Social media cannot be judge, jury and executioner

Sometimes AfriForum gets it right.

Gerrie Nel, who found fame as the “bulldog” during the Oscar Pistorius trial, shook the trousers of Minister of Police Senzo Mchunu for identifying the headmaster of Bergview College in the Eastern Cape as a suspect in the rape case of seven-year-old Cwecwe.

Despite evidence the principal was not at the school when the girl was allegedly raped, “social media detectives” and “shoddy police work” led to death threats, despite the principal having “no contact with the child on the day of the rape”, Nel told lieutenant-general Nomthetheleli Mene, Eastern Cape provincial police commissioner in a scathing letter.

“The evidence shows he was at the school’s main campus 2km away.”

The alleged rape has ignited outrage over systemic failures in handling the case.

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Hundreds of people took to the streets under the banner #Justice for Cwecwe. Some threatened to close down the offices of the department of education. And a petition calling for justice has reportedly amassed over 670 000 signatures.

The public should keep on raging at the atrocities our education system is subjecting children of all ages to, from not addressing the pit toilets to sex pest teachers who flourish with little consequence in our schools.

But in this emotive frenzy, let us heed Nel’s message: let us not subject innocent people to a trial-by-social media.

Let the law run its course without us casting stones dipped in social perceptions.

And let us hope our police minister keeps his stones in his pocket, too…

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