{"id":434939,"date":"2011-06-02T17:30:38","date_gmt":"2011-06-02T17:30:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.ghanamma.net\/2011\/06\/02\/sa-ex-spy-chief-opposes-secrecy-law\/"},"modified":"2011-06-02T17:30:38","modified_gmt":"2011-06-02T17:30:38","slug":"sa-ex-spy-chief-opposes-secrecy-law","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/06\/02\/sa-ex-spy-chief-opposes-secrecy-law\/","title":{"rendered":"SA ex-spy chief opposes secrecy law"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><div readability=\"74.3393380813\"><span><span>2 June 2011<\/span> <span>Last updated at<\/span> <span>13:30 ET<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>South Africa&#8217;s ex-intelligence minister has warned the governing African National Congress (ANC) against pushing a secrecy bill through parliament.<\/p>\n<p>The Protection of Information Bill would allow the government to classify material that is currently not secret.<\/p>\n<p>In an open letter, Ronnie Kasrils said it could have unintended consequences and silence whistle-blowers.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;It will certainly undermine public trust in the intelligence and security services,&#8221; he said.<\/p>\n<p>The BBC&#8217;s Karen Allen in Johannesburg says the proposed legislation has been met with a torrent of criticism from across the political divide.<\/p>\n<p><span>&#8216;Freedom of expression sacrosanct&#8217;<\/span><\/p>\n<p>Mr Kasrils is the latest high-profile figure to speak out against the controversial plans.<\/p>\n<p>He said the existing apartheid-era legislation needed reform, but said a public interest defence needed to be included to protect whistle-blowers.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Since freedom of expression is a dearly won principle of our liberation struggle, it needs to be treated as sacrosanct outside the narrow national-security sphere,&#8221; he said.<\/p>\n<p>Mr Kasrils initially introduced the Protection of Information Bill in 2008 when he served under former President Thabo Mbeki.<\/p>\n<p>The bill was withdrawn under huge public opposition, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.timeslive.co.za\/local\/article1097447.ece\/Kasrils-warns-ANC-on-steamrolling-secrecy-bill\">according to South Africa&#8217;s Times newspaper<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Current State Security Minister Siyabonga Cwele introduced a revised bill last year.<\/p>\n<p>The close relationship between senior politicians and the intelligence services has triggered alarm bells in South Africa in recent years, our correspondent says.<\/p>\n<p>Observers have accused the ANC of flexing its muscles on the bill, now that local government elections have been held.<\/p>\n<p>On Wednesday, trade unions threatened to sue the government in the Constitutional Court if the bill was pushed through in its current form.<\/p>\n<p>One of the Congress of South African Trade Unions&#8217;s biggest objections was the lengthy prison sentence someone would face if they came into possession of a classified document and passed it on to anybody but the police, the Sapa news agency reports.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/p>\n<p>See original article:<br \/>\n<a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/go\/rss\/int\/news\/-\/news\/world-africa-13628857\" title=\"SA ex-spy chief opposes secrecy law\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">SA ex-spy chief opposes secrecy law<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p> 2 June 2011 Last updated at 13:30 ET South Africa&#8217;s ex-intelligence minister has warned the governing African National Congress (ANC) against pushing a secrecy bill through parliament. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":415063,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-434939","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sports"},"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.0 - 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