Appeal to be opposed
READY TO FIGHT: GOVERNMENT SAYS REGULATIONS CRAFTED TO SAVE LIVES
Group that wins case that lockdown regulations are unconstitutional is dissatisfied.
The group that took government to court and this week won a ruling declaring most of the Level 5 and 4 lockdown regulations unconstitutional and invalid is unhappy that the Cabinet will appeal the ruling.
The Liberty Fighters Network (LFN) said it had noted the news “with extreme dissatisfaction”.
It said LFN had not received any formal notice from the government of its intentions, but that it would still formulate a suitable response once the request for leave to appeal at the High Court in Pretoria had been scrutinised.
LFN president Reyno de Beer said it was ready to oppose any appeal attempt by the government and would accept any such challenge “as representatives for the people of our country”.
De Beer said LFN been “astounded by all the thanksgiving messages” it had received since the judgment, “not only from the people of South Africa, but also from across Africa and the United States of America”.
He said LFN had accepted its now “unofficial role as the delegate for the people of South Africa country during the time when all the political parties pledged their lockdown support to our clearly disorientated government”.
He said: “If a referendum could be called today, LFN believes the vast majority of the South African electorate would be voting in favour of a government submitting itself to a judgment which, we feel, to have been a very fair and just assessment of the South African reality under lockdown. “Instead of bringing its regulations in line with our constitution and end the ongoing abuses of human rights, government appears to have chosen a path of a rather weird resistance.
“If this, our government, was indeed a government by the people and for the people, you would not be reading this. “Thank you all for your support.”
Minister in the Presidency Jackson Mthembu on Thursday said the government was confident about the prospects of its appeal of the high court ruling.
He was briefing the media on outcomes of a special Cabinet meeting convened to deal with the judgment.
Cabinet was concerned about it, hence the decision to take the matter on appeal.
He said Cabinet believed the government had been transparent on the regulations and what informed decisions during the lockdown and had not done anything justifying the adverse high court judgment.
Cabinet was “very confident” that all lockdown levels “were crafted to save lives ... that’s what we were about”.
A number of public commentators and the World Health Organisation had applauded the government for the steps it had taken to deal with the Covid-19 pandemic.
They allowed for the slowing down of the infection rate and gave the country’s hospitals time to prepare and be ready for the “inevitable spike” of the pandemic infections, Mthembu said.
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Government appears to have chosen a path of rather weird resistance