Unequal before the law: Why SA jails the hungry and protects the well-fed

SOUTH Africa lives with a contradiction that we often pretend not to see, we do not have a single justice system. We have two. The first is fast, harsh, and designed for the poor. The second is slow, cautious, and endlessly negotiable, a luxury reserved for the powerful.

- NYANISO QWESHA

Walk into any magistrate’s court on a Monday morning. You will see shackled young men arrested for shoplifting food, for stealing copper to sell for taxi fare, for taking a cellphone to pawn for rent. These are “survival crimes’, born not of greed but of hunger and unemployment. Their cases move quickly. Bail is often unaffordable. Sentencing is swift. Jail time is normal.

Contrast that with the treatment of those who steal millions or sometimes billions through public procurement fraud, tender manipulation, financial engineering, or outright looting of state institutions. Their crimes destroy hospitals, schools, water systems, and trust in government. Yet they arrive in court flanked by senior counsel, not shackles. Their cases stretch for years through postponements, review applications, and “technical challenges”. They are never rushed. They are rarely imprisoned.

Some have the leisure to fight extradition from abroad, funded ironically by the proceeds of the very crimes they deny.

The message is clear, if you steal to eat, the law will break you. If you steal to enrich yourself, the law will negotiate with you.