Phumzile Van Damme punches man in the head following race argument
The young man reportedly swore at her and threatened violence prior to their scuffle.
Phumzile Van Damme | Image: Twitter
Democratic Alliance MP and Shadow Minister of Communications and Digital Technologies Phumzile Van Damme literally had to take matters into her own hands following a confrontation with a family at Cape Town’s V&A Waterfront.
Van Damme took to Twitter to share the aftermath of what she has labelled a “racist” ordeal.
She began her thread with a video of the premises’ on-duty manager who attended to Van Damme after the incident.
Management of @VandAWaterfront if you’re going to allow racism & racists on your premisis, please announce it to all. I will not stand for anyone’s racism towards me or anyone. And don’t send me some PR clichéd response either, ACTION pic.twitter.com/YIriYXUKQW
— Phumzile Van Damme (@zilevandamme) June 18, 2019
AND, @VandAWaterfront the right way to deal with this would’ve been to take my details & the family’s details & apologized to me for what I’d experienced. Your “Manager” did neither. He treated me like the rubbish & told me to go, so I said “fine, I’ll have to expose you”
— Phumzile Van Damme (@zilevandamme) June 18, 2019
She followed that up with an image of the family in question and proceeded to explain why she punched one of the family members in the photo in the head.
According to Van Damme, she acted in self-defence after he swore at her and “was threatening violence”.
So @VandAWaterfront given the chance, you do not tell people racism is not allowed in your mall. Ban this family from your premises so we can see you’re serious, you have their photo. And no, I won’t stand while violence is threatened towards me, risk being beaten. ENOUGH!
— Phumzile Van Damme (@zilevandamme) June 18, 2019
The MP demanded that the mall ban the family from the premises in order to show that they were serious.
Van Damme has refused to officially comment on the matter.
Hello Media, please stop calling me. Do you understand how one feels after such? How do you think I feel? Exercise some sensitivity, I’m not here to give you website clicks. Leave me alone.
— Phumzile Van Damme (@zilevandamme) June 18, 2019
She even declined the Black First Land First’s (BLF) show of support.
No thank you very much. I do not need BLF’s support. Don’t piggyback on my pain to score political points for your nonsense. I’ll deal with them just fine. https://t.co/FV55MT3XM7
— Phumzile Van Damme (@zilevandamme) June 18, 2019
The V&A Waterfront was made aware of the matter shortly after Van Damme sent her tweets and are currently working to remedy the situation.
An update and a statement will be communicated in due course.
UPDATE:
“We have noted the incident relayed by Ms Phumzile Van Damme via her twitter profile, and we are engaging with her directly on this issue, as well as with the security manager involved to get a full account of the incident. We are also reviewing the video footage of the alleged incident,” said the V&A Waterfront in a statement.
“We do not tolerate any act of racism at the V&A Waterfront, an environment which daily, sees thousands of visitors from all walks of life, from all over the country, and all over the world, enjoying its facilities. We would ban anyone who displays racist behaviour on the property, with immediate effect,” added the V&A Waterfront.
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