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Jacoline Prinsloo<\/p>\n
Maharaj<\/p>\n
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Shanti Aboobaker <\/p>\n
Political Bureau<\/em><\/strong> <\/p>\n<\/p>\n A public war of words erupted yesterday between cartoonist Jonathan Shapiro, aka Zapiro, and Presidency spokesman Mac Maharaj following President Jacob Zuma\u2019s decision last week to withdraw a defamation case against the cartoonist. Yesterday the Presidency said the cartoon \u2013 showing Zuma about to rape \u201cLady Justice\u201d \u2013 was a product of \u201cingrained prejudices\u201d about African male sexuality. <\/p>\n Maharaj invited Shapiro to a face-to-face and public debate. The two were interviewed separately on two radio stations. <\/p>\n On Sunday the Presidency issued a statement saying Shapiro and the Sunday Times, which published the controversial cartoon, had wanted to perpetuate the image of Zuma as \u201ca sexual deviant\u201d despite his acquittal on rape charges in 2006. <\/p>\n The statement went on to say that \u201cdeeply ingrained prejudices regarding not only the president, but which extend to views about African males and sexual mores\u201d lay at the heart of the cartoon\u2019s publication. <\/p>\n Shapiro<\/p>\n AP<\/span><\/p>\n But Shapiro rejected the accusations, dismissing them as nothing but a \u201cred herring\u201d and adding that his legal team had intended to use the court to disprove such claims. <\/p>\n \u201cThis is the old, tired spin that they [Zuma and his allies] used already four years ago. <\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s a cheap trick to withdraw the case unconditionally and all the charges, and then to trot out this old red herring.\u201d <\/p>\n He said the rape of Lady Justice was an obvious metaphor and was unequivocally not about Zuma\u2019s personal history, including the rape charges he faced in 2005. <\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s about his bullying and threatening of the judiciary. He did it to get into power, and he\u2019s done it since,\u201d Shapiro said. <\/p>\n However, Shapiro acknowledged the sensitivities over the way in which black male sexuality had been negatively characterised historically, as well as the obvious inferences the cartoon might elicit about Zuma\u2019s well-publicised personal life. He had deliberately drawn the cartoon so that it was \u201cnot salacious\u201d, and so that it would not demean women. <\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m aware of the connotation. People could make that link, but is that my fault?\u201d he asked. <\/p>\n Speaking to The Mercury yeterday, Maharaj acknowledged Shapiro\u2019s explanation, adding that he was open to discussing the issues with him. <\/p>\n \u201cLet\u2019s look at it [the cartoon] through the multicultural lens of South Africa\u2026 in an atmosphere where we can listen to each other and stop pretending that any one individual has the infallible answers to all our problems,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n \u201cLet\u2019s create an environment of dialogue rather than confrontation.\u201d <\/p>\n The Presidency said earlier that Zuma was withdrawing the charges in order to preserve a culture of freedom of expression in the country \u2013 an argument Shapiro has called \u201cweird\u201d and \u201cconvoluted\u201d. <\/p>\n Shapiro said Maharaj believed Zuma\u2019s legal team would have won, and therefore had decided to allow the cartoon to go unchallenged as a gesture in \u201cgranting something to freedom of expression\u201d. <\/p>\n He said Maharaj was repeatedly in a position of having to \u201cdefend all sorts of indefensible things\u201d, but that he had \u201cnever heard such convoluted [arguments]\u201d. <\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m adamant the central metaphor could be used for any politician anywhere.\u201d <\/p>\n He and his legal team had consulted widely and had found \u201ca number of drawings\u201d which were similar. <\/p>\n His cartoon showed Lady Justice \u201cabout to be raped\u201d, whereas in Europe there were cartoons which depicted former Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi \u201cactually raping\u201d a woman. <\/p>\n \u201cWhat Mac Maharaj and Jacob Zuma are doing is exploiting a very real sense of hurt \u2013 and I think they did this quite deliberately,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n Shapiro said the invitation to debate was \u201cintriguing\u201d but that he would have to think about it. <\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m never one to shy away from debate, but in this context we have won a total victory [with the withdrawal of charges] and they\u2019re trying to score points now,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n He was not yet rejecting the offer, but would wait to hear a more specific proposal from Maharaj. <\/p>\n \t8<\/strong>P9 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Jacoline Prinsloo Maharaj Shanti Aboobaker Political Bureau A public war of words erupted yesterday between cartoonist Jonathan Shapiro, aka Zapiro, and Presidency spokesman Mac Maharaj following President Jacob Zuma\u2019s decision last week to withdraw a defamation case against the cartoonist. Yesterday the Presidency said the cartoon \u2013 showing Zuma about to rape \u201cLady Justice\u201d \u2013 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[8275,953,2143],"class_list":{"0":"post-16015","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-south-africa","7":"tag-durban","8":"tag-newspaper","9":"tag-the-mercury","10":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16015","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16015"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16015\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16015"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16015"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16015"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"nm](\"http:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-content\/plugins\/rss-poster\/cache\/baec0_986561255.jpg\")
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