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Life in a Concrete Cube: Albie Sachs Recalls Apartheid

1,732 views · Published 1 February 2010 · 8:16 · Indexed 27 October 2026

Channel: FORA.tv · 2010 · News & Politics

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Complete video at: http://fora.tv/2010/01/21/Albie_Sachs_The_Strange_Alchemy_of_Life_and_Law

Albie Sachs, a former judge on the Constitutional Court of South Africa, recalls being placed in solitary confinement without trial while living under South African apartheid. Sachs describes the experience as worse than the car bomb that took his right arm and left him blind in one eye.

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From a young age, Albie Sachs played a prominent part in the struggle for justice in South Africa. As a result, he was detained in solitary confinement, tortured by sleep deprivation and eventually blown up by a car bomb which cost him his right arm and his sight in one eye.

After helping draft South Africa's post-apartheid Constitution, he was appointed by Nelson Mandela to be a member of the country's first Constitutional Court. Over the course of his 15-year term on the court he has grappled with major issues confronting modern South Africa, and the challenges posed to the fledgling democracy as it sought to overcome the injustices of the apartheid regime.

Sachs's book The Strange Alchemy of Life and Law (Oxford University Press) provides an insider's perspective on modern South Africa and a rare glimpse into the working of a judicial mind. - Open Society Institute

Albie Sachs became involved in human rights activism as a second-year law student at the University of Cape Town, when he took part in the Defiance of Unjust Laws Campaign. Three years later, he attended the Congress of the People at Kliptown, where the Freedom Charter was adopted.

In 1966 he went into exile. After spending 11 years studying and teaching law in England, he worked for a further 11 years in Mozambique as law professor and legal researcher. In 1988 he was blown up by a bomb placed in his car by South African security agents, losing an arm and his sight in one eye.

In 1990 he returned home, and as a member of the Constitutional Committee and the National Executive of the ANC, took an active part in the negotiations which led to South Africa becoming a constitutional democracy. After the first democratic election in 1994 he was appointed by President Nelson Mandela to serve on the newly established Constitutional Court.

In addition to his work on the court, he has traveled to many countries, sharing South African experience in healing divided societies.

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