THE human rights organization African for Palestine says it plans to lodge another complaint with the Judicial Services Commission against Chief Justice Mogoeng Mogoeng for his COVID-19 vaccine remarks.
The organization said Mogoeng’s latest comments undermined medical science and the South African government’s position on the distribution of vaccines.
“We are confident that such outlandish fanatic speech and denial of medical science during a pandemic is a violation the JSC’s Code of Conduct which explicitly urges judges to refrain from such controversies,” said the organization’s director, Muhammed Desai.
“The Chief Justice is again failing to uphold the integrity of the office and position he holds. By terming certain vaccines as “666” or the “devil’s vaccines” he is undermining not only medical science, but also contradicting our government’s position on vaccines.”
Desai added that the Chief Justice’s comments on Israel and on vaccines are unacceptable, unbecoming, and they undermine the human rights as well as the safety of Palestinians and South Africans alike.
South Africa has registered more than 22,700 deaths from Covid-19, by far the highest number on the continent.
After South Africa began hosting the continent’s first coronavirus vaccine trial, anti-vaccine activists protested against Africans being used as test subjects.
Mogoeng caused a stir this week after he cautioned against harmful vaccines, saying he was praying that God would destroy any vaccine containing “666” and the devil.
He said it must be voluntary, adding that he was against the idea that people must travel with a vaccine certificate when it becomes available.
On Friday, Mogoeng said he stood by his remarks made at the Tembisa hospital on the vaccine developments taking place in South Africa and around the world.
“I said if there is any vaccine that is manufactured to advance a satanic agenda of the mark of the beast 666, if there is any vaccine that is manufactured for the purpose of corrupting the DNA of the people that vaccine must be burnt, it must die. God must intervene and destroy it,” said Mogoeng.
“So anybody who supports a vaccine that infuses 666 in the bodies of people, anybody who supports a vaccine that is meant to corrupt the DNA of the people I would understand if they raise an alarm.”
He added: “I’m not going to be begging for permission to pray. Never. In public and in private, I’m going to pray all the more. It is my Constitutional right. I am a Christian and I am not going to be hypocritical. Being a robust Christian in public and in private, I pretend, maybe so that when I deliver judgments that are in line with my Christian principals, people cannot spot it. I’m not that guy. We need to be open and we need to be transparent and that’s where I am.”
South Africa hopes to receive its first coronavirus vaccines from the Covax global distribution scheme in the second quarter of next year.
(SOURCE: INSIDE POLITICS)
