Kidnapping charges against 53 “military veterans” accused of holding the Minister of Defence and several other government officials hostage for two hours at the St George’s Hotel in Centurion in October last year have been dropped.

A police special task force team had to rescue defence minister Thandi Modise, her deputy Thabang Makwetla, and Minister in the Presidency, Mondli Gungubele after negotiations with their alleged kidnappers deadlocked.

NPA regional spokesperson Lumka Mahanjana said the case was withdrawn during their appearance at the Pretoria magistrate’s court on Tuesday.

Since the trial would not be going ahead, the R500 bail paid in October for their release would be reimbursed to them, she said.

The veterans each faced one count of conspiracy to kidnap and 26 counts of kidnapping.

The group’s lawyer, Andries Nkome, told Pretoria Rekord that he was shocked by the State’s decision to drop the case although he argued that their case was not strong enough for prosecution.

Also read: UPDATE: Case against 53 ‘veterans’ in Tshwane hotel ministers’ hostage drama continues

“We argued that the state could not prove that the veterans conspired to commit kidnapping because they did not even know where the meeting would take place.”

The meeting was initially set to take place at Luthuli House then changed to a college in the west of Pretoria and was finally held at the hotel. Venues changed within hours of the day, Nkome said.

Despite footage obtained from the hotel on the hostage drama, Nkome said the footage did not depict the charges against his clients.

“There was no way they could have won the case against our clients,” he said.

“Our clients always believed that the trumped-up charges against them were used to try and stop them from fighting the state to get the military pensions they are entitled to.

“If any of the ministers felt they were endangered, their bodyguards would have used the firearms they had.”

Nkome confirmed that several of the 53 were previously convicted of crimes.

Also read: Charges mount against 53 ‘veterans’ arrested after Tshwane hotel ministers’ hostage drama

This also included a murder conviction.

He said many of them did things such as bomb railway lines in the struggle against apartheid.

Because of “unfulfilled promises” others returned to a life of crime after the fall of apartheid.

One of the 53 died last week.

“Accused no.13 Nonhlanhla Dlamini passed away last week while still awaiting the promise of the pay-outs.”

According to him, the pay-outs were estimated at R4.2m per veteran.

In a previous media briefing, Modise said the group were not recognised as military veterans.

“They should await the outcome of applications to verify whether they were members of liberation struggle forces,” said Modise.

On the credibility of the group Nkome said: “I am an associate of the Phosa attorneys [ANC Mathews Phosa] who was a general of the uMkhonto we Sizwe. The government can get people like that to verify members. The state cannot be crying foul that the verification process is difficult.”

He said the group would continue their plea to get compensation although “nothing” was done by the government to engage with them, since last year.

According to a 2011 military veterans act, any South African citizen who served in the SA liberation struggle between 1960-1994 may receive a military pension, housing, free access to military health services, skill acquisition and education support.

WATCH: Gungubele, giving an account of the incident