South African court orders white supremacist to be freed on parole

JOHANNESBURG (AA) – South Africa’s Constitutional Court on Monday ordered the release of Janusz Walus, who was jailed for killing anti-apartheid leader Chris Hani in 1993, on parole.

“The decision of the Minister of Justice and Correctional Services made in March 2022 denying the applicant’s application for parole, is reviewed and set aside,” Chief Justice Raymond Zondo said in his judgment.

According to the court order, Walus should be placed on parole in the next 10 days.

Walus, a Polish immigrant who acquired South African citizenship, gunned down Hani outside his home in Boksburg, east of Johannesburg, in April 1993.

The assassination nearly threw South Africa into a civil war barely a year into its transition from apartheid to democratic rule.

Chris Hani’s widow, Limpho Hani, expressed disappointment over the court order, calling the judgment “diabolical.”

“This court has not even addressed the victims. This country is finished. A foreign white person can come into the country and kill my husband and then the court does not refer to my family and trauma (we went through),” Limpho Hani told reporters.

Walus was sentenced to death in 1993 but the sentence was later commuted to life in prison.

Hani was the leader of the South African Communist Party, a close partner of the ruling African National Congress.

The South African Communist Party also expressed displeasure with the judgment.