s pelvic area.As a result of the X-ray examination, Ndiweda was taken to a hospital at the mining town where he was given laxatives.What followed was a two-million-dollar bowel movement that delivered glittering results.Emerging from Ndiweda’s lower intestine were four parcels of uncut diamonds, containing a total of 107 stones.Ndiweda appeared to be extremely reluctant to recount the finer, more unpleasant, details of the incident to Judge Silungwe on Tuesday.He told the Judge repeatedly that he did not see the need to give detailed explanations to the court after he had already admitted his guilt on the theft charge.Among the things that he did not want to tell the Judge about, was exactly how he had carried out the theft or what he intended to do with the sparklers.Instead, he told the court that he was remorseful over what he had done.At the time of the theft he had been employed with a company that was contracted to do work for Namdeb.Since the day he was caught, he had been unemployed, he claimed.He explained that he was now making a living and trying to support his family – his wife and their six children, and his mother and five orphaned children of siblings of his who had died – through farming that he was engaged in in the north of the country.Pleading not to be sent to prison, Ndiweda told the court that he would prefer to be fined and would rather be willing to lose the N$50 000 that he had posted as bail.”I’m a parent, and there’ll be no-one to take care of my family,” he said.Judge Silungwe cancelled Ndiweda’s bail and remanded him in custody when he postponed Ndiweda’s case to today for sentencing.Ndiweda (47) admitted that he stole 107 rough diamonds from Namdeb at Oranjemund on December 18 2000.The stones, weighing a total of 222,64 carats, were valued at N$2,269 million.In the indictment which Public Prosecutor Orben Sibeya put to Ndiweda on Tuesday, it was charged that he was arrested after an X-ray examination at Namdeb’s personnel control centre revealed “foreign objects” in Ndiweda’s pelvic area.As a result of the X-ray examination, Ndiweda was taken to a hospital at the mining town where he was given laxatives.What followed was a two-million-dollar bowel movement that delivered glittering results.Emerging from Ndiweda’s lower intestine were four parcels of uncut diamonds, containing a total of 107 stones.Ndiweda appeared to be extremely reluctant to recount the finer, more unpleasant, details of the incident to Judge Silungwe on Tuesday.He told the Judge repeatedly that he did not see the need to give detailed explanations to the court after he had already admitted his guilt on the theft charge.Among the things that he did not want to tell the Judge about, was exactly how he had carried out the theft or what he intended to do with the sparklers.Instead, he told the court that he was remorseful over what he had done.At the time of the theft he had been employed with a company that was contracted to do work for Namdeb.Since the day he was caught, he had been unemployed, he claimed.He explained that he was now making a living and trying to support his family – his wife and their six children, and his mother and five orphaned children of siblings of his who had died – through farming that he was engaged in in the north of the country.Pleading not to be sent to prison, Ndiweda told the court that he would prefer to be fined and would rather be willing to lose the N$50 000 that he had posted as bail.”I’m a parent, and there’ll be no-one to take care of my family,” he said.