The choice that could save South Africa, or wreck it

SOUTH AFRICA’S Constitutional Court may be the world’s most emotionally powerful building. The courtroom is built with the bricks of the Old Fort prison, where both Nelson Mandela and Mahatma Gandhi were held. A glass strip around the courtroom, allowing passers-by to see in, represents transparency. Above the entrance, the values of the constitution are set in concrete in the handwriting of the first constitutional judges after apartheid—including the childlike script of Albie Sachs, who had to learn to write with his left hand after the white regime’s security services blew off his right arm. In painful contrast with its uplifting setting, a recent conversation between an Economist journalist and an official working in the building was, at the official’s request, conducted outside and, as a further precaution against surveillance by today’s security services, the journalist was asked to leave her phone inside. It is a measure of how far South Africa has...Continue reading