Professor Tshepo Madlingozi is a Commissioner at the South African Human Rights Commission. Before joining the SAHRC, he was the Director of the Centre for Applied Legal Studies at the Wits University, and was actively involved in the work of various civil society organizations and initiatives, including, among others, the Rural Democracy Trust, Khulumani Support Group, and the African Coalition for Corporate Accountability (ACCA). For thirteen years from 2005 to 2018, Professor Madlingozi dedicated his efforts to the Khulumani Support Group, serving as the National Advocacy Coordinator and later as Chairperson, supporting the movement's 120,000 members composed of victims and survivors of apartheid. Furthermore, he played a pivotal role as Chief Panelist for the South African Human Rights Commission Enquiry into Racial Discrimination and other forms of Discrimination in Advertising from 2021 to 2022. He holds academic positions at the International Institute of Social Studies of Erasmus University Rotterdam and the Vienna Master of Arts in Applied Human Rights. 

ABSTRACT

THE SOUTH-AFRICAN TRUTH AND RECONCILIATION COMMITTEE – THE EFFECTS ON SOCIETY TWENTY-SIX YEARS LATER

Tshepo Madlingozi, Commissioner: South African Human Rights Commission  

This year, 2024, South Africa is celebrating thirty years of democracy. This milestone is a perfect time to reflect on the journey that South Africa has travelled to overcome its more than three hundred and thirty years of colonialism, colonisation, land dispossession, genocide, economic subjugation, and institutionalised patriarchy, homophobia, ableism and racism. At the heart of both reckoning with and overcoming this history was a transitional justice process in the form of a Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC). The goals of the TRC were to establish the truth about the past, grant amnesty where appropriate, and establish measures for reparations. The TRC was the biggest commission to date: it received more than 22,000 statements and conducted 100 hearings. The TRC has received international acclaim, resulting in versions of it being exported to various contexts. Yet, today, according to the World Bank and UN agencies, South Africa is the most unequal country in the world. The effects of institutionalised racism,  patriarchy and other forms of discrimination and oppression are all too visible in society. The unrests of 2021, where more than 350 people lost their lives, as well as other incidents of outbreaks of xenophobic attacks and racial disharmony point to a country still grappling with the afterlives of colonialism. This address aims to take stock of the effects of the TRC on the South Africa society twenty six years later.