THE Constitutional Court has ordered the Department of Justice to release former SA Communist Party (SACP) General Secretary Chris Hani’s killer, Janusz Walus, on parole.
Chief Justice Raymond Zondo said the decision to deny the Polish immigrant parole on March 2020 was irrational and set aside.
In a unanimous judgement on Monday, Zondo ordered Justice Minister Ronald Lamola to release Walus on parole in the next 10 days.
An immigrant from Poland, Walus killed anti-apartheid activist Chris Hani in October 1993.
Janusz Walus is getting parole. The man who killed Chris Hani will be a free man today. I can already hear where this is going. The man hasn’t even told us who ordered him to kill Hani.😭😭😭
— Gugu Lebohang❤️ (@gugu_mtho) November 21, 2022
He was initially sentenced to death for the murder but later had that sentence commuted to life behind bars.
Reactions
[WATCH] Chris Hani’s widow Limpho Hani reacts to the Constitutional Court’s decision to release his killer, Janusz Walus on parole.#Newzroom405 pic.twitter.com/j2BGNl8j23
— Newzroom Afrika (@Newzroom405) November 21, 2022
“Chief Justice Raymond Zondo is a big disappointment. This country is finished. A foreigner came to this country to kill my husband. Today Minister Lindiwe Sisulu is vindicated,” Chris Hani’s wife Limpho Hani said following the judgment.
“The department will study the judgment, and consult lawyers,” Minister of Justice and Correctional Services spokesperson Chrispin Phiri said.
Hani said the decision to instruct the Minister of Correctional Services to grant Janusz Walus parole was “diabolical”.
Speaking outside the court on Monday, she said: “Minister Lindiwe Sisulu is my hero- she saw this coming. She has been vindicated.She is the only one who saw this one coming. It’s not a coincidence that both former President Jacob Zuma and Waluz ‘s parole judgements are being delivered today (Monday).
She decried the decision of the court and said it was more a dictatorship than a constitutional court because it failed to consider the victims.
“I do not exist. This country is finished. We are done. A foreign white man came into this country and killed my husband. I wish them the best.
‘This judgement is diabolical. Chief Justice Zondo is basically saying indirectly that Waluz did well in killing my husband,” an emotionally charged Hani said.
SACP
South African Communist Party (SACP) General Secretary Solly Mapaila said the constitutional court judgement was sickeningly disappointing.
“The judgement does not even say anything about the submissions made by the SACP and the Chris Hani family when the court heard this matter”, said Mapaila in reaction to the ruling.
The SACP said it fully supports the family of Chris Hani was the General Secretary of the SACP when he was assassinated on 10 April 1993.
The assassination of Chris Hani left a gaping wound in his family, the SACP and the ranks of the working-class.
“The judgement has rubbed salt granules to the wound. Hani was assassinated for being a communist, for leading the struggle for democracy in our country, but the Hani family permanently lost a husband, father, uncle, you name it all.
“Like Hani, we are unapologetic for being communists ourselves”, said Mapaila.
Mapaila said the judgement has far-reaching implications that compel the SACP to analyse it deeper and look for a new way forward under the circumstances.
EFF rejects decision
The Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) said it rejects the Constitutional Court ruling to release the murderer of Chris Hani Janusz Walus.
It said the court undermined the sensitivities of black people and would invoke instability in the country because “there will never be peace if Waluz is out of prison.”
EFF said the court must take full responsibility over what will happen if he comes out of prison.
“The murderer of Chris Hani cannot be forgiven and must therefore remain in prison until death” The decision is callous, insensitive and regressive, and is made by a self-centred collective led by Raymond Zondo, who have today spit on the grave of Chris Hani and those who diedfighting for the freedom of this country.”
EFF said it was disappointing that the decision was taken despite the fact that there has been no resolution between Janusz Walus and the Hani family: A family which has consistently opposed his release due to the trauma they suffered, of discovering the lifeless and bloodied body of their father and husband in a driveway all those years ago.”
This singular act, EFF argued, has reduced the Constitution Court to an instrument that reinforces white-supremacy and disrespects the memory of an icon.
“We as Economic Freedom Fighters will do everything humanly possible to refuse and reject the release of Janusz Walus as a free person because he has destroyed a revolutionary, a true Freedom Fighter who would have saved us from white supremacy,oppression, exploitation and domination had he lived,” it said.
PAC
The Pan Africanist Congress (PAC) said it noted with disdain and disgust the decision of the neo-liberal Constitutional Court to authorise the release of the killer of former Umkhonto We Sizwe (MK), SACP and ANC leader Chris Hani.
“This is against the backdrop of decades and decades of our calls for the release of incarcerated soldiers of the Azanian Peoples Liberation Army (APLA). The decision spits in the face of Hani, and all the APLA prisoners as well as real leaders of the liberation movement,” PAC said through its Twitter page.
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