Johann Kriegler

Johann Christiaan Kriegler (born 29 November 1932) is a retired South African judge who served in the Constitutional Court of South Africa from February 1995 to November 2002. Formerly a practising silk in Johannesburg, he joined the bench as a judge of the Transvaal Provincial Division in 1984. He was also the first chairperson of the post-apartheid Independent Electoral Commission and Electoral Commission of South Africa.

An Afrikaner from Pretoria, Kriegler was called to the Johannesburg Bar as an advocate in 1959 and took silk in 1972. In addition to his trial advocacy, he gained prominence for his involvement in human rights law, particularly as founding chairperson of Lawyers for Human Rights from 1981. Upon gaining judicial appointment, he served in the Supreme Court of South Africa from 1984 to 1995, first in the Transvaal Division and then, from 1993, in the Appellate Division. President Nelson Mandela elevated him to the inaugural bench of the Constitutional Court upon the court's inception, and he served in the apex court until his retirement in November 2002.

While a sitting judge, Kriegler was appointed to chair the Electoral Commission in December 1993, and he oversaw both the administration of the first post-apartheid election in April 1994 and the commission's own establishment as a permanent institution. Both before and after his retirement, he was active in international engagements on electoral disputes and judicial independence, notably as chairperson of Kenya's Kriegler Commission in 2008. In addition, from 2008 to 2023, he was the founding chairperson of Freedom Under Law, a prominent non-profit organisation which aims to promote the rule of law in South Africa.

Early life and education The son of an Afrikaner professional soldier, Kriegler was born in Pretoria on 29 November 1932. He matriculated in 1949 at the King Edward VII School in Johannesburg and attended the South African Military Academy for two years thereafter. In 1954, he graduated with a BA degree from the University of Pretoria, where he was politically active as an opponent of the apartheid-era National Party government.

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During his career as an advocate, Kriegler chaired the Johannesburg Bar Council in 1977 and 1980, Defending Kriegler's human rights credentials, George Bizos pointed in particular to Kriegler's refusal to resign from the Legal Resources Centre, despite a contrary instruction from the apartheid government and Chief Justice Pierre Rabie.

1994 general election In December 1993, during the final stages of the negotiations to end apartheid, Kriegler was appointed as chairperson of the Independent Electoral Commission, which was tasked with administering South African's first elections under universal suffrage. Dikgang Moseneke was appointed as Kriegler's deputy. In Kriegler's summation, "Probably because we knew no better, we pulled it off." ' and he served there until he retired from the judiciary on 29 November 2002, his 70th birthday. though he also argued extra-curially that it was not within any court's remit "to be seen or to aspire to being seen to be activist". pointing to his minority opinions in President v Hugo and Du Plessis v De Klerk as examples of his judicial "boldness". Indeed, in this role, Kriegler had increasingly strained relations with Mandela's African National Congress government: among other things, he was a vocal critic of the government's decision to strengthen voter identification requirements (in particular by requiring the universal use of bar-coded identification documents for voter registration), and in July 1998, he threatened to resign if the government did not augment the commission's budget.

On 26 January 1999, ahead of that year's general election, Kriegler resigned from the Electoral Commission. he was harshly criticised by South African Justice Minister Penuell Maduna, who told the press that the extra-curial activities of Kriegler and Justice Richard Goldstone demonstrated that Constitutional Court justices were under-worked and lazy.

Retirement After his retirement in November 2002, Kriegler spent two further years training South African aspirant judges, prosecutors, and advocates,

Freedom Under Law and Hlophe dispute

In 2008, Kriegler became the founding chairman of Freedom Under Law (FUL), a non-profit organisation newly established to promote the rule of law in Southern Africa through public advocacy and strategic litigation. Kriegler said that the decision was "gravely harmful to the rule of law".

Kriegler had engaged in a minor public spat with Hlophe the prior month – after he made critical comments during a public lecture at Witwatersrand University – and FUL's announcement deepened the controversy. Three FUL members resigned from advisory positions in response: while Kgomotso Moroka and Cyril Ramaphosa said only that they had not been consulted on FUL's legal action, Dumisa Ntsebeza told the press that he was concerned about "the statements and words which are attributed to Judge Kriegler in the media. It's impossible to live with a very clear patronising attitude toward black people, which has become a recurring theme in his [Kriegler's] statements." Kriegler said that FUL would nonetheless proceed with the legal action, saying:I was frightened at the prospect, I am still frightened at the prospect, but fortunately I had an old boer grandfather who taught me as jou voet in die stiebeuel is moet jy ry [ Afrikaans for 'when your foot is in the stirrup, you’ve got to ride']. We’ve got to go with it now... I am far too vain an old man to grow a thick skin, but all I can do is wrap myself in the blanket of duty. The resulting legal and disciplinary processes continued for over a decade. On 1 March 2021, the Sunday Times'' quoted Kriegler, speaking on behalf of FUL, as making further critical remarks about Hlophe, including the propositions that Hlophe was not fit to be a judge and that he had employed "contrived reasoning" in acquitting politician Bongani Bongo of corruption. Hlophe's lawyer, Vuyo Ngalwana, laid a complaint against Kriegler at the Judicial Service Commission, alleging that Kriegler had misconducted himself in making these remarks publicly. In July 2022, in a ruling penned by Judge Dumisani Zondi, the Judicial Conduct Committee found against Kriegler, ordering him to retract his statement.

Kriegler retired from the board of Freedom Under Law on 30 July 2023, ceding the chairmanship to retired judge Azhar Cachalia.

International consulting He also continued his engagements as an international consultant on electoral and judicial matters, including on behalf of the International Commission of Jurists, the United Nations Electoral Assistance Division, and the International Bar Association. and in 2010 he and Safwat Sidqi were the international members whom Afghan President Hamid Karzai appointed to the Electoral Complaints Commission which adjudicated disputes arising from the 2010 Afghan parliamentary election.

Awards and honours In 2003, the General Council of the Bar of South Africa presented Kriegler with its Sydney and Felicia Kentridge Award for Service to Law in Southern Africa, He is an honorary life member of the Johannesburg Bar and an honorary bencher of Gray's Inn, London.

Personal life

He has six children and three step-children.