Gentlemen,
There is no denying what I said. And there is no reason for feeling "sorry'' for me. Why indeed? I have paid my dues through suspension and (also) humiliation in that I was (and until October) cant appear on Tellytrack and cant use my name on my stories and my regular columns (ie Legends Of The Turf in Racing Express). I have lost exposure and income but there was a plus side in that I had time to work on my new site which is now launched and doing extremely well! As said in a previous posting, I have no time to dwell, I push forward.
I am a spur of the moment person, I said what I said but my apology to Hanif Manjoo is sincere and I have moved forward. Racism and racist attacks are not things I pride myself on or occupy myself with. The apology was drafted by my laywers in response to a multi-bulleted initial document with legal jargon presented by Advocate Scala representing Mr Majoo and there is nothing sinister in an answer through my lawyers presented in similarly procedural language.
My original outburst was a result of my belief that Mr Richard Maponya sketched several innacuracies in his interview with Dave and Chris Sturdy and was then held to be a rejected icon of racing. That, to my mind, was an unwarranted attack on the golden era of racing which was professionally and respectfully managed. A debate ensued and unfortunately bubbled over into a verbal and (in hindsight), unwarranted attack. on Mr Manjoo, for which I have as you have seen apologised unconditionally.
All of us, all South Africans, have said things we are sorry for, there is no doubt. He/she, in this cauldron of pent-up emotions called South Africa, who claims in the course of heated conversations not to have made a racist remark against a black, coloured, Indian, white, Chinese - or laughed at what might be deemed to be a racist joke - is a liar. So you might as well stop calling me a racist, the full support of all my advertisers on freeracer and those who know me will tell you I am not.
As for remarks about ABC.. there was undoubtedly a joint attempt from prominent members of ABC, to bring me down and those comments made, at the time, were in my opinion fair.
Since then, Dave Scott, the proprietor of his site, in an acknowledgement that ABC took things too far, took back the control of his site and two members/maybe three, left the site. Dave also propogated my reinstatement at Phumelela, hence my reappearance here.
I also stated on my site that I would support Dave in his quest to rebuild ABC, and have now started posting again here with an open mind. I have no agendas, like you I sometimes wish to comment on things that interest me. I do not want to get involved in personal attacks again, in the end it really benefits nobody.
As for comments on the freeracer syndicate, there is enough info on my site to disprove any suggestion of profiteering, and I wouldn't call 3 cheques from 6 runs "poor'' performance. Unsatisfatory yes, and again, I have made very pinpointed and serious attempts to rectify the results by negotiating a package which involves five new horses, at no extra cost to the syndicate.
Lastly, and I might as well talk about this while I am at it - there is a clash of personalities and perhaps a few fundamantal issues between myself and messers Jess Kyriacou and Brett Maselle.
Those things have prompted both sides to hurl at times vindictive nastiness at each other. I distance myself, however, from physical attacks against the mentioned people. I was interviewed recently by Mr Mike Bolhuis, a forensic investigator representing the pair, in which I put on record that I had nothing to do with the attack on Mr Masellle. In principle, I really have nothing against the two gentleman except a disagreement on certain of racing's issues. That in all fairness does not call for a continuation of personal attacks or even sarcasm.
As my friends Messers Castmug, Mr Hawaii and Oscar have been pointing out to me endlessly over the last few weeks, continued bitterness will get nobody nowhere. I have listened and I will make an attempt to state my viewpoints without hurling insults.
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