The parole for the man behind the 1993 assassination of anti-apartheid activist Chris Hani is set for February 2022 when the Constitutional Court is expected to decide if Polish migrant Janusz Walus “has turned a new leaf in his life to deserve the pardon,” APA learnt here on Tuesday.
Walus killed the anti-apartheid activist on the eve of South Africa’s new political dispensation when he shot him outside his Boksburg home in Johannesburg for political reasons.
He and politician Clive Derby-Lewis were arrested for the killing and were sentenced to death but the sentence was commuted to life imprisonment after the death penalty was abolished in 1994.
Derby-Lewis was released on medical parole in 2015 and died of cancer months later.
The latest application for parole will be the third attempt by Walus to free himself from the jaws of justice.
In his application, Walus said he has realised that “apartheid is wrong and I have grown closer to God during my almost 30-year incarceration.”
These revelations were listed in papers filed in the Constitutional Court earlier this year when he asked the apex court to look into his last failed bid to get parole in March 2020.
“I have already, in the application papers, apologised to the Hani family. And I have done everything that I could to show remorse and to communicate my apology to the Hani family,” the convict said in the application.
He added: “I have great remorse in respect of what I have done. I realise today that it was completely unacceptable.”
NM/jn/APA