No one is above the law

NOTHING will bring Mido Macia back –

that’s beyond the purview of justice in

the here and now – but after Judge Bert

Bam’s ruling in the High Court in Preto-

ria this week, police officers will think twice about

taking the law into their own hands.

On the afternoon of February 26, 2013, Macia was

arrested for parking his taxi illegally at a taxi rank

in Daveyton. The policemen handcuffed his hands

behind his head to a police van and dragged him

through the streets and then beat him to death in

the police cells. On Wednesday, Judge Bam sen-

tenced the eight officers, whom he had earlier con-

victed on the doctrine of common purpose, to

15 years’ imprisonment for murder.

It’s a judgment that has come at the right time in

South African society as police stand accused of ex-

ecuting suspected gunman Khulekani Mpanza in

cold blood in Krugersdorp. This case has polarised

the nation. Many believe the police have every right

to shoot to kill as exhorted previously by a national

police commissioner and a deputy minister, no less.

Others are aghast at this flagrant breach of the

law, to say nothing of the constitution. Judge Bam’s

judgment recalibrates the argument entirely.

First, no one is above the law and second, those

who we entrust to uphold the law have a greater ob-

ligation than normal citizens not to break it.

That’s precisely how it should be, right down to

the use of the common purpose doctrine, much

loathed in the apartheid era because it was abused

to send batches of activists to the Island or the gal-

lows. In this case it was absolutely fitting, since

good officers must stop bad officers, which in this

case patently didn’t happen.

We all sympathise with the plight of the police,

but we can never condone any situation where they

unilaterally ascribe to themselves the roles of

judge, jury and executioner, because when we do

that, the war is lost – and so are we.