South Africa’s Constitution runs the risk of being downgraded to a mere Act of Parliament, Democratic Alliance leader Tony Leon said on Tuesday.
In his Human Rights Day message, Leon said the Constitution is South Africa’s supreme law.
”Yet it has been subjected to a slew of amendments which undermine its vitality and centrality, and which, if this trend continues, will risk downgrading it to, in effect, an ordinary Act of Parliament.”
The continuous amendments to the Constitution could make a mockery of the original settlement that South Africans negotiated in 1993, when the interim Constitution incorporating a Bill of Rights was adopted.
It was viewed then, as it should be viewed now, as a bridge over the troubled waters of the past.
However, Parliament is currently facing its 14th constitutional amendment.
”Ominously, this amendment is borne of the government’s desire to tamper with the judiciary,” he said. ”The draft Constitution 14th Amendment Bill appears to violate the separation of powers and jeopardises judicial independence.
”It has drawn rightful outrage and opposition from the judiciary, which is united in its rejection of the Bill.”
Leon said it is instructive to note that, in 10 short years, the South African Constitution had already been subject to 12 amendments, with the 13th and 14th amendments waiting in the wings.
While not all of these amendments have been contentious, it should be remembered that the Constitution of the United States has only been amended 27 times since it was adopted 217 years ago, in 1789.
”There is no doubt that the intended Constitution 14th Amendment Bill undermines the spirit of constitutional democracy itself; it goes to the root of the sacrosanct principle of the independence of our judiciary by seeking to take administrative control of the courts away from the chief justice and give it to the minister of justice.”
At the same time, some ANC MPs are considering mooting a constitutional amendment that would downgrade the status of the leader of the opposition, Leon said.
”When personal spite or political malice become the driving force for tampering with the Constitution, then warning lights start flashing. These proposed amendments will stifle a real culture of constitutionalism.
”By constitutionalism I mean respect for independent institutions to check and balance government’s power; the concept that parliamentary majorities are subject to judicial veto; and the idea that majoritarian power must yield, on occasion, to minority interests if we are to go forward as a nation truly united in our diversity,” Leon said. — Sapa