A Fight For Rights
The fight for dignity and access to treatment for all was won in streets, but also in the courtrooms. ‘Without our comrades in the AIDS Law Project, now SECTION27, our campaigns would not have succeeded. We were also helped by other human rights lawyers, especially the Legal Resources Centre,’ says TAC activist Vuyiseka Dubula.
Fatima Hassan, a lawyer who used to work on TAC cases, explains: ‘During the deadly period of AIDS denialism, we worked with TAC on its legal cases and together won
a number of victories. We operated as activists, then as human rights campaigners, and only then as lawyers. We practised activist lawyering, using every democratic institution and route – inspired by great lawyers of the anti-apartheid movement. Working with TAC, first when it was a small volunteer-based organisation and then as a national organisation, I realised that the law alone cannot fully transform our society, only people can. The most
valuable and transformative legal challenges are those that mobilise and educate people so that communities use the law to give effect to their own voices and their own issues.’
Her colleague, Jonathan Berger, continues: ‘TAC’s work is deeply grounded in the Constitution – in the rights it recognises, in the obligations it imposes on the state and
the private sector, and in its recognition of the importance of the rule of law to good governance, accountability and service delivery. This understanding of the Constitution
has helped TAC to frame its demands in human rights language and use the law as a tool for progressive social change.’
This section of the archive is focused on TAC’s legal battles and includes footage of the following:
- Beating the drug companies in court – the Pharmaceutical Manufacturer’s Association dropped their court action on 19 April 2001. It was a big blow against the pharmaceutical industry. But immediately after the victory, Health Minister Manto Tshabalala-Msimang said in a press conference that antiretrovirals would not be made available.
- Hazel Tau versus big pharma. In her affidavit to the Competition Commission, TAC member and the first complainant Hazel Tau wrote, ‘I am an adult female residing in Soweto, Gauteng. I am a single woman. I am also a breadwinner in my family. I was diagnosed with HIV in 1991… But I cannot afford to pay the prices the drug companies charge for antiretroviral treatment.’ In December 2003, both GlaxoSmithKline and Boehringer agreed to allow generic companies to sell their medicines both in South Africa and to other sub-Saharan African countries. It was a huge victory in the fight for greater access to medicines and prices soon came down.
- Campaign against rape – TAC’s work to end gender based violence in our communities and to promote access to health and justice services for rape survivors.
- Justice for Lorna? In December 2005, after TAC members attended every one of the over 20 court hearings, the court found two people guilty. The first accused was found guilty of murdering and raping 21-year-old mother and TAC health educator Lorna Mlofana. The second accused was found guilty of attempted murder. [Footage of final verdict in the case]
- The prevention of mother-to-child transmission case was one of many examples of TAC using the courts to fight for the rights of poor people.
- HIV-positive soldiers win case against SANDF – immediate reinstatement of five people who were denied positions in the country’s military on the basis of their HIV status.
- TAC speaks out against xenophobic violence. Zolani Mahola from South African Afrofusion band Freshlyground speaks her mind about the wave of xenophobic violence which gripped South Africa during the month of May 2008.
- How TAC used the Constitution to benefit the general public
