The case of the two Middelburg racists and the illegal renditions case should both provoke our rage, writes Police Minister Nathi Nhleko.
Johannesburg - There is a striking resemblance between the incidence of two white men who this week appeared in a Middleburg court charged with assault after shoving a black man into a coffin, and the case of the alleged illegal renditions of four Zimbabweans in 2010/2011. Both cases are a frightening reminder that pernicious and obnoxious acts of dehumanising the African are far from over in a democratic South Africa.
These incidents show how often it is those who claim to hold the highest moral standards shock all of us when they act in a manner that betrays deep-seated prejudice and disrespect for the right to life of those they consider less human and children of a lesser god.
One obvious difference in the two cases is that in one case, the culprits are white and in the other, the alleged gross violators of human rights are state officials who worked for the SAPS at the time of the illegal renditions.
As right-thinking citizens, our sense of justice and equality must surely spur us to rise and strike like thunder in our collective effort to stop the seemingly unending dehumanising of the African.
We must storm all bastions of racism and bigotry to assert the right to life for the African in a world that trivialises African lives.
The alleged illegal rendition of four Zimbabwean citizens from South Africa in 2010/2011, two of whom were subsequently murdered in Zimbabwe, as well as the mysterious death of two South Africans who were key witnesses and the absence of any thorough judicial probe into the matter, continues to stare at our country’s criminal justice system with eyes of fire and the curse of iniquity.
The narrative is a continuation of the horrifying saga of wanton brutality, emasculation, molestation and the lynching of Africans that goes back countless centuries. Treating African lives as if they are not human is a disgrace that must be fought with everything in our power.
As the Minister of Police it burdens my conscience immensely to know that serious allegations against senior former members of the SAPS, in which lives were lost, remain untested in a court of law, and that our democratic society is made to regard the matter as insignificant.
When there is a conspiracy of silence on allegations of murder, I am disturbed that we are on a slippery road.
Since human rights are the kernel of our democracy, it goes without saying that any gross human rights violations, such as the case of the two Middelburg racists and the illegal renditions case, should provoke our rage and sense of utter disgust.
When I suspended Ipid executive director Robert McBride last year, I was concerned about allegations that he had tampered with a report that recommended criminal charges against two senior SAPS officers who were implicated in the illegal extradition process.
I felt, and still do, that shoving people into a van without a fair trial, and then throwing them out of the border, is grossly unjust and barbaric.
Why should a country that fought so much and whose citizens lost lives for a just and fair society look the other way when the right to life for Zimbabweans is violated, allegedly by SAPS members? Why should we take the lives of these Africans cheaply?
When society continues to learn of the violence Africans are subjected to, even as our democracy matures, one wonders on which side we are really; the truth or cover- ups? How would the illegal renditions case, for instance, be treated had the victims of this heinous crime been people of European descent?
I am certain the reaction would have been different.
In one of his judgments, the then president of the Constitutional Court, Arthur Chaskalson, said: “The right to life and dignity are the most important of all human rights. By committing ourselves to a society founded on the recognition of human rights we are required to value these two rights above all others.
“And this must be demonstrated by the state in everything that it does, including the way it punishes criminals.
“This is not achieved by objectifying murderers and putting them to death to serve as an example to others in the expectation that they might be deterred thereby.”
The right to life stands at the apex of all the rights in the Bill of Fundamental Human Rights.
It ensures the continued existence of humanity, and awareness of all life.
Without humanity, there is no one to say “this is life”, and therefore no concept of life itself. Our social experiences as South Africans recognise, also, the sanctity of life - the idea of the ultimate importance and inviolability of human life.
In our faith-based traditions the concept of the sanctity of life transcends its “inviolability”.
It holds the view that, because people are made in God’s image, human life has an inherently sacred attribute that should be protected and respected at all times.
Rightly so; to entrench the full measure of the protection of human life, clauses 9 - 11 of our constitution ensure, among others: protection for everyone before the law and the right to equal protection and benefit of the law; protection and respect of everyone’s dignity; and protection of the right to life itself. What is the value of the Bill of Fundamental Human Rights if we do not make it part of our lived reality and experience? What are the implications thereof, for our country’s future stability and peace? Can our country’s best interests ever be best served by us taking tactical detours even in relation to the Bill of Rights? Can we do so and still maintain the people’s faith in the constitution? I do not think so, for the people are not foolish.
Finally, the case of the racists who shove a black man into a coffin as if he is subhuman, the illegal renditions of four Zimbabweans and the mysterious murders of two South African witnesses in the illegal renditions matter, give us an opportunity to reflect deeply on our core values as a society.
It is a clarion call for all of us to work even harder to reassert the right to life for all.
Especially for the African, no matter his or her country of origin.
* Nhleko is the Minister of Police.
** The views expressed here are not necessarily those of Independent Media.
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