| (a) | without lawful reason and with intent to compel or induce any person or persons of a particular nature, class or kind or persons in general to do or to abstain from doing any act or to assume or to abandon a particular standpoint— |
| (i) | assaults, injures or causes damage to any person; or |
| (ii) | in any manner threatens to kill, assault, injure or cause damage to any person or persons of a particular nature, class or kind; or |
| (b) | acts or conducts himself in such a manner or utters or publishes such words that it has or they have the effect, or that it might reasonably be expected that the natural and probable consequences thereof would be, that a person perceiving the act, conduct, utterance or publication— |
| (i) | fears for his own safety or the safety of his property or the security of his livelihood, or for the safety of any other person or the safety of the property of any other person or the security of the livelihood of any other person; and |
| (ii) | [Subsection (1)(b)(ii) deleted by section 6 of Act No. 126 of 1992] |
shall be guilty of an offence and liable on conviction to a fine not exceeding R40 000 or to imprisonment for a period not exceeding ten years or to both such fine and such imprisonment.
[Subsection (1) substituted by section 32 of Act No. 138 of 1991]
| (2) | In any prosecution for an offence under subsection (1), the onus of proving the existence of a lawful reason as contemplated in that subsection shall be upon the accused, unless a statement clearly indicating the existence of such a lawful reason has been made by or on behalf of the accused before the close of the case for the prosecution. |
