Smith told TimesLIVE there was no ill intent behind the joke and that he was aware of the video snippet making the rounds on social media and the “humorous” comments around it.
“I have already spoken to Abongile. He said to me there was a whole range of humorous remarks made by him and others at the start of it, that he took no offence and didn't see anything offensive in the comment,” said Smith.
He added that Nzelenzele had previously made fun of his own surname.
“There is context to it. I just spoke to him now and he took no offence. [People] are being shown a portion of the proceedings, so it is easy to [take it] out of context, but we are speaking about a person and that person himself did not see any offence in the remarks.”
This was also shared by the City of Cape Town in a statement on social media.