Complaints f low after BLF leader’s ‘kill whites’ talk
● Organisation defends remarks as legal action looms
The SA Human Rights Commission has received multitudes of complaints through its social media platforms against Black First Land First (BLF) leader Andile Mngxitama.
“We have the complaints‚ but we can’t prejudge,” spokesperson Buang Jones said on Monday afternoon.
“We have to subject them to a particular assessment process to determine if there are human rights violations.”
Mngxitama came under fire at the weekend for his latest controversial remarks about the killing of white people.
During a rally in Potchefstroom‚ in the North West‚ on Saturday‚ Mngxitama threatened to kill five white people for every black person killed.
“You kill one of us‚ we will kill five of you.
“We will kill their children‚ we will kill their women‚ we will kill anything that we find on our way‚” Mngxitama said.
DA leader Mmusi Maimane‚ speaking at the party’s 2018 government review in parliament on Monday‚ condemned Mngxitama’s statements.
“Mngxitama’s recent remarks are a violation of human rights and tantamount to hate speech,” he said.
“Hate speech must always be spoken out against.
“Mngxitama’s comments cheapen people’s rights to human dignity, which is a fundamental tenet of what liberal democracy depends on.”
Lobby group AfriForum has instructed its legal team to prepare court documents to lay a complaint of hate speech against Mngxitama.
The court papers are expected to be filed at the Equality Court on Tuesday.
AfriForum said Mngxitama’s latest remarks were blatant hate speech and incitement of violence‚ and the organisation would fight it “with the necessary earnestness”.
In the court documents‚ AfriForum said it would request that Mngxitama be ordered to pay R500,000 to an organisation campaigning against hate speech.
BLF has since defended its president‚ saying he had been speaking in the context of selfdefence.
It was believed Mngxitama had been responding to a statement by billionaire Johann Rupert about the taxi industry.
Rupert mentioned during a recent and much-talked-about interview with Power FM that he had a long-time friend in the taxi industry, whom he referred to as the chair of the taxi association.
Rupert said: “Jabu [Eskom chair Jabu Mabuza] and I have one thing in common – he’s chairman of the [SA Black] Taxi Association, and one of the first [partners] in Business Partners was the taxi association.
“So I also have my own army. When those red guys [EFF supporters] come‚ they’re gonna have to remember the taxi association.”
The Ruperts started Business Partners in 1981 to support small businesses.
Mabuza was involved with the SA Black Taxi Association during and after apartheid. It was established in 1979.
The EFF accused the billionaire of suggesting that people in the industry would protect him from the red berets.
This‚ BLF spokesperson Lindsay Maasdorp said‚ was inciting black-on-black violence and the BLF “couldn’t allow that to happen”.
During his speech‚ Mngxitama told his supporters to retaliate should they be attacked by taxi bosses.
“Johann Rupert says if we touch him he is going to unleash upon us the taxi-industry people.
“Now here is a message to [him] – pay the taxi industry bosses‚ but here is the deal: for each one person that is being killed by the taxi industry‚ we kill five white people.”
In a separate hate speech case against the BLF‚ the rights commission’s Jones said the matter was expected to be before the Johannesburg Magistrate’s Court on January 29.
“We are just waiting for BLF leadership to obtain legal representation.”–