DURBAN - The National Association of Democratic Lawyers (Nadel) and the INJEJE yabeNGUNI Council have issued scathing statements denouncing calls for advocate Dali Mpofu, SC, to be removed from the Judicial Service Commission.
This follows Freedom Under Law, the Pretoria Society of Advocates, and some media criticising the manner in which Mpofu handled the JSC interviews.
The INJEJE yabeNGUNI Council said it was disgusted by those seeking to have Mpofu removed from the JSC, arguing these calls were informed by the “inherent racist culture and attitude towards African professionals. The Bar is full of individuals made senior counsels without any true substance to them and their work, and thus it comes as no surprise when dirty white fossils rears their racist heads … it’s on the basis of racism that the majority of them are even senior counsels.
“We shall never be held to ransom by envious has-beens … advocate Dali Mpofu has demonstrated African excellence,” it said, adding Mpofu was a shining lamp of exceptional competence.
The chairperson of the Pretoria Society of Advocates, advocate DM Leathern SC, denied his organisation was racist. “This has absolutely nothing to do with the race card, this organisation is not racist; we will never entertain racism.”
The National Association of Democratic Lawyers (Nadel) also supported Mpofu, and the JSC commissioners. Secretary-general, Nolitha Jali, said Nadel took exception to the defamatory, slanderous language used by Media24’s editor-in-chief, Adriaan Basson, against Mpofu.
“The insults are crude, inappropriate, and unacceptable especially because the JSC commissioners are democratically elected by organisations and institutions which include representatives of political parties, the profession, academia, and the judiciary.
“The distasteful labelling of advocate Mpofu as a ‘legal nincompoop’, ‘scoundrel’, ‘sly’ and ‘immoral’ leaves much to be desired not only from Basson, but also from the News24 publication.”
Nadel heeded the call in defending black professionals against “the racist onslaught”, and demanded Basson and News24 retract the article and apologise. Basson said: “I fully subscribe to Section 16 of the Constitution that safeguards freedom of speech. They are entitled to their opinion, just as I am to mine.”
Freedom Under Law chair, Judge Johan Kriegler, denied it had racially targeted Mpofu, saying playing the race card when all else failed was an “easy way out”.
Mpofu said he was humbled by the support.
“Many black professionals continue being racially targeted by those who have no regard for black people.”
Daily News