Global Citizen Series with Judge Albie Sachs “Constitutional Democracy, Corruption, and Leadership – where to South Africa?”

The University of the Free State (UFS), South Africa, and the South Africa Chamber of Commerce UK (SACC UK) take great pleasure in extending an invitation to the next conversation in its Global Citizen webinar series.

On 18 October 2022, Global Citizen partners – the UFS Rector and Vice-Chancellor, Prof Francis Petersen, and SACC UK Chairman, Sharon Constançon – will discuss the state of South Africa through the lens of its constitution, its educators, and its state of corruption, with one of the finest legal minds, Judge Albert ‘Albie’ Sachs, described by The Guardian as “arguably the world’s most famous judge”.

Albie Sachs is a South African lawyer, activist, writer, and judge appointed by Nelson Mandela to the first Constitutional Court of South Africa. Sachs worked tirelessly as an African National Congress activist to end apartheid, sustaining debilitating personal injury in the process.  He was a key player in writing the Constitution of South Africa – one of the most progressive in the world, and one that met with high acclaim internationally when it took effect on 4 February 1997.  Human rights and the separation between the judiciary and parliament were given high prominence, heralding the opportunity to create – through the checks and balances inherent in government by constitutional democracy – a robust and flourishing state. 

How has this come to pass?  How can leadership in sectors across South Africa rebuild confidence and positively mobilise all communities to redress it?

Prof Francis Petersen, in discussion with Judge Albie Sachs, will revisit the notion of a constitutional democracy, and what role the law, and universities as educators of leaders, play and should play in addressing corruption.  How do we ‘turn back the clock’ to 1997 to regenerate the strengths and potential still inherent among South Africans and its international diaspora to set the country on a different path to that endemic of a failed state.

Judge Albie Sachs
Albie Sachs is an activist, writer and former judge on the Constitutional Court of South Africa (1994 – 2009). He began practising as an advocate at the Cape Bar at the age of 21, defending people charged under the racial statutes and security laws of apartheid. After two spells of being detained in solitary confinement without trial, first for five months, then for three months, he went into exile in England, where he completed a PhD at Sussex University. In 1988, he lost his right arm and his sight in one eye when a bomb was placed in his car by South African security agents in Maputo, Mozambique. After the bombing, he devoted himself to the preparations for a new democratic constitution for South Africa. When he returned home from exile, he served as a member of the Constitutional Committee and the National Executive of the African National Congress until the first democratic elections in 1994.

Sachs is a Board member of the Constitution Hill Trust, which promotes constitutionalism and the rule of law. He has travelled to many countries sharing South African experiences that might help heal divided societies.

He is the author of several books, including The Jail Diary of Albie Sachs, Justice in South Africa, Sexism and the Law, Soft Vengeance of a Freedom Fighter and The Strange Alchemy of Life and Law. His latest books are We, the People: Insights of an activist judge (2016) and Oliver Tambo’s Dream (2017).

Watch the replay below: