Janusz Waluś, the far-right extremist who assassinated anti-apartheid leader Chris Hani in 1993, will be deported to Poland on Friday, South Africa’s government announced.
Waluś, 71, served nearly 30 years of a life sentence for Hani’s murder before being released on parole in 2022, a decision that sparked protests in South Africa. After completing his parole, Waluś will now be handed over to the Department of Home Affairs for deportation, according to Minister in the Presidency Khumbudzo Ntshavheni.
“This is a Constitutional Court decision, and the government is complying with it,” Ntshavheni said at a briefing. Home Affairs Minister Leon Schreiber confirmed the deportation would take place on Friday, with costs covered by the Polish embassy.
Waluś, who moved to South Africa in 1981, lost his South African citizenship after being convicted of Hani’s assassination. During the 1990s Truth and Reconciliation Commission hearings, he admitted to killing Hani to prevent what he saw as communists gaining power in South Africa.
Hani, a senior African National Congress leader and head of the South African Communist Party, was gunned down outside his Johannesburg home in 1993. His death came during a tense period of negotiations for the country’s democratic transition. The South African government noted that Hani’s assassination forced negotiating parties to set a date for the first democratic elections.
“Every year, as we celebrate Freedom Day, we are in large part indebted to Chris Hani,” the government said in a statement.
