Jeff Radebe, the convenor of the African National Congress (ANC) Provincial Task Team in KwaZulu-Natal, has expressed objections to a letter written by then-Magistrate C.I. Boswell in 1967. This letter was addressed to the Secretary of Justice just a week before Boswell was set to preside over an inquest into the death of former party president Chief Albert Luthuli. The Pietermaritzburg High Court is currently hearing the re-opened inquest into Luthuli’s death.
The court heard that Boswell attempted to prevent the initial inquest from being held. For the past 57 years, the ANC and the Luthuli family have been in dispute over whether he was struck by a freight train in Groutville, located on the North Coast of KwaZulu-Natal. They believe he was murdered by the apartheid government to silence him.
During his testimony on behalf of the former ruling party at the inquest, Radebe spoke about Boswell’s conduct.
He says, “Being a presiding officer, who is in charge of an inquest to pre-judge the matter is actually to destroy the rule of law. So in other words, my two grounds of objecting to this letter is on the basis of the separation of powers and also of subverting the cause of justice.”
Radebe says, “My conclusion from reading this letter is that there was no separation between presiding officers, especially magistrates, and the Department of Justice; in other words, the magistrates were an extension of the Department of Justice and as a result part of the state machinery to ensure the subjugation of the oppressed people.”
He says he is optimistic that justice will prevail once the reopened inquest into Luthuli’s death has been concluded.
Radebe says, “So happily today, we live in a constitutional democracy where the basic law of the land is the Constitution, and any law or conduct that is contrary to the Constitution would be struck down as unconstitutional.”
