Constitution sets out everyone’s right to dignity

Think twice before making a racial slur against someone because it could land you in jail if crimen injuria is proven.

Sentencing former estate agent Vicki Momberg to jail yesterday for a racist rant in 2016, Randburg magistrate Pravina Raghoonandan noted the crime of crimen injuria was not generally regarded serious and did not usually engender prison time.

“Crimen injuria is generally concerned with the impairment of dignitas. The concepts of self-respect, mental tranquillity and privacy are judged, both objectively and subjectively, in that it depends upon the particular person and the circumstances whether it can be said that dignitas has been impaired,” said Raghoonandan, quoting case law from 1981.

“Society demands retribution because of a continuous lack of respect. This is clearly not acceptable. This habit and culture must change for us, as a nation, to grow mentally and spiritually.”

Claude Leon Foundation chair in Constitutional Governance at the University of Cape Town, Pierre de Vos, said a person’s dignity was “affected if publicly or privately he or she is subjected by another person to offensive and degrading treatment, or when he or she is exposed to ill will, ridicule, disesteem and contempt”.

“This kind of attack will only attract criminal sanction if it is deemed to be unlawful and it will only be deemed to be unlawful if the insult to the dignity of another person is so gross as to evoke outrage in the minds of reasonable people,” De Vos said.

Section 10 of the constitution’s Bill of Rights states that everyone has a right to dignity. Section 16 allows for freedom of expression which does not extend to “advocacy of hatred based on race, ethnicity, gender or religion, and that constitutes incitement to cause harm”. Raghoonandan found Momberg’s actions were intentional and racial.