The Palestine Solidarity Campaign and Mothers4Gaza picketed at the Kirstenbosch National Botanical Gardens earlier this week calling for the withdrawal of The Kiffness from the 2025/26 Summer Concert. Wearing keffiyahs and waving Palestinians flags, about 100 protesters stood outside of the South African National Biodiversity Institute (Sanbi) offices demanding to speak to a representative.
The protesters say that The Kiffness, real name David Scott, continues to make racist and bigoted statements on social media targeting those who are in solidarity with the people of Palestine. Usuf Chikte from the PSC said that allowing the artist to perform in Kirstenbosch would be normalising racism, supremacy, Islamophobia and the attacks that have been directed to South Africa.
“A racist and islamaphobe in terms of the comments he has been making, he belongs to a growing movement in South Africa, the MAGA movement, Make Apartheid Great Again. He has made horrible comments about the reintroduction of separation, about hatred amongst the people of South Africa, causing dissension. And they have invited him for the Summer Concert. We are telling SANBI, please, don’t allow such a person to perform at Kirstenbosch because you normalise racism, supremacy, islamophobia and the attacks that have been directed to South Africa,” he said.
The Kiffness mocked the revocation of Naledi Pandor’s US visa application, calling the former minister of international relations, who was instrumental in taking Israel to the International Court of Justice, a jihadist.
“I am appalled that a racist who spews such hatred is allowed to get a platform in our beautiful country and we are protesting because we do not stand for any form of racism on the continent,” said Suzanne Hotz from PSC.
Paul Calladine from London and one of the leaders of Palestine solidarity campaign who happened to be touring the Kirstenbosch garden at the time of the picket, said that the campaign in London is intensifying.
“There is no ceasefire, we all know that. There is an ongoing terrorism campaign on the West Bank … It is not a war. Israel and our media describes it as Israeli war; it’s not a war if it’s taking place in a concentration camp. It was never a war,” he said.
No response from SANBI and The Kiffness
SANBI acknowledged receipt of our email but has not responded. The PSC said that Sanbi has asked for more time to respond to the letter from the PSC.
The Kiffness has also not responded to an email from Elitsha, but the artist has since attacked those who ‘have been trying to get his Kirstenbosch show cancelled’. He says that they have not been successful and that they want his show cancelled because they do not think like him.
“We are not going to allow ourselves to be reduced to second class citizens. We are not going to allow ourselves to be subservient to the growing racism that is infiltrating our public space and that is why we are here. We are opposing his presence at the Summer Concert and we are asking Sanbi to remove him from the programme,” said Chikte. If they refuse to, he added, the protest will continue.
