Hate-Speech Bill: A threat to democracy in South Africa

On February 8, 2018, the Hate Crimes Working Group (HCWG) published a petition, widely covered in the media, decrying the fact that the controversial Prevention and Combating of Hate Crimes and Hate Speech Bill (the hate-speech bill), published for public comment in late 2016, is being delayed.

While the HCWG's and human-rights activists' impatience can be understood – South Africa has a hate-crime problem that urgently needs to be dealt with – the hate-speech bill is not the vehicle to accomplish this. On the contrary, it may lead to tyranny that South Africa has only ever known under the Suppression of Communism Act of the apartheid era.

[Read the full article at HuffPost SA here: https://www.huffingtonpost.co.za/martin-van-staden/hate-speech-bill-a-threat-to-democracy-in-south-africa_a_23374035/]

Martin van Staden

Martin van Staden sits on the Executive Committee and Rule of Law Board of Advisors of the Free Market Foundation. He is pursuing a doctorate in law at the University of Pretoria and is author of 'The Constitution and the Rule of Law: An Introduction' (2019).

Publish date: 27 March 2018
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Martin van Staden, Hate Speech Bill, democracy, communism, Rule of law / Law

The views expressed in the article are the author’s and are not necessarily shared by the members of the Foundation. This article may be republished without prior consent but with acknowledgement to the author.

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