The controversy around the recent singing of freedom songs was a sign people had not "dealt with" the country's history, President Jacob Zuma said on Tuesday.

"The controversy indicated that we have not yet effectively dealt with the issues of history and heritage," he told hundreds of people in the Bethlehem informal settlement in Pretoria west, home to poor Afrikaners.

Zuma was referring to the recent negative reaction by political parties and some South Africans to African National Congress Youth League (ANCYL) leader Julius Malema's singing "kill the boer".

Zuma said that another sign South Africans had not "dealt with history" was Friday's ruling by the High Court in Johannesburg that singing "dubula ibhunu" (shoot the boer) in the song "Ayesaba Amagwala" (the cowards are scared) was unconstitutional and unlawful. Anyone found singing the song could face charges of incitement to murder.

The ANC on Tuesday said that the ruling was "incompetent" and "unimplementable". There was no correlation between the singing of the song and attacks on farmers, the party argued.

According to The Sowetan, Malema said that he would rather go to jail than stop singing liberation songs.

Lawyers for civil rights group AfriForum and farmers' union Tau-SA intended to apply for an urgent interim interdict to stop him singing the song.

Zuma said that the country had done well since 1994, but there was a need to make social cohesion a top priority.

He called for a national discussion on common heritage to reach an understanding and tolerance of culture and history. If this failed there would be an outcry every time a street or town name was changed.

"We must make social cohesion as important as providing access to water, electricity or roads."