Africa-Press – South-Africa. Sport, arts and culture minister Gayton McKenzie has accused the South African Human Rights Commission (SAHRC) of defaming him after it issued a statement saying it has launched an investigation into allegations of racism against him.
He said the commission’s statement was issued without him receiving a letter or any communication from them.
The commission had given McKenzie until Wednesday to respond after it asked him to delete the posts, issue a public apology, undergo sensitivity training and pay damages.
“I view the SAHRC’s decision to go public with its ‘evidence’ against me of ‘hate speech’ as defamation, because they said these things before giving me a hearing and without completing even a cursory investigation of any sort,” he said.
“Had they done so, they would have soon realised they had misunderstood the evidence and suggesting I could produce hate speech of any kind is not legally defensible.”
In its statement issued on August 15 the commission said it would investigate the minister after receiving complaints from political parties and outrage on social media.
This was after McKenzie’s old tweets allegedly using the k-word resurfaced on X, sparking outrage and calls for his removal.
“After assessment of the contents, the commission is of the view that utterances made by minister McKenzie are prima facie violations of the provisions of the Promotion of Equality and Prevention of Unfair Discrimination Act (Equality Act),” the SAHRC said.
“Consequently the commission has sent an allegation letter to minister McKenzie. Thereafter the commission will determine the best way forward, which may include instituting proceedings in the relevant equality court as per the SA Human Rights Commission Act read with the Equality Act.”
However, McKenzie hit back, saying if the commission had felt the need to make any public statement it could have said they had received complaints against him and would investigate them.
“That would have been fair and reasonable. Instead, they effectively released preliminary findings, even suggesting what the penalties could or should be,” he said.
“The SAHRC in this way made itself the prosecutor, judge, jury, sentencer and executioner — all in a day’s work. What they did not do was make themselves the investigator, because they have investigated nothing, questioned nothing and cross-examined nothing.
“They have merely taken at face value what social media and rival politicians told them I did — without even attempting to speak to me they were already convinced of my evident ‘hate speech’ to go public about it.”
McKenzie said this had caused unnecessary embarrassment in his working environment.
“Not one of my tweets have demonstrated any intention to harm, incite harm or promote hatred. In the case of my tweets, there was a clear attempt — rather, by the people driving the political campaign against me and the SAHRC — to see my comments in isolation and in a false light, which disfigured their meaning and intent.
“Regarding the ongoing accessibility of the online content, I am not averse to deleting any tweets, especially since they appear to be creating much public confusion around their formatting.
“On the proposed remedies put forward by the SAHRC, I have already stated these were arrived at far too prematurely. We should never have arrived at a point where my ‘punishments’ were already being contemplated before I could even be asked for my side of the matter.”
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