A swindler who told gullible businessmen he had made millions of pounds of chemically brewed ``magic money bank-notes'' for his ``friend'', Nelson Mandela, was jailed for 18 months yesterday.

Claude Ismael, 41, used a backdrop of five-star hotel luxury and a briefcase-sized chemistry kit to prey on victims who believed he could turn ordinary paper into cash.

With promises he could double whatever cash they cared to entrust him with, he conned tens of thousands of pounds out of a clothing chain chief and a recording studio boss.

Southwark Crown Court was reduced to laughter as Mr Yash Malhotra, who runs 15 shops across London, admitted to feeling ``stupid and ashamed'' at the way he was fooled.

Frenchman Ismael, he said, demonstrated how his alleged secret formula could make money and used a photograph of himself standing next to the South African President to add credence to his claims.

``He said he was a friend of Mr Mandela and said that in his election he helped him and made millions of this money for him,'' he said.

Passing sentence Judge Eugene Cotran told Ismael, who was convicted of conspiracy to defraud between December 1995 and July this year, that he had played a ``significant'' part in a swindle that was clearly of ``some magnitude''.

Jean Dakou, 30, was sentenced to 12 months after admitting the offence.

The three-week trial heard the pair would approach likely victims by pretending they were interested in striking legitimate business deals before demonstrating their trick.

Two methods were used. The first involved sandwiching strips of banknote-sized black paper between genuine #20 and #50 notes before dipping them into allegedly secret solutions.

Ten minutes later they were retrieved, with the process apparently having created a third new note.

What they did not realise was the black paper was a genuine note turned black with iodine then washed clean in another liquid preparation.

The other method was to put a banknote between two white strips of paper which were then turned blue with an unnamed chemical.

One of the fraudsters would then stand on the package for five minutes before disappearing into the bathroom and re-emerging with two apparently newly created banknotes.