Comments on: NILC support for JSC on Hlophe to be welcomed

By: Cycle

Cycle — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 19:01:13 +0000

You’re right Traps – it’s time SOuth Africa put race behind and start looking at the issues on their own standing. As a start, I vote we deport Malema for inciting hatred – we would all be certainly better off.

By: gumrol

gumrol — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 16:51:44 +0000

Some of this commentary makes me want to laugh and cry at the same time.. @ Madoda, @ T-man : The fact is JUSTICE IS NOT DONE, IF POLITICS INTERVENES AND A CASE NEVER MAKES IT TO COURT. That DOES threaten the constitution and is NOT just. I’m sick of this argument that ‘there was no proper case anyway’ – its not for us nor the politicians to decide – its supposed to be done in court. But now that process has been unconstitutionaly short-cicuited & the case doesn’t even get to court.
@ Sipho – what are you on about mate? T-Man made no reference to ‘lowly placed individuals’? Also, in your own words: ‘People have a right to raise objections and interpret events the way they perceive them’. So you agree then, that Johan Kriegler has a right to raise the objection he has?

By: enrico

enrico — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 11:09:21 +0000

Lynne nobody said that we must hang on to him at all costs, but this campaign started with the white bar council in the Cape whose members could not swallow the fact that a young black legal scholar with exceptional university qualifications could be the JP of the Cape nogal!There are still judges sitting on the bench with dubious records for imposing apartheid laws and for imposing capital punishment for their role in the struggle for liberation. You know who they are but hipocrites like you and Johan Kriegler have convenniently forgot abo those muderers who are still amongst the bretheren. And for the record, I don’t assume that you are white, I know that you are white.

By: Rod MacKenzie

Rod MacKenzie — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 22:41:16 +0000

Ray McCauley is simply a cunning opportunist who knows how to get people to hand their money over to him using the magic spell and false promises of his form of religion. Finish and klaar. Don’t use him as an example in this context.

By: Lynne

Lynne — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 18:29:40 +0000

Ja, Enrico, you racist! Why do you assume that I am white? Because I happen to agree with the criticism of the JSC? Do you assume that only white people see fault in the judgement?

This is what I have issue with. It is profoundly racist to believe that under the new present dispensation we cannot ask for the BEST for every one of our citizens. Judge Hlophe has compromised himself several times. We do not have to hang on to him because of the grossly racist belief that no-one else will further the cause of transformation, upliftment, etc. if this man is removed. I honestly believe that in this land of ours there are numerous qualified and soon-to-be qualified men and women with integrity and honesty who will pick up the baton. Why do we have to put up with less than the best??? Please will you tell me that?

By: Avhatakali Nenungwi

Avhatakali Nenungwi — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 16:23:26 +0000

It is very funny that South Africans become very uncomfortable when racial dynamics are discussed. Interesting enough, it is generally white people who do so. Race is a very prominent factor in South African society. Racism is practised on daily basis in different forms by both black and white people but mostly by white people.

South Africa is a racially divided country and it is fairly normal that most issues will be racialised.

People will never stop talking about racism unless racism itself ceases to exist or exists in comfortable quantities. We can not avoid being in conflict even when we need to, just because we want to appear as civil with one another. Conflict is necessary sometimes, as long as people do not commit crimes as a result. Forced love and peace is the worst we cab ever try to settle for.

Most of the influential people who are living in South Africa were socialised in deep racial communities, to become racists. Most of them can not even be expected to change entirely, they are broken for life. So, in the current generation, it is normal to have a racially divided society but with time people will converge naturally.

By: Lyndall Beddy

Lyndall Beddy — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 16:16:50 +0000

Mark Thatcher’s arrest and trial would have embarrassed the ANC no end thank you. Read “The Wonga Coup”. They thought they had the support of Mbeki and the Spanish against a dictator who was also alleged to be as bad as Idi Amin, and who had the most money salted away in the USA of all the Africa dictators.

By: Sipho

Sipho — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 13:42:09 +0000

@Mike Atkins. Point of correction, good or bad verdicts of the Constitutional Court cannot be appealed, hence all parties are jossling to have their own people there.That’s the only way of balancing the scales in that court. How do you explain eleven judges hearing a hearsay story from two judges and rushing to collectively lay a charge of misconduct.Subsequently one of the judges is no longer sure that Hlophe’s intent was to influence him.
@ T-man. I find it wrong that since other “better” nationals were subjected to humiliation in the past, therefore Caster should take it like a “man”. I say “better” because why would you raise stories of lowly placed individuals who deserve no better. People have a right to raise objections and interpret events the way they perceive them. It’s not their problem that you’re trying hard to sound reasonable in the face of immense provocation. Just cringe everytime a black person cries racism.

By: Blackbravo

Blackbravo — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 12:11:23 +0000

Edmund Burke said that “all that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing”. Rather than Kriegler being subjected to these nonsensical and childish attacks, he should be commended for having balls to defend the rule of law and integrity of the judiciary.

By: Peter L

Peter L — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 12:08:42 +0000

Traps,
I think that it is more a case of individuals or groups getting behind those that share their political viewpoint and support of a particular party, rather than race.
It just so happens that there is a strong positive correlation between SOME ethnic groups in SA and support of particular parties.
Indinas and coloureds seem to buck the trend, and would appear to base their voting trends on ideas and policies. Perhaps there is merit in not having a “natural home”?

@Siphiwo Siphiwo – nearly all of us if not all of us abhorred the alleged deeds of medical Doctor Dr Wouter Basson (SA’s Mengele?). The fact is that he was tried in a number of courts of law and there was found to be insufficient evidence for a guilty finding, so he was acquitted (a very different concept to “Not Guilty”). Many of us would have liked the ZUMA and Hlope issues also tested in a couurt of law, rather than withdrawn.
Your outrage would be justified if the cases against Basson had been withdrawn.
The slap on the wrist that Mark Thatcher got was pure politics – despicable and no different from the politics that have bedevilled the Zuma and Hlophe legal matters.

See – we agree on something.

At the end of the day, two wrongs do not make a right.

The fact that the Political heads were not held to account for Apartheid era atrocities is an utter disgrace – the TRC process was used and abused by some.