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- A Stuijt
- Retired South African medical journalist, ex-Sunday Times of Johannesburg.
I cannot stand white people…
21:01 | 
Posted by
A Stuijt |
SA Airways Technical ‘sweeping racism complaint under the carpet’… trade union
September 21 2009 PRETORIA. The state-run SA Airways’ technical department was accused of ‘trying to sweep a serious racism complaint under the carpet’, said trade union Solidarity spokesman Jaco Kleynhans on Monday.
"A black employee hurled racist remarks ‘in an insulting and racist manner’ at another employee in August this year, saying that he ‘could not stand white people and also could not stand working with white people’," said Kleynhans in a statement. Solidarity criticised the company's decision not to take disciplinary action against this black employee, although according to SAA technical’s own discliplinary code, a charge of racism is grounds for immediate suspection…
The union said that last week, it had granted the SAA Technical department ‘s management a three day time period to take "the correct disciplinary action", but the employee in question was only ‘warned about his remarks and management now regarded the issue as concluded.”
Insulting and racist manner:
"These statements were aimed directly and in an insulting and racist manner at the person's white colleague and white people in general... It is nothing less than blatant racism."
Shortly after the incident, the trade union member submitted a grievance to the employer, but ‘the employer decided not to follow the disciplinary procedures, as prescribed for complaints about racist behaviour’, the union said.
- "According to SAA Technical's disciplinary code, a charge of racism is grounds for immediate suspension, after which the applicable disciplinary action must be taken," the union said.
It said the company earlier indicated that it ‘preferred employing mediation as an alternative to disciplinary action.’
However, said Kleynhans, ‘the disciplinary route simply has to be followed and directives cannot be ignored at will, ‘adding that racism was not a mild charge and, therefore, no employer could afford to take it lightly.
- "Mild action sends the message to employees that it is acceptable to infringe on the human dignity of others with racist remarks," Kleynhans said.
- "Management reiterated to Solidarity that the member is in fact ‘entitled to taking the matter further internally, but this is meaningless," Kleynhans said. “The member had already tackled the correct internal procedure, but management did not follow the correct disciplinary route and was now trying to "sweep a serious case of racism under the carpet". SAA could not be reached immediately for comment. – Sapa http://www.int.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1&click_id=15&art_id=nw20090921151434280C649175
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Murder of Wimpy manager Lambert Theron: 2 in court
Monday, September 22 2009 – Two black workers at the Wimpy snack bar in Kempton Park appeared in court today, suspects in the murder of their Afrikaner manager Lambert Theron, 20, on 30 Augus 2009. His mutilated body was found in the Wimpy establishment by his older brother Johan.
Remanded to 16 November 2009:
The accused workers, Lloyd Katsande and Fanie Msiza (both 25), were not asked to plead. The case was remanded to 16 November 2009. The men were ordered to remain in police custody. Police told the news media at the time of these two arrests, just hours after the murder, that they’d found R1,000 in cash, traced from the Wimpy till, as well as Theron's cellphone and other items belonging to the young manager, on the two suspects when they lifted them from their beds.
Family members and friends say that ‘the arrested men’s comments to the investigating police officers at the time, were that the murder had been 'an accident'.
A journalist who spoke to the murdered man’s 64-year-old father Johan at the court today, said his son had been badly mutilated – and mourners at his funeral were also able to view this fact at first-hand when his bruised face, beaten black and blue, was displayed at the service.
- Said the father on Monday: ‘The inside of his lips were torn because of all the many kicks and blows with a meat-hammer --and he was also cut at least 30 times with a knife. One of his fingers was cut off and was hanging just from its skin.’
No interest from the Afrikaans news media:
Police also interfered in a photographer’s attempt to photograph the two accused. Moreover, the only newspaper reporting this killing thus far was the local Kempton Express, published by Caxton newspaper. email kemptonexpress@caxton.co.za editor Ms Christa Smit, tel 011 970-3030. They have no website. We thus publish the clipping provided to us about this report below this report. It’s surprising that the mainstream Afrikaans-language news-media has shown no interest in this case whatsoever.
REVENGE ATTACK…
Picture: Lambert Theron, 20: photograph from family archives.
As was reported on Sept 10 2009 in the Kempton Express weekly -- a Caxton paper which does not have a news-website -- the young Afrikaner was just closing up shop on August 30 2009 when two black co-workers demanded that he must give them money from the till to 'borrow', according to well-informed witnesses. Mr Theron told them he couldn't - as it was the company's money, not his.
According to the closed-circuit TV video footage of the incident, police said , the black co-workers were then seen to fly into a rage, stabbing the young Afrikaner, kicking out his teeth and hacking into his head with a meat-hammer.
Mourners at his funeral described his face as having been beaten ‘completely black and blue.’
The two co-workers were lifted from their beds at 2am Monday morning after police had viewed the murder on the close-circuit camera videos, Capt Jethro Mtshali said.
The murder was discovered later that night after Theron's father Johan Sr. 64, had sent his other son Johan, 24, to go and look for Lambert when he failed to return home: in time for Johan Junior ‘s birthday celebration that day.
The brother found the mutilated corpse of his young brother in the food-shop -- and the father and brother then contacted the local police. However two of the cops who arrived to investigate, reportedly were 'very arrogant', according to witness reports, and had chased the traumatised father from the Wimpy restaurant.
Comment about this could not be obtained by us from the police, however the police did confirm that, after having viewed the horror-scenes of the young man’s murder on the closed-circuit TV video recording at the shop, the police immediately drove to the workers' homes - finding them asleep in their beds.
Source of picture of news-cutting below: coertbotha@hotmail.com 
SAPS censors murder report to news media?
- The SA Police Service’s daily reports of crimes to the news media did not include this murder in their lineup – and neither have they thus reported this in their SAPS Journal online – which usually is very quick to record such ‘police successes’.
- http://www.sapsjournalonline.gov.za/dynamic/journal_dynamic.aspx?pageid=413&rws=30&stid=2&head=Police Successes&orderby=start_publish_date desc
Wimpy targetted before:
This same Wimpy also was the scene of an armed robbery on 29 May 2006. Staffers then were confronted by two black men inside the diner at about 08:00 and loudly screamed for help, spokeswoman Cynthia Kleinhans said. The pair then ran off and some of the mall's informal, unarmed car guards then gave chase. Police and metro police arrived and one man was arrested carrying a firearm and the restaurant's keys. The second man had run into the veld and was shooting at the police. He was arrested about 20 minutes later in CR Swart road. He was shot in the leg during this arrest.
Information gathered by Adriana Stuijt, a.j.stuijt@knid.nl NOTE -- We invite readers to please also send us any pictures, documents etc. they could submit to complete our records, and any public court documents they could obtain for publication during the course of the trial. a.j.stuijt@knid.nl -- We aspire to be as accurate as possible. We would also appreciate any links and clippings of any media-reports in this case.
DEATHS COMMEMORATED AT MEMORIAL WALL – KEMPTON PARK AFRIKAANS HIGH SCHOOL:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=119094534819&ref=share#/group.php?gid=119094534819
I am not a racist – Judge Hlophe in Constitutional Court Bench interview
Constitutional Court candidate denies being ‘anti-white’
- He did call Afrikaner attorney Joshua Greeff a ‘piece of white shit… who should go back to Holland…’ and wrote a 64-page report about the ‘white racists in the judiciary’ -- But hey, that’s not being racist, is it?
Sunday, 20 September 2009 – SAPA reports -- JOHANNESBURG - The Western Cape’s judge-president Hlophe vehemently denied accusations that he was a ‘racist and doesn’t like white people’. He argued during his candidacy interview with the Judicial Service Commission for the Constitutional Court that he would ‘love’ to be part of it, describing it as ‘dynamic”on Sunday.
The Northern Cape Judge was supported by a small but highly vocal group outside from the Justice for Hlophe lobby group, sporting t-shirts with his picture printed on the fronts. However, Hlophe denied during his interview for the Bench-job however that he knew its leader, Percy Gumbi, seen left on this photograph taken by Lisa Skinner of the Mail & Guardian, while talking to the media with his comrade Jabu Khuluse. However – Gumbi was quoted as saying during this July 2009 presser that ‘Judge President Hlophe has personally signed their nomination letter and that he accepted the nomination as such”; but that the funds for their campaign came from their members' own pockets; http://www.mg.co.za/article/2009-07-17-hlophe-and-the-chamber-of-secrets
Up until last month Hlophe was caught up in a complaint and counter-complaint row, relating to allegations that he made ‘inappropriate approaches’ to two judges last year to try and influence a corruption case against pres. Jacob Zuma – a case which has now been abandoned. After the JSC decided that there was ‘no need for a full enquiry’ however, reports SAPA on Sunday, Hlophe's life changed from facing the disgrace of being removed as a judge, to being a candidate for chief justice as head of the Constitutional Court, the highest court in the land.
"We had a fight. It was never personal right from the beginning," he said on Sunday -- explaining that he was just ‘exercising the rights that every South African had when he complained about the judges making their complaint public before he could answer them:’
- "In my mind Mr Burgess, I have put this behind me..." he said in response to a question by JSC representative Cecil Burgess, who was chosen from the ANC in Parliament and believed they would be able to work in a "collegial" way.
He rejected a suggestion by Burgess that "newspapers say you are racist* and you don't like white people". He cited two of his judgments to prove that he wasn’t - one where he ruled against a person who did not want his case heard by a white judge, and the other denying an appeal from the security guard who was found guilty of murdering South Africa’s former first lady Marike de Klerk in her seaside apartment.
- Hlope said he “visited white people, they visited him, they gave lifts to each other's children and had each other's children over at their houses. "So, I am not a racist, I deny it."
Hlophe, who holds a doctorate from Cambridge university in the UK, and whose CV include lectureships and head of department at the University of Transkei, denied knowing Percy Gumbi, although this man was lobbying for him under the "Justice for Hlophe Alliance".
However when Hlophe was questioned about his financial dealings with the company Oasis**, problems arose when the outspoken Independent Democrats’ opposition party leader, MP Patricia De Lille asked Hhlophe ‘to describe the terms of his retainer with the company to help her understand the matter.’
