The SA Students’ Congress has distanced itself from an election poster which has been labelled as “hate speech”.
|||Cape Town - Sasco, the SA Students’ Congress, has distanced itself from an election poster which has been labelled as “hate speech”.
The poster was put up at both the Cape Town and Bellville campuses of the Cape Peninsula University of Technology on Wednesday.
DA Youth reported Sasco to the Human Rights Commission on Thursday after a third-year quantity surveying student, who asked not to be named, spotted the poster on the Bellville campus on Wednesday.
The poster, which features a photo of former ANC Youth League president Julius Malema and ANC and Sasco logos, said: “We as Sasco lament with all words possible the racism coupled with white tendencies in the faculty of engineering, and we further say that those white pigs must leave.
“We further say that we support that our people must multiply in this province to curb this white dominance (Zille tendency).”
It continues: “We have long foreseen that you want to control our country again, that is why as Sasco we support and sing with our president Malema when he sings ‘Kill the Boer, kill the racist’.”
The student had immediately taken a poster, one of about four he had seen, to the judicial affairs office. “I have laid a complaint with the judicial office and I’ll have to see where that goes. They were very shocked. It was the first time they had seen it. They said they would investigate.”
The student said everyone he had spoken to had reacted similarly to the poster. “They were all pretty shocked. Everyone was disgusted. It is clearly hate speech. I just want CPUT to act swiftly and catch the people involved. Racism is not acceptable.”
Sello Nkhatho, Sasco provincial chairman, denied the poster had been created by Sasco members. “We are of the view that this is a concerted effort to dent our image as an organisation.
“We distance ourselves completely from that poster.”
He said it was not known who would have made the poster, but suggested it could have been CPUT management.
“Everyone has a stake to gain out of that. There is an effort to undermine our organisation.”
Nkhatho said Sasco would be taking legal action.
Makashule Gana, DA Youth leader, said they had reported the poster to the Human Rights Commission on Thursday.
He said information had been received which indicated the poster had been created by Sasco. “If these are the kind of young leaders that the ANC is grooming, then South Africans should be extremely concerned.”
The Human Rights Commission’s Isaac Mangena said: “We have registered this complaint, and it will be taken through our processes to see if it warrants an investigation… ”
ANC provincial secretary Songezo Mjongile said he had not seen the poster.
He would discuss the poster with Sasco and urge it to destroy it if they had been responsible for it.
CPUT spokesman Thami Nkwanyane did not respond to queries.
michelle.jones@inl.co.za
Cape Times