Political parties have come out strongly against the Pan Africanist Congress (PAC) member who refuses to allow racist comments, posted on the party's Facebook page, to be taken down. They say this is “totally irresponsible”.
Anwar Adams, administrator of the Facebook group, says the reason he is leaving the comment up is because it is part of a healing process.
“If people cannot express their true feelings, then we cannot have true healing. I also don't believe there is such a thing as a black or white person, and so this cannot be considered hate speech,” he says.
Adams, who is also the interim chairman of the PAC's Western Cape Committee, says he is waiting for someone involved in the debate to give him a workable solution, but until then he won't take it down.
Murderous intent
The posting on the Facebook page that has raised the most ire is one from a Facebook poster Ahmed El Saud, who said in his post: "Kill the f***ing whites now!!! If you afraid of them, let's do it for you. In return, you can pay us after the job has been done... text us... we are not afraid for the whites like your own people... it's a disgrace ... he asked you and you don't want to... we will do it, Mandela! (sic)"
This post caused much reaction on the site, some of it considered and some of it pure invective. Adams says in subsequent posts that these comments do not reflect the views of the PAC.
He also told ITWeb he took personal responsibility and that the PAC would issue a statement in the near future.
Political backlash
However, major political parties have taken a dim view of Adams' failure to ban invective from the PAC Facebook page. They also point out the importance of balancing freedom of expression and limiting this right when it comes to hate speech. All say they would act against any member of their party who appeared to condone incitement to violence.
Ismail Vadi, of the African National Congress and chairman of the Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Communications, says incitement to violence is unacceptable.
“While we must realise that people will express racist tones, either overtly or covertly, we must avoid incitement to violence as that does not help at all,” he says.
Juli Killian, of the Congress of the People, says all the major wars under way on the African continent are based on ethnic strife, and so anyone allowing for the promotion of such strife is “grossly irresponsible”.
Lindiwe Mazibuko, communications spokesperson for the Democratic Alliance, says: “Incitement to violence is definitely something that can be contested in a court of law. While freedom of expression has to be upheld, we cannot condone anything that promotes the extermination of a group.”
Steven Otter, Independent Democrats' national media officer, says hate speech in a debate will not help solve the issue.
“However, we must also realise there are other forms of hate speech appearing on the Internet. For instance, the adverts for accommodation where people explicitly say they do not want certain race groups to stay with them. Again, this is totally unacceptable,” he notes.
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