Stand up for the Constitution

The most grievous damage inflicted by the ANC's leadership struggle is the growing political contamination of our legal system.

President Thabo Mbeki's opponents accuse him of using South Africa's law enforcement agencies to shore up his leadership -- his intervention in the Scorpions' planned arrest of police chief Jackie Selebi puts the matter beyond doubt. But supporters of Jacob Zuma who level this accusation are just as tainted.

This week Julius Malema made the outrageous threat that he and his fellow hooligans in the ANC Youth League are prepared to kill to prevent Zuma coming to trial. Their only motivation for this is the length of time it has taken to bring Zuma to trial -- when Zuma's systematic blocking tactic at every level of the court system is the main reason for the delay. It does not matter how long the judicial process lasts: if he has broken the law, he must face the music.

But the central point is that it is not for the ANC Youth League or any other political grouping to decide the ANC president's guilt or innocence -- that is the constitutionally determined job of the judiciary.

Then there is the case of Western Cape Judge President John Hlophe, accused by the full Bench of the Constitutional Court of trying to lobby two of its judges in Zuma's favour. Hlophe's guilt must still be decided by the Judicial Services Commission, but the court's complaint quotes him as talking of his "mandate" -- presumably political mandate -- and connections in the intelligence establishment. Let there be no doubt: if politicians and spooks start to lean on the highest court in the land, ordinary South Africans will be in the deepest possible trouble. Such interference raises the spectre of sectional political interests and vendettas shaping our fundamental law.

Freedom and constitutionalism don't disappear overnight. They are eroded by the rhetoric of intolerance, by ignorance and by apathy. Let us, as citizens, not be apathetic and speak up for the nation's founding document.

Source: Mail & Guardian