By Malcolm Ray
Disgraced former National Party MP Abe Williams has apologised to coloured communities along the West Coast and the general public for crimes he committed during his time as welfare minister.
"If I must say sorry, then I apologise to communities I might have hurt, and the world. I made mistakes and I paid the price. I have no regrets about going to prison," he told journalists at the gates of Pollsmoor prison on Tuesday.
As Williams, 59, walked out of Pollsmoor a free man, he looked thinner after spending little more than a year of his three-year sentence behind bars.
Williams applied for leave to appeal against his three-year sentence in June last year after initially entering a not guilty plea during his trial in the Cape High Court for fraud, theft and corruption related to the mismanagement of more than R500 000 intended for poverty relief in underprivileged communities along the West Coast.
He was found guilty on 36 charges of theft and four of corruption, all dating back to his time as welfare minister in the apartheid era House of Representatives.
Williams said on arrival at his home in Rondebosch East after his release that it had not been his intention to take money earmarked for the upliftment of destitute communities.
"It was not my intention to pocket the money. Although most of the money I used was spent on political-party work, the law found me guilty of fraud. I accept that."
The charges related to bribes he accepted for pension payouts and literacy training contracts while he was welfare minister in the Ministers Council in the House of Representatives.
He was jailed in September last year for theft amounting to R268 114 and fraud involving R240 112.