h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Eugene TerreBlanche was the leader of the AWB of Afrikaner Weerstandsbeweging (Afrikaner Resistance Movement) since its inception in 1973. He was murdered on his farm, in his sleep, this weekend. He was beaten and hacked to death with pipes and machetes.

What can I say about this man? There's a lot being said about him in the media, not all of which is true.

The AWB was always the most rightwing of the Afrikaner groupings (perhaps with the exception of some small, secret and totally underground subversive groups). Back when my involvement in politics started, I viewed the AWB as *too* rightwing, even though I was right of centre myself. The AWB was openly racist. TerreBlance frequently used negative racial epithets and racist talk. I never approved of that since I never in my life believed that one race was inherently better or more deserving than another, never mind that I never fully believed that people could actually be rigidly classified into races, anyways. My own interpretation of right-wing politics was simply that I thought my people, the Afrikaners, would be doomed in a fully-democratised country, unless we had some kind of protection. In my youth I entertained the idea of a small Afrikaner homeland, leaving the majority of the country for the other groups, peoples, races, cultures. (I no longer think that - I now think we must make our future in this country together - but I still care for my own people - as for others.)

But anyways, Eugene TerreBlanche was a demagogue. He appealed to people's beliefs of racial superiority; he milked their fears of other peoples, and historical processes. He spoke as if there was a condition of open war between the Afrikaners and everybody else, not even to mention the 'Afrikaner traitors to their own people', those who had any sort of liberal sentiment whatsoever. TerreBlanche was loud, arrogant and confrontational. As has been said, he was fond of various kinds of gestures and dramatised speech. He liked controversial symbols. He often appeared in public dressed in Khaki like the Boer soldiers during the war with the British, and riding on horseback (which once backfired when he embarrassingly fell off his horse in public). He popularised the use of the Vierkleur (old Transvaal flag, symbol of Afrikaner resistance against the British) at AWB rallies. The AWB flag itself is highly reminiscent of the swastika flag used by the Nazis. This, in spite of prominent denials that alleged a different kind of symbology. (I had it from one of the designers of the flag himself, that indeed the goal was from the outset to have it resemble the swastika - all denials, were indeed outright lies.) TerreBlanche himself seems to have molded his public image and his style of speaking after Adolf Hitler. Not going as far as cultivating a Hitler-like mustache, he was always very recognisable with his Boer-style beard and mustache. The AWB was very militaristic, and had at its call a number of Afrikaner 'warriors' willing to go to war, to defend people seen as threatened, and in some cases, to engage in illegal acts of violence and subterfuge. The goal of the AWB was to either retain white superiority in South Africa, or to restore the old Boer Republics: the Transvaal - officially called the Zuid Afrikaanse Republiek or ZAR - and the Orange Free State, leaving the Cape and Natal for the other peoples and groups.

Now Eugene TerreBlanche mainly achieved the following: polarising whites and Afrikaners even more than maintaining disharmony between whites and non-whites. Many if not most Afrikaners couldn't stand him. That certainly includes many conservative or right-wing Afrikaners. Speaking for myself and others who felt like me - TerreBlanche was giving us a bad name. He was giving right-wingers a bad name. He was giving Afrikaners a bad name. He said he was speaking for us, but he wasn't speaking for us. 'We' wouldn't speak and carry on like that. Every word and act of his and the AWB’s strengthened the stereotype of Afrikaners as being stupid, bearded bigots.

But then there *were* many Afrikaners who found themselves in sympathy with what TerreBlanche said. Many friends I knew who attended the AWB rallies, said that TerreBlanche speechified with great conviction and with great persuasive powers too. The fears he spoke of, were real. Many of us did believe there was a kind of war or threat against us, against the Afrikaner people, against the whites in general, and against Christians - and most Afrikaners were Christians and still are. Even the official position of the Government for a long time, was that there was a 'total onslaught'. This was usually portrayed in the light of the cold war: a communist attempt to take over the world, and focused on Africa, trying to destroy regimes sympathetic to America and western Europe. In the light of all this, many of us felt that we should stand together.

