Medical parole obviously only for the well-connected

We were told he had a few months, maybe just weeks, to live. We were told he was entitled to early release from prison so that he could be cared for by his loved one in his dying days.

This was, of course, Schabir Shaik, high-flying businessman and sometime financial adviser to President Jacob Zuma, who served four months of a 15-year sentence before heading home on medical parole.

Seven years later, Shaik is rocking and rolling, regularly being spotted out and about - and even generating the odd news headline, such as when he had a spirited altercation with some troublesome individuals on a golf course.

With this in mind, our Justice Department might try to explain to the nation how another patently ill prisoner was denied medical parole - and ended up dying while still incarcerated.

Xolile Mngeni, 27, the man sentenced to life imprisonment for the killing of Anni Dewani, died at the weekend. He had been diagnosed with a brain tumour in 2011, while awaiting trial for murder, and, given the high profile of the Dewani case, everyone knew of his condition. But when he applied for parole the authorities turned him down flat.

Is it only people connected to ANC bosses who are given any consideration?

This isn't an isolated case. Many convicts who are seriously ill and whose ailments are verified by doctors struggle to get the government bureaucracy to pay them any heed.

Yet the likes of Shaik get red-carpet treatment as they stroll out of jail.

Murder is the most serious of crimes but the regulations don't exclude those convicted of it from being considered for parole.

One can only conclude that Mngeni, being a "no-name" with no political influence, was left to die behind bars by impervious officials and politicians who look no further than personal gain.

Now that Mngeni has died in prison, Correctional Services bosses should have tough questions to answer.

But will anyone in power bother to ask them?