Thandi Modise was wrong to that debate on government’s role in Sundanese President Omar al-Bashir’s apparent illegal flight from South Africa were sub judice‚ the Congress of the People (Cope) said on Thursday.

Modise‚ chairperson of the National Council of Provinces (NCOP)‚ on Wednesday said that the matter could not be discussed because it was still before the North Gauteng High Court.

But‚ “the court had already decided the matter”‚ said Cope’s Dennis Bloem‚ who added that the question posed to Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa in the NCOP “was why the court decision was flouted by the government”.

“There was nothing sub judice about that. When the occasion suits the government‚ the courts hold sway‚ otherwise not at all. This is the highest level of hypocrisy‚” said Bloem.

“Our courts issued an order to prevent Bashir from leaving the country. In doing so the court upheld our Constitution which is undervalued and even resented by the ruling party. The ruling party ignored the order.”

An interim court order issued on Sunday ruled that Bashir could not leave the country while judges heard an application brought to have him in terms of an International Criminal Court warrant. The court later ordered Bashir’s arrest‚ but it emerged that he had already left the country.

Bloem said the “ruling party…clearly played a subversive role in allowing Bashir to enter the country and again help him to surreptitiously escape”.

“The ruling party helped him evade justice. Al-Bashir is accused of the commission of gross human rights violations and war crimes that saw some 300000 or so people killed and thousands of women raped‚” said Bloem.

“After this‚ no self-respecting democratic state in the world will again trust this government to abide by the its commitments to the international community. Our foreign policy is in tatters.”