The law is [sometimes] an ass

[Mail & Guardian Newsletter logo](#) [mg.co.za]( [Divider Strip] Your Daily Briefing [Divider Strip] February 20 2020 | [View in browser]( [Divider Strip] [Facebook icon]( [Twitter icon]( [Instagram icon]( [LinkedIn icon]( Hi there, Apartheid was once the law. So too was the Prohibition of Mixed Marriages Act, the Bantu Education Act, the Group Areas Act and the Reservation of Separate Amenities Act. On Tuesday afternoon, after the Constitutional Court adjourned, the song Senzenina -- the lament sung in the aftermath of the Sharpeville Massacre in 1960, where 69 protesters were gunned down for objecting to the forced carrying of passbooks -- was the soundtrack. It was an appropriate song because the case before the court dealt with one of the last vestiges of apartheid legislation -- the Riotous Assemblies Act. It is a law drafted specifically in response to another momentous historical moment of struggle, the adoption of the Freedom Charter in 1955. The preamble of the Act says its purpose is "the prohibition of the engendering of feelings of hostility between the European and non-European inhabitants of the Union". The Act survived the dawn of democracy. This piece of legislation was not just law passed in the era of apartheid, said counsel for the Economic Freedom Fighters, Tembeka Ngcukaitobi. It was a law that was specifically passed to enforce apartheid -- "to deal with [Nelson] Mandela" and the other political leaders agitating to fight the system. The Act makes it a crime to "incite, instigate, command or procure" another person to commit "any offence". After laying unused on our statute books for years, it was "dusted off" and used to charge EFF leader Julius Malema, after he called on his supporters to occupy vacant land. The crime he was inciting his followers to commit was trespass under the Trespass Act, said the National Prosecuting Authority when he was charged in 2017. The Mail & Guardian knows all too well about how lawfare has been in the past and present to make citizens toe the line. Back when we were the Weekly Mail, we got a taste of the lengths government would go to to suppress and curtail civil liberties. Now, we need your help to survive another battle: [Support our journalism](. Coming up in the Mail & Guardian over the next two days: We head back into the tangled web of bureaucracy surrounding [South Africans stuck in Wuhan]( the epicentre of the coronavirus outbreak. We told you last week about the government's plan to [quarantine people]( returning from China in Thaba Nchu in the Free State. But it seems increasingly likely that the South African government -- like other African governments are reluctant to bring home their citizens from Wuhan, and other affected areas. We simply don't have the infrastructure to deal with a massive outbreak on the continent. Bill Gates, bless his billionaire heart, cautioned that a coronavirus outbreak in Africa would imperil the lives of millions of people. So what's a government to do? [Divider Strip] [Facebook icon]( [Twitter icon]( [Instagram icon]( [LinkedIn icon]( You are receiving this email on {EMAIL} because 1.) You're a member of "Mail & Guardian" or 2.) previously subscribed [M&G logo] 25 Owl St, Braamfontein Werf, Johannesburg, 2092 Want to be removed? No problem! [UNSUBSCRIBE]( Email support: help@media-connect.co.za - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -