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In 2013, Polish sociology professor Rafał Pankowski sat in front of his computer and watched a Europa League soccer match between Italian club Lazio and Warsaw-based Legia Warszawa.
During the game, fans of the reigning Polish champions displayed a banner in the stands. The image of a man was imprinted on the flag: a stony face and chiseled features.
“At first I wasn’t sure who it was. But I checked. And it was Janusz Walus, ”said Pankowski, who is a spokesperson for the Warsaw-based anti-racism movement Never Again.
Janusz Walus is the confessed assassin of former South African Communist Party (SACP) general secretary Chris Hani. Walus, along with Clive Derby-Lewis, a member of the now-defunct Conservative Party, plotted, plotted, and killed Hani outside his Boksburg home in 1993.
Hani’s assassination threatened to send South Africa into a spiral of possible civil war just 10 months before the country’s first democratic elections in 1994.
During a Truth and Reconciliation Commission hearing in 1997, both men described in detail how they dealt with the murder. Both were denied amnesty.
Derby-Lewis died in 2016, while Walus continues to serve a life sentence in jail. In March, he was denied parole for the umpteenth time.
A symbol of the Polish right
Pankowski’s revelation started a seven-year process to document the growing prominence of far-right and racist groups in Poland and their connection to Walus.
“The moment I first saw the banner during the game with Lazio, Legia was fined. But, Uefa [the Union of European Football Associations] He did not know who the person was and implemented a rule that political symbols or images should not be displayed in stadiums. “
Pankowski said the fine was substantial, but that Legia was “lucky.” This is because the Uefa did not interpret the flag as a racist symbol, but as a political flag.
In a recent match on August 28 in Warsaw between Lechia and Raków Częstochowa, a banner with the image of Walus could be seen hanging behind the home team’s goal posts.
Since then, the growing presence of Walus’s image and name, particularly at local soccer matches, has become part of a growing call from the right for his parole release in South Africa and his return to Poland.
Pankowski is not clear about how Walus became a symbol of the Polish right. But he thinks it has less to do with Hani being a communist and more to do with him being a black man.
Yes, his message is based on anti-communist rhetoric, but in a way it is artificial. At the center of the pro-Walus movement is the glorification of racial violence. They are also not just saying that he should be paroled on humanitarian grounds, which is a point we can debate, but they are glorifying what he did, ”Pankowski said.
“The support here for him is so great that there are even banners that say ‘Janusz for President.’ It will never happen. But just seeing that is scary. “
The commodification of Walus’s image
Another worrying development for Pankowski is the increasing commodification of Walus’s name and image. T-shirts, buttons and scarves with your image, name and messages of support are for sale on the Internet.
One of the websites where such paraphernalia is available is the second-hand goods site OLX Poland. Technology investment firm Prosus owns OLX. Prosus is, in turn, owned by South Africa-based tech giant Naspers.
the Mail and tutor You’ve seen Janusz Walus-inspired scarves and clothing on the site. One says: “Anti-communist shooting club. Poland. South Africa. Tribute to Janusz Walus “.
Naspers media relations director Shamiela Letsoalo said the media and technology giant “unequivocally condemns racism, including racist content posted by outside parties for sale on our companies’ trading platforms.”
Letsoalo added that Naspers considers content that incites violence, racism or discrimination to be abhorrent and contrary to the values and beliefs of the organization.
“OLX Poland has 20 million listings generated by active users and attracts and reviews 240,000 new listings every day, an average of 10,000 per hour. Our systems use technology automatically to identify and remove listings that violate OLX policies, ”Letsoalo said.
Added that OLX systems automatically block problem words if they are entered in the product description field. Image recognition programs detect inappropriate images, but not with complete precision. The company said its technology uses “a variety of techniques, including image recognition, and that it” analyzes as many data points as possible, and we are constantly improving its accuracy. “
“There are filters installed at OLX Poland that prevent items using the Janusz Walus name from being listed. The list he marked on Sunday night, September 6, did not contain the name Janusz Walus and, as a result, it was not identified as a violation. Upon further investigation of the links you provided, our team confirmed that they both came from a single list, which has since been removed, ”Letsoalo said.
The example sent to Naspers by the M&G it was a scarf with the name of Walus surrounded by other right wing paraphernalia. Naspers responded on Tuesday, September 8. As of Tuesday night, the “anti-communist shooting club” jersey was still available on the website.
Growing racist sentiment
“It’s not just Walus stuff, but other racist stuff too [on the website]”Said Pankowski.
“It’s hard for me to explain, but why would a company with a complex history like Naspers approve of something like this? He is careless and irresponsible, “he added.
There are also Facebook pages calling for “freedom for Janusz Walus”, calling him a “political prisoner” in South Africa.
The Never Again movement has been fighting the growing right-wing and racist sentiment in Poland since 1996. Its work has intensified in recent years to counteract the growth of anti-immigrant, xenophobic and racist populist political parties that progress slowly, electorally and in membership.
Pankowski said soccer clubs and stadiums appear to be fertile ground for turning Poles, particularly young people, into a right-wing nationalist message.
“The irony is that Polish football teams are very diverse. Players from other countries and continents are here. The teams are quite different from Polish culture in general. If you walk down the street, they all look the same. But our soccer teams are racially diverse. It is disappointing because we see an increase in xenophobia and racism, “said Pankowski.
The controversy surrounding the growing appeal of Walus in Poland may be a long way from South Africa. But it also reflects a country still struggling to find social cohesion 26 years after free and fair elections.
When contacted for comment, the Hani family, through their daughter Lindiwe Hani, said they “would not like to participate.”
‘Scandalous activities’
The SACP said it had been aware of the growing use of Walus’s image in Poland for some time, adding that the Communist Party of Poland keeps it informed of developments.
“The SACP is aware of the scandalous activities of right-wing racist elements in Poland. They have been using Janusz Walus for a while as the meeting symbol on their agenda. It is barbaric to celebrate a murderer and glorify his act of murder, ”said SACP spokesman Alex Mashilo.
When asked if the SACP, as a member of the ANC’s ruling tripartite alliance, would ask for a diplomatic response calling on the Polish ambassador to respond to the growing use of Walus’s image in that country, Mashilo said he continued to raise development “internally. “. .
The party insists that any request from Walus’s legal team to be released on parole be rejected.
“We maintain the firmness that the murderer must remain in prison, with an orange jumpsuit, must not be paroled. We want the full disclosure of the truth and all the circumstances of the murder committed by the murderer who pulled the trigger of the murder weapon, ”Mashilo said.
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