Pages

20091201

Hate-speech charge against SA depy-president Motlanthe

Submission to the SA Human Rights Commission:

HATE SPEECH BY THE DEPUTY PRESIDENT OF THE REPUBLIC OF SOUTH AFRICA

INTRODUCTION

250px-Kgalema_Motlanthe, deputy president of SA charged with hatespeech Dec1 2009 The media quoted the Deputy President of the Republic of South Africa, Mr Kgalema Motlanthe on 27 – 30 November 2009 as follows:

"Some of the most brutal farm murders are committed by foreign nationals, who were brutally exploited and made to toil without any remuneration. The day when they demand remuneration, they are reported (by farmers) to the law enforcement units and are duly arrested and are sent back to their countries of origin. "Of course, they come back and they go back and commit the most horrendous murders. This is why we need to condemn those who take advantage of foreign nationals in this fashion," he said. (Sibusiso Ngalwa, journalist,  IOL 30 November 2009)

CHARGE

The Transvaal Agricultural Union of South Africa (TLU-SA) has lodged a charge with the SA Human Rights Commission, as the TLU says ‘it seriously doubts whether the deputy president had any factual proof at his disposal which could form the basis of his accusation. Based on the information in TAU SA’s data base (which includes a detailed list of farm attacks and farm murders), no such information reflects the accusation contained in the deputy president’s statement.

  • As such, the unfounded accusation affects the vast majority of farmers (if not all) not guilty of malpractice but who may become the victims of senseless violent attack and / or murder.

This complies with the specification and prescription in Sec 184 of the South African Constitution, Act 108 of 1996, dealing with the functions of the South African Human Rights Commission and in particular with Sec 184 (2) (b) and (c).

It remains the belief of TAU SA that the deputy president’s statement could incite further violence in retribution for perceived maltreatment of employees, that it advocates hatred of a specific racial and economic group and that it constitutes incitement to do harm. As such it reflects insensitivity and bigotry and consequently implies that farmers are to be despised, scorned, denied respect and made subject to intimidation, ill-treatment and violent crime on the basis of group affiliation.

REQUEST

The Commission is requested to investigate the charge and to make a finding:

The president of TAU SA, Mr Ben Marais, said that the deputy presidents' statement was not based on the existing facts and that it creates a climate for increased attacks on farmers, their families and their employees.

  • The data base available to TAU SA indicates that attackers are on the contrary, seldom known to the victims and that the latter are indeed being attacked by groups of unknown strangers.

Freedom Front Plus dismayed about statement:

The opposition Freedom Front Plus  party – whose leader Pieter Mulder is the deputy-agricultural minister in the Zuma-cabinet --  also expressed dismay about the ‘deputy-president’s ignorance’ in this regard. Their spokesman Walter Weber, former chairman for the Action Stop Farm Attacks, said:

  • “Deputy President Kgalema Motlanthe is looking for a justification for farm murders. No murder can ever be justified.”

Mr. Weber said that “Motlanthe dares not make generalisations about a very serious issue such as this so easily and should rather mention specific examples.”

On the contrary, he pointed out that ‘research has proven that in the majority of cases of farm murders, the murderer(s) and victim(s) did not know each other at the time of a farm attack and that very little or nothing at all was stolen. Motlanthe’s comments creates the impression that he is indeed on the side of the farm murderers who perpetrate these criminal attacks and does not have any understanding for farmers.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

sources:

View the great many details of these farm attacks at: http://censorbugbear-reports.blogspot.com/2009/11/genocidal-black-gangs-target-sa_30.html

http://cid-b6b44a5376348175.skydrive.live.com/albums.aspx

Trauma-pictures of victims 2008/9: (also view the other farm-attack farm victims’ albums on this site)

DUVHA

not for publication – background info.

Duvha coal-fired power station unreported accident 

  • A well-informed, close observer of this photographed turbine-explosion at the 3600MW fossil-fuel power station in Mpumalanga on February 10 2011 writes:“They were doing a test of the turbine overspeed protection system, and in short, the protection did not kick in. Conventional wisdom tells me that there should be a better way to test a protection system than to try and destroy the turbine and see if it feels like protecting itself, but that’s basically what they did. “…

“The turbine has a governor valve which controls the amount of steam coming into the turbine In order to keep it running at the right speed (3000 rpm for our grid frequency) and then it has a main isolation valve to shut the steam off completely. The protections systems (of which there are 3 independent systems, and a dude with his finger on the emergency button) are supposed to close this main isolation valve in a fraction of a second when the turbine overspeeds.

DUVHA coalpowerstation SA UNREPORTED ACCIDENT TURBINE1


TESTS OF 3000 RPM TO 4500 RMP OVERSPEED, all three systems failed - yet the guy who was supposed to push the manual-trip button wasn’t even at his post…

“So they get ready for the test, they dump a helluva lot of steam onto the turbine, speed starts going crazy, it went from 3000 RPM to 4500 RMP in ten seconds (they are generally only designed for 10 to 15% overspeed, all three protection systems should have kicked in by the time you get to 110%). Anyway, I don’t know why, but all three systems failed, and the dude with his finger on the manual trip button wasn’t at his post. So the result was a big bang, some fire and a lot of steam going where it shouldn’t go.”

DUVHA coalpowerstation SA UNREPORTED ACCIDENT TURBINE roof -----------

DUVHA has a shared turbine hall… all six units neatly placed in one long line without missile shields in between…

Scary thing is Duvha has a shared turbine hall. (picture below). All six units are placed in one long straight stripe, with no missile shield between them. And if you look at the third last pic you can see how big that shaft is, if that landed on another turbine it would have destroyed that too. They are very lucky they didn’t lose the entire station.” So anyway, what gets reported in the news? “Unforeseen maintenance” at one of the units at Duvha requires it to remain shut down for 18 months.” …  understatement of the century in my book. “

DUVHA coalpowerstation SA UNREPORTED ACCIDENT TURBINE DESTRUCTION

BELOW IS THE OFFICIAL SA GOVERNMENT VERSION OF EVENTS:

  • ‘Repairs to Eskom’s Duvha Power Station to Take Time”
    February 11, 2011 - Eskom has warned that a unit which burst into flames this week at Eskom’s Duvha Power Station during a routine test will take extensive time to repair. Eskom spokeswoman Hilary Joffe said Unit 4 of Eskom’s Duvha Power Station was “damaged last night in the course of a routine test. No one was injured but the unit is expected to take extensive time to repair,” she said. Joffe said the other five units of the 3,600 MW Duvha power station were running normally and the national grid remains in ‘green’ status, meaning that Eskom is generating enough power to satisfy the demand in the national grid. The incident happened when the 600 MW units at Duvha had been taken off load to perform a required turbine test.“This is a statutory test that is carried out in every power station. In the execution of the test, the protection of the unit failed, causing severe mechanical damage and starting a fire, which was brought rapidly under control by the power station’s fire team,” said Joffe. Eskom have since launched a “technical review “ of the incident. Eskom’s divisional executive for power-generation, Thava Govender, said: “The technical review is aimed at finding the cause of the unit failure, so that we may take appropriate action to prevent similar incidents in future.” Source: Nthambeleni Gabara at BUA News agency.
    http://www.netnewspublisher.com/repairs-to-eskoms-duvha-power-station-to-take-time/