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AfriForum’s Private Prosecution Unit has questioned the state’s apparent failure to properly investigate the very serious allegation that University of Cape Town (UCT) Professor Pierre de Vos distributed child pornography on social media. The unit believes this may be a case of selective prosecution and urges the South African Police Service (SAPS)and the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) to act without fear, favour or prejudice. 

“The NPA were so blinded by the status of the suspect that it may have overlooked the purpose behind offences of this serious nature,” says Adv. Gerrie Nel, head of the unit, in a letter to the NPA. “The focus remains the protection of children but includes the protection of society against the distribution of sexually explicit deeds against children.

“Our client remains steadfast that her complaint is sound in law and if proficiently dealt with will objectively sustain the alleged charges she has raised in her affidavit including that De Vos may have possessed and distributed child pornography.”

On 10 September 2022, a post on De Vos’ X account included a video of what was described in the post as a “Chinese virgin young boy” being sexually abused by an adult male. Soon thereafter, the post was removed from the timeline. On 18 September De Vos posted that his X account was hacked and tweeted porn, adding that it was obvious that nothing will come of any criminal complaint filed against him. 

On 21 September 2022, the complainant, who was a representative of AfriForum Jeug at the time, reported allegations of contraventions of the Films and Publications Act to the Humewood police station. On 28 September, De Vos opened his own criminal case where he alleged his social media account had been hacked. 

Through a Promotion of Access to Information Act (PAIA) application, the Private Prosecution Unit has obtained the docket in the case filed by the AfriForum Jeug representative. It contained only two statements: one drafted by the complainant to register the case, and another unsigned electronic statement by De Vos. 

“It is apparent that the SAPS and the NPA accepted De Vos’s unsigned electronic affidavit as sufficient to not only register a case docket on his complaint but to serve as a version in the case wherein he was identified as a suspect,” says Nel. “It remains inexplicable that the SAPS and NPA would accept a complaint statement from one docket as sufficient to serve as a ‘warning statement’ in another. This creates the ineluctable inference that De Vos received special treatment.”

AfriForum’s Private Prosecution Unit referred the NPA to one of its own statements wherein a prosecutor is quoted as saying “the abuse of the internet to exploit the most vulnerable of society cannot be understated.” The NPA should appreciate that this applies to all cases involving the sexual exploitation of children, including those allegedly involving prominent academics.

Issued by AfriForum