ANC secretary-general Fikile Mbalula said they will not chant “Kill the Boer, Kill the Farmer” but they will not “Kiss the Boer.”
Image: Kamogelo Moichela/IOL
Secretary-General Fikile Mbalula said that the party will not chant the provocative slogan “Kill the Boer, Kill the Farmer'' as there was no need to use it in the current political landscape.
Speaking on Friday during the ANC National Executive Committee (NEC) meeting, Mbalula said the chant was relevant when Boers were killing and acting as commandos towards people who were coming into the country during the apartheid era.
“As the ANC, we don’t think that slogan is relevant to the course at the present moment,” he said, speaking on the Friday on the sidelines of the ANC National Executive Committee (NEC) meeting
“We wouldn’t chant that slogan neither will we actually water it down because when we chant that slogan it has a particular meaning about guerillas across the Limpopo coming back home,” he said.
He further added that they will also not say “Kiss the Boer” because the chant has a historical meaning.
“We wouldn’t chant that slogan neither will we actually water it down because when we chant that slogan it has a particular meaning about guerillas across the Limpopo coming back home,” he said.
“The background to it then meant as a chant in the camps as we prepared to infiltrate the country, the slogan came up, ‘Kill the Boer, Kill the Farmer’ because these farmers were acting as commandos of the SANDF which belonged to apartheid,” he said.
Mbalula was reacting to the Constitutional Court's decision to dismiss Afriforum’s leave to appeal the chant as hate speech.
On Thursday, IOL reported that the apex court said the application bears no reasonable prospects for success.
The decision comes on the heels of a prolonged struggle initiated by AfriForum, which has been vocal in its push to eliminate the song from public discourse, citing its violent connotations and historical context tied to racial tensions in South Africa.
The ruling confirmed an earlier ruling by the Equality Court that the song, often chanted by EFF leader Julius Malema at political rallies, does not constitute hate speech but rather falls under the protection of free speech.
Malema held that the songs were meant to agitate and mobilise support and were not a literal call to arms.
kamogelo.moichela@iol.co.za
IOL Politics
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