Chief Justice Pius Langa is so measured and consistent that one might think he is dull.
Every word is carefully chosen and often coupled with a knowing smile — especially when he is answering sensitive questions.
But Langa’s calm demeanour is deceptive. Behind it lies the resolve and moral purpose of a preacher’s son. That does not mean he is solemn. At times when he chairs meetings of the Judicial Service Commission (JSC) he reveals a dry, self-deprecating sense of humour.
He recently lightened the mood at the Twelve Apostles Hotel in Cape Town where the JSC sat to select judges. New commissioner Dumisa Ntsebeza’s tough grilling of candidates was eased by Langa’s gentle words.
Supporting North Gauteng High Court judge Frans Malan, who drew a parallel between religion and the law, Langa reminded him of the biblical book dedicated entirely to judges.
When Ntsebeza rounded on Eastern Cape advocate and atheist Torquil Paterson, the chief justice gently reassured Paterson that he was in friendly company.
This ability to calm troubled waters without raising his voice or taking the offensive will be missed when Langa retires in October.
When he was interviewed in his chambers last week his religious convictions were immediately apparent. Inscribed on a plaque above his head were St Paul’s words to the Thessalonians: “Therefore encourage one another and build each other up.”
Appointed by former president Nelson Mandela in 1994, Langa was one of the Constitutional Court’s founding judges.
From the moment he replaced Arthur Chaskalson as chief justice four years ago, he placed the stability of the judiciary at the top of his agenda.
“I regard the judiciary as a very important element contributing to a stable democracy. You may have politicians fighting among themselves, you may have Parliament possibly in disarray or near-disarray but if you have the judiciary in disarray I think that is very serious,” he said.
Without a forum to resolve their disputes it would be ordinary South Africans who would be worst affected.
Langa told the Mail & Guardian that it was his leadership that had “managed to steer the ship into calmer waters” after battles with the government over proposed legislation that was seen as threatening judges’ independence.
He said he remains “optimistic” about the future, as “there will always be sufficient sober leadership” to see the judiciary and the country through.
In 2005 Langa told the JSC that the judiciary had to win recognition among South Africans for its integrity and impartiality, but also for “the extent to which it succeeds in the delivery of justice”.
Asked what qualities will be needed in the judges who will replace him and the three colleagues who also step down this year, he repeated these sentiments.
However, he warned: “I dare say if someone does not subscribe to the values of the Constitution that person would not be appointed.”
In Kliptown next month, at what may be Langa’s last sitting as chair, the JSC will interview more than 20 applicants for the four vacancies.
Among them will be Western Cape Judge President John Hlophe, who has run headlong into Langa over allegations that he (Hlophe) tried to influence two Constitutional Court judges in a case involving President Jacob Zuma.
Hlophe has denied a recent M&G report that he had said he would not shake Langa’s hand, as this would be shaking “the hand of a white man”, and that the nature of the Constitutional Court was “green robes, white justice”.
A knowing smile spreads across Langa’s face when he is asked if he regrets his reported intervention to save Hlophe from possible impeachment over allegedly improper payments he received from a private company, Oasis Asset Management.
He gave the standard line about not wanting to discuss “confidential” JSC deliberations.
The term Langa has used to describe his life is “persistence”. He was born in Bushbuckridge, in rural Mpumalanga, after his father, a priest, was posted there from KwaZulu-Natal.
His six siblings include the award-winning novelist Mandla, former head of the Independent Broadcasting Authority, and Ben, who was close to black consciousness stalwarts such as Steve Biko and Unisa vice-chancellor Barney Pityana and who later became an ANC member and was assassinated in Durban in 1984.
“I regarded it as my function to debate with [the BC supporters],” Langa said, adding that he had always believed in non-racialism and had been a long-standing United Democratic Front member.
The Black Consciousness Movement’s values of independence, hard work and community involvement had, nevertheless, influenced him.
Quizzed on the succession, he would say only that: “I don’t want a chief justice who is a clone of Pius Langa, as much as I didn’t want to be a clone of Arthur Chaskalson.”
This week the DA, the Independent Democrats and the Congress of the People backed Langa’s long-time deputy Dikgang Moseneke as their choice for chief justice.
On the Africanisation of the law — which Hlophe has advocated — Langa said that “it’s easy to talk glibly” about the issue.
The Constitutional Court always had a bias towards customary law, both because it had been neglected and because of the country’s African setting. But, he said: “We are in Africa, we are all very much African. But we happen to be in South Africa and we have a purely South African Constitution.”