Former Truth and Reconciliation commissioner Dumisa Ntsebeza has sharply criticised the government’s condemnation of overseas lawsuits against multinational corporations that benefited from apartheid, maintaining there is “nothing illegitimate” about the lawsuits.
The right to seek redress in United States courts was the same as that of the asbestosis victims who successfully sued Cape plc in United Kingdom courts, he said.
And it was unconscionable that “the executive should rush to the defence [of business] even when they have not yet entered their defence”, he said during a public debate on the truth commission this week.
“Reparations are not a question of largesse that is bestowed by either government or those in a position to do so. It is a right that comes out of the Constitution,” maintained Ntsebeza, who is helping to coordinate some of the overseas lawsuits in South Africa.
During last month’s parliamentary debate on the truth commission report President Thabo Mbeki said it was “completely unacceptable” that the future of South Africa “should be adjudicated in foreign courts, which bear no responsibility for the well-being of our country”.
During the debate Ntsebeza said South African business had undoubtedly benefited through unjust enrichment by, for example, paying a black worker 10 times less than a white worker for the same job.
“They never had to give account of what they did. And there’s a lot they did. When you talk about Anglo, we are talking about the gold mines, we are talking about conditions you would not keep your dog in.”