Malema's comments about journalists ‘not hate speech’
The Equality Court, sitting in the high court in Pretoria, has heard that Julius Malema's comments against several journalists do not amount to hate speech.
The South African Editors Forum (Sanef) approached the high court on behalf of the journalists after Malema made comments outside the Zondo commission on November 2018, referring to them as the Ramaphosa defense force and calling for his supporters to deal with them.
Advocate Thembeka Ngcukaitobi, representing the EFF, told the court Malema was only criticising the journalists.
Malema mentioned journalists such as Ranjeni Munsamy, Adriaan Basson, Pauli Van Wyk, Max du Preez and Barry Bateman.
"The criticism is that these journalists are propagandists that may be an unfair criticism because they may be doing they work honestly, but it's not hate speech.”
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Sanef also told the court that after the speech, when Malema was invited to meet with Sanef, he referred to Basson as a racist on Twitter.
But Ngcukaitobi told the court there was nothing in it.