Dewani intelligent – and tight-fisted

MURDER accused Shrien Dewani is intelligent and articulate, according to a psychiatric report handed to the Western Cape High Court. But he is a cheapskate too.

It seems the wealthy newlywed went out of his way to cling onto a few pounds when it came to his honeymoon in South Africa.

Not only did he pretend to be a travel agent to save on a stay at a luxury lodge, he overlooked upmarket restaurants.

And if Dewani’s co-accused are to be believed, he also ripped them off and forked out only R10 000 to have his wife, Anni, killed – R5 000 less than agreed.

This R10 000 is less than the £1 000 (about R17 000) a German sex master claims Dewani paid him for sex.

The wealthy UK businessman, who is charged with conspiring to have his wife murdered in Cape Town in 2010, was on Friday found fit to stand trial by a team of experts, who found him intelligent and articulate.

After arriving in South Africa on honeymoon, the couple stayed at the Chitwa Chitwa Private Game Lodge at the Sabi Sands Game Reserve in Mpumalanga. The lodge’s spokeswoman Angela Ciuchini at the time said Dewani had presented himself as a travel agent wanting to do a site inspection of the lodge.

Special rates were negotiated and he paid R3 000 instead of R36 000.

Later, the couple travelled to Cape Town where they checked in at the luxurious Cape Grace Hotel.

But on the night of Anni’s murder, instead of dining at the hotel’s Signal Restaurant, the couple went to the Surfside restaurant in the Strand.

A former waitress there said Dewani had not tipped her well.

Anni was murdered on the trip back from the Strand restaurant after a hijacking, which was allegedly staged.

The couple’s chauffeur and the hijackers – who have all been convicted and are serving time in prison – claimed Dewani had offered R15 000 to have Anni killed.

Hijacker Mziwamadoda Qwabe said after Anni was shot, he and his accomplice, Xolile Mngeni, found the money in a packet behind the vehicle’s passenger seat.

“We found out it was R10 000, not R15 000. We split it up half-half,” Qwabe testified.

Dewani’s trial is due to start on October 6.