new update,<\/a><\/strong> group admins will have the ability to delete any message sent to the group and “delete for all”, and the time limit for this function has been extended to a couple of days.<\/p>\nIn South African law, if you can delete something, and you choose not to, then you become legally responsible for the content, she said.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf you\u2019re the admin of a WhatsApp group, because of this recent change, you become legally responsible for everything that appears on that group.\u201d<\/p>\n
Any administrator of a group whose members are posting hate speech, threats, incitement, or other illegal content could face legal repercussions if that content is not removed, according to Sadlier Berkowitz.<\/p>\n
How it expands the law<\/strong><\/p>\nJeffery said that existing law is not efficient enough in that, under the Promotion of Equality and prevention of Unfair Discrimination Act (PEPUDA), it involves civil matters where a person must approach the equality court within their capacity.<\/p>\n
Under the new bill, if it becomes law, a hate crime would be followed up by the state and criminally prosecuted.<\/p>\n
This is not the first piece of law that restricts people’s speech, said Jeffery. South Africa already has restrictions such as crimen injuria<\/em> – the willful injury to a person’s dignity as a result of obscene or racially offensive language – that is common law.<\/p>\nThe Constitution also already lists forms of speech such as propaganda for war, incitement of imminent violence or advocacy of hatred based on religion, gender or race.<\/p>\n
Jeffery added that the new bill is not trying to replace crimen injuria<\/em> but rather provide a statutory crime of hate speech so that there is greater clarity for parliament.<\/p>\nHe added that hate speech laws are commonplace in Western Europe, places like Canada, as well as African nations like Kenya.<\/p>\n