Criminalise racism, urges EFF
SENTENCED: PARTY BELIEVES MAN WHO USED K-WORD IN VIRAL VIDEO WAS TREATED LENIENTLY
Adam Catzavelos handed a R50 000 fine or two years in jail, suspended.
Adam Catzavelos has lauded Magistrate Hleziphe Nkasibe for his judgment, which ruled that the convicted racist be sentenced to a R50 000 fine or face a suspended two-year jail term, suspended for five years. Meanwhile, the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) has slated the sentence for being too lenient.
“I’m very relieved and very grateful that I had a very fair and reasonable judge and I’m very grateful for the judgment and ruling,” Catzavelos said outside the Randburg Magistrate’s Court.
During sentencing, Nkasibe told the court that direct imprisonment or a fine was adequate for Catzavelos, who pleaded guilty to crimen injuria for using the k-word.
He said Catzavelos, a married father of three minor children, had lost employment as a result of his racial slurs.
Adding that Catzavelos was a first-time offender, the magistrate pointed out he had shown remorse for his actions.
In August 2018, Catzavelos shot a video of himself on holiday on a beach in Greece, saying: “Let me give you a weather forecast here. Blue skies, beautiful day, amazing sea and not one k **** in sight.
F **** heaven on earth. You cannot beat this.”
He sent the video to a WhatsApp group. It found its way into the public domain and went viral.
He pleaded guilty to a charge of crimen injuria last December.
This month he took the stand in mitigation of sentencing and said he was a changed man. He was accompanied to court by a group of his gogos (grandmothers/elderly women), who argued in mitigation of his sentence, and revealed his nickname was now Mxolisi, which meant forgiveness.
The EFF was disappointed by the sentence.
Its Gauteng leader, Mandisa Mashego, said: “I hope that once Catzavelos is done attending some sort of rehabilitation with an NGO [non-governmental organisation] in Soweto, he will see the need to go back to his white community, family, friends and colleagues and try to rehabilitate whoever he knows about racism.”
She said Nkasibe was constrained by the fact that racism hadn’t been criminalised.
“In the law book, racism is not criminalised. That’s why we were left with no choice but to stick to a crimen injuria charge and only talk to the issue of racism.
“This case points out the need for racism to be criminalised,” Mashego said.