Public protector is inept

In an otherwise interesting article on the role of the public protector (“'Let chickens, not foxes, choose who guards henhouse”, July 10), Steven Friedman makes a disputable and uncorroborated claim that “attitudes to this protector and her predecessor depend on where you stand on the ANC’s factional divide for both sides, the protector’s job is not to protect the public but to support their favoured politicians”.

If I recall correctly, those who supported Thuli Madonsela did so not because she supported anyone’s favoured politician but because she defended the constitution and the strict adherence to the rule of law.

The problem with public protector Busisiwe Mkhwebane is not so much that she has targeted specific individuals, such as Pravin Gordhan and Cyril Ramaphosa, leaving her open to accusations that she is advancing a factional agenda, but that she has displayed an astonishing lack of competence, an abysmal lack of legal literacy and a severe lack of impartiality.

The scathing court judgments on two of her reports are a vivid testimony to that (Absa/Bankorp and Vrede/Estina dairy farm).

So the question is not whose favoured politician the protector is supposed to support but the requisite traits of character, such as moral integrity, impartiality and objectivity, as well as legal competence and knowledge of the constitution, that any public protector is supposed to have in order to discharge her duties.

Maurizio Passerin d’Entreves University of Cape Town