FF Plus will continue to lay charges of hate speech against Zuma until HRC takes action  

26 July 2016

The FF Plus submitted another complaint of hate speech with the Human Rights Commission (HRC) against president Jacob Zuma, following his attack on white people this weekend and will continue to submit complaints to the HRC until it takes action, Adv. Anton Alberts, the FF Plus’ parliamentary spokesperson on communication, said.

According to a report of Netwerk24, president Zuma said, amongst others, during an election gathering in Thembisa on the East Rand, that whites are oppressors and are responsible for black people’s poverty.

According to the report, he continued the attack on white people in front of a crowd in Nelson Mandela Bay and said black people cannot be governed by the ‘descendants of apartheid’. He also insinuated that whites are like ‘a poisonous snake which gives birth to another snake’.

Adv. Alberts says such statements are shocking, especially coming from a state president who governs everyone in the country, black and white.

“The HRC has had enough time by now to shut Zuma’s mouth with regards to his divisive and racist comments. The FF Plus had already at the start of last year submitted a complaint, which to date has still not been finalised.

“The time has come for the HRC to serve the people of South Africa without fear or favour, and in this regard to take a leaf out of the book of the Public Protector who did not hesitate to call the president to account.

“The FF Plus had to exert great pressure on the HRC in terms of the PAI Act before the complaints against the president were given attention again. He has to provide an explanation of his Jan van Riebeeck comments in January last year, by the end of this month.

“We will do the same with this complaint until he is found guilty, as there is no doubt that it is hate speech. Our patience are finished with with the HRC’s one-sided investigations and Zuma as president. This is part of the FF Plus’ attempt to eventually get rid of Zuma.

“The FF Plus is of the opinion that the increasing racial rhetoric of president Zuma is a symptom of the retrogression of the ANC.

“The proverb goes; an anxious cat makes anxious leaps, but the tragedy of these anxious leaps is that it is unnecessary and cause divisive racial conflict in the country,” Adv. Alberts says.

Issued by Anton Alberts, FF Plus parliamentary spokesperson: Communication, 26 July 2016