No Evidence Needed

Another form of banning, is to impose 12-hour or 24-hour house arrest. A 12-hour house arrest order usually confines the person to his house from 6pm to 6am, during which period he may receive no visitors, while over the weekend he is confined to his house from 2pm on Saturdays to 6am on Monday mornings. A 24-hour house arrest order confines him to his house day and night.

A banning order, of course, effectively prevents a banned person from taking part in the activities of any organisation, not only a political organisation. It also prohibits one banned person from communicating with another banned person.

Severe as these banning orders are, they can be imposed without any evidence whatever being produced of unlawful activity by the person concerned. They are arbitary punishments against which there is no appeal.

by Stanley Uys — Observer Foreign News Service — in Capetown