Judge Kriegler’s viewpoints on the continued prosecution of President Zuma as reported in the below Netwerk 24 article deserves serious consideration. It is especially relevant whilst the National Dialogue and Madlanga Commission are underway.
It should be strongly be considered whether this is not the opportune time, in view of the public revolt against corruption and waste of taxpayers’ money by state institutions, to transform the current National Dialogue into a kind of CODESA on how democratic government and specifically the civil service should function in the RSA to the benefit of all its citizens and to the maximum advantage of the poor and previously disadvantaged.
As a feature of “drawing the line in the sane”, indemnity against criminal prosecution could be used as a successful tool. The indemnity should however relate to crimes committed before such declaration and amnesty granted to persons convicted of such crimes before the date of declaration relating to all acts of corruption, fraud as well as theft and related crimes of dishonesty. This will obviously not extend to crimes of violence committed in the process such as the murder of whistleblowers.
Such declaration will also entail a common undertaking by all citizens of a democratic Republic of South Africa that, going forward, only acting in the utmost good faith and compliance with prescribed norms would be acceptable from anyone dealing with state funds (mostly tax paid by citizens) as well as the use thereof for the public benefit.
More importantly, civil recovery of monies misappropriated in the past should not be covered by such amnesty and the recovery of misappropriated funds MUST still be pursued with all vigour through the courts or by bodies such as the Special Investigation Unit or the Asset Forfeiture Unit of the National Prosecuting Authority.
As with the CODESA agreement, this will not satisfy the outcry from the public for justice to be done and criminals to be convicted and to be seen in orange overalls serving jail time BUT importantly this will free up vital state resources to, going forward, enforce transparent administration and ensuring that any deviation from these standards of utmost honesty be quickly and effectively dealt with by bringing criminals to book. Failing this we will always only be playing catchup dealing with past offences (mostly the State Capture era) and not be able to effectively deal with the current enforcement of proper governance.
As it was recently again pointed out by Judge Edwin Cameron, imposition of long sentences do not ordinarily act as a deterrence. Certainty of detection and successful prosecution of criminals may act as a better deterrence.
As was the case during the years 1992 to 1994 the Republic of South Africa is again at a crossroad, this time however not to avoid civil war but at a choice between becoming a failed State (which will in itself lead to grave unrest) and the prospect of a gloriously successful RSA to the benefit of all its citizens.
We now have to urgently focus most of our resources on the present need to enforce proper governance, specifically the proper spending of our tax money for proper service delivery, even if it means that justice is not fully done relating to past wrongs.
Read more of Judge Kriegler’s input here – https://www.news24.com/southafrica/crime-and-courts/how-is-mr-zuma-going-to-live-judge-questions-impact-of-pension-benefit-attachment-20251016-0683
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