by Karl Gernetzky, 30 March 2016, 14:35
Clive Derby-Lewis and Janusz Walus appear in front of the Truth and Reconcilaition Commission in June 1997. Picture: ADIL BRADLOW/PICTURENET AFRICA
JUSTICE Minister Michael Masutha has launched an appeal against a ruling by the High Court in Pretoria earlier in March that the minister release Janusz Walus on parole.
Legal representatives filed the application for leave to appeal on Wednesday morning, with the minister believing the court "erred in its judgment and is of the view that there are prospects of success on appeal," the Department of Justice and Correctional Services said.
On March 10, the High Court in Pretoria overruled a decision by Mr Masutha not to grant Walus parole, a move that sparked outrage by the African National Congress (ANC) and the South African Communist Party (SACP). The appeal from the department had been widely expected.
Walus has served 23 years of a life sentence for the 1993 murder SACP general-secretary Chris Hani, an act that brought SA to the brink of civil war.
The ANC had called for Walus, a Polish immigrant, to be deported, while the SACP said it would fully support an appeal.
Both the SACP and Hani’s widow, Limpho Hani, had criticised the ruling as biased. Walus had originally been sentenced to death for the murder. Co-conspirator Clive Derby-Lewis, who provided Walus with the weapon used in the murder, was released on medical parole in 2015.