Some of the boldest criticism of the government came from black intellectuals sympathetic to the ruling party, Democratic Alliance leader Tony Leon said on Tuesday.
Speaking to commemorate the public service and parliamentary career of Helen Suzman, he said on the other hand watchdog institutions, including universities and the business community were no longer outspoken.
Referring to the weekend statement by Western Cape premier Ebrahim Rasool that the ANC intended to bring down Cape Town City’s multiparty government, and to the assault on DA mayor Helen Zille at Crossroads, he noted the ”absolute silence of some of South Africa’s supposedly independent public institutions and civil
society organisations”.
”The Human Rights Commissions said nothing about the violence in Crossroads, nor did the Institute for Justice and Reconciliation, nor the Institute for Democracy in SA”.
English-speaking universities should have been guardians of liberal tradition of free thought, expression and inquiry, Leon said.
”They ought to have fiercely defended their independence. But they gave up long before the struggle for freedom was won.”
Leon warned that floor-crossing paved the way for Parliament becoming ”a shell, an empty forum for non-debates about non-issues”.
”Rules and procedures have been altered to amplify the government and muffle the opposition.
”Committees exercise little oversight over the executive, and ministers often get away with dodging difficult questions of failing to answer questions at all.”
Leon said that during Suzman’s time in Parliament, as a lone progressive voice, she was often able to use questions to produce important and often embarrassing information about what the apartheid government was up to.
”There was, however, a respect for the convention of answering parliamentary questions to the full.
”Today that convention is being discarded.” – Sapa