A father who claimed that his family, including his children, fell ill after eating “rotten polony” and that one of the children had died as a result, was finally interdicted from posting these allegations on social media, blaming it for what he said happened to his family.
The Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF), which took on the plight of Anthony Hadebe, and called on social media for people to boycott the Thompson’s Tasty Meats brand, was also finally interdicted from badmouthing the manufacturer of the emulsified meat products.
Gen4foods (applicant), the manufacturer of the meat, earlier obtained an interim interdict against Hadebe and the EFF in the Durban High Court, preventing them from spreading these false rumours.
The matter was now back in court for the confirmation of the interim order.
One of the applicant’s brands is the Thompson’s Tasty Meats brand, which was established in 1860. Thompson’s meat products are sold in major supermarkets, including by Shoprite, where Hadebe bought a two-kilogram chicken polony in August last year.
He claimed that his nine children, wife, and brother ate of the polony and became ill and that one of his children died directly as a consequence of eating the polony, which was allegedly rotten and not fit for human consumption.
The EFF took up his cause and both began publishing allegations on popular social media platforms such as Facebook and X (formerly known as Twitter), calling, essentially, for a boycott of Thompson’s products and for justice for both the child who died and for Hadebe.
He attacked the quality of the products manufactured by the applicant and repeatedly stated publicly that the child had passed away as a consequence of eating rotten and contaminated polony manufactured by the applicant.
The applicant regarded those repeated statements as being untrue and defamatory of it and earlier brought an urgent application against the respondents in a bid for them to stop these false allegations, including that Thompsons chicken polony caused the death of the child.
The respondents were ordered to remove any communications, declarations, and statements on social media, including Facebook, Instagram, X, or any other medium or forum, which states that the Applicant’s product caused the death of the child.
After he claimed his family fell ill and the child had died, Hadebe lodged a complaint with the store where he had bought the polony, and representatives of the meat manufacturer gave him a complimentary pack of Thompson’s products.
A few days later, however, he complained that the polony in the complimentary pack was also “rotten.”
Hadebe and the EFF meanwhile continued with their social media campaign in which it, among others, told the public that these products are not safe and that they should not buy them.
The EFF vowed on social media that “Thompson polony and Shoprite will pay for their sins.”
As news of the “tragedy” spread, some of the media also published articles regarding the father’s alleged ordeal.
Hadebe claimed that the polony had expired but, confusingly, also acknowledged at the time that its expiry date was in 2024, which was several months into the future. He said his daughter, aged two, had died and that two of his other children were in and out of hospital. He also told the media that he had lost his job and that the mother of his child had also lost her job because she was forced to spend time at home nursing her children back to health.
Hadebe’s story gained a lot of sympathy with others, and judge Robin Mossop remarked that this is understandable in a way.
“But was it true? It remained simply an unverified story, confusing in its constituent elements. A terrible story undoubtedly, but an unverified story, nonetheless,” Judge Robin Mossop remarked.
There was contradictory information about when the polony was consumed. There was no evidence that the deceased child had eaten the polony. There was no proof that the polony was contaminated. There was no proof that the polony had caused the death of a child. There was no proof that the first respondent’s child had died, he said.
As Hadebe still had some of the damning polony left, tests were done on it and it was found not to be contaminated. It also later appeared that the child who had died was not Hadebe’s child but one with whom he had an association. The death certificate stated that the child had died of natural causes.
Judge Mossop found that the manufacturer of the polony is entitled to a final order to protect its good reputation, as there are no facts to prove that its product had caused this family any harm.
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Pretoria News
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