Man fails to get job back after racist joke

A former Durban engineer has lost a 10-year legal battle over a racist e-mail.

Vishnu Chetty, a former industrial engineer at Toyota, was fired in 2004 after he sent an e-mail depicting black people as relatives of monkeys.

Chetty’s offence was discovered by a shop steward who found a copy of the e-mail on the company printer, which was shared by 80 people. The steward reported it to Chetty’s superiors and he was suspended and later dismissed after being found guilty of “circulation of racially offensive e-mail using company resources”.

The e-mail, with the subject line “A black guy and a white man were sitting in the park”, describes how a white man leaves his monkey in the care of a black man. He returns to find the monkey dead and the black man responds “Mr, don’t get involved, it was a family affair.”

Chetty, who had worked at Toyota for 23 years, headed to the Commission for Conciliation, Mediation and Arbitration (CCMA), claiming he had been unfairly dismissed. The CCMA confirmed the fairness of the dismissal, which sparked the lengthy legal battle spanning both the CCMA and the Labour Court.

Chetty denied sending the e-mail, saying a colleague who held a grudge against him may have sent the mail from his computer. He also argued that the e-mail was not offensive and that he had been treated differently to colleagues who were guilty of similar behaviour and who were not fired.

Toyota denied treating staff inconsistently and referred to a case where an employee was fired for e-mailing a caricature showing Zimbabwean president Robert Mugabe as a gorilla with an offensive caption.

In one of the incidents Chetty referred to, two colleagues argued, with the one calling the other “a baboon”, but this was found to be distinguishable as the two men were black.

“Even if some form of ironic racial slur could be imputed to the word used it is significantly less offensive coming from a person of the same race,” Durban Labour Court acting Judge Paul Schumann said.

Schumann dismissed Chetty’s bid to have the case reviewed, finding that the "racially offensive comparison of black persons with apes justified [Chetty's] dismissal".

He added that while gender stereotyping remained a “vital issue”, “racism is the more serious offence”.

Schumann added that Chetty later admitted the e-mail was racially offensive, but the judge said that not only was it offensive, it was “crass and stupid”.

Toyota’s lawyer, Michael Maeso, said the company was “happy with the outcome”, especially given the dispute’s long history.

Chetty and his lawyer, Jay Reddy, were not able to comment prior to publication.

This week Chetty, 54, said his life has been “ruined” by the decade-long court battle.

"There are times that I just want to commit suicide. … I have been struggling financially and with my health ever since I was fired. I'm not the person they said I was; I am not a racist."

Chetty, who says he spent over R150 000 on legal bills, said he would consult with his lawyer on whether or not to appeal the latest judgment.