Admiration for Archbishop Desmond Tutu goes from strength to strength as we watch him setting about the Herculean task of cleaning out the Augean stables of apartheid-era
atrocities. But even as we applaud him, we cannot help but worry about him.
“Arch”, as he would have us know him, has made no secret of his determination to make of the truth commission a new creature of judicial inquiry. He does so in the intelligent appreciation of the fact that the commission has to be more than an instrument of investigation, judgment and reparation; his task – one which no ordinary judge has had to face – is no less than that of cleansing the national psyche. It was for this reason that Tutu, versed in the therapeutic mechanisms of the confessional, was chosen to lead the process. It was an inspired choice.
But the archbishop needs to recognise that, whatever else it is, the commission remains a judicial body and its activities must be circumscribed by the rule of law. Reputations, and probably lives, are at stake. The accusers must be heard, but the accused must be allowed to defend. Failure to recognise this (and it is a failure which probably lies at the door of the Department of Justice, rather than the archbishop) has forced the supreme court to intervene in the commission’s proceedings, ordering it to open its files to those accused. If urgent steps are not taken to meet the challenge, a further application to the supreme court can be expected, demanding such things as the right to cross-examine.
There is no reason why the adjustments cannot be made to meet the demands of “due process”. But if the commission is more than a judicial inquiry, it is also more than a morality play, or revivalist rally. In that respect, caution is also to be urged on President Nelson Mandela. His dramatic appearance at the truth hearings this week – during which he was to be seen dancing in the company of members of the commission – was a moving one.
But it could have opened him to the charge of political stuntmanship, particularly at a time when he is seen to be on the election trail in KwaZulu-Natal and the Western Cape. We are sure that his motives in making the appearance were entirely noble. But it was not necessarily helpful to Tutu, the man on the high wire.