Born in Durban, Didcott became active in anti-apartheid politics at the University of Cape Town, where he was president of the National Union of South African Students.
Between June 1975 and October 1994, Didcott served as a judge of the Natal Division of the Supreme Court of South Africa, where he was particularly reputed for his progressive judgments in public and administrative law.
Eschewing textualist interpretation of apartheid legislation, he handed down various judgments in favour of individual rights and the political freedoms of the anti-apartheid movement.
[3] Chief Justice Ismail Mahomed, who was a student during the same period, described him as a charismatic politician,[4] and he was known as a skilled public speaker;[4] his debates against Zach de Beer and Sharkey King frequently packed the university's Jameson Hall.
[1] He practised there for the next two decades, with the exception of several months in 1960, when, during the state of emergency that followed the Sharpeville massacre, he fled briefly to Southern Rhodesia to avoid the attention of the security police.
But if ever South Africa had a Judge Hercules on the Bench during the past 20 years, including the worst of the apartheid era, it was John Didcott.
His commitment to principle, intellect, integrity and courage over a sustained period of judicial office represented a beacon of hope when many questioned the role of law in the country.
Didcott wrote several significant judgments in civil cases, including Roffey v Catterall,[9] on the onus of proof in restraint of trade disputes.
Among other things, he overturned a banning order against activist Fatima Meer,[3] and in 1986 he handed down judgment in the earliest legal challenge to the nationwide state of emergency instituted by the government in the aftermath of the Vaal uprising.
[11][12][13] The following year, Didcott overturned a government ban on foreign donations to the United Democratic Front, then the country's foremost anti-apartheid organisation.
[6] Alongside a small number of other judges, such as John Milne and Michael Corbett, Didcott was regarded as maintaining "the minority position of ameliorist sensitivity to liberty wherever possible", despite the apartheid context.
'''[21] From August to December 1984, Didcott was a visiting scholar at the Columbia Law School in New York,[1] and that trip to the United States cemented his support for the development of a South African bill of rights akin to the American one.
Its justification is the judicial assumption, deeply rooted in our legal heritage, that Parliament contemplated no greater infringement of personal freedom than is clearly and unmistakably apparent from the language in which it has expressed itself.
Because of his "innovative" interpretation of apartheid legislation, Didcott was sometimes subject to the criticism – as paraphrased by David Dyzenhaus – that he "was in dereliction of his duty because in order to establish his unblemished record, he had to lie about the law", trenching on parliamentary sovereignty.
[28] Following the negotiations to end apartheid, Didcott was a member of the Special Electoral Court that handled disputes arising during South Africa's first post-apartheid elections on 26 April 1994.
[6] Controversially, newly elected President Nelson Mandela declined to appoint him directly to the new court,[6][29] but he was shortlisted and interviewed by the Judicial Service Commission in October 1994.
Notably, S v Vermaas restored the accused's right to legal representation, effectively redeeming Didcott's 1988 Supreme Court judgment in Khanyile.
The wanton killing must stop before it makes a mockery of the civilised, humane and compassionate society to which the nation aspires, and has constitutionally pledged itself.