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ECAAR-SA's Application to Appeal to be Heard Tomorrow, May 5 |
Press Statement by :
Economist Allied for Arms Reduction - South Africa
04 May 2004
ECAAR-SA
3B Alpine Mews
High Cape
Cape Town 8001
021-465-7423
ecaar@icon.co.za
Our application for leave to appeal against the judgment against us on March 4 2004 will be heard at 9am on Wednesday, May 5 in the Cape High Court. The judgment held we should have directed our attack against the Cabinet rather than the Minister of Finance.
We believe that we were entirely correct, and that the judges erred in their findings. The State Liability Act 20 of 1957 requires that a litigant must cite the responsible minister in a representative capacity. It is the loan agreements signed by the Minister of Finance "for an on behalf of the Republic of South Africa acting through its Department of Finance" that give effect to the arms deal. The loan agreements are integral to the supply agreements.
We also believe that the judges erred in finding that the Minister was presented with a fait accompli by the Cabinet, and that his role was merely to implement the decision of his colleagues. Such a judgment reduces the Minister to a mere functionary of the Cabinet, and is therefore at variance with section 92 (1) of the Constitution. As Minister of Finance, the funding of socio-economic upliftment of the poor and disempowered, as required by the Bill of Rights, renders him ultimately responsible for financial policy decisions taken by the Cabinet.
Similarly, in disregarding the warnings of the "affordability study," both the Cabinet and judges rendered it superfluous and irrelevant. Yet the authors of the study warned that analysis of the risks of the arms deal "may create a situation in which the government could be confronted by mounting economic, fiscal and financial difficulties at some future point". The authors clearly understood the arms deal to be economically and financially reckless, and irrational (and therefore unconstitutional).
We are applying for leave to appeal to the Supreme Court of Appeal of South Africa in Bloemfontein from whence we may need to take it ultimately to the Constitutional Court in Johannesburg. The attached 12 page paper endeavours to set out the issues.
Terry Crawford-Browne