'Shoot the boer' translation under scrutiny

'(AfriForum deputy CEO) Mr (Ernst) Roets became aware of the song when he went into The Times website and saw the translation,' Maleka said in the South Gauteng High Court, sitting as the Equality Court. 'The problem is not with the word, but with the translation,' he said, adding that the word 'ibhunu' did not refer to a specific person, notes a report on the IoL site. 'In 1994 ibhunu had a political connotation... the word needs to be given a different meaning after 1995,' he said. Judge Collin Lamont asked Maleka why Malema had not explained what the song meant to the media when he read the reports in the newspaper. 'He (Malema) never disabused the public that the words did not mean 'shoot the boer', the judge noted. Maleka disagreed saying Malema had explained what the song meant when he first sang it at the University of Johannesburg last year. 'He explained to the crowd there what the song was about but the explanation did not find its way to the media.' Full report on the IoL site

The judge also suggested the words might mean different things to different people. According to a Mail & Guardian Online report, Lamont said: 'It is common cause that (shoot the boer) could be the translation, but we can't say it is the proper translation.' He added: 'The context of the song is destroy the regime (apartheid).' He said words sung in a particular language may have a meaning to one audience and that a translation could have a meaning to a different audience. AfriForum lawyer, Martin Brassey, said the ANC had failed to establish that the song sung during the struggle years against apartheid was not considered inflammatory. TAU-SA's lawyer Roelof du Plessis agreed. According to the report he said the ANC should have held a formal press conference when the translation of the song lyrics was first published explaining what it meant and why it was being sung. Du Plessis also told the court the singing of the song had caused negative feelings and friction among the public. The chants were reminders that Afrikaners could face the same fate as Zimbabwean farmers, according to Du Plessis. He cited an incident in which Malema had thrown a BBC journalist out of a media conference, his comments that he would kill for Zuma and his stance on land restitution as examples of a violent person, says a report in The Mercury. However, Mail & Guardian Online report quotes Lamont as saying he thought the issue had opened up a debate that could be seen to be healing to the country. Full Mail & Guardian Online report Full report in The Mercury (subscription needed)

When it came to hate speech, the meaning of the words for Malema were irrelevant, argued Du Plessis. What mattered was the meaning in the ears of the listener. For this reason, the court had to rely on the dictionary meaning of the words. And nowhere in the dictionary did ibhunu mean the oppressive regime, he said, according to a Business Day report. But Lamont asked why he should favour the dictionary over the testimony of witnesses who had come to the court and told him what the meaning meant. Du Plessis said because only one witness had said so and he was not an expert. Du Plessis said that Lamont, when deciding what a reasonable person would think, had to put himself in the shoes of a 'conservative Afrikaaner'. Full Business Day report

Lamont referred to evidence by ANC witnesses that ibhunu did not refer to Afrikaners but to a system of oppression, and that the phrase did not incite violence because it was understood that the words did not refer to specific people, notes a report in The Times. 'Who devised that phrase? Was it not the translator who published it in the newspaper,' asked Lamont. Brassey said that if Malema had 'simply sung the song on a first occasion in the belief that it was value-neutral' he would have corrected it by relying on 'the time honoured bolt-hole of politicians: that they had been 'misquoted'.' Lamont debated with Brassey the historical significance of the song, asking: 'In a society where history is largely orally recorded, does it not grossly interfere with history if you remove passages from it?' Brassey said a song could be commemorative, but it could also be used as a 'contemporary exhortation to violence'. He referred to the All Blacks' Haka, the French national anthem, and Nazi war songs. Full report in The Times See also a Beeld report

Monday's High Court order that dubula ibhunu was an incitement to murder was also raised, with Lamont saying he planned to ignore it. 'There was no evidence in the case apart from the agreement by the two parties,' the judge said. 'I think I should ignore it.' Brassey opposed Lamont's decision saying it 'can't be discounted', notes a report in The Citizen . On Monday Judge Leon Halgryn said in the High Court '...the publication and chanting of the words 'dubula ibhunu', prima facie satisfies the crime of incitement to murder'. The case related to two members of the Society for the Protection of Your Constitution. One of them, Mahomed Vawda, planned to sing it at an anti-crime march in Mpumalanga last year. His colleague Willem Harmse opposed this. Eventually the two reached an agreement and without much press fanfare secured a settlement order prohibiting the singing of the words. Full report in The Citizen