The situation with the AWB was therefore uncomfortable in many ways. On one level, they were seen as a bunch of clowns. On another, they were seen as people who were willing to stand up for Afrikaner rights and interests even if doing so made them unpopular. And unpopular, they certainly did make themselves. But I can attest that there were many Afrikaners who would condemn TerreBlanche and the AWB even while at the same time having some admiration for them.

The AWB however was its own worst enemy where public relations were concerned. Now I want to say this: I do believe there was strong ‘official’ pressure on the media, from the government and from other powers too, to do all in their power to present the AWB as ridiculous, to focus on anything they could get that would embarrass TerreBlanche and the AWB. But certainly, they did not need to search long and hard to find such embarrassments. I sometimes wonder if this was not all done as a deliberately planned campaign – whether TerreBlanche wasn’t actually in on a conspiracy to found an Afrikaner organization and then do so many embarrassing things that right-wing Afrikaner politics would be completely discredited. I mean, if that was TerreBlanche’s true secret agenda, he couldn’t have done much better than he did, in actual fact.

There were confrontations between armed AWB members and the SA police, such as the so-called ‘Battle of Ventersdorp’. There was the storming of the Kempton Park World Trade Centre – where multi-party negotiations were taking place. AWB members swarmed into the centre after having an armoured car drive right into it, through the glass windows. These acts of military confrontation had no effect whatsoever apart from getting people injured, killed or imprisoned.

There was Eugene TerreBlanche’s alleged affair with journalist Jani Allan. There was the incident when he fell of his horse.

And then there was the ‘invasion’ of Bophutatswana.

Here I want to correct impressions conveyed by the mass media. The AWB never tried to invade or take over Bophutatswana! That is too ridiculous even for them. The truth of the matter may be too nuanced for the mainstream newspaper readers but it comes down to the following.

You need to know first of all that Bophutatswana was one of the intended ‘Black Homelands’ under the grand scheme of official Apartheid: set aside for non-white people and intended to become independent republics, or ‘Bantustans’. The leaders of these homelands were in a way puppets of the SA government. The president of Bophutatswana at that time was Lucas Mangope, an authoritarian leader. The ‘country’ itself was a patchwork collection of disconnected bits of land in the west of the then Transvaal province. Like all other ‘homelands’ it couldn’t in any sense be said to have been independent of South Africa, or to have any potential for full independence, or to even be able to house all the ‘people’ it was supposed to be a homeland for.

When negotiations for a new, democratic South Africa started, the idea of independent homelands was abandoned. It was understood that all these ‘states’ would now come to be incorporated into South Africa proper. No more Bantustans. Generally the ‘leaders’ of those homelands were in accord with this – but Lucas Mangope wasn’t. He wanted Bophutatswana to remain – or to become – independent, and himself to remain as its leader. In this, he was out of sympathy with the majority of his people, who engaged in mass protests against him. An internal coup in his country threatened: against him were those people who would rather be included in South Africa, and they called for assistance from the forces of South Africa … or more properly, the ANC.

In turn Mangope called for assistance as well. Now this is the funny part … he called for assistance from conservative and right-wing white groups. Constand Viljoen, an ex-Army General who now led the moderate-right Afrikaner Volksfront or AVF, pledged to support Mangope, using militiamen under his command.

The AWB wanted in, too. But they were too reactionary even for Mangope. Neither he nor his people – those who supported him and those who didn’t – would want these racist Boers in his country, and with weapons, too. Viljoen assured Mangope that the AWB would be kept out of the thing.

But the situation in Bophutatswana deteriorated to the point that Mangope himself fled the country. There were reports of ANC troops on the borders. There was anarchy in the country. The AVF went in … and the AWB went in, too.

Now imagine a bunch of armed white right-wingers with a reputation for being racists, going into this temporarily lawless country. In the words of one AWB member, they considered themselves as going on a ‘k*fferskietpiekniek’ (a ‘n****r-shooting picnic). It is very probable that a large number of those troops had no idea what they were supposed to be doing anyways or who they were fighting for, or against. Reports indicate that the AWB ‘soldiers’ had no discipline and shot or tossed grenades at anyone in sight. Needless to say … the people of Bophutatswana … neither those sympathetic to Mangope, nor those rioting against him … did NOT welcome this ‘assistance’.

