Quote of the week
Mr Zuma is no ordinary litigant. He is the former President of the Republic, who remains a public figure and continues to wield significant political influence, while acting as an example to his supporters… He has a great deal of power to incite others to similarly defy court orders because his actions and any consequences, or lack thereof, are being closely observed by the public. If his conduct is met with impunity, he will do significant damage to the rule of law. As this Court noted in Mamabolo, “[n]o one familiar with our history can be unaware of the very special need to preserve the integrity of the rule of law”. Mr Zuma is subject to the laws of the Republic. No person enjoys exclusion or exemption from the sovereignty of our laws… It would be antithetical to the value of accountability if those who once held high office are not bound by the law.
Secretary of the Judicial Commission of Inquiry into Allegations of State Capture, Corruption and Fraud in the Public Sector including Organs of State v Zuma and Others (CCT 52/21) [2021] ZACC 18
On Academic Censorship in China
Five years ago, no one on the mainland would have thought that an English academic journal with a small, highly specialised readership would require censoring. Chinese censors usually target large foreign news outlets such as the New York Times, the BBC, the Economist, or the Wall Street Journal, and leave academics in peace. The New York Times is blocked in both its English and Chinese versions by the Great Firewall of China (the world’s most infamous internet censor); the BBC’s main anglophone site comes and goes, depending on what it’s publishing; the Chinese version is fully blocked.
