Responding to reports that a North West farmer had laid a charge of genocide against league president Julius Malema, at the International Criminal Court in The Hague, league spokesman Floyd Shivambu issued a scorching statement in which he attacked the entire Afrikaner community."If there are people who committed genocide against our people, it is the Afrikaners, who slaughtered many freedom fighters and innocent South Africans to protect the racist apartheid regime for many years, and we have forgiven them for that," he said.
Shivambu's statement came after reports that an unnamed Afrikaans farmer had charged Malema in the International Criminal Court for singing a liberation song with the words "dubul' ibhunu" (shoot the boer).
The Rustenburg farmer reportedly interpreted the song as inciting league supporters to commit genocide against "Afrikaans boers".
Shivambu said "right-wing elements" were using the courts to "lodge ludicrous complaints" in an attempt to "divert us from our political programme".
"As a matter of principle, the youth league encourages all South Africans to watch out against right-wing agents provocateur, most of whom are beneficiaries of a racist, murderous apartheid regime.
"They recurrently abuse the rights fought for by the liberation movement in order to divert our attention from serious issues of economic emancipation of the black majority and Africans in particular," Shivambu said.
His statement came after the Equality Court forced the league's Free State leader, Thabo Meeko, to apologise for statements about University of Free State vice-chancellor Jonathan Jansen.
Jansen was attacked for letting students involved in a racist incident at the university back on campus.
The DA brought a charge of hate speech against Meeko after he told supporters last year that Jansen was "equally a criminal like these racist young students at that university".
Shivambu said the league was confident that the complaint arising from "some Afrikaners' stupidity and insecurities" would not be entertained in The Hague.
The international court should instead focus on "prosecution of imperialist-sponsored wars that continue to happen in the world", Shivambu said.
"The reported complaint with the ICC has only come to our attention through media reports, and no communication has been sent to us . The youth league has never been engaged in any criminal activity, and will never, because we are aware that such undermines the freedom our forbearers fought for with their lives," he said.
"The issue of liberation songs is currently before the courts, which have issued an interim interdict on the singing of some songs until the ANC has successfully defended its struggle and liberation songs and heritage," Shivambu said.
The fact that the ANC wants to defend this song, is threatening in itself. Afriforum leader Ernst Roets said the withdrawal of the charge regarding singing dubula ibhunu (shoot the boer) was cause for concern.
ReplyDelete"It's an indication of the ANC's nonchalant attitude towards the independence of the judiciary and their support for the song.
"The fact that important issues have been completely ignored means that we now have to continue our battle against Malema's hate speech in all earnest," he said.
Meanwhile, the Young Independent Democrats also voiced concern that the youth leader's "real crimes" had gone unpunished.
It called the ANC's disciplinary process a dishonest attempt to portray itself as an ethical party.