Government’s decision to pull out of the Rome Statute and by implication the International Criminal Court (ICC), marks a definitive break with the legacy of Nelson Mandela. SA’s liberation icon championed a foreign-policy posture based on human rights. But it is an ideal with which the ANC has grown increasingly uncomfortable. And it is one it has honoured more in the breach than the observance.We give Robert Mugabe a free pass when he stomps on Zimbabwe’s opposition and steals elections; we pander to China by blocking the Dalai Lama from crossing our borders; we abstain from a UN Human Rights Council vote on sexual orientation (despite being the first country to enshrine gay rights in its constitution); and we allow Omar al-Bashir, the Sudanese dictator wanted on charges of genocide, to slip out of SA in violation of our international duty to arrest him.SA’s exit from the ICC has seemed inevitable since the Al-Bashir debacle. But why now?After all, it was June last year when Al-Bas...
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