This was the ruling of the Gauteng North High Court after court action by trade union Solidarity. The ruling follows an incident in which Van den Berg was accused of racism by a technical controller at a Super Rugby game on 7 May 2016. Van den Berg asked this specific controller to do his work correctly since the controller was late for his calling time and he also ignored the rules of the stadium.
Anton van der Bijl, head of Labour Law Services at Solidarity, says the trade union turned to the North Gauteng High Court in Pretoria to sue the national broadcaster on behalf of its member for loss of income. “There was about another year left on Mr Van den Berg’s contract and as such he has suffered a huge loss of income,” Van der Bijl said.
“This case is yet another example of where accusations of racism are being flung about while there was absolutely nothing of the kind. The fact that a respected broadcaster of integrity lost his job simply because a colleague levelled false accusations at him, is outrageous.
We are pleased that the court has once again found that racism should not be sought where it does not exist,” Van der Bijl said.