Hlophe racism allegations go to Judge President

‘If these allegations are indeed true, they are most disturbing since they completely undermine the Judge President\'s public stand on racism, and, in addition, seriously impair the position that he holds,’ said Advocate Ashton Schippers, chairman of the Cape Bar Council. Hlophe is alleged to have called attorney Joshua Greeff a ‘piece of white s..t’ in the presence of advocate and former acting judge Dirk Uijs, acting justice Tandaswa Ndita and prosecutor Christehenus van der Vijfer. Schippers said another serious implication, should the allegations prove to be true, was the silence on the part of Ndita. ‘All of this does not augur well for the relationship between the Bench on the one hand, and the Bar and the wider legal profession, on the other.’ Full report in The Witness

Political parties are beginning to react to the issue, with the ANC saying the judiciary\'s ability to identify and weed-out racism internally has its backing. Spokesperson Smuts Ngonyama is quoted by the Cape Times as saying he is confident that this weekend\'s heads of court meeting in Cape Town will deal with the issue. However, The Mercury says the Azanian People’s Organisation became the first political party to publicly support Hlophe. During members’ statements in the National Assembly yesterday, Azapo MP Pandelani Nefolovhodwe backed the view of the Black Lawyers Association – that there was a deliberate attempt to discredit Hlophe. ‘Azapo believes that the attacks on Judge Hlophe are indicative of the desire by those who hitherto have been in charge of the judiciary … to protect vested interests that favoured the rich.’ However, Freedom Front Plus MP Frik van Heerden was of the view that there could be no smoke without a fire, and urged Hlophe to go on long leave pending an investigation by the Cape Bar Council’s racism complaint against him.
The Mercury report not available online Full report in the Cape Times