E/CN.4/1999/15/Add.1 page 12 their white colleagues staff the special units (scientific service, elite units…) and headquarters posts. Justice 39. In order to protect the independence of the judiciary and the public’s access to the judicial system, a Justice Commission has been established which will attempt to achieve a racial balance among magistrates. An educational programme has been developed at Pretoria Justice College with a view to reforming the judiciary’s attitudes and thinking. B. Opposition to the changes 40. The opposition takes the form of a veiled and persistent conspiracy: the efforts of the white minority to hold on to economic power and privileges, the sabotaging of governmental initiatives within the administrative system, negative propaganda in certain media regarding government activities, and attempts to depict the equal opportunity and affirmative action policies as racism and inverted racial discrimination. 41. At the 50th national conference of the African National Congress on 16 December 1997 at Mafikeng (Gauteng province), President Mandela strongly condemned a planned insurrection aimed at destabilising South Africa’s young democracy. In his words, “various elements of the former ruling group have been working to establish a network which would launch or intensify a campaign of destabilisation, some of whose features would be: the weakening of the ANC and its allies; the use of crime to render the countryside ungovernable; the subversion of the economy; and the erosion of confidence both of our people and the rest of the world in our capacity both to govern and to achieve our goals of reconstruction and development.” 42. The initiators of the planned insurrection were said to be already working actively in government and in other sectors of South African society. They had incited people to commit crimes and were attempting to weaken and paralyse the machinery of State through the theft of equipment weapons and ammunition; according to President Mandela, they had concealed documents of State importance and were in the process of setting up parallel structures, including an espionage system and armed forces. The most active tendencies in this movement were said to belong to neo-fascist groups with international contacts. Supporters of the former regime who oppose the measures being taken to redress past injustices argue that they constitute inverse racial discrimination which is incompatible with the Constitution; they protest that a brain drain is taking place and that an economic disaster will occur if the programmes of equal opportunity and affirmative action are implemented. 43. With competent officials in short supply, one of the major dilemmas facing the Government is that it must rely on an administration whose origins lie in the apartheid regime in order to implement a reform programme which that administration does not support. Some of those interviewed by the Special Rapporteur spoke of the recalcitrance of a part of the administration which still supports the beliefs of apartheid and hampers implementation of the reforms through delaying tactics.