Remember Madiba’s words

SOUTH Africa should not be a friend, associate or protector of the President of Sudan, Omar al-Bashir. Yes, we know the West is full of hypocrites – and countries of the so-called developed world have unleashed untold misery and visited death and destruction in dozens of countries around the globe.

We believe that any world leader, whether he or she be from the US, the UK, Germany or France, should be charged with war crimes if they are guilty of widespread torture and the use of weapons of war on the innocent.

We condemn the doctrine of collective punishment.

We believe it is as dastardly as the terrorism we regularly – and rightly – condemn.

We are therefore horrified that South Africa would want to defend someone accused of having carried out the most horrendous of war crimes – because someone else in the West has not been accused of and charged with similar crimes. It is crazy logic. Given what the majority of South Africans lived through during the apartheid years – the murder the torture and the general deprivation based on skin colour – we would have expected our government to stand up for the right to dignity and life of those under threat all over the world. Especially in Sudan. Omar al-Bashir grabbed power in a coup in Sudan in 1989 – and almost immediately starting ruling with an iron fist.

The International Criminal Court (ICC), has accused him of being the orchestrator of genocide in Darfur in the west of Sudan.

On March 4, 2009, the court issued a warrant of arrest against him for crimes against humanity and war crimes.

He is accused of being the mastermind behind the deaths of more than 300 000 men, women and children, and of the displacement of more than 3 million Darfuris.

In June 2015, South Africa had a chance to arrest him when he was in the country for an African Union meeting. They didn’t. The ICC has ruled that our government was at fault for not arresting him.

We urge our government to think back on our experiences under apartheid, and the inauguration speech in May 1994 of the founding father of our democracy, Nelson Mandela: “Never, never and never again shall it be that this beautiful land will again experience the oppression of one by another,” he said.

Let us remember these words, and let us act accordingly when dealing with tyrants such as Omar al-Bashir.