South Africa: Renaldo Gouws ‘Hate Speech’ Row – SAHRC Seeks Apology, Community Service, R100,000 Fine for Ex-MP

The South African Human Rights Commission is seeking an order declaring that a video made by former DA MP Renaldo Gouws, 14 years ago, constitutes hate speech. and that he should publish an apology to all South Africans on all his social media channels.

Listen to this article 5 min Listen to this article 5 min The South African Human Rights Commission has thrown the book at former DA MP Renaldo Gouws over a video that it claims constitutes hate speech, asking that he be ordered to apologise, be fined R100,000, undergo diversity training and be given 20 hours’ community service.

But Gouws has persisted in court papers that what he said was taken out of context, and that he never had the intention to call for the killing of black people or be hurtful or harmful or to incite harm or propagate hatred.

In September, the DA’s highest decision-making body, the Federal Executive, unanimously decided to terminate Gouws’s membership, ending his brief three-month career as a parliamentarian.

The decision follows a comprehensive investigation by the party’s Federal Legal Commission.

In the video that is the subject of the Equality Court complaint, Gouws is heard saying: “Alright, so there’s a couple of things I want to say. Kill the f**ing k*ffirs, kill all the f*ing n*ggers. That’s all I gotta f*ing say. Kill all the k*ffirs! Kill all the f*ing n*ggers!”

But in papers filed before the Gqeberha Equality Court he said it was…

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