AfriForum’s Deputy CEO, Ernst Roets says that Vicki Momberg’s two year jail sentence is an indication of racial double standards in South Africa.
Momberg was sentenced to three years in prison with one year suspended, on four counts of crimen injuria on Wednesday, 28 March 2018, at the Randburg Magistrate’s Court.
Momberg claims that she was suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder when she hurled racial slurs at a police officer. In a video captured in 2016, Momberg called police officer kaffir, a derogatory term in South Africa, after the officer tried to help her following an alleged smash-and-grab incident in Northriding, Johannesburg.
Roets says that the law is inconsistently applied when it comes to cases of racism.
“However, the inconsistency being applied in this country regarding minorities has reached the level of absurdity,” he said in a statement.
“The reality in South Africa is thus that a white person who insults a black person goes to prison, while a senior officer in the Defence Force who says that white people’s eyes and tongues must be stabbed out (sic) is simply asked nicely not to repeat it,” he added.
Roets was referring to a Facebook post by a General MV Mohlala, purported to be from the South African National Defence Force (SANDF), which appeared to incite violence against white people. According the Rapport newspaper, Mohlala praised the beating of an 80-year-old white man, Braam Van Wyk.
Meanwhile, Michael Morris from the South African Institute of Race relations says that Momberg’s actions were unacceptable, and that the sentence should send a signal to others who wish to participate in racism to think twice.
