BDFM News Online
Tuesday, January 09, 2007
OPPOSITION parties have criticised the African National Congress (ANC) for attacking the Human Rights Commission, which has told Justice Minister Brigitte Mabandla to get her act together on applications for presidential pardons of 384 Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP)-aligned prisoners.
The IFP and Democratic Alliance (DA) said the attack was uncalled for, and accused the ruling party of interference.
The United Democratic Movement (UDM) called for an investigation into the presidential pardons.
The commission is a chapter nine institution, with a constitutional mandate to curb executive power. The attack comes after accusations that chapter nine institutions are the lapdogs of government.
Commission CE Tseliso Thipanyane said last week the institution found the minister violated the applicants' rights because their applications had not yet been processed. Some had been pending for three years. The commission recommended that Mabandla process the applications within three months.
The ANC accused the commission of being ill-informed and "making inappropriate and highly irregular public pro- nouncements".
It said the commission had not followed protocol in its interaction with the ministry, and so its integrity and its publicly stated positions were undermined.
IFP KwaZulu-Natal spokesman Blessed Gwala said the ANC's statement was "a barometer to check how the ANC interferes with such structures".
"The minister made a serious violation by attending only to the applications of ANC political prisoners. They are defending the minister because she is a member of the ANC. They should instead encourage the minister to deal with the matter," he said.
DA justice spokes-woman Sheila Camerer said the delay in processing the applications was because of politics, and that each application should be handled in due course.
"The human rights commission was entirely within its rights to be critical. The ANC is playing politics again, and is entirely out of line. The human rights commission is there for everyone, after all," she said.
UDM spokesman Star Khonco said an inquiry was needed.
However, the party would comment on the minister's alleged bias only after it had seen the commission's report.
The commission said it could not comment on the ANC's attack as its chairman, Jody Kollapen, was on holiday.