President Jacob Zuma's son Edward has threatened to lay a charge in the Equality Court against Lotus FM presenter Ravi Govender for calling his father a "zombie".
After the opening of the ANC policy conference at Nasrec, Johannesburg, on Friday, Govender posted the offending comment on his Facebook page.
"Just hear a Zombie Zuma giving a speech on the news. Massacring the beautiful English language. Uneducated creature. Even the other moron Mugabe speaks much better. " (sic)
The post, which generated a slew of responses in support for and against Govender's comment, has been deleted.
Edward lashed out at Govender, saying his family failed to understand what prompted him to make the statement.
"What's the difference between calling blacks monkeys to calling them zombies? Let's lay charges at the Equality Court for hate speech," he said, adding the president was his parent and he was prepared to defend him if need be.
He said the country faced many challenges but "to say our father is a zombie is not only an insult to us as the family but to the whole country and ANC members".
"We believe this is the worst form of abuse of democracy that many of our leaders fought so hard to achieve.
"Is this still part of freedom of speech?"
Edward said he would be taking up the matter with the management at Lotus FM.
Govender said yesterday he was angry at the way Zuma was "abusing the English language", saying his comment was meant to be humorous and not an attack.
He said he had apologised but felt the whole thing had been blown out of proportion.
"I'm never a racist but, despite apologising twice, I have been receiving threats on social media."
Edward could not be reached for comment yesterday.
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