Sue Blaine
16 November 2009
Johannesburg — THE Human Rights Commission (HRC) is likely to decide this week when to file an Equality Court application that could compel the four former University of the Free State (UFS) students involved in a racist incident last year to pay damages to their victims, HRC spokesman Vincent Moaga said on Friday.
The HRC wanted to file its application last week but had to wait for the Free State prosecuting authorities to pass the four men's application on to the Bloemfontein Regional Court to participate in a restorative justice process.
University vice-chancellor Jonathan Jansen stirred up a hornet's nest when he decided to withdraw the university from the criminal case against Danie Grobler, RC Malherbe, Johnny Roberts and Schalk van der Merwe, who face crimen injuria charges relating to the alleged coercion of five cleaning staff into making a video used to make a statement against the racial integration of residences.
The workers were recorded consuming food into which it appeared that one of the men had urinated.
Jansen told the Cape Town Press Club on Friday that the men were likely to apologise publicly by the end of the month.
The HRC wants to apply to the Equality Court to award the five workers damages, and to obtain a formal admission from the four men that what they did was wrong. Moaga said it also wanted the men to formally apologise to their victims.
"We want this to be a precedent- setting case," he said.
The HRC was granted a watching brief in the criminal case, which allows it access to filed papers.
It did not want to file its own papers until it had seen the men's application to participate in arbitration and a restorative justice process -- which the HRC opposes because this would happen outside open court, Moaga said.
The four men made their application, and publicly announced that they wanted to apologise, after Jansen's announcement in the middle of last month caused heated public debate. Nobel laureate Anglican Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu praised Jansen for his "reconciliatory gesture," but it sparked outrage from other quarters, including the African National Congress (ANC).
UFS spokeswoman Lacea Loader said the UFS would not comment on the provincial ANC's call for the disbandment of the university council for being "too white".
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