Why did the President mislead the House on al-Bashir, and why are we attending his inauguration?

While the Democratic Alliance (DA) welcomes the President's statement yesterday, in response to a question I raised with him in the National Assembly, that Omar al-Bashir will be arrested if he attends the World Cup, the President appeared to have misled the House when describing the nature of the African Union resolution that South Africa had supported, and his administration has subsequently confirmed that we will be attending al-Bashir's inauguration later this month - a totally wrongheaded show of support from the ANC government for a man who stands accused of crimes against humanity.

To begin with, the President needs to clarify why he totally misrepresented what went on at the African Union.

The President said yesterday:

"[The AU] did not say we must not arrest al-Bashir."

Yet on 3 July 2009, at an African Union (AU) assembly meeting in Libya, AU member states passed Assembly Document 13(XIII), which expressed its "deep concern at the indictment issued by the Pre-Trial Chamber of the ICC against President Omar Hassan Ahmed El Bashir of the Republic of The Sudan". The resolution goes on to say:

"AU Member States shall not cooperate pursuant to the provisions of Article 98 of the Rome Statute of the ICC relating to immunities, for the arrest and surrender of President Omar El Bashir of the Sudan."

The AU resolution that was passed stated in no uncertain terms that AU member states should not arrest al-Bashir, and that is precisely why we have raised concerns over this AU motion in the first place.

The President, therefore, is either ill-informed or has deliberately misled the House. The latter would be a very serious offence.

The fact is that South Africa's representative at this AU meeting failed to vote down Assembly Doc. 13(XIII), oppose it, abstain from it, or distance the South African delegation from it in any way. And the enforcement of the AU's decision on South African soil would be an unconstitutional act in our Republic. Our Constitution mandates that South Africa is bound by international agreements upon ratification by Parliament, and our Parliament passed the International Criminal Court Act in 2002, which effectively binds South Africa to the Rome Statute, and to the particular arrest warrant issued for al-Bashir. In essence, the South African delegation on Libya supported a resolution that was unconstitutional and ought never to have been passed without South African opposition to it, and the Zuma administration has never publicly explained why such a decision would have received South African support.

Yesterday, the President attempted to justify the ANC government's support for the AU decision, but the fact of the matter is that the AU decision cannot be reconciled with our own laws. One says that South Africa should not arrest al-Bashir, the other says we should. This means that although we welcome the president's confirmation that South Africa would abide by the ICC decision, his defence of the AU decision is perplexing and contradictory, and his misrepresentation of it warrants explanation.

Equally disappointing is that the Department of International Relations has failed to confirm whether al-Bashir has indicated he will be attending the tournament. The department's spokesperson Saul Molobi appears to have ducked the topic with reporters yesterday, which hints that al-Bashir may be attending. If that is the case, the International Relations Department must confirm that fact, rather than shy away from reporters' questions.

The DA is also very disappointed by the Zuma administration's decision for South Africa to attend al-Bashir's inauguration as Sudanese president, as was announced by the Department of International Relations yesterday.

The South African government should not be attending celebrations devoted to a man who faces an international warrant of arrest over crimes against humanity - which include rape, torture, forced displacements and the murder of between 200,000 and 400,000 Sudanese.

We do not see how attending this inauguration would advance our Constitutional imperative to protect "human dignity, the achievement of equality and the advancement of human rights and freedoms".

Statement issued by Kenneth Mubu, MP, Democratic Alliance shadow minister of international relations, May 28 2010

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