Pretora - Yet another legal showdown over the street names is looming between AfriForum and the City of Tshwane.
This follows the failure by AfriForum Youth to remove the old Church Street signs it put up a week ago. The city had given Afriforum Youth until Friday to take them down.
AfriForum reinstated the signs bearing the Church Street name on WF Nkomo, Helen Joseph and Stanza Bopape streets. The roads were known as Church Street before the names were changed.
The city had threatened to take further action against AfriForum if the signs - defaced by the EFF - were not removed.
But the deadline passed and AfriForum was still refusing to remove the signs, which bears the name Church Street in Sotho, Afrikaans and English.
Mayoral spokesman Blessing Manale said legal steps would be taken against AfriForum.
But AfriForum’s Ian Cameron was still unrepentant on Sunday.
He accused the city of not knowing what to do about the matter. “They said they are going to charge us, but there is no crime we have committed. The police could not charge us,” he said.
The five people who put up at least 49 old street names were interrupted by police, who detained and later released them. Cameron said there had not been any formal correspondence from the city with regard taking legal steps.
He said the city could not press criminal charges because they had not broken any law. “I'm not sure on what grounds they'd go to court. I'm sure a judge would throw the case out. They have a weak case.”
Afriforum would not remove the signs because it would like to create room to celebrate the culture of everyone who lived in the country, he said. Reinstating the signs sent out the message that Afrikaners were here to stay, he said.
The names are now in the hands of the Supreme Court of Appeal. The city lost its objection to both the old and new street names being displayed pending court proceedings.
Pretoria News