WATCH: Mandela was a terrorist, communist and murderer, says Dutch group

While many South Africans spent their 67 minutes celebrating Nelson Mandela’s birthday on Saturday, 18 July, by making a donation, protesters from the Netherlands were seen hanging a sign on a statue of Mandela, stating that the global icon was a “terrorist, communist and murderer”.

In video footage, the Voorpost group, which protests every Mandela Day, shows three men hang the sign on Mandela’s statue.

The Mandela statue is located in Scheveningen, Netherlands.

According to SA-News, one of the men said people around the globe, including mainstream media, worshipped Mandela while concealing the “harsh truths” about the icon.

“Nelson Mandela was a murderer, a terrorist and a communist, and it’s about time we started to do something about it,” one of the men is heard saying in the video.

“It is time for people to know that it was not a saint. Since this man was released, over 4,000 white farmers in South Africa have been killed,” he claimed.

Meanwhile, the peaceful protest against farm attacks and murders that was scheduled to take place at the Union Buildings in Pretoria on Mandela Day was cancelled.

This comes after the Tshwane metro police department (TMPD) issued a statement last Thursday, 16 July, rejecting the application for the protest to go on amid the peak of the Covid-19 pandemic in South Africa.

“Should this march go ahead, it will be regarded as illegal,” said metro police spokesperson senior superintendent Isaac Mahamba.

Devon Hofmeyr, one of the speakers on the day, said it was unfortunate that the march had to be cancelled.

“Unfortunately, I cannot send people, whose interests I put first, in an illegal march. The safety and well-being of our people in times like these must come first.

“I really hope that those who hold marches, which are supposed to be illegal, will also receive the type of opposition from the metro,” he said.

The Democratic Alliance (DA) also has been calling on government to declare farm murders as a hate crime.

In another incident, the statue of Cecil John Rhodes was vandalised at Cape Town’s Rhodes Memorial, with the head removed from the bust last Monday, 13 July.

The Western Cape South African Police Service (SAPS) is currently investigating a case of malicious damage to property regarding the statue.

Police spokesperson Colonel Andrè Traut confirmed that no one has been arrested yet.

Rhodes’ statue is situated on the memorial site in Devil’s Peak in Cape Town.

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