Black First Land First (BLF) spokesperson Lindsay Maasdorp has been ordered by the Equality Court to delete statements about killing white people from his social media accounts, and to submit himself to sensitivity and diversity training.
The case arises from several complaints to the South African Human Rights Commission (SAHRC) relating to social media posts by Maasdorp dating back to 2016.
According to News24, the complaints include that
- on 24 September 2016, during a conversation on his Facebook page in relation to white people in South Africa, Maasdorp posed the question: ‘When will we kill them?’;
- on 25 September 2016 on his Twitter page, he wrote: ‘I have aspirations to kill white people, and this must be achieved’; and
- on 14 December 2018, he published a statement on Twitter celebrating the murder of an elderly white couple in which he stated ‘ratio: 5:1’ (this being a reference to an earlier statement by a member of the BFL that five white people should be killed for every black person killed).
The Equality Court heard the SAHRC’s application and handed down judgment against Maasdorp on Friday.
The SAHRC said in a statement: ‘Maasdorp is ordered to delete any remaining offending statements from all his social media accounts and is interdicted from publishing any statements that advocate for the killing of or any form of violence against any group in South Africa.’
The commission said it believed this was a significant judgment that went a long way towards its goal of eradicating all forms of hate speech on racial or other grounds.
[Image: Jeremy Bezanger on Unsplash]