In short, all hell was loose. A large number of innocent civilians were killed or injured. Bophutatswana security forces eventually stopped the AWB. A high profile incident was where three AWB’s were shot dead point blank after having been arrested and disarmed – they were lying on the ground. This was therefore a summary execution of unarmed POW’s. The incident was filmed and shown on TV. I saw it, and it was pretty shocking. The policeman who did it, claimed to have been outraged by the AWB’s firing on innocent people, and received amnesty for his act.

This fiasco was perhaps the AWB’s biggest embarrassment.

Almost needless to say, it was all in vain: Bophutatswana did become part of South Africa. It doesn’t exist any more.

After this ‘defeat’ the AWB became toned down. No longer were they threatening civil war in the case of the leadership of the country being transferred to Nelson Mandela and the ANC. That indeed did happen, in spite of anything the AWB said or did.

Importantly, as well: the country did NOT fall into ruin as soon as black majority government happened. There was NOT any outright genocide against the whites. The transition was mostly peaceful and effective. This in and of itself discredited what TerreBlanche and the AWB said. Since the start of democratic South Africa, support of the AWB has dwindled and become almost completely negligible.

TerreBlanche did ask amnesty – at the Truth and Reconciliation hearings – from acts of violence and homicide for himself as well as for other AWB members. TerreBlanche was responsible, directly or indirectly, for the deaths of more than a hundred people, but claimed it was all politically motivated. Amnesty was granted.

He was not so lucky with other crimes, however. In 2001 he was sentenced to six years in prison for assault of a petrol-station attendant, and attempted murder of a security guard. He was released after three years and claimed to have ‘mellowed’ his racist views – somewhat.

After his release he sort of re-started the AWB but they’ve not really been in the limelight. There was still sympathy for this ‘cause’ in the light of things not going *very* well in the new South Africa. There are matters like crime and poverty among the Afrikaners, the language of Afrikaans being pushed out of the public sphere, and official discrimination against white job applicants. So, many Afrikaners still feel threatened by the government and by non-whites.

As I’ve repeatedly written in my journals here, there is indeed a spree of violent crime that is specifically directed against whites. This takes the form especially of attacks and murders of white people living on farms. Perhaps over 3 000 white farmers have been killed in this manner over the past 15-20 years. There have also been many brutal attacks on whites in towns. What makes me – and many others – believe that many or most of these crimes are politically motivated, is the brutality as well as the overt racist comments made, as reported by survivors of the attacks. They’re motivated by hatred against whites, and in a sense of taking revenge against us for wrongs committed during the apartheid years. So, any specific family of white people can be seen as representative of all, and carrying the guilt of the collective white crimes against the collective black population.

It is true that the whole population, white and black, is currently suffering under an exorbitantly high crime rate. Many black people are murdered as well – more than white people that are murdered. But this is part of general unfocused crime, while the ‘farm murders’ seem deliberately aimed against whites. At the very least there is no similar kind of phenomenon of murders against blacks. The country is ultra-sensitive to that right now. Even if a white person accidentally kills a non-white person, there are instant protests and exclamations of outrage.

But killings of whites continue, while not being given attention by the government, while not being acknowledged as being racist in intent. On the contrary. ANC politicians are singing songs – to crowds, and along with crowds – songs with lyrics like ‘Kill the Boer, kill the Farmer’, and ‘Kill the Boers, they are rapists’. Note that ‘Boer’ is the name often used to refer to Afrikaners, as in ‘Boer Wars’.

So anyways, against the background of violence against whites, the AWB has again been gaining support. Again whites, and Afrikaners especially, are feeling threatened by this ‘Kill the Boer’ phenomenon.

And now TerreBlanche has been the victim of this very phenomenon.

And Afrikaners and whites everywhere are saying, now: see, he was right. Even the papers today carried the headline: “It was the song’s fault’.

Could this be like a spark in a powder keg?

AWB supporters have already pledged to take revenge for TerreBlanche’s death!

And the guy who’s been the biggest singer of those ‘Kill the Boer’ songs – Julius Malema, the president of the ANC Youth League, is still completely unapologetic!

