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

Try again.

'De mortuis nil nisi bonum' - of the dead, speak nothing but what is good.

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 a club and a machete.

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. (As I've matured I've come to accept that for better or for worse, we have these different people and races and cultures all in one country, and we simply will have to make the best of it and learn how to get along with each other. So for the record: I understand the fears and concerns that underly rightwing views, but I disapprove of the kind of reaction *against* other people, other groups, that is typical of righwing politics like that of TerreBlanche.)

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 incient 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 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 was established. 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 appears to be 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 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.

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.

Just for perspective. The world knows about the wrongs of the regime of Robert Mugabe in Zimbabwe, and the newspapers report internationally how white owners and black workers on farms are terrorised. In Zimbabwe about 12 white farmers have been killed; in South Africa the number like I said above, is close to 3 000. Is this not a phenomenon to be concerned about?

But these killings 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?

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. It's out there. Most black people in the country realise their hopes and dreams of a better life appear to be doomed - poverty and unemployment is worse than ever. White poverty is increasing as well, and *lots* of whites have skipped the country - many of the better-off ones, that is, since the poorer ones can't afford emigration. The ones that remain, are experiencing themselves as being targets for crime and discrimination. 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 in Apartheid, and we would like to make amends in a positive manner; but we don’t like being killed, being insulted, 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, 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?

Him having been such an extremist in his life, though ... his death will spark even more extremism in his extremist followers, and this may then spark counter-reactions from other extremists like Julius Malema and his followers.

But maybe, we can avoid that path. Maybe this incident will force us to look at ourselves once again, at what we are doing to each other, and to take a different road.

Thank you for reposting this. I don't know what is going on with the other journal entry, or the stray post over there that has been removed, but the answer to disturbing speech is more speech, not less.

When I wasn't able to read your post yesterday, I read the BBC article Bel posted as well as the W*k* entry, just to get an idea of who this man was.

Frankly, he sounds like the sort of posturing idiot troubled times sometimes throw up. Have you ever heard of Lester Maddox?

http://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/nge/Article.jsp?id=h-1387

Maddox was typical of a kind of reactionary - and often quite silly - Southern politician. But his day had passed, and he calmed down, and nobody got killed.

People attaching political slogans to theft and murder is terrifying. This is no way to move forward. That was why there was a Truth and Reconciliation Commission - to give everyone a chance to move on.

My heart goes out to you all - so much work to do, and so many obstacles. I wish there were something we could do other than to express moral support.

Thanks for the comment Dmitri ... now I would just like to know, the posting as it appears above, as I've written it: is there anything 'out of line' there? I took out a few small things ... they haven't hidden it yet ...

This stuff is important to me, I want people to know what's going on here, without whitewashing stuff. I know we're a rather rough and crude bunch down here, so I may be saying something that is offensive to someone over there in Britain or America without even realising it. But it's something I worry over, having to phrase everything so delicately as to not offend anyone, while trying to tell people about what is going on here, the very nature of what is going on here, being offensive.

The very nature of interhuman violence is offensive.

But you are not being offensive.

I want to know - because I'm not there, and I should know. How can I find out if you don't tell me? You're an intelligent observer, and you're there, so you can tell me.

I don't worry about people thinking we're crude down here. There are a lot of crude people everywhere. Most of us just do the best we can. From what I've seen, there are also admirable people everywhere. "Find the good and praise it", wasn't that what Alex Haley said?

I started looking up Gordon Brown yesterday. Ironically, I'm not sure why our friends in the UK are so mad at him. It would be nice if somebody could explain.

On one of my journal threads, somebody misunderstood and thought I was criticising Mr Obama. I wouldn't do that - I think he's doing a good job at a hard task, but hey, if I disagreed with him, I could do it in a reasonable way. I don't pitch teabags.

Let's keep talking. (Sometimes yikesing is just an anonymous form of vandalism.)

And now I have to go back and explain to innocent schoolchildren why some *d**t in the 19th Century thought he could justify slavery.

I also find it hard to understand why people in other countries get so angry at their politicians, when what those politicians do or say, is such baby stuff compared to what they're doing and saying over here. If you find out what the matter was with Gordon Brown, please let me know!

OK find the good and praise it! In the current fiasco around TerreBlanche's death:

- Praise to Jacob Zuma for at least having condemned the murder and for asking all to remain calm.

- Praise to the AWB guy who withdrew the threat of revenge.

- Praise to all people in this country who are still decent towards each other.

Amen. Sometimes saying the obvious is a good thing. And saying, 'Let's calm down' might not be original, but it's good and sane.

I think the main thing would be to make sure that people view what happened as a crime, and not a political act.

