Andrew Barnes, the anchor of the eNews television programme Channel Africa, will meet Virgin Active gym management this morning, after being the target of homophobic slurs by another gym member yesterday morning.
A clearly incensed Barnes posted on his Facebook page around midday yesterday that he had already laid a formal complaint with Virgin Active Point (in Green Point) management about his unsavoury experience.
He wrote: "Verbally abused at gym this morning by an old fart who took exception to seeing my partner kiss me goodbye - in this day and age?? Seriously??
"Anyway, we've laid a formal complaint and the manager of Virgin Active Point will be talking to the aggro homophobe tomorrow. I'll keep you posted ... [sic]"
Just under an hour later, he was anchoring the 1pm to 4pm programme, News Day.
Virgin Active South Africa's head of strategic communications, Les Aupiais, said yesterday Barnes had agreed to meet gym manager Robert Masters to see if he could help identify the man.
Aupiais said: "We have a zero tolerance approach to any kind of prejudice and we will act swiftly as soon as we have all the facts.
"We do try to bring parties together to see if we can find some middle ground and elicit an apology as a starting point," she added.
Barnes joined the TV station in 2001, presenting eBusiness and eNews Prime Time, and is a permanent fixture during Budget Day and the opening of parliament.
Attempts to reach him for comment proved fruitless.
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