Our president, Jacob Zuma, has expressed condolences to TerreBlanche’s family, and asked that South Africans should not let this issue divide us.


This is coming a bit late. Grave polarization has already happened. He didn’t do anything to stop Malema and his ‘kill the boers’ antics – though people have been complaining loud and clear for a long time now; he hasn’t given the farm attack issue any attention; in general he hasn’t done anything against discrimination against whites or the weakening of Afrikaans in schools, universities and courts; in short he’s done nothing concrete to allay the fears of the Afrikaners or to make us feel welcome in this country. That’s just the thing: we are feeling unwelcome and unwanted, we are feeling we are being pushed away, or wished away, we are exposed to hatred and violence – and most of us *want* to be a valuable part of this country, we want to contribute, we are sorry for what happened under Apartheid, and we would like to make amends in a positive manner; but we don’t like being killed, being insulted, being treated like cr*p, we don’t want us and our children and their children and all their descendents to be punished in all perpetuity for the sins of our forefathers. We don’t want to be kicked or otherwise forced out of the country. This country, this continent, is home to us. We want to be able to belong here. We really want it to work. We want peace with the other peoples here. I mean, really. I want a future for the Afrikaners, for our language Afrikaans, in this country, in peace and harmony with the other people here. I want South Africa to succeed as an experiment, to show people in other countries that it can be done, that different races, cultures, languages, peoples, can peacefully exist together and not oppress or commit injustices against each other.

But what chance of it, now? TerreBlanche has been killed in such a brutal way, and suddenly people who never had sympathy for him in life, now have sympathy with him. In his death he’s made his point stronger than he could make it in his life. For all he did wrong, he was a human being. Did he deserve to die like this?

But ... in a way, though I don't think he deserved it, he certainly had some responsibility for what happened to him. He was an old and rather broken man when he suffered this, much 'toned down' and no longer a hothead, but back in his youth, he certainly preached enough violence against *others*.

But what if certain AWB’s now take it upon themselves to avenge him? And kill a bunch of completely innocent black people? And if black people in turn retaliate against more white people? Black people may not understand that TerreBlanche was indeed only ever the leader of a small, small minority of white people. It's very easy to see him and his followers as representing all whites. Just as easy as it is to see Julius Malema as representing all blacks. In a way it's quite funny. Malema today is the same kind of demagogue that TerreBlanche was in his day. They are more similar than they are different.

Still, between the followers of Malema and the followers of TerreBlanche, things could escalate, and very easily, into civil war and genocide!

Please pray for us, pray that this doesn’t happen!

It was a very fascinating article about the death and the party of TerreBlanche.

I hope ti will be back soon, as I only made it half through the post. Absolutely fascinating, Willem.

Thanks, Bel. I hope so, too.

Just putting back the subject line as I remember it.

Willem, I hope this won't be the start of civil war and genocide. I would pray if I believed in god, but I don't. My thoughts are with you, and your country, though.

Oh, and here's a BBC link:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/3797797.stm

Now somebody dare to yikes that!

This is a terrible occurrence - because murder is a terrible thing.

I'll pray for them all, Bel.

Wouldn't it be a wonderful world if people like Mr Terreblanche simply caused us to shake our heads? And then talk calmly about what the problems are and how to solve them so everybody gets a fair shake?

Suppose they held a war and nobody came?

I'd laugh at people posturing and falling off horses - except that I've seen stuff like that erupt into serious trouble before. I sympathised with the late American satirist Lewis Grizzard, who referred to the KKK as 'half a dozen idiots in bedsheets', but I also know that disagreements can polarise.

I'm not there, I don't know what it feels like, but I care. So I'm praying.

Hi folks! Thanks for your comments, all. I'm sorry this was hidden. I think the reason might be a racist quote towards the end of the article. I asterisked-out some letters of a racist term but perhaps this is still not enough for the moderators ... but the quote gives a good clue to the mind-set of the AWB 'warriors' who went into Bophutatswana.

