Cape Town - The ANC is demanding heavy financial penalties and criminal prosecution for people guilty of racist outbursts that undermine people’s dignity.
Late this week the ruling party launched hate speech cases in Equality Courts in Durban, Cape Town and Port Elizabeth against KwaZulu-Natal estate agent Penny Sparrow, DA member of Parliament Dianne Kohler Barnard and Nelson Mandela Bay Municipality DA councillor Chris Roberts under the Promotion of Equality and Prevention of Unfair Discrimination Act.
ANC secretary general Gwede Mantashe said the applications were launched because the party “has a moral and legal duty to demonstrate leadership and responsibility to prevent racial conflict and warfare”, and the purpose was “to restore the dignity of the African, coloured and Indian majority and to defend the constitution”.
The party wants the court to declare that freedom of expression does not extend to racist utterances, that Kohler Barnard, Sparrow and Roberts pay between R200 000 and R500 000 to an organisation that promotes non-racism, that they give written undertakings not to make racist statements again and that the matters are referred to the national director of public prosecutions for criminal proceedings.
Asked for comment, Kohler Barnard referred the matter to DA justice spokeswoman Glynnis Breytenbach, who could not be reached.
However, DA national spokeswoman Phumzile van Damme said the party was consulting its lawyers about the matter.
She said Sparrow was “no longer a member of the Democratic Alliance” and would have to deal with her matter on her own.
The application in the Western Cape Equality Court against Kohler Barnard was for an order declaring that the Facebook post of Paul Kirk, shared by Kohler Barnard in September last year, was “racist and constitutes hate speech and unfair discrimination” as defined in the Promotion of Equality and Prevention of Unfair Discrimination Act.
They want an order that Kohler Barnard “denied the members and/or supporters of the complainant, as well as members of the African, coloured and Indian communities their inherent dignity and their right to have their dignity respected”.
The application calls on the court to declare freedom of speech does not extend to racist utterances.
In his founding affidavit Mantashe quotes Kirk’s retweeted tweet: “Please come back PW Botha – you were far more honest than any of these ANC rogues and you provided better services to the public.”
Mantashe said the post “suggests that life in South Africa was better under apartheid president PW Botha and it is a yearning for a return to white minority rule.
“Under apartheid health services to black people were largely non-existent and the education system was designed to keep black people in subjugation.”
Mantashe cited many of the gross human rights abuses perpetrated under apartheid, which caused the UN to declare it a crime against humanity.
“Under PW Botha’s rule thousands of people (predominantly black South Africans) were incarcerated and detained without trial, many disappeared without trace, while countless numbers were brutally tortured and killed.
“Apartheid hit squads flourished. He presided over a system which sanctioned the extra-judicial killing of many innocent African, coloured and Indian people.”
In the Port Elizabeth case, the ANC applied for the same relief against DA councillor Chris Roberts, for calling fellow councillor Mongameli Bobani a “bobbejaan” during a council debate on July 30.
This application calls for the court to direct Roberts to pay R500 000, half of which would go to Bobani and half to an organisation identified by the court “which promotes non-racism, tolerance and reconciliation in South Africa”.
Mantashe writes in his founding affidavit that Bobani confirmed Roberts called him a baboon “on at least three occasions... to insinuate that he Bobani) was akin to an animal, in particular an ape or a baboon”.
The affidavit says a complaint was lodged with DA Eastern Cape leader Athol Trollip, but that no action was taken.
At the start of the new year Durban estate agent Penny Sparrow grabbed national and international headlines when in a Facebook post she compared black people on a Durban beach to monkeys.
“Tens of thousands of responses from enraged South Africans were elicited.”
The ANC asked the Durban Equality Court to declare her comment hate speech, to fine her R200 000 and to order that she be prosecuted.
The ANC has also taken a stand against black people whose actions and utterances have exacerbated the current tensions in the country.
On Tuesday the party instituted an application against Gauteng provincial employee Velaphi Khumalo in the Roodepoort Magistrate’s Court for hate speech and unfair discrimination for calling for South Africa to be cleansed of all whites as Hitler did to the Jews.
Explaining the reasons for this action Mantashe said the ANC had many white and Jewish members and the organisation had a duty to protect its members and keep the focus on building a non-racial society.
“Hitler subjected Jews to the most inhumane forms of human rights violations, identical to what Africans, coloureds and Indians were subjected to in South Africa under PW Botha and Hendrik Verwoerd,” Mantashe stated.
Weekend Argus