The African National Congress (ANC) says it is not going to compromise the rule of law for expediency.
It was reacting to criticism that despite its calls for the transformation of the judiciary, it has supported the impeachment of two black judges.
For the first time since the dawn of democracy the ANC has instructed its MPs to vote for the removal of judges John Hlophe and Nkola Motata.
The party’s Secretary-General Fikile Mbalula says they cannot allow a situation where the law becomes blind when it has to deal with black people.
Mbalula says, “When a very good judge makes a misjudgment and does things that are not supposed to be done, and unfortunately it happens to be a black judge and then you say the law must be blind because Hlophe is black, the rule of law must not be upheld, where will this constitutional democracy go to in the next couple of month and years to come? It’s going to die.”
“Once the rule of law collapses, society collapses. Now they have gone through a rigorous process, they started challenging him. You know Mandela once said, ‘if you change policies on the basis of the constituency you fail, not on the basis of principle you are not a leader’,” he adds.
VIDEO: Judges Matter on Hlophe and Motata’s removal:
