Quote of the week
[T]he moral point of the matter is never reached by calling what happened by the name of ‘genocide’ or by counting the many millions of victims: extermination of whole peoples had happened before in antiquity, as well as in modern colonization. It is reached only when we realize this happened within the frame of a legal order and that the cornerstone of this ‘new law’ consisted of the command ‘Thou shall kill,’ not thy enemy but innocent people who were not even potentially dangerous, and not for any reason of necessity but, on the contrary, even against all military and other utilitarian calculations. … And these deeds were not committed by outlaws, monsters, or raving sadists, but by the most respected members of respectable society.
Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on The Banality of Evil
Correction of SABC report by DCJ Moseneke
CHAMBERS OF Constitution Hill
JUSTICE D MOSENEKE Private Bag X1
DEPUTY CHIEF JUSTICE OF SOUTH AFRICA BRAAMFONTEIN
2017
Tel: (011)359-7442
Fax: (011)403-8883
E Mail: grobler@concourt.org.za
PRESS RELEASE
Monday 15 August 2011
Yesterday the South African Broadcasting Corporation reported that in my address to the annual conference of the South African Chapter of the International Association of Women judges at North West University I said almost 90% of South Africa’s courts have not delivered judgment on cases before them.
That report is inaccurate.
I stressed to the judges and magistrates who attended the conference that the delay in the finalisation of cases may lead to injustice and that judges and magistrates are duty-bound to deliver judgments promptly. I added that almost 90% of complaints against judicial officers relate to judgments that had not been delivered promptly.
Clearly this does not mean that “almost 90% of South African Courts have not delivered judgment on cases before them.”
This inaccuracy in reporting is to be regretted because firstly the SABC appeared to televise the entire address and more importantly, by and large, Courts of this country do their work diligently and as promptly as it is reasonably possible.
Issued by: Dikgang Moseneke
Deputy Chief Justice
