ANC Chief Whip Mathole Motshekga has lodged a complaint with the Press Ombudsman against the Cape Times and columnist Max Du Preez, over a “racially derogatory article” published on Tuesday.
In a letter to ombudsman Joe Thloloe, Motshekga says Du Preez, in the article headlined “Black rulers' whitewash of coloureds”, makes racially disparaging claims on the coloured community, by “claiming that unlike other South Africans, coloured people have no roots and belonging”.
“I believe the following remarks are particularly offensive:
'This rootlessness of most coloured people, this sense they got over centuries of not belonging, is the only reason why gangsterism is so rife in that community. Gangsterism is almost always (a) yearning for a tribe, an attempt to belong'.”
The suggestion that most coloured people were criminals and that, because of their alleged “lack of belonging” or “roots”, turn to the life of crime for solace or sense of belonging, is highly offensive and portrays the worst form of racial stereotype, he said.
The SA Press Code is unambiguous in its discouragement of racist remarks in the press.
“I am of a strong view that the Cape Times should not have published Du Preez's piece, as it is in plain violation of the press code.
“I therefore request that the ombudsman instructs both the newspaper and the writer to retract the article and offer an unreserved apology to South Africans, particularly our coloured people, for these derogatory and racist views,” Motshekga wrote. -
Sapa