This archive report was first published on 5 July 2019.
Published on July 5, 2019, by AFP
South Africa's firebrand opposition party leader Julius Malema has lost a court bid to scrap an apartheid-era anti-riot law, which he has been charged with violating.
The 1956 Riotous Assemblies Act, used during white-minority rule to suppress anti-apartheid rallies, defines conditions under which public gatherings can take place and makes it an offense to incite others to commit an offense.
Malema, the leader of the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) party, has been charged with incitement after urging supporters to occupy vacant land in 2014 and 2016.
He argued that the law contravenes South Africa's post-apartheid democratic constitution and vowed to take his case to the Constitutional Court, the country's highest legal authority.
"We believe that it (the law) doesn't have a place in a democratic South Africa," Malema said. "We still believe that the Riotous Assemblies Act is unconstitutional in its entirety."
