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Wendy Isaack
When the department of justice and constitutional development published its draft Prevention and Combating of Hate Crimes and Hate Speech Bill for public comment, it meant that the government was finally ready to punish bias-motivated crimes. But the cause for celebration is also cause for consternation.
The draft includes an overbroad and vague provision criminalising hate speech, which threatens freedom of expression, a fundamental human right. That is not to say hate crimes legislation is not necessary; it is and it should be welcomed. South Africa faces a scourge of racist and xenophobic attacks, sexual violence and murders of black lesbians and transgender men, as a 2012 Human Rights Watch report documented. And the violence continues: most recently the December 5 2016 report of the assault, abduction and murder of a black lesbian, Noluvo Swelindawo, in Driftsands near Khayelitsha in Cape Town.
