Lobbying leads to SA man’s release from Thai jail
JOBURG resident Alex Krebs looked tired but healthy as he walked through the doors of a changed OR Tambo International Airport early yesterday morning.
Krebs was sentenced to 100 years in a notorious Thai prison for drug smuggling. It was later commuted to 40 years but he was given amnesty after 18 years.
But the man known by friends as Shani, who left SA for a holiday in Thailand in 1994, returned to a very different world. SA held its first democratic elections the day after his arrest in Bangkok. Cellphones had just entered the SA market. But that was all in the past. The future was the 50 or so family members and friends who wore T-shirts emblazoned with “Welcome Home Shani” and “We Love You”, as they anxiously waited to see Krebs.
Krebs, 52, was first met by his mother, Cathy Nick, 87, who burst into tears, handing him a bunch of roses before they held each other. They were joined by his sister, Joan Sacks, and his father, Mihaly.
Overcome with emotion, Joan asked a friend to hold her because “my legs are about to collapse”. “I cannot believe he is here. I cannot believe this,” she said, weeping.
Friends and supporters jostled as they lined up to pose for photos with him.
“I am just so happy that I have survived these years to see him again,” said his mother.
“I am happy, very happy,” said her husband.
Refusing to discuss the circumstances of his arrest and incarceration at the impromptu press briefing. Krebs said: “Nothing is registering in my mind.”
Returning home was “overwhelming” and “unbelievable”.
“I haven’t seen much yet, but when I was walking through the gates I was thinking this is my country, this is my people, and I am home.”
Krebs said he had not slept much since his release from the prison known as the Bangkok Hilton into a transitional holding area until he boarded the plane on Friday.
Krebs was among a group of foreigners convicted of drug trafficking who were granted amnesty by King Bhumibol Adulyadej of Thailand in December.
“I never gave up hope. I knew that some day I would come home so I just stayed strong and did what I know best, and that is painting,” said the man whose only wish was to go home and have a long, relaxing bath.
Speaking about the changes he would have to face in a world in which he had not lived for the past 18 years, Krebs said he looked forward to seeing sunlight and was ready to embrace all the challenges that lay ahead.
“There are a lot of things going on in my mind. I have been invited to talk and maybe I will do some drug counselling. I may want to open up an art academy. I am in the process of writing a book called Dragons and Butterflies,” he said.
Joan lobbied relentlessly for his release, even having an audience with the Thai king pleading for a pardon in 2005. She said his return was a dream come true, telling the Sunday Tribune this week that their mother was ecstatic about seeing her only son.
“She last saw Shani when she was 69. She is 87 now. Our first night together as a family will be special as we’re cooking his favourite meal.”
She believes her brother’s positive attitude helped keep him sane as he was the longestsentenced prisoner at Bang Kwang Prison, one of the more notorious prisons in Thailand.
“He said once prisoners gave up and lost hope, they got ill and died. He was determined to be upbeat.”
Patricia Gerber, a director from Locked Up (which campaigns for SA inmates abroad), whose supporters were at the airport to greet Shani, said there were still too many South Africans serving lengthy sentences in foreign countries with no assistance from the government. She said about 1 040 South Africans were in foreign prisons, although these were only the known cases.
Gerber, who started the organisation seven years ago when her son was arrested in Mauritius for drug smuggling, said there was little chance he would be released early.
“I will never stop campaigning for South African prisoners to be transferred to serve the remainder of their sentence in South Africa, because the conditions in foreign prisons are so deplorable.“
charmel.bowman@inl.co.za