Judge President Hlophe and the politics of legal transformation
By Isaac Shai
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Law played a decisive role in the dispossession and oppression of African people in South Africa. In post-apartheid South Africa, law was once again poised to play a central role as an instrument for radical transformation.
The South African Constitution is regarded as a lodestar that guides the process of transformation. However, it appears that there are fundamental questions that as a country we either forgot to ask or took for granted.
One critical aspect that is scarce, particularly in public discourse on the nature and trajectory of our constitutional democracy, is the tension between transformation and “the deeply entrenched attitudes towards and thinking about what the ‘The Law is’, how it works and its function in the legal system and society”.
Умер один из последних защитников Брестской крепости Петр Котельников
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Guilty of gross misconduct: What s next for Judge John Hlophe?
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It is astounding to think that it was some 12 years ago that the Constitutional Court heard a case dealing with Thint and Jacob Zuma. Before judgment in those matters was handed down, Judge President John Hlophe visited Justice Bess Nkabinde and Justice Chris Jafta separately in their chambers at the Constitutional Court and had relevant discussions with them. The first visit was to Justice Jafta towards the end of March 2008; Justice Nkabinde was visited on 25 April 2008. During these respective visits, Judge Hlophe discussed, among other things, the issues which were the subject of the pending judgments in Zuma-Thint matters.
On 30 May 2008, the 11 Justices of the Constitutional Court lodged a complaint with the Judicial Services Commission (the JSC). In terms of the Judicial Services Commission Act 9 of 1994 (the Act), the JSC is the only body empowered to receive and deal with complaints concerning the conduct of judges. The complaint was that Judge Hlophe had, during the discus