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CRIMINAL JUSTICE SYSTEM REVIEW: FOUR SALRC DISCUSSION PAPERS OUT FOR COMMENT
- 20 February 2025
- Justice & Constitutional Development
- SA Legal Academy
Please note: In a media statement welcoming the discussion papers, Justice & Constitutional Development Deputy Minister Andries Nel is quoted as having noted that the discussion papers ‘do not reflect the views of government or any of the (associated) departments or institutions’. Their purpose is to elicit input from ‘ordinary members of the public’. According to the statement, public perceptions of the prevailing criminal justice system range from describing it as ‘an oppressive and untransformed relic of apartheid that does not reflect the values and rights enshrined in the Constitution’ to one in which ‘criminals enjoy more rights than law-abiding citizens, especially (the) victims of crime’.
The South African Law Reform Commission has called for input by 31 March 2025 on four discussion papers. Together, they form part of an ongoing review of the criminal justice system in general with a complete ‘overhaul’ of the 1977 Criminal Procedure Act in mind.
Please click the links below to access the documents:
- discussion paper on appropriate (alternative) dispute resolution (ADR) in criminal matters (recommending the use of pre-trial ADRs to ‘redirect’ criminal cases away from the courts and finalising them by way of ‘abbreviated’ and cost-effective processes)
- SALRC notice
- discussion paper on non-trial resolutions (exploring this option in the context of corruption cases)
- SALRC notice
- discussion paper on the arrest dispensation (recommending measures to curtail unlawful arrests)
- SALRC notice
- discussion paper on the bail dispensation (recommending measures to address ‘deficiencies or gaps’ in the statutory framework requiring ‘urgent attention’.
- SALRC notice
Published by SA Legal Academy Policy Watch
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