Penny Sparrow guilty of hate speech
The Equality Court sitting at the Scottburgh Magistrate’s Court has this afternoon found Penny Sparrow guilty of hate speech in absentia.
In January this year, Sparrow wrote a Facebook post referring to black people as monkeys.
This caused an outcry nationwide. The ANC in KZN laid charges against her.
Magistrate Irfaan Khalil ruled that Sparrow’s post amounted to hate speech and ordered to her pay an amount of R150 000 to the Oliver and Adelaide Tambo Foundation.
The court has also prohibited her from posting any further inflammatory comments.
The ANC’s KZN Secretary, Super Zuma, has given this reaction outside court following the ruling.
"We think it's a very good judgement - it will go a long way in terms of advancing our objectives as the ANC of a non-racial, non-sexist, democratic, united and prosperous country. It sends a very clear message and it's assisting us to build the society that we envisaged to build," he said.
Her daughter, Charmaine Cowie was in court and had earlier tried to convince the court to postpone the matter, saying her mother was still trying to secure legal representation.
She also told the court Sparrow was frail, unemployed and feared for her life.