Once you start dignifying murder with political labels, that's when you get trouble.

Hi there again Dmitri! They re-instated the previous journal entry so after all it wasn't so offensive. Anyways, here's someone else's opinion about TerreBlanche ... also comparing him with Malema:

http://allafrica.com/stories/201004060396.html

Geagte Willem.

thank you for all your writings that you have been busy with. You have given an estremely well balanced and objecive angle to so many of the people you write about. I have absooutely no idea why you were moderated, and I am plesed that it was reinstated because it certainly gave me an insight into people whom I have read about about and about whom I had absooutely no idea except what I read in the prress.

I believe that when I lived in SA we knew about Terreblanche and were always rather "nervous" of him regarding him as an extremeist. I reckon he may quite conceivably done the Afirkaner quite grievous harm in the way that he demonstrated everything that the other peoples in SA were nevous of.

Anyway, you write so lucidly and objectively about it all my dear friend, that I really think you should consider either writing a book, or writing regular ariticles on the subject. You really heolp us to understand so much.

I have been rather tired and silent lately.

I hope you and your Mum are well. Also your sister and her little family. It must be hard for your mother to cope. She is fortunate in having you.

With much affection my dear friend,

Chrisitnae

AR80

Thurs 8/IV/2010 `6.55 BST

I thought it might be worth linking the two Willem as I have been flicking back and forth http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/alabaster/F63395?thread=7416661 Also this which I picked simply because it is the BBC link http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/from_our_own_correspondent/8611200.stm I would very much like to know what you think of the reporting over here. I found the pictures in the following one very disturbing. Is the media making too much of it all? http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/africaandindianocean/southafrica/7575708/South-Africa-a-separate-homeland-for-Afrikaners.html Websailor

Hi there Websailor! To me those reports are quite scary as well. It really needs to be stressed at this point is that the majority of white people are NOT extremists like the AWB people, and the majority of the black people also don't agree with Julius Malema. The problem is, that the extremists may be enough to make a hell of a lot of trouble in this country. I'm watching the newspapers ...

As for the reporting over there ... both of them are focusing very much on the AWB folks and other Afrikaners being 'racists'. They may be, but they're humans. It's part of human weakness. It's difficult for many whites to be neutral and objective when so many of us are getting murdered.

On the other hand, black hatred of whites can also be seen as justified. Because the wounds of the past haven't healed yet ... they still remember being disrespected by whites, considered inferior. Black people are still suffering - most of them; poverty, unemployment, various kinds of social deprivations. It is easy to blame the whites for all that's bad. And to be fair, we ... our forebears ... are to blame for many of the messes. But what does it help now, to talk about hurting or killing white people?

Right now, really trying to be objective, the worst things that will likely happen, are that *more* white people will leave South Africa, and that perhaps Malema and others will start a program of grabbing farms like in Zimbabwe, and also nationalise some mines, both of which might seriously upset the economy, with the result of worsening even more people's conditions.

So how would one go abolut 'linking' the two entries?

I just thought that putting the link to the original entry as I did would be easier than searching for the other thread as it sinks down the list. Nothing technical

Thank you for your insight. I have been reading extracts from a book by a journalist whose parents live in Zimbabwe and had a farm and business. What happened to them was dreadful, but it also showed that not all people are bad on either side. I say 'side' because that is what it seems like, yet for the good of any country people of all persuasions need to work together, a lesson we could well learn here too.

Websailor

I don't know if this will help, Willem, but I hope so. I have found this man's work helpful:

http://www.salon.com/life/feature/1998/02/cov_27feature.html

Edward Ball is a journalist. When he decided to figure out what his family was hiding, he found out they were among the biggest slaveholders in South Carolina. He set out on a journey. He apologised to those people.

He said, we aren't guilty of anything - but we are responsible. For ourselves, for our history. I think he's onto something here.

Hi again Websailor ... OK I'll put in a link here every now and then but it seems to me the discussion is happening here, mainly.

I hate the idea of people being divided on racial lines ... or actually on any lines ... to me, people are people. Heck, to me animals are people too!

Hi there Dmitri! Very interesting, I read the story of Edward Ball. I'd like to read the book.

I totally agree about responsibility. Most white people here won't accept responsibility for what's happened or is happening in this country ... for that matter, the government here also is not accepting the full responsibility for making things better. It's always someone else's fault. It's a double-edged sword. The only thing that will help is if EVERYBODY should realise that there are two factors at work: OF COURSE we have inherited all sorts of problems from the past, BUT ALSO we are living in the present with powers to make the wrongs of the past right again.

I think I'll see about writing something for the newspaper.