Who and what is AfriForum?

AfriForum is an Afrikaans civil rights organisation that protects the rights of minority groups at national as well as provincial level, and anyone who can identify with AfriForum’s principles and objectives may join the organisation. AfriForum’s community plan focuses on mobilising communities to thus take control of their own streets and neighbourhoods again. AfriForum ensures that your constitutional and civil rights are recognised and protected at national level.

Wie en wat is AfriForum?

AfriForum is ’n Afrikaanse burgerregteorganisasie wat die regte van minderheidsgroepe op sowel nasionale as provinsiale vlak beskerm, en enigiemand wat met AfriForum se beginsels en doelstellings kan identifiseer, mag by die organisasie aansluit. AfriForum se gemeenskapsplan fokus daarop om gemeenskappe te mobiliseer om só weer beheer terug te neem oor hul eie strate en woonbuurtes. AfriForum verseker dat jou grondwetlike én burgerregte op nasionale vlak erken en beskerm word.

Media statements | Private prosecution Media statements

Police station labels charge as false within 8 minutes – AfriForum supports complainant

ByAfriForum 09/11/202001/09/2021

AfriForum’s Private Prosecution Unit is currently supporting a complainant in a case after his complaint was within 8 minutes labelled as “false” by the Brooklyn police station, after which the detective branch closed the complaint. The unit also laid a service complaint against a police captain in this regard. The complainant’s son was found dead in January this year under suspicious circumstances in a toilet in the Menlyn Mall shopping centre.

The deceased took out a life insurance policy in November 2019. After his death, the family was informed that no payment would be made to them, as another person had been named as beneficiary. However, this person’s details were completed in a handwriting and ink colour that differ completely from that of the other information in the policy document. It therefore seems that the original beneficiary appointment was tampered with.

Despite this information, the complainant was turned away at the police station because the officer who was investigating his son’s unnatural death was unavailable. After AfriForum intervened, the complainant was allowed in October 2020 to lay charges. However, an SAPS captain then threatened him with arrest because he was apparently laying a false charge – without launching any investigation.

According to Natasha Venter, Advisor for Private Prosecution at AfriForum’s Private Prosecution Unit, these actions by police officers are one of the reasons why people have so little faith in the country’s legal system. “The SAPS is supposed to be the first recourse for victims of crime. The opposite seems true: In many cases people are turned away at police stations or – even worse – are treated like criminals. It is disconcerting that the Private Prosecution Unit has to involve itself in more and more cases like these to force the SAPS to do its job.”