Constitutionally Speaking » Quote of the week

Pierre De Vos — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 13:28:03 +0000

Government’s inability to accept criticism and facilitate dialogue was highlighted in the recent vociferous debate about whether Cape Town is a “racist city”. The phrasing of the debate is unproductive, but the truth is that there are few cities in South Africa where our nation’s divided past is so stark. Although our city has made some progress since 1994 in providing services to historically neglected communities, we must accept that Cape Town’s racial and class divisions remain largely intact. You just have to drive the short distance from Cape Town’s leafy suburbs to the sprawling shantytowns at the city’s margins to see this. Finding lasting solutions requires us to be honest about these difficult realities. - Gavin Silber in an article on Politicsweb

Pierre De Vos — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 20:48:32 +0000

The complaint about lack of transformation is sometimes directed at the retention of power by those who held it under apartheid. That charge cannot be made against the leadership of the judiciary. The Chief Justice, the Deputy Chief Justice, the President of the Supreme Court of Appeal, the Deputy President of the Supreme Court of Appeal and all the Judges President of the High Court are Black; none held office under apartheid; all were appointed under the present Constitution. That charge can also not be made against the judges of the Constitutional Court which is the highest court in the land and the guardian of the Constitution. Chief Justice Mogoeng was a judge of the Constitutional Court when he was appointed as Chief Justice following the retirement of Chief Justice Ngcobo. The vacancy caused by the retirement of Chief Justice Ngcobo has not yet been filled; prior to his resignation 8 of the 11 judges of the Constitutional Court were black; and all eleven had been appointed to the Constitutional Court by the President in accordance with the provisions of the Constitution. – Former Chief Justice Arthur Chaskalson in a speech delivered at UCT

Pierre De Vos — Mon, 16 Jan 2012 14:37:30 +0000

Every time I hear a political speech or I read those of our leaders, I am horrified at having, for years, heard nothing which sounded human. It is always the same words telling the same lies. And the fact that men accept this, that the people’s anger has not destroyed these hollow clowns, strikes me as proof that men attribute no importance to the way they are governed; that they gamble — yes, gamble — with a whole part of their life and their so-called ‘vital interests’. – Albert Camus

Pierre De Vos — Sat, 14 Jan 2012 07:19:56 +0000

I didn’t make myself clear to the last man I worked for until after I took the job. It was as if the Marquis de Sade had suddenly found himself working for Billy Graham. The man despised me, of course, and I had nothing but contempt for him and everything he stood for. If you asked him, he’d tell you that I’m “not very likable, (that I) hate people, (that I) just want to be left alone, and (that I) feel too superior to mingle with the average person.” (That’s a direct quote from a memo he sent to the publisher.) Nothing beats having good references. – The late Hunter S. Thompson’s 1958 letter applying for a job at a Canadian newspaper

Pierre De Vos — Mon, 09 Jan 2012 13:27:16 +0000

One can, however, make the case that the practice of law is more than a technical/strategic exercise in which doctrines, precedents, rules and tests are marshaled in the service of a client’s cause. The marshaling takes place within an enterprise that is purposive. That is, law is more than an aggregation of discrete tactics and procedures; it is an enterprise informed by a vision of how the state can and cannot employ the legalized violence of which it is the sole proprietor. That vision will come into view in the wake of a set of inquiries. What obligations do citizens owe one another? How far can the state go in enforcing those obligations? What restrictions on what the state can do to (and for) its citizens should be in place? How do legal cultures differ with respect to these issues? Such questions are prior to the bundle of particulars that make up the content of any corner of legal practice. – Prof Stanley Fish in The New York Times

Pierre De Vos — Thu, 05 Jan 2012 07:01:25 +0000

My point is that sovereignty itself – and certainly who the ANC elects as leaders and what the party decides vis-a-vis nationalisation of mines and expropriation of land without compensation – will have much less force and effect in determining South Africa’s political and economic future that we might imagine. Economic policy, laws governing ownership and general “good behaviour” around fiscal and monetary policy are rigidly constrained both by the discipline of global capital markets and by a myriad bilateral and multilateral agreements between countries and blocks of countries. As I said to clients earlier this week (concerning the ANC centenary): “Obviously we must continue to watch the ANC as carefully as always in 2012 – but this small open country and economy will continue to be tossed on the currents of the global economy and the various geopolitical, technological, cultural and environmental forces that shape the world. We might miss a trick or two if we lull ourselves into believing the myth that the ANC is a kind of metaphor for the country as a whole. – Nic Borain on his Blog

Pierre De Vos — Sat, 17 Dec 2011 13:50:20 +0000

[Princess Diana] was in Angola on her landmine campaign, and there was a hushed, reverent BBC commentator. And he said, ‘The thing about mine fields is that they’re very easy to lay, but they’re very difficult and dangerous, and even expensive to get rid of’ – the perfect description of Prince Charles’s first wife. – the late Christopher Hitchens, on CBS.

Pierre De Vos — Mon, 12 Dec 2011 18:17:45 +0000

[T]here is an almost fascistic tone to the rhetoric of some on the political right which can stretch from Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman’s Yisrael Beiteinu party to younger members of the governing Likud, the prime minister’s party, and also to some in its Mizrachi base, that is, those who descend from Islamic countries and poorer sectors of the population. They certainly are soft on the thugs of the settler movement who try to intimidate both Palestinian Arabs and Israeli peaceniks. And they are adept at manipulating administrative law through the bureaucracies and the courts to burden Arab life, both in Israel and the territories. There is also a certain militaristic cast to their ways. Moreover, they are sure that, if they don’t win this political battle and that, the apocalypse is just around the corner. This is the ugliest part of Israeli political life. - Marty Peretz, TNR.

Pierre De Vos — Fri, 09 Dec 2011 06:42:26 +0000

Corruption is the elite’s way to steal from the poor, Cosatu general secretary Zwelinzima Vavi said in Johannesburg on Thursday. “It has become a matter of life and death. Corruption is the biggest threat to the realisation of our dreams,” he told an anti-corruption summit. “Self-enrichment will unravel the fabric of society.” Vavi said up to 20 percent of government procurement was lost to corruption as officials exploited gaps in the system to procure government tenders. “We are facing a nightmare future in South Africa… people are systematically using their power to secure… parts of society.” He said if the current economic system of capitalism continued with the “me first” mentality, it would be difficult to root out corruption. “The culture of me first accumulates and accumulates that one person in this country earns R627 million per year… while workers earn less than R1500 per month,” said Vavi. – Sapa

Pierre De Vos — Thu, 01 Dec 2011 19:20:03 +0000

The party has a responsibility to ensure that, in the process of seeking to transform both the state and society, the legitimacy of the state is not compromised. Whereas the party, through its government, exercises political authority over the State, the separation between the Party and the State is imperative. Given the character and nature of the ANC, contestation to influence and control the State is an ongoing struggle, whose outcome will partly be determined by the balance of forces, as well as the imperatives of what type of society and State, the ANC seeks to build. The ANC’s approach and orientation on the question of State Power and its use is well documented. The Strategy and Tactics document of the ANC, as adopted at the ANC’s 52nd National Conference held in Polokwane, is clear on what must be done. The challenge lies in our day to day experiences, wherein the ANC, its Alliance partners and its functionaries in and out of government, adopt different and at times conflicting postures towards the State and its Organs. The ANC fully embraces the doctrine of Separation of Powers as articulated in the Constitution of the Republic of South Africa. – ANC Gauteng discussion document