EMSIE FERRIERA, Johannesburg | Tuesday 8.30pm
JUSTICE Minister Penuell Maduna on Tuesday emerged unbowed from an emergency meeting with President Thabo Mbeki where he was expected to be censured for a tirade against the country’s top judges.
The minister on Monday launched a scathing attack on the Constitutional Court, the highest in the land, accusing its 11 judges of inefficiency and saying they “could work harder.” He also lashed out at the legal profession in general, labelling it racist and lazy.
Meduna said Constitutional Court judges appear to have plenty of free time while Appeal Court and High Court judges and magistrates are overworked. That is why, he continued, Constitutional Court judge Johann Kriegler is able to go to East Timor as part of the United Nations election monitoring team.
He also singled out Judge Richard Goldstone, who has been invited to chair an international commission of inquiry into the Kosovo war. How could judges during their recess, he asked, go and do work out of the country while South African courts have big backlogs to work through?
The resources the Constitutional Court enjoy, he added, are hard to justify when placed alongside those of lesser courts, particularly the magistrates’ courts which shoulder at least 90% of the workload.
He bitterly attacked the white legal establishment for frustrating attempts to appoint blacks as advocates — lawyers who are allowed to appear in the High Court — and for failing during the apartheid era to expose black lawyers to high-profile and complex cases.
Meduna’s remarks upset Constitutional Court deputy president Judge Pius Langa Langa, who approached Mbeki on Monday night to urge the president to take strong action against the minister. But after the meeting with Mbeki, an unrepentant Meduna told reporters the president is satisfied with the explanation for his remarks.
“I saw the president. I told him what I had said and he was satisfied,” Meduna said in Pretoria. — AFP