Hundreds protest Zuma 'penis painting' in South Africa

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InterAksyon.com
The online news portal of TV5

JOHANNESBURG - Hundreds of supporters of South Africa's ruling ANC on Tuesday marched on a Johannesburg art gallery that had displayed a controversial painting of President Jacob Zuma with his genitals exposed.

The ruling party had mobilised supporters and anticipated at least 15,000 protesters, but only about a thousand turned up, most of them bussed in.

Mostly dressed in the black, green and gold colours of the African National Congress, they marched about two kilometres along one of the city's busiest roads to the gallery in the upmarket neighbourhood of Parkwood.

The gallery, which was closed last week after the painting was vandalised, had on Tuesday pulled down all materials from the exhibition by satirical artist Brett Murray.

"Goodman Gallery respect your right to protest," read a sign posted on the gallery' shop windows, in big capital letters.

Protesters sported T-shirts with messages such as "President has the right to human dignity and privacy" and "We say no to abuse of artistic expression".

Two women held a placard that read: "Whites hate blacks" and "Whites are rude".

Dorcas Ntshaodinsane, a protestor in her 50s said: "We are coming here to protest against discrimination. It is discrimination, you just dont take any person and make him naked, whoever he is."

The painting depicts Zuma mimicking a pose by Vladimir Lenin in a Soviet era propaganda poster, but with his penis exposed.

The ANC which has described the painting as "indecent, racist, disrespectful and an abuse of freedom of expression".

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