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South Africa’s justice minister Wednesday placed a white judge on “special leave” over her Facebook remarks linking rape and black culture, which caused a national outcry.
Mabel Jansen, a judge in the High Court in the capital Pretoria, has been pilloried for declaring “I still have to meet a black girl who was not raped at about 12. I am dead serious” in a series of posts dating back a year that were made public on Sunday.
She also alleged that “In their (black) culture a woman is there to pleasure them. Period” and wrote that “Murder is also is not a biggy. And gang rapes of baby, daughter and mother (are) a pleasurable pastime.”
The ministry said she had been placed “on special leave, pending finalisation of a complaint submitted to the Judicial Services Commission (JSC)”.
“The complaint relates to comments on social media attributed to her which have caused outrage among members of the public,” it said in a statement.
Jansen’s remarks, which have been condemned across the political spectrum, are the latest to underscore the lingering racial tensions in South Africa, 22 years after the formal end of apartheid rule.
On Monday, local media reported Jansen as saying her comments were misrepresented.
South Africa has one of the highest rape rates in the world.
Official statistics showed that 43,195 rapes were reported between April 2014 and March 2015. The real figure is believed to be much higher, with many rapes going unreported.