Race issue takes centre stage at JSC hearings

Mothle is quoted in a Business Day report as saying people at the Pretoria Bar 'talk about transformation', but there has to be an 'institutional intervention' and a programme to recruit black people and women to the advocates' profession and support juniors in developing their practice. He said there was no such programme at the Pretoria Bar. Mothle was responding to questions by Deputy Judge President of the South Gauteng High Court, Phineas Mojapelo. Mojapelo asked Mothle whether there was 'buy-in (for a transformation programme) from the dominant membership of that Bar'. Mothle replied: 'I'm sorry to say, there isn't.' He said there are individuals who are committed to transformation but, 'as an institution, I don't think the Bar Council has moved beyond just discussing transformation'. Willem van der Linde SC, from the Johannesburg Bar, was grilled by commissioners for having been a member of the Ruiterwag, an Afrikaner youth secret society. Van der Linde said he believed the Ruiterwag was an organisation with the aim of 'preserving and asserting Afrikaner culture'. But Justice Minister Jeff Radebe suggested that the Ruiterwag was used by the NP to select the 'staunchest' supporters of its ideals to operate undercover in order to promote such ideals. But Van der Linde said if this was the case, it went 'over my head'. He said he was not asked to do anything undercover. Nor did he know the Ruiterwag was linked to the Broederbond, he said. Full Business Day report

One of the questions Chief Justice Sandile Ngcobo asked each candidate was on the importance of public confidence in the judiciary. Mothle said, as did all the candidates, that public confidence in the judiciary was 'vital'. But, notes Business Day, he added that this was particularly so given SA's history, where for most people the judiciary was an instrument of the apartheid state in enforcing its unjust laws. He said in certain quarters, this perception still existed. Mothle said this was why transformation of the Bench, particularly the appointment of black judges, was so important. When black people were appointed as judges, their people knew that 'we are now represented there'. When he entered the legal profession in 1980, it would have been 'impossible' for him to aspire to judicial office, Mothle said. Full Business Day report

A veteran Gauteng attorney was quizzed on whether rulings he had delivered as an acting judge were all his own work. According to a report on the News24 site, Commissioner Engela Schlemmer, a Unisa law professor, told Ramarumo Monama she had read through all the judgments he had attached to his application. 'There is something that concerns me and that is the fact that some paragraphs in your judgments flow perfectly: grammatically they're correct, the references are perfect, your quotations are perfect. 'And then your style sometimes changes and you make a lot of grammatical errors and the quotations and references are incomplete. Could you explain that to me,' she asked. 'To the extent that they are indeed incomplete, I apologise,' said Monama. 'It may well be that pressure of putting this judgment out... but I take full responsibility for the errors that I've made.' Pressed by Schlemmer on why the style had changed, he said style was 'very difficult', and he tried to use the style recommended for judgment writing. 'Perhaps I should put it a bit clearer: it sometimes seems as if part of the judgment was written by someone else,' said Schlemmer. 'Inelegant as it may be...I would assure you that I do my own writing,' replied Monama. Full report on the News24 site See TODAY'S ANALYSIS (below)