Only persons who had been vaccinated against Covid-19 or could produce documentation of a negative Covid-19 test result would be allowed to attend some court cases at Durban High Court.
This decision was confirmed by Judge Mahendra Chetty during the case that involves involving KwaZulu-Natal ANC deputy chairperson and former MEC Mike Mabuyakhulu.
According to some media reports the message was sent out on Wednesday, September 8, urging those who wanted to attend the trial to provide proof that they had been vaccinated.
“In terms of the directive issued to the parties prior to the commencement of the Trial, all parties present in Court are required to complete a form, to be retained by my Registrar, indicating whether they have had a vaccine for SARS CoV-2 infection and Covid-19 disease. Proof of vaccination is required when completing the questionnaire,”
Dozens of health experts, scientists, political analysts and scholars have shared their views about the controversial Durban High Court.
Mosa Moshabela believes that the Durban High Court vaccination passport label term is problematic because it means that people are restricted in one way or another in terms of access.
”From an individual rights perspective, that labelling has a little bit of an injustice. The vaccination ‘passport’ term might’ invoke a lot of trauma from the past where people are constantly thinking of their pasts. The vaccination ‘passport’ term is almost like some sort of authoritarian rule.”
UKZN Professor Tulio de Oliveira fully supports a mandatory vaccination for anyone who wishes to attend any public gathering events. According to Professor Oliveira, providing some form of safety guarantee is something that has always been done and it is about time all South African also accept that vaccination password is of benefit to everyone.
‘’The idea of vaccine passports is something that has been used for the past 30 years or 40 years. For example, when we started primary school, they wanted to see the immunization certificate against polio against measles and stuff like that.
Another typical example internationally exposed South African will tell you is that you cannot go to many countries in the world, including you cannot enter in South Africa, if you come from South America, or Southeast Asia, if you have done the yellow fever.
Now if you were to put aside science and all these other unfounded theories, it really doesn’t make sense why the COVID-19 vaccine document, passport or certificate is so controversial.’’
On the other hand, researcher and lecturer, Dr Dale T McKinley questioned the constitutional legitimacy of independent organizations power to decide access to human rights.
”There is the other side to this mandatory vaccination debate that needs to be explored. That has to do with asking difficult questions like, can or should the decision to vaccinate or not be only considered as a purely an individual rights issue?
Or is this the case where public health and collective rights trumped individual rights and that’s a fundamentally constitutional important question that we mustn’t run away from
According to some experts, at this stage, debates about compulsory vaccinations and Covid 19 passport is premature because it won’t make any sense to make vaccinations compulsory until the vast majority of people have access to vaccinations or do not want to get vaccinated.
Attempts to get comments from the SA Human Rights Commission were unsuccessful.
