BLF, 100 social media users face charges

“I’M NOT surprised AfriForum came out and tried to vilify and attack black people with these stupid charges against us.”

This was the response from Lindsay Maasdorp, the national spokesperson of Black First Land First (BLF), one of the 100 social media users who the civil rights organisation accused and charged with racism, hate speech and the incitement of violence.

AfriForum also asserted that black people have no power to be racist.

“… 97% of the economy belongs in white hands, they forget that more than 80% of the land belongs in white hands, therefore black people have no systematic power to be racist,” said Maasdorp yesterday.

“AfriForum as an organisation has a duty within the settler colonial state as a component of that to continue making us run around in circles through the courts.”

The civil rights organisation last week approached Lyttelton police station in Centurion to lay the charges against the 100 social media users.

The accusations caused controversy as many failed to understand the relevance. This included musician and activist Ntsiki Mazwai, who was left enraged that only black people had been listed by AfriForum.

“It worries me that there are no white people on that list, it looks like a witchhunt for black people,” she said.

But AfriForum’s deputy chief executive Ernst Roets rejected the assertions.

“I think those are ridiculous accusations, these people are committing serious crimes,” Roets said.

He said AfriForum were taking the matter so seriously that they were in consultation with the Hawks and the Cyber Crimes Unit. He added that those accused wouldn’t escape judgment, even if they deactivated their social media accounts.

He told The Star that the names were released to shame the 100. “We want to name and shame these people.”

Roets said his organisation was planning to file more charges as more complaints of racism, hate speech and incitement of violence streamed in.

“We will charge more people because we have many more complaints, we have between 500 and 1 000 complaints. We hope that people will be held accountable, there is no excuse for this.”