Racism hearings ‘just turn into white-bashings’
INVESTIGATIVE hearings into racism is a “waste of time” and always turn into “white-bashing gatherings”.
Speaking at a two-day event hosted by the SA Human Rights Commission (SAHRC) which dealt with racism and social media, AfriForum deputy chief executive Ernst Roets said racist black people were forgiven while white people were being punished for being racist.
Roets made reference to for mer minister for women, children and people with disabilities, Lulu Xingwana, who he said was not punished for her remarks about fallen Olympian Oscar Pistorius after the shooting of his girlfriend, Reeva Steenkamp, on Valentine’s Day in 2013.
Xingwana later apologised for saying: “Young Afrikaner men are brought up in the Calvinist religion believing that they own a woman, they own a child, they own everything and therefore they can take that life because they own it.”
Roets said Standard Bank economist Chris Hart was sus- pended faced severe criticism and subsequently quit his job over his controversial tweet which read: “More than 25 years after apartheid ended, the victims are increasing along with a sense of entitlement and hatred towards minorities.”
The AfriForum boss said when it came to violent crime in which the perpetrators were white and the victims black such crime were dealt with so much enthusiasm, but not when it was the other way around.
Roets said the media “is very biased” and they “would rather focus on girls complaining about wearing their natural hair in school than on a university student calling for white genocide”.
Roets remarked the government would rather focus on cable theft than the murder of white farmers.
Brian Makeketa, from the Commission for the Promotion and Protection of the Rights of Cultural, Religious and Linguistic Communities (CRL Rights Commission), said they were faced with issues of prejudice and discrimination, mainly based on religion and not racism.
“Our constitution favours Christianity a lot, which is why when you speak of religion people assume you are speaking about Christianity.
“For instance, when you look at our public holidays, other religions are not acknowledged but Christianity is and that excludes a number of people who then feel discriminated,” said Makeketa.
“The second issue is the dominance of the English language.
“At what point is the constitution going to implement the other 10 official languages?”
Makeketa said the CRL Rights Commission has strategies in place to deal with the challenges of religion and basic human rights.
The Department of Higher Education said the minister was in a process of appointing new members of the committee that would establish the oversight committee on transformation in South African universities.
“We have call centres for receiving complaints in the entire post-schooling sector. The complaints are referred to to the relevant branches for processing,” the department said.
The SAHRC on Wednesday said during the 2015/16 financial year it received 505 race-related complaints.
“This indicates that despite the significant achievements over the past 23 years of dem- ocracy, deep inequalities and unfair discrimination remain a serious concern.”
It said the two-day hearing was intended to arrive at an understanding of the complexities of online hate speech, whether private companies ought to have the same responsibilities as public authorities in dealing with online hate, and whether these responsibilities should be derived from human rights law.
It said the hearing presented an opportunity to enquire from implementing authorities about measures in place to investigate complaints pertaining to racist hate crimes or hate speech.