S.African minister apologies for Afrikaner comment

South African women’s minister who said young Afrikaans men were raised to believe that they owned women was in hot water Thursday as her apology fell flat.

Minister Lulu Xingwana made the comments during a television interview on the recent shooting by athlete Oscar Pistorius of his girlfriend.

“Young Afrikaner men are brought up in the Calvinist religion believing that they own a woman, they own a child, they own everything and therefore they can take that life because they own it,” she told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation.

A backlash followed and Xingwana was forced to step back, saying her words may have been offensive to some.

“I would, accordingly, like to retract these remarks and apologise unconditionally for them,” she said.

The presidency also stepped in “to assure the Afrikaans community” and to say no single cultural group should be blamed for the serious problem of violence against women and children.

But her apology was dismissed by several groups on Thursday with calls for her to be sacked.

The Afrikanerbond, an Afrikaans interests group said the apology was “half-hearted” and “not an acknowledgement that she was wrong and voiced blatant untruths to the world”.

An Afrikaans lobby group Afriforum wants the minister to resign, while the Christian Democratic Party said she was “unfit to be a minister”.