Haneef: another blow for civil liberties?

Perhaps civil libertarians will regard the ruling in the Haneef proceedings as a small concession. Be that as it may, the legal procedure thus envisaged offers a degree of transparency, accountability and fair treatment for the visa holder. Those parts of the Act which allow the Minister to withhold information from the court, if this is in the national interest, were not challenged in these court proceedings.

For me the Haneef saga remains oppressive despite the concession achieved by the court proceedings. I refer to the unscrupulous use of a matter involving a person’s personal liberty for propaganda purposes.

During the entirety of the Haneef saga the Minister, and others associated with the case, used press conferences to release information to the media. Some of this material moreover was selective and prejudicial. The Minister resorted to innuendo referring repeatedly to “his suspicions” and he used talk-back radio shamelessly to support his views.

Further, the entire saga was portrayed, choreographed and presented as part of the “war” against terrorism; a war which incorporates and transforms administrative proceedings against a foreigner into a “law and order” issue; a time-honoured means to differentiate “us” from “them”; a time-honoured means whereby a polity creates insecurity and fear only to mobilise that insecurity to remain in power and in so doing curtail our liberties. It is this latter facet of the saga which, I believe, cannot be underestimated.