Parliament - The ANC government has come under fire from the opposition in Parliament for giving protection to Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir at the expense of the constitution, by allowing him to escape last week.
While some opposition parties accused the ANC on Tuesday of failing to stick to its international obligations, the EFF and the UDM said the International Criminal Court should go and arrest Bashir in his home country of Sudan and not look for him in other countries like South Africa.
The National Assembly was debating the escape of Bashir last Monday following a motion tabled by DA leader Mmusi Maimane.
The EFF and UDM said the ICC could not wait for Bashir to leave his country before arresting him when he visited countries like South Africa.
But Minister of Small Business Development Lindiwe Zulu, quoting former Cuban leader Fidel Castro during his imprisonment in 1953, said “history will absolve” the ANC.
Zulu said the AU had decided at its meeting in Sirte, Libya, in 2012 not to co-operate with the court because of the concerns it had with its agenda to target certain leaders like Bashir.
“Honourable Speaker, do these members think we were going to arrest a head of state. They must think again,” said Zulu of the opposition.
The DA’s Stevens Mokgalapa and Cope leader Mosiuoa Lekota accused the government of being in contempt of court by allowing Bashir to flee the country.
They said Bashir had to be kept in the country until the South African court decided on his arrest by the ICC.
But Floyd Shivambu of the EFF and UDM leader Bantu Holomisa said if the ICC wanted Bashir it should go and get him in Khartoum.
“If the ICC wants al-Bashir it must fetch him in Sudan. That is where he is, not anywhere else,” said Shivambu.
Holomisa said the UN was patrolling the streets of Darfur and it would find him there.
However, Lekota said when South Africa signed the Rome Statute in 2002 it did so voluntarily.
He said it was shameful that President Jacob Zuma and his ministers had defied the court order by getting Bashir out of the country.
For the Sudanese leader to prove his guilt or otherwise he must go to the ICC, said Lekota.
“This thing done in the name of South Africa (by Zuma and his government) is a serious crime,” he said.
Maliyakhe Shelembe of the NFP described the conduct of the ANC government as scandalous.
He said the government had flouted the constitution and international law.
Deputy Minister of Co-operative Governance Obed Bapela, who is also the head of the ANC’s subcommittee on international relations, said they would consider pulling out of the ICC if it did not reform.
Political Bureau