THE LOWLY NEWSPAPERMAN: Anti-immigrant mob is fuelling a dangerous anti-constitutionalist fire

A dangerous element landing with the population now is that the Constitution and the judiciary that upholds our republic’s founding document are a luxury. The anti-immigration lobby is driving this sentiment.

The hoodlums were back on our streets again this week, forcefully taking over the enforcement of immigration policy while the state was at sixes and sevens.

Mind you, they never went away. The date of 30 June, which they set as a deadline for undocumented migrants (who they call illegal immigrants) to leave South Africa, was just the symbolic peak of their campaign, but they never stopped. Jacinta Ngobese-Zuma, Phakel’umthakathi Ndabandaba and their mobs of ruffians have since June continued their crusade against foreign nationals living in this country. They claim they have been targeting those who are illegally here and are a burden to society, but it has been totally indiscriminate. Anyone who was worthy of the “kwerekwere” or “grigamba” epithet has been pretty much fair game. Before and after 30 June these gangs have been going on human hunts, banging on doors and residences in search of foreigners.

This week’s renewed outrage, which saw armed mobs take to the streets, had to do with a circular issued by the Department of Home Affairs about the need to abide by the Constitutional Court’s directive that asylum seekers cannot be turned away, regardless of how they entered the country.

“Every refugee reception office must, with immediate effect, receive every person who reports in person and indicates an intention to apply for asylum, and must assist that person to lodge an application,” the circular instructed officials. It told them that “no refugee reception office may operate a policy or quota that prevents persons from obtaining effective access to the asylum application process.”

The mob then turned on Home Affairs and the judiciary, accusing them of allowing the overwhelming of South Africa by stinky foreign elements.

Hostility towards the judiciary, fuelled by political leaders and populist activists, is on the rise. It is not new.

This mob’s head prefect, Ngobese-Zuma, foamed that “being a South African is really tough. Is this really the democracy we signed up for? Where our voices are completely ignored even in court cases because the courts will tell us what the law is and we have to accept it because the courts say so?”

Trying hard to misunderstand that she lives in a constitutional democracy and not some godforsaken backwater banana republic, she asked: “What is the use of democracy if the judges are there? Why don’t the judges just run our lives?”

Now, Ngobese-Zuma is no dolt. She is an extremely intelligent person who fully understands the prescripts of the rule of law. She just ignores them and she knows that the yobs who follow her yelling do not get it as much as she does. She, and all of us, know that the Constitutional Court is the servant of the Constitution. It is the non-porous border through which no violation of our sacred rights should be allowed through. The courts below are also servants of that Constitution and laws of the land. Judges do not impose their views on us.