Photo: Alan Taylor, Cape Times.
Some of the JSC-commissioners objected at once -- saying that they had ‘ already dealt with this matter.” They wanted to clear the press and public from the room at this point -- however, both De Lille and the Inkatha Freedom Party's MP Koos van der Merwe insisted that they had to stay, saying ‘it was important to be able to ask questions in public on this issue,” SAPA reported.
Advocate Isak Smuts had also wanted Hlophe to explain the apparent contradiction that his "fight" with the Constitutional Court Judges was ‘not personal.’ Smuts said that during the JSC preliminary enquiry Hlophe had made certain derogatory statements about the judges.
After ‘some debate’ the Supreme Court of Appeal Judge President Lex Mpati then decided that he had ‘wanted to avoid such arguments.”
- What was left out of many news media reports however was the following: the room was then ordered cleared of the media and public – and while waiting downstairs to be called back in again, the media were then moved out of the building altogether: raised voices could be heard inside.
- Only about 45 minutes later -- at 22:50pm, did this hearing resume and the public and the news media were allowed back inside, SAPA reported.
- http://www.politicsweb.co.za/politicsweb/view/politicsweb/en/page72308?oid=144201&sn=Marketingweb
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* Racism issues attributed to Hlophe:
- In 2005, Hlophe was reported to have called Cape Town attorney Joshua Greeff, a “piece of white shit who is not fit to walk in the corridors of the High Court”. He also suggested that Greeff should go back to Holland.Greeff is not Dutch. He made the comments in front of witnesses, however later denied making the remarks,
- In 2004 Hlophe wrote a report to Chief Justice Pius Langa alleging racism at the Cape Bar. He also accused his deputy, Deputy Judge President Jeanette Traverso, of racism. Hlophe accused certain white judges and leading members of the Cape Bar of racism in a 43 page report submitted to the Minister of Justice in November 2004.
- In 2005 Hlophe had allocated an Afrikaans language rights case to senior Cape High Court Judge Wilfred Thring “because I knew he would fuck up the trial and then it could be set right on appeal”. He repeated this in front of numerous witnesses, including senior advocate Norman Arendse SC, who wrote to Chief Justice Pius Langa about the incident. Denying he ever made the remark, Hlophe claimed there was a smear campaign against him.
- On October 9, 2007, nine senior members of the Cape Bar Council wrote to the Cape Town- based Cape Times newspaper in support of former constitutional and appeals court judge Johann Kriegler's comment at the weekend that Hlophe was "unfit for the Bench".They were Schalk Burger (Senior Counsel, former acting judge, a top commercial lawyer and former chairman of Johannesburg Bar Council); Michael Fitzgerald (Senior Counsel and former acting judge); Jeremy Gauntlett (Senior Counsel, former chairman of General Council of the Bar and Cape Bar Council, and at various points advocate for government and senior ANC members); Peter Hodes (Senior Counsel and former leading figure in the Cape Bar Council); Rob Petersen (Senior Counsel, human rights lawyer and apartheid exile); Les Rose-Innes (Senior Counsel and former chairman of the Cape Bar Council); Nic Treurnicht (Senior Counsel, former chairman of the Cape Bar Council); Henri Viljoen (Senior Counsel, former acting judge and anti-apartheid lawyer in the famous "Wit Doeke" case) and Renata Williams (Senior Counsel and former acting judge).
** Oasis: In early 2006 it was reported that Hlophe had, without the necessary Ministerial consent, taken a remunerated position on the board of Oasis, an asset management company. It was subsequently reported that Hlophe had used his position to advance Oasis for, whilst on the Oasis payroll, ‘had considered a matter involving one of his colleagues’, JudgeSiraj Desai andd Hlophe had granted Oasis legal permission from an order from his Bench to sue Desaj.
Summary of Hlophe cases: http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?click_id=3078&set_id=1
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ANC Youth League leader Julius Malema defends hate-speech charge in Equality Court
September 21 2009 – JOHANNESBURG. ANC Youth League president Julius Malema is expected to be cross-examined in the Equality Court in Johannesburg on Monday on an anti-female hate speech charge.The Sonke Gender Justice Network laid the complaint against Malema for saying in public that President Jacob Zuma's rape accuser "had a nice time".
Last month, Magistrate Colleen Collis dismissed a complaint of unfair discrimination against Malema, but ruled that the charges of hate speech and harassment remain.
Malema has been adamant that he ‘will not apologise for his comment’- made at the Cape Peninsula Technikon in January in the run-up to general elections, saying it had been ‘taken out of context.”
- His comment was: "Those who had a nice time will wait until the sun comes out, request breakfast and ask for taxi money. In the morning, that lady requested breakfast and taxi money." Malema was referring to a rape charge against Zuma, on which he was acquitted in 2006 before he became president.
The Sonke Gender Justice Network said the comment ‘perpetuated rape myths and could affect the lobbying and workshops they did among boys and men to prevent sexual violence’.
- It wants a full apology and R50,000 in damages to be paid to a shelter for abused women. - Sapa http://www.thestar.co.za/?fSectionId=3268&fArticleId=nw20090921083155162C283490