Recalibrator of Axioms : a tribute to Justice Sandile Ngcobo

• Author: Albie Sachs
• DOI: 10.10520/EJC-103384f1bf
• Published date: 01 August 2017
• Date: 01 August 2017
• Record Number: sapr1_v32_n1_2_a1
• Pages: 1-8

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https://doi.org/10.25159/2522-6800/3579

ISSN 2522-6800 (Online) | ISSN 2219-6412 (Print)

© Unisa Press 2017

Southern African Public Law

https://upjournals.co.za/index.php/SAPL/index

Volume 32 | Number 1 and 2 | 2017 | pp.1–8

COMMENTARY

Recalibrator of Axioms: A Tribute to Justice Sandile

Ngcobo

Albie Sachs

Justice of the Constitutional Court 1994—2009

Email: albie@albiesachs.com

When I heard whistling outside the gate of my chambers, I knew that my neighbour and

colleague Sandile Ngcobo had solved yet another legal problem. Sandile (as I know him

and as I will refer him in this piece) had joined the Court a few years after me when we

were still in our temporary accommodation at Braam Park. His chambers had been far

from mine. I would see him at the workshops we held after hearings in Court, having

noticed how quiet-voiced he had been on the Bench. He was clearly a person with a

strong interior life, very correct in his conduct and not easy to get to know outside of the

main purpose of our work, resolving constitutional issues.

Now in our new building in the heart of the Old Fort Prison where Gandhi, Luthuli

and Mandela had been locked up, we found ourselves to be neighbours. The young

Durban architects who had won the competition for the Court building had told us that,

instead of having sealed-o oors, one on top of the other, we would have galleries with

walkways to our chambers. This would give the space an open and friendly character

where you would be able to wave to your colleagues on the oors below or above. It

also meant that if your colleague was wont to whistle when he walked, you would hear

his whistling. Sandile would say afterwards that he had no idea that he’d been whistling,

but my memory is quite clear: a loud, melodious and spring-like whistle would be an

advance signal that a breakthrough judgment was on its way.

Each judge had the same space and the same basic set of furniture, but we could choose

our own colours and some additional furnishings and curtains to our taste. Within no

time, each set of chambers turned out to be dierent. Mine was light, bright and spacious,

with gauze curtains to maximise the opportunity to enjoy the view outside. There were

books and papers lying open and piled up on my desk and all over the place. Sandile’s

oce, I discovered, was completely enclosed, with rich earthy African colours, every

book in its proper position—hermit like, a well-articulated cocoon.