South Africa's retail giant withdraws "Apartheid symbol"
Cape Town, South Africa (PANA) – South African retail giant Woolworths on Friday issued an apology after “mistakingly” marketing a gym bag in the colours of the Apartheid-era flag.
Shoppers flagged the Country Road bag which was displayed in stores around the country.
The company said the bag was designed in Australia and it regretted that “the applications of its seasonal colours” had caused offence. It confirmed that the product has been withdrawn nationwide.
“We offer our sincerest apologies to all our South African customers. It is never our intention to cause offence and we have decided to discontinue sales of this item,” it said.
Woolworths operates 218 full line stores and 430 food stand alone stores in South Africa, with 64 stores throughout the rest of Africa.
Two months ago, South Africa's Equality Court ruled that the display of the apartheid-era flag demonstrates a clear intention to be hurtful and harmful and incites hatred against black people.
The complaint was lodged by the Nelson Mandela Foundation and the South African Human Rights Commission (SAHRC).
This was after the hated symbol of apartheid was displayed at a public rally by white farmers in 2017 to protest against high crime levels.
The organisation AfriForum, which opposes the banning of the flag, argued that displaying it did not constitute hate speech.
Judge Phineas Mojapelo effectively delivered the fateful blow to a powerful symbol of Apartheid 25 years after Nelson Mandela swept into power on a ticket of racial reconciliation.
“Displaying the flag is destructive of our nascent non-racial democracy. It is an affront to the spirit and values of ubuntu (unity), which has become a mark of civilized interaction in post-apartheid South Africa,” he said.
Analyst Howard Feldman said the flag should be “thrown into the trashcan of history”.
“South Africa is not the first country to deal with this issue. Germany, following the loss of World War II banned the Swastika. It banned Hitler's Mein Kampf and it banned the celebration of his birthday. France banned Nazi paraphernalia, so too did Austria and Hungary and Ukraine.
"The United States still allows the display of the Swastika per their First Amendment, but it is noteworthy that the US, whilst suffering the significant loss of life during the war, was never subject to Nazi rule, as were the European countries that have outlawed it,” he said.
–0– PANA CU/AR 18Oct2018
