CONSTITUTIONAL COMMENTARY AND EVENTS
ARTICLES AND STATEMENTS
ARTICLE: DRUNK BEHIND THE WHEEL – THE EXPLOITATION OF MEDICAL INTERNS IN SA
The medical profession is amongst the most altruistic of career paths. There is a commonplace understanding that becoming a doctor involves dedicating one’s life to the passion for saving the lives of others. The true extent of the dedication required is however a lesser known reality. Public health care practitioners face rigorous working hours rendered unlawfully exploitive in most other sectors. Young medical graduates bear the bulk of this burden, obliged to deal with these despotic working conditions in their two-year internship and further year of mandatory community service in order to complete their qualification.
STATEMENT BY FW DE KLERK FOUNDATION ON DECISION BY THE UNIVERSITY OF PRETORIA TO USE ONLY ENGLISH AS A LANGUAGE OF INSTRUCTION AND ASSESSMENT
The University of Pretoria’s (UP) new language policy does not pass constitutional muster and leaves the university open to legal challenges.
In terms of the Higher Education Act, section 27(2), a university has the right and responsibility to determine its language policy, subject to the national policy of the Minister of Higher Education. In this regard, the national policy describes Afrikaans as medium of instruction as a “national asset”. The Ministry “acknowledges that Afrikaans as a language of scholarship and science is a national resource…(and) fully supports the retention of Afrikaans as a medium of academic expression and communication in higher education, and is committed to ensuring that the capacity of Afrikaans to function as such a medium is not eroded” (par 15.4). There are therefore no legal impediments from government’s side on the UP accepting Afrikaans (and any other language) as a language of instruction.
ARTICLE: THE ORIGINS, INTENTIONS AND CONSEQUENCES OF THE EXPROPRIATION BILL
There should be no doubt about origins, intentions and consequences of the Expropriation Bill that President Zuma is about to sign into law.
The Bill has its origins deep in the ANC’s National Democratic Revolution (NDR) which calls for “the elimination of apartheid property relations”. This, according to the ANC, will require “the redistribution of wealth and income to benefit society as a whole, especially the poor” – and in particular “the deracialisation of ownership and control of wealth, including land…” In 2007 the ANC stated that “the central task in the current period is the eradication of the socio-economic legacy of apartheid; and this will remain so for many years to come.”
PODCASTS
SUBMISSIONS
SPEECHES
EVENTS
LETTER TO THE EDITOR: CITIZEN NEWSPAPER
Dear Madam/Sir
I refer to your article of 6 October 2019 titled “The policy that has seen R60m spent since 2016 on former Presidents and their wives” dealing with the benefits afforded to former Presidents.
The article quotes DA MP Leon Schreiber – referring to “the lifestyles of the rich and shameless” – and claiming that
“…taxpayers foot the bill of the lifestyles of six former presidents, deputies and their families….We spend about R3.5 million per year on each former president…” and “this is all on top of the generous pension benefits and the R3 million annual salary each president continues to receive for the rest of their lives.”
ARTICLE: CONCOURT HOLDS UNIVERSITY OF STELLENBOSCH’S LANGUAGE POLICY, PREFERRING ENGLISH, CONSTITUTIONALLY VALID
On Thursday, 10 October, the majority of the Constitutional Court held that the University of Stellenbosch’s contentious 2016 Language Policy (US 2016 Language Policy), which effectively provided for the increase of English tuition to broaden access to the University, with no similar provision for Afrikaans tuition, was constitutionally valid. The Gelyke Kanse and Others versus the Chairman of the Senate of the University of Stellenbosch and Others matter (Gelyke Kanse matter) was heard on appeal from the Western Cape High Court, which dismissed the review of US’s 2016 Language Policy in October 2017.
INVITATION: ROUNDTABLE SERIES 2019 – NUMBER 3
Join us for the third discussion for 2019 hosted by the Centre for Unity in Diversity (CUD) and supported by the Konrad Adenauer Foundation (KAS).
CONSTITUTIONAL ISSUES
- Equality
- Non-racialism
- Gender Rights
- The Constitution
- The Rule of Law
- Multiparty Democracy
- Personal Rights
- Cultural, Religious and Language Rights
- Freedom of Expression and Political Rights
- Social and Economic Rights
- Property Rights
- Education
- Access To The Courts, Information And Fair Adminstration