MADLANGA J Nature of the right [26] The country’s apartheid history was characterised by the wanton invasion of the privacy of people by the state through searches and seizures, the interception of their communications and generally by spying on them in all manner of forms. Here is what Mistry tells us: “The existence of safeguards to regulate the way in which state officials may enter the private domains of ordinary citizens is one of the features that distinguish a constitutional democracy from a police state. South African experience has been notoriously mixed in this regard. On the one hand there has been an admirable history of strong statutory controls over the powers of the police to search and seize. On the other, when it came to racially discriminatory laws and security legislation, vast and often unrestricted discretionary powers were conferred on officials and police. Generations of systematised and egregious violations of personal privacy established norms of disrespect for citizens that seeped generally into the public administration and promoted amongst a great many officials habits and practices inconsistent with the standards of conduct now required by the Bill of Rights. [The right to privacy] accordingly requires us to repudiate the past practices that were repugnant to the new constitutional values, while at the same time re-affirming and building on those that were consistent with these values.”47 “Limitation of rights (1) The rights in the Bill of Rights may be limited only in terms of law of general application to the extent that the limitation is reasonable and justifiable in an open and democratic society based on human dignity, equality and freedom, taking into account all relevant factors, including— 47 (a) the nature of the right; (b) the importance of the purpose of the limitation; (c) the nature and extent of the limitation; (d) the relation between the limitation and its purpose; and (e) less restrictive means to achieve the purpose.” Mistry above n 44 at para 25. 21