President Cyril Ramaphosa told the National Conference on the Constitution that it presented a platform to address challenges around the rule of law, accountability, and social and economic justice.
The three-day conference, held under the theme “Reflections and the road ahead”, got under way in Midrand, Gauteng on Wednesday.
“Working together with parliament, I think there should be an opportunity for us to look at our constitution as a product of long and protracted struggles for freedom, for justice and a better life for all the people of our country,” Ramaphosa said.
The president further said all levels of government needed to be addressed.
“It should also reflect on matters such as how we deal with corruption, with crime, national security, and how these issues impact on the exercise and the protection of human rights.
“This conference gives us an opportunity to reflect on the road that we must traverse to strengthen our constitutional democracy,” he said.
In the first certification case of the new constitution, the Constitutional Court said: “South Africa’s past has been aptly described as that of a deeply divided society characterised by strife, conflict, untold suffering and injustice which generated gross violations of human rights, the transgression of humanitarian principles in violent conflicts and a legacy of hatred, fear, guilt and revenge.”
Ramaphosa stressed that the constitution is more than the dominate law of the land.
“Our constitution is therefore more than the supreme law of our land. It is a firm and emphatic rejection of the political, social, and economic system that came before it.
“Our constitution, which has now been in operation for over 25 years, constitutes a social compact on how we should relate to each other as a people, how we should relate to other nations as a sovereign state, and how we should govern ourselves and our resources.”
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