AfriForum/L Boshoff vs Mail & Guardian
BEFORE THE APPEALS PANEL OF THE PRESS COUNCIL OF SOUTH AFRICA
In the matter between:
AfriForum/L Boshoff Applicant
and
Mail & Guardian Respondent
Matter No: 000585/04/2026
DECISION ON AN APPLICATION FOR LEAVE TO APPEAL
- This is an application by AfriForum together with L Boshoff (hereinafter jointly referred to as the applicant) for leave to appeal a Ruling by the Acting Press Ombud dated 12 May 2026. The Ruling was on a complaint by the applicant following an article by the Mail & Guardian (respondent) published on 17 April 2026. The sentence complained about in the article was the following:
“Afriforum and their allied organisations frame their position through claims of targeted violence against white farmers, which they present in international advocacy as a form of ‘white genocide’, a claim that functions here as a basis for mobilisation rather than as a question for determination with this legal analysis.”
- In its complaint, the applicant says that it “has not claimed that there is a white genocide occurring in South Africa. This statement is neither truthful nor accurate and is therefore in breach of section 1.1 of the Press Code. It is not a form of protected comment, since it has not taken fair account of all material facts.” The complaint went on to say that the respondent had already published apologies to the applicant regarding that same error twice, and thus asked for a Tier 3 sanction. Of course, before coming to the issue of sanction, the first question is whether there has been a breach of the Code.
- In its defence, the respondent said that the article was an opinion piece. It says the part complained of does not expressly say what the applicant alleges it says. It did not say that the applicant expressly said in Washington or elsewhere, that there is a white genocide in South Africa. The basis of the defence is that the statement complained of was an opinion: “The sentence is framed in the language of an analysis; it refers to how Afriforum and its allies ‘frame their position’ and how those claims are [presented] in international advocacy as a form of white genocide politics …. Read fairly and as a whole, the sentence is interpretive and evaluative. It is not a direct factual attribution of quoted words to Afriforum.” The respondent then argued that the complaint overstated what the article said.
- The Acting Ombud found that the part of the article complained about was indeed an opinion piece which met all the requirements of the Code.
- I agree with the Ruling of the Acting Ombud for the reasons he gave after a thorough analysis of the complaint and the defence. The applicant has itself to blame; if you say things which are open to all sorts of interpretations, you cannot complain later. President Trump concluded from what Afriforum had said that there was white genocide in South Africa; the opinion piece came to the same conclusion. As the Acting Ombud indicated, Afriforum has had the opportunity on many occasions to dispel any impression that they were conveying that there was white genocide. Afriforum kept on saying things capable of suggesting white genocide, but complains when so interpreted or understood. As the Ruling points out, President Trump accused South Africa of white genocide following the visit to that country by a delegation of Afriforum. Afriforum ought to have reasonably realised that what it said was capable of carrying an interpretation by others that it conveyed that there was a white genocide; it can therefore hardly blame the opinion piece or perhaps even President Trump.
- The application has no reasonable prospects of success and it is therefore dismissed.
Dated this 24th day of June 2026
Judge B M Ngoepe, Chair, Appeals Panel
