Pretoria - The International Bar Association (IBA) on Thursday expressed deep concern over amendments to South Africa's prosecutions policy, which it said granted the government new powers to give immunity to criminals and thereby undermined victims' human rights.
"A clear example of the possible detrimental effect of the new policy was the power it gave to the national director of public prosecutions (NDPP) to decline to prosecute murder even though in South African law there is no statute of limitations or prescription on the crime of murder," the IBA said in a statement.
The special policy directives for the prosecution of apartheid-era political criminals were unveiled in Parliament in January.
They were aimed at individuals denied amnesty by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) after its hearings into SA's apartheid past, and those who failed to seek such indemnity.
The amendments gave wide-ranging discretion to the NDPP on whether or not to prosecute those who did not apply for or who did not receive amnesty from the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.
While making provision for special plea and sentencing agreements with the State, the directives did not amount to an amnesty process for perpetrators, deputy director of public prosecutions, Gerhard Nel, said in January when briefing Parliament's justice portfolio committee the amendments.
Phillip Tahmindjis, IBA programme lawyer in a statement said SA's 1996 Constitution retained provisions relating to amnesty, but only for the TRC's purposes with a limited period of amnesty being granted to perpetrators who came forward prior to May 11, 2004.
"These criteria have been replicated for the purposes of the National Director of Public Prosecutions exercising his or her discretion over all cases in future.
"To use these criteria to prioritise cases would be legitimate. But to use them to assist in exercising discretion not to prosecute can amount to an impunity for crime. This is a breach of the human rights of the victims," Tahmindjis said.
"This is neither appropriate nor effective policy in today's South's Africa.
"The human rights of victims should be of paramount importance and people should not be allowed to escape prosecution simply because a policy is arbitrarily applied to the decision as to whether or not an individual should be prosecuted," the IBA's executive director, Mark Ellis, said.
The organisation said Ellis had written directly to justice minister Brigitte Mabandla to outline their concerns.
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DAAR'S NET EEN PAD OM TE LOOP,EN DIS DIE BOERVOLK SE PAD,SAAM MET DIE SKEPPER