I really hope they can re-instate it ... I have a copy on the computer but it's not exactly the same as the one I posted here. I spent a lot of time researching and writing that, and I also did what I could to keep contentious political views out of it. But it's information - perspective around these events that are getting reported in newspapers worldwide now.

Hmmm ... to be fair, there are contentious political views in it ... TerreBlanche's and at least an allusion to Julius Malema's ... but I'm reporting, not endorsing. The BBC article (and others) does the same.

I hope it is reinstated as I wanted to read it and didn't have time. Anyone who know you would know that you are not racist and would write a balanced article. The genuine views of people who live in the country, rather than those that report on it, should be valued and treated with respect.



Websailor

Hello again folks! I'm going to try and re-post it, excluding bits that might come across as offensive or contentious or whatever.

Oh, Bel, if you don't pray, that's perfectly fine and I appreciate it that you're thinking of us!

I was rather upset yesterday when I wrote it because after all this is my country. I am feeling a bit better today. I am VERY happy that the AWB leadership has today retracted its statement about 'taking revenge' for TerreBlanche's death. Revenge or any kind of talk of revenge at this stage is just the last thing we need.

I mean just what would this 'revenge' entail? Killing some people who had nothing to do with TerreBlanche's death? Or lynching the perpetrators? (They gave themselves up to the police and have been formally charged with murder today. There was an AWB crowd in front of the court but as far as I have heard, this was a peaceful protest.) Or trying to assassinate Julius Malema? Heavens preserve us from that! Malema's following is FAR greater than TerreBlanche's ever was, and they're just as hotheaded if not more so.

Anyways, the two murder suspects claim that they murdered TerreBlanche due to a dispute about wages he owed them. I dunno, this is not a very constructive way to settle such a dispute ... generally, killing one's employer is not a good way of ensuring one's employment. But whatever, we live in a country where not much makes sense. I - and others - suspect there was a political motive.

Once again I reiterate that TerreBlanche was not a pleasant person at all. He probably didn't treat his employees with the respect he should. He probably was 'asking' for this kind of thing. But still, he was a human being, and nobody 'deserves' to be brutally bludgeoned and hacked to death.

TerreBlanche himself also did inexcusable things ... a great many of them in fact. It started for instance when he and a few 'pals' tarred and feathered a University professor for saying things about the 'Geloftedag' (I don't know how to translate that into English, but a 'Gelofte' is a vow to God: at the battle of Bloedrivier the Boers vowed to God they will keep that day sacred, if he granted them victory ... they did win, so the day was from then on celebrated as a holy day. This professor said that 'Geloftedag' shouldn't be enforced by law, but should rather be a 'secular' observance. TerreBlanche disagreed and for that he and his pals threw hot tar and feathers over the professor.) Apart from his speeches and acts of violence by his supporters, he also praised things like the murder of Chris Hani. He went to jail later on, for having assaulted a worker, beating him so badly that he suffered brain damage. For this he was sentenced to six years, of which he served three.

We really need in this country to start working on constructive ways to improve the relations between the various groups and peoples!

The same thing that happened to TerreBlanche happened to a great many other white people as well ... but *he* has the following of extremist hotheads, who might do *anything* now, in reaction. And like I said in my posting, now with his death, even people who had no sympathy with his political views at all, are feeling some sympathy for him due to what happened to him. That's why I put the phrase 'de mortuis nil nisi bonum' in my posting ... when someone dies, one is reluctant to be critical of him or her; instead, one feels sympathy. While TerreBlanche divided the Afrikaners in his life, by dying, he has made 'amends' of sorts and have managed to unify (well, most of ...) them again. The letters and articles in the papers today confirm that: while many of them come from people who couldn't stand TerreBlanche and his ilk, all of them express sympathy for his death, to his family, and deplore the conditions in the country that lead to his murder.

I think we will avoid civil war and outright genocide. But still in the wake of this, we might experience an increase of attacks against white and against black people, by *individuals* motivated by feelings of bitterness and revenge. And the atmosphere is getting very unpleasant. Now more than ever we need, again, a national campaign of peace and reconciliation to bring our people back together again.

Sigh ... what did I say wrong *there*???

Phew ... I see it's been reinstated. Still I'd like to know what was considered 'flag-worthy'.