Court verdict comes as the populist politician Julius Malema faces internal disciplinary charges that could see him kicked out of the ANC. Louise Gray reports
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A South African court has today found Julius Malema, leader of the youth brigade of the country’s ruling African National Congress (ANC), guilty of hate speech. He was ordered to pay costs for singing an apartheid-era song that advocated the killing of white farmers. The civil case was brought against Malema by the Afrikaner civil rights group, Afriforum, who claimed white farmers felt vulnerable due to the song’s lyrics, which translate to “shoot the white farmer“.
The editor of an independent weekly newspaper in the Central African Republic was jailed on 6 June. Faustin Bambou’s arrest on 27 May followed a series of articles he wrote on embezzlement cases. In one article he suggested that defence minister Jean-Francis Bozizé, President François Bozizé’s son, had embezzled funds donated by the European Union. The court claimed that Bombou’s reports “incited hatred and violence” by encouraging violent demonstrations by former soldiers demanding to be paid.
Local authorities have shut down a community radio station, Radio du Peuple Oïcha, after callers to a phone-in show criticised the local security situation following a spate of murders and robberies in the area. On 3 February, a day after the phone-in broadcast, the deputy administrator of the area ordered the radio station’s closed until further notice.