GRAHAMSTOWN resident Sazi Matama has instituted a R100 000 claim against the business owner who admitted to calling him a "k*****" after a parking altercation.
Matama, 45, has charged that Muiriel Els’s conduct has violated his rights to human dignity and violated the Promotion to Equality and Unfair Discrimination Act. His case at the Equality Court in Grahamstown was postponed this week for heads of arguments.
The Legal Resources Centre, for Matama, made reference to last week’s Constitutional Court judgment, which confirmed the banning of the K-word. It delivered a scathing ruling against former Sars employee Jacobus Johannes Kruger, who made racist remarks to his black supervisor during an exchange.
Matama claimed Els had attempted to run him over while he was taking her vehicle’s registration number, and had also opened a criminal case against Els with the SA Human Rights Commission after the heated argument in 2012.
In his court papers, Matama said Els had blocked his driveway with her business vehicle when he wanted to get out of his yard. “I asked one of the employees of the company to ask the driver to remove it. The driver came and moved it out of the way."
After parking his vehicle at its normal spot, Matama said he heard loud, “persisting hooting” coming from Els’s vehicle parked behind him.
“I then got out of my car and proceeded to the bakkie behind me to ask the driver if everything was all right. Upon my asking, the driver swore at me. Her exact words were “f***** k*****".
"Immediately after this, I walked back to my car to get a pen and paper to write (down) the bakkie’s registration number. At this point, the driver was verbally abusing my mother. She called my mother a ‘f***** b****’,” he said.
Els has denied claims of discrimination, saying she “merely responded” to Matama’s racial insults and aggression when he allegedly called her a "f****** white boer". She said she had apologised that same day, and did not deserve to suffer indefinitely due to Matama’s lack of forgiveness.
“I admit I called the respondent in kind by calling him a k*****. I fully appreciate that my action, although fuelled by his provocative and insulting words, was uncalled for, and I therefore apologised to him the same day,” she said in court papers.
Matama claims that Els drove off but later returned to apologise, saying that she had been upset by her sister’s sickness. He said he was "psychologically and emotionally harmed".
Els has asked the Equality Court to dismiss Matama's case because the senior public prosecutor had established his version was not acceptable for a criminal prosecution.