The hate speech ruling on an article by the Huffington Post South Africa earlier this year‚ which resulted in former editor Verashni Pillay resigning‚ has been overturned.
In April this year‚ the press ombudsman of South Africa’s Johan Retief found the HuffPost SA guilty for serious misconduct of the publication of hate speech.
Following the ruling‚ Pillay – who was then editor-in-chief – resigned and apologised for the blog titled “Could it be time to deny white men the franchise?” after it was revealed that the blogger “Shelly Garland” was fake in May this year.
Pillay then appealed the ruling and the appeals panel of the press council yesterday released its ruling that the blog did not amount to hate speech.
The ombud originally found HuffPost in breach of section 5.2 of the press code and said because the blog was “inflammatory‚ discriminatory and targeting a specific group of people” the text could be described as hate speech.