A man has been arrested after a construction worker in Nova Scotia’s Pictou County alleged harassment by a colleague escalated last month from racist name calling to being purposely shot in the back with a nail gun.
Nhlanhla Dlamini, 21, said he was working at the site of a new home in Abercrombie when his co-worker pulled back the safety on the air-powered tool, aimed it at him, and waited for him to turn and run before firing.
RCMP said Wednesday that a 43-year-old man was arrested Sept. 27 and is facing a charge of criminal negligence causing bodily harm. They have not released the man’s name.
Read “Pictou County” and thought “oh wow my home town?” And then read the name. STACEY’S SON???
I met his mother through a social assistance program that took place at a youth shelter she ran called Roots. She married a man from South Africa whom she started seeing during the apartheid. They dealt with that and now this? They adopted children, and this son moved from South Africa five years ago. He didn’t even realize that his co-workers were calling him a racial slur. They took advantage of his inexperience to mock him. They are the kindest, most selfless people you could know and they definitely don’t deserve this.
Pictou County is an insidious kind of racist. I can imagine people back home saying things like “he’s pulling the race card” and “he doesn’t have proof that it was racist.” I read a comment from someone experienced with nail guns that said it is not easy to pull back the safety accidentally. An accidental firing would look very different. There’s no doubt this was intentional. The construction company dismissed Dlamini’s claims of racism in the workplace, refused to acknowledge that he was seriously injured, claimed he only needed a Band-Aid (he actually required emergency surgery), and is backing up the racist assailant. I hope his company goes bankrupt.
The-Lounge 