Senekal must not be turned into race war - Maimane
One SA Movement leader Mmusi Maimane has pleaded for the murder of a young farmer from Senekal in the Free State not to be turned into a racial war.
This after the court appearance of two men in connection with the murder of Brendin Horner led to clashes between police and the local farming community outside the Senekal Magistrate's Court.
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A 52-year-old man was arrested after gunshots were fired, a police vehicle was torched and court property was vandalised.
#OneSAMovement | Maimane condemns the violence in Senekal. He says the matter should sow further racial divides in but should rather bring the country together to fight against crime pic.twitter.com/GooN3JTMXb
— Jacaranda News (@JacaNews) October 8, 2020
Maimane, speaking during the unveiling of the movement’s economic recovery plan in Auckland Park on Thursday, called on South Africans not to deepen racial divisions in the country.
"The incident is fast becoming one that is racially polarised, as people frame it as a war between Afrikaner versus a black South African.
"I want to say that we have to work together, we have to ultimately ensure that we do not allow this incident to divide our country, that we can reduce this war to contestation between races but that we let institutions do their job," Maimane said.
He urged the community to let the police do their jobs and not take the law into their own hands.
"And I understand that it is hard, no citizens ought to lose their lives in this country. We are in a war against crime. Whether it is murder in a farm or in a township then we must unite against crime," Maimane said.