If you have ever wondered what the future of law — and lawlessness — in SA looks like, then come with me. Walk with me as we consider whether “rule of law” works for some or for all. Hold my hand as we look at how precedent is set. Come.
In October last year defence and military veterans minister Thandi Modise, her deputy Thabang Makwetla and minister in the presidency Mondli Gungubele sat in a meeting at the St George’s Hotel in Irene, Centurion, with about 55 members of a group of alleged military veterans.
The group had a list of demands which had been expressed at various meetings before October. Just four days before, the same group had marched on the ANC head office in Johannesburg and caused such concern among the ANC staffers present that the building was evacuated. The group calls itself the Liberation Struggle War Veterans (LSWV). It brings together alleged members of the ANC’s military wing Umkhonto we Sizwe and veterans of the Azanian People’s Liberation Army and Azanian National Liberation Army. I use “alleged” because some members of the group refuse to be verified by authorities to determine whether they did serve in any of these formations. Some of them are just, well, young. When did they serve?
The meeting was heated. The “veterans” had expected a meeting with deputy president David Mabuza, who chairs the presidential task team on military veterans, but had got the defence ministers and Gungubele instead. The veterans want a R4.4m reparation settlement each, medical aid, a housing allowance, government jobs and bursaries for their children.
The parties could not agree. This is what Gungubele, in a video posted soon after the meeting, described: “We found ourselves in a situation which I consider untenable, legally unacceptable, where we thought we were in a meeting, the intention of which was to attend to the problems that affect military veterans.
What we have here is a clear message being sent to the populace that ordinary men and women dare not break the law. However, an elite that is connected to the ANC can do so.
“We could not agree on how the meeting should take place. We reached a point where I thought we were agreeing that it should adjourn. As we were leaving the meeting, proceeding to the doors, they closed the doors. It is at that point that we realised that we’re held hostage.” It was an ordeal that lasted for three hours. The police were called in and negotiated with the hostage-takers. Lwazi Mzobe, the group’s spokesperson, said at the time: “There are no barricades. [Modise] is not being held hostage. She can come and go as she pleases.”
Yet none of the hostages left the meeting, despite Mzobe saying they could “come and go” as they please. Ultimately the police’s special task force (not your run-of-the-mill constable Mabena) staged a rescue operation and arrested the hostage-takers. They were charged with conspiracy to commit kidnapping and 26 counts of kidnapping.
Last week the National Prosecuting Authority withdrew the charges against the 52 veterans “after careful consideration of the contents of the docket and representations made by the defence”.
“The state is of the view that there is no prima facie case because neither the identity nor the individual acts committed by each individual accused can be proven,” the NPA said in a statement.
When I first read this story, I was shocked by the decision. The NPA statement about the merits of the case is so flimsy a toddler can put up a better case. Then I saw a couple of paragraphs in a News24 report of the story which made perfect sense — this case was decided in the ANC.
The report said that the ANC had reached “an internal agreement to settle the matter before it went to court”. Apparently, a member of the military veterans and a senior ANC leader told News24 that “the agreement was reached for the good of the party”. He said the way the situation was handled would not set a precedent. This, he said, was “because ministers had been ‘re-educated’ on how to engage in situations after that incident and another in which ministers were allegedly prevented from leaving a mall in Gqeberha in March”.
This, dear reader, is how lawlessness thrives. This is how a sense of impunity is encouraged. What we have here is a clear message being sent to the populace that ordinary men and women dare not break the law. However, an elite that is connected to the ANC can do so. These “veterans” kidnapped people — and will not have to account for it at all.
Why would any ANC politician think twice about stealing? Why would any member of society, realising that others all around them are getting away with murder, not do the same? This is why we have massive numbers of civil servants, Eskom staff and others across society milking the state.
This is how a culture of lawlessness starts and this is how it flourishes. This is how states fail.
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