Waluś is also entitled to benefit from the law, says ConCourt

Everyone is equal before the law, even apartheid-era assassins like Janusz Waluś. 

This was confirmed in the Constitutional Court on Monday after it ruled that it was time to release the Polish national from prison 28 years after he started serving time for killing SA Communist Party general secretary Chris Hani. 

Hani was gunned down in his driveway in Vosloorus in April 1993.

At the time of his killing, the Sunday Times reported how four shots had been fired and Hani was hit at point-blank range in the chin, behind the ear and in his chest.

The 50-year-old lay dead, clutching a newspaper to his chest, while his assassin, later identified to be Waluś, sauntered back to his car, reversed out of the driveway and drove around the corner.

Hani’s daughter, Nomakhwezi, 15 — the only member of his family at home at the time — opened the front door to the sight of her father’s bloodied body in his blue tracksuit and running shoes in the driveway. 

Waluś and right-wing politician Clive Derby-Lewis were sentenced to death for murdering Hani. Derby-Lewis and Walus’s sentences were later commuted to life imprisonment when SA abolished the death penalty. Derby-Lewis, who had allegedly ordered the hit carried out by Walus, was granted medical parole in 2015 and died the following year of cancer.

While the Hani family has fought tooth and nail to have Hani’s self-confessed killer incarcerated forever, chief justice Raymond Zondo on Monday said it was irrational to keep him behind bars. 

He ordered the justice department to free him within 10 days.

In an unanimous decision delivered by Zondo, the court found that justice and correctional services minister Ronald Lamola’s 2020 decision to deny Waluś parole was irrational and set it aside for review.

Zondo said in its decision, the court took into account that the applicant was convicted of a serious crime but said it was not reason enough to deny him parole, as he has served his time in prison.

“It was a cold-blooded murder. His conduct nearly plunged this country into civil unrest,” Zondo said.

The chief justice, however, said Waluś is entitled to benefit from the law as everyone was equal before the law.

“The applicant made numerous applications [for parole], and they were rejected by minsters for many reasons. He should have succeeded,” Zondo said.

The chief justice said the history of Walus’s applications for parole reveal that the parole board had previously recommended he be released on parole, but that never happened as justice ministers always rejected his release. 

“They can no longer stand in the way of the applicant. He has complied with every aspect, and the court finds it just and equitable that he should be released on parole,” Zondo said while delivering the report in a packed court. 

The gallery, which was mostly packed by members of the SA Communist Party that Hani led, moaned in disagreement. A few members of the party also shed tears as a composed Zondo delivered the judgment. 

“He became eligible for parole more than 17 years ago. He has been behind bars for 28 years and falls within the category of prisoners who could have been eligible for parole after serving 13 years,” Zondo said. 

Zondo also said Lamola had admitted Waluś showed commendable behaviour during his incarceration, showed remorse and was unlikely to reoffend. 

Hani’s widow, Limpho, who was also in the gallery, didn’t mince her words responding to the judgment.

She expressed her disappointment in the ConCourt justices who had all agreed her husband’s killer should be set free.  

“The family of the deceased is not mentioned anywhere in this judgment. In this country, a white foreign man can come and just kill my husband and this court today just said it’s OK. The very same court is saying an old man [former president Jacob Zuma] must be jailed without a trial, but a white foreign man can be free. This country is gone, it’s finished,” a furious Limpho said in court. 

Seething, she said “karma” would get them, saying “two years is all I give them”.

She and the numerous SACP members who had descended on the Parktown-based court were not the only ones filled with disappointment. 

The EFF labelled the ruling as nonsense and said the ConCourt had “undermined the sensitivities of our people and will invoke instability in our country”.

They said Zondo had been insensitive, callous and regressive, adding there was never a resolution reached between the Hanis and Waluś. 

“It is a betrayal of all combatants who fought the forces of apartheid,” said the EFF. 

It vowed it would not simply accept Waluś’s release. 

“The EFF will do everything humanly possible to refuse and reject the release of Waluś. We refuse to live alongside Waluś as a free person because he has destroyed a revolutionary, a true freedom fighter who would have saved us from white supremacy, oppression, exploitation and domination had he lived,”  the party said. 

It warned of things to come. 

“There will be serious consequences and repercussions, and the Constitutional Court will take full responsibility over what will happen if Waluś comes out of prison.” 

The party urged the Hani family and government to apply for a rescission of the ruling.  

In one of his numerous parole applications, Waluś expressed his remorse for killing Hani, said he had found God and had since recognised that apartheid was wrong. 

“I have had lots of interaction with many different persons of different races in prison, and I have come to realise that apartheid was wrong and that all persons are born equal and I reject racism in any form,” Waluś said. 

Back in 2016, when Waluś was recommended for parole, the department of home affairs had indicated that Waluś would be stripped of his SA citizenship and deported back to Poland should he be released.

In 2017, his lawyers confirmed Waluś had been stripped of his citizenship.

This would mean that Waluś will need to be immediately deported once released.