A good week for SIU head Andy Mothibi

Good week

Andy Mothibi, head of the Special Investigating Unit (SIU), has been cracking down on the National Lotteries Commission (NLC), which has long been suspected of steering money meant for deserving causes to the undeserving. His gumshoes uncovered millions of Lotto money that were “hijacked”, and the Special Tribunal granted the SIU a preservation order against former NLC board chair Alfred Nevhutanda, who allegedly used some of that hijacked money to buy a house for R27m.

Bad week

On the scale of right-wing regression, it takes a lot to top the US Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe vs Wade. But justice Clarence Thomas has done his level best. Not content to simply strip women of their constitutional right to abortion, he’s also suggested that three other landmark decisions be revisited. These “demonstrably erroneous” rulings protect same-sex intimate relations and marriage, and married couples’ right to contraception. It’s a sad day when the institutions that ultimately safeguard the autonomy of citizens set out to actively dismantle those protections. Welcome to America, the land of the formerly free.