South African President Jacob Zuma created an uproar online after saying that owning and taking care of a dog was a part of white culture and un-African. In a speech on Wednesday, he also commented on other racial issues, saying “Even if you apply any kind of lotion and straighten your hair you will never be white”.

Zuma’s spokesperson Mac Maharaj tried to diffuse the controversy by issuing a statement in which he said the president was trying to “decolonise the African mind post-liberation” and encourage black Africans to “love who they are and uphold their own culture”.