Business owners who attended a public meeting in Palmerston on Tuesday to call on the government to do more to solve the out-of-control crime problem had the event overshadowed by the Fyles Government accusing an organiser of posting racist comments on social media after her business was broken into last month.

The public meeting, attended by more than 30 people in Palmerston also saw people in Alice Springs and Katherine voice their concerns about surging crime levels across the Northern Territory, however the Labor Government did not attend.

While the CLP supported the event and attended the Darwin meeting to hear from the business owners, the Fyles Government used the opportunity to accuse the CLP of “supporting racist views and racist hatred” and sent comments made on social media last month to select media outlets.

“Enough is enough, racist views and remarks are not welcome or tolerated here in the Territory and the CLP must immediately apologise to all Territorians for supporting such people,” Ms Fyles told the ABC before the meeting took place.

Ms Fyles’ office sent screenshots of the comments to select media, which included suggesting “a cull in Darwin”, “hiding bodies” and a line about how the next “little dark C..t that looks at me sideways like I’m white trash I’m gonna snap it’s neck”.

“Today is clean up my office get rid of the Black fella smell, blood and sterilise everything,” another line read.

“Fence the fckn communities keep them cunts in,” another post said. “Put a collar on them that they get zapped out of their area and zapped real fck good.”

Organiser of the public meeting Donna Roos did not explain the comments, saying “this is a crime meeting not a racism meeting” when asked about the posts.

Opposition Leader Lia FInocchiaro said the comments “don’t align with our (CLP’s) values, but ultimately today is a meeting of business people who want to raise their concerns to government around crime, anti-social behaviour, law and order and the fact that victims are being left behind”.

“There is absolutely no room for racism in our community,” she added.

The CLP had been calling on Fyles Government Ministers to attend the meeting to hear from the public about their concerns around the ongoing crime problem.

But Ms Fyles did not attend and instead asserted that the CLP was supporting “racist views and racial hatred” by attending.