History Department

Understanding Crime and Violence in Post-Apartheid South Africa: Representations of the Killing of Eugene Terreblanche

By: Thandolwetu Sipuye (2749770)

BA Honours History

Date: 19 November 2012

Supervisor: Prof. Nicky Rousseau

Abstract

This research essay seeks to explore the manner in which Eugene Terreblanches murder was reported, interpreted and understood not simply as a case of crime and violence, but as one with strong political overtones and ramifications that dragged with it multiple histories. I shall examine the diverse productions and representations of knowledge about Eugene Terreblanches murder in the media, its appropriation and constitution as a significant, political and historic event. Such an examination may provide some insight into the complex relationship between narratives, texts politics and history. I will also look at the different strand of narratives and representations that emerge from the Terreblanche killing and show how these were part of larger histories of colonialism and apartheid. I used secondary data from academic literature (like peer-reviewed journal articles) as well as grey literature such as newspaper reports and online news sources on the Terreblanche killing.

Contents Introduction ................................................................................................................................ 4 Methodology .............................................................................................................................. 10 Chapter 1 ................................................................................................................................... 11 The Terreblanche Murder ....................................................................................................... 11 Historical background of Crime & Violence in post-apartheid South Africa ...................31 Media and Representation ......................................................................................................36 How the murder unfolds .........................................................................................................38 Shoot the Boer, Crime & Violence: The Farm Attack Phenomenon ................................42 Chapter Two ............................................................................................................................. 46 Not a Normal Murder ...........................................................................................................48 The White Genocide Narrative ...............................................................................................76 The Homosexual/ Condom Scandal .......................................................................................81 The Farm Workers Narrative ...............................................................................................86 Conclusion ................................................................................................................................. 97 Bibliography ............................................................................................................................ 104

Introduction

On Saturday, 03 April 2010, both South African and international media news announced the murder of Eugene Terreblanche, leader of the infamous right-wing group, Afrikaner Weerstandsbeweging (AWB). At about 10pm TalkRadio702 announced a report that Mr. Terreblanche had been murdered at his farm on the outskirts of Ventersdorp, North West province, between 5pm and 6pm. Subsequent reports stated that two of Terreblanches farm workers had phoned the police to confess to the killing, had waited at the farm for the police to arrive and had been arrested later that evening1.

The news of this murder instantly became the center of attraction and discussion in the media and on the social networks Twitter and Facebook, continuing right into the early hours of the next day. On Sunday morning, Terreblanches murder was front-page news in South Africas Sunday papers and made headlines not only in South African broadcasting media, but also in international media such as CNN, BBC and Reuters, among many other international media. For example, early Sunday morning the Mail & Guardian online newspaper reported:
Eugene Terreblanche, who once threatened to wage war rather than allow black rule in South Africa, was hacked to death at his farm on Saturday following an argument with two employees. Terreblanches mutilated body was found on his bed along with a panga and knobkerrie, police said2[My Emphasis]

The report went on to state that:

Vena, V. (2010); Anatomy of a Farm Murder, Mail & Guardian online, Johannesburg Accessed at http://www.mg.co.za/article/2010-04-08-anatomy-of-a-farm-murder on 08/08/2011
2

Mail & Guardian online, 2010-04-04, Terreblanche killed after row with workers Accessed at http://mg.co.za/article/2010-04-04-terreblanche-hacked-to-death-after-row-with-workerson 08/08/2011

workers on the farm, have been arrested and were expected to appear in court on Tuesday

On the afternoon of the same day, as media reports and news concentrated on the killing, none other than the State President, Jacob Gedleyihlekisa Zuma, issued a public statement in condemnation of the murder of Terreblanche, urging for calm in the country. In his statement Zuma said:

We strongly condemn such acts of violence. People should use legal means to resolve differences of any nature including labour disputesI call upon our people, black and white, to remain calm, and allow police and other organs of State to do their work. This is not the time for speculation that can worsen the situation. It is time for us to unite all of us, black and white and put the nation and the country first. South Africa belongs to all who live in it, regardless of race, colour and political affiliation. This is the fundamental principle upon which our nation is founded. It is the fundamental principle that will keep this nation together always, united in its diversity All leaders must act responsibly and work with government to control emotions and anger during this period. Leaders and organizations must not use Mr. Terreblanches death to score political points. Instead, they must work harder to unite our people3[My Emphasis]

The statement by Zuma invoked the principles enshrined in one of the basic and core ANC documents, the Freedom Charter. Zumas invocation of this principle served to remind the South Africa nation, and the international community4 that the ANC government was still committed to

Accessed at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZpP5AfjQf_M on 16/07/2012

It was strategically important for President Jacob Zuma to ensure the international community of the South African governments commitment towards the nation building and reconciliation project, and its continued efforts and commitment to curb the high rate of crime in the country. This was important because, in less than two

its policies of national reconciliation and nation-building, but also to counter any politicization of the murder that would escalate racial tension and polarization in the country.

Later that Sunday, the President, in an unusual performance, appeared on national television news, again, condemning the murder of Eugene Terreblanche and urging leaders and people of South Africa to:

unite in the call for calm in this country, to make this country unite in calling for stop of violence, that violent crime must be fought and defeated by all of us I condemn this act, cowardly act and the murder of Mr. Terreblanche. Its not acceptable in our society, in our democracy5[My Emphasis]

From the very outset, the killing of Mr. Terreblanche was not treated as a normal murder but was rather catapulted into the realm of politics, and even war, being continuously written into many other histories. Thus, the following days saw many recurring sensationalist reports, statements and threats of civil unrest, bloodbath, war, revenge, genocide and racial conflict in South Africa being the central focus of media discourse related to the Terreblanche murder6. These threatening statements and reports, published by different print and online newspapers and expressed in different broadcasting media nationally and internationally were however, marked by ironies, contradictions and conflicting perspectives and narratives as this research shall show. Needless to say, Terreblanches murder also evoked international attention, as South Africa was
month after the Terreblanche murder, South Africa would be hosting the much anticipated FIFA Soccer World Cup. The Terreblanche murder, precisely the narratives and discourses that evolved out of it, thus, raised fears and concerns about crime and violence in South Africa amongst many people internationally who were preparing and planning to come for the event.
5

Accessed at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZpP5AfjQf_Mon 16/07/2011 Accessed at http://mg.co.za/article/2010-04-05-terreblanche-killing-awb-vows-revenge on 08/08/2011

preparing to host the FIFA soccer World Cup, as it rejuvenated sentiments of polarization in South African society, but also brought more attention to the heated debates and discourses around the complexities of crime and violence in post-apartheid South Africa.

This research essay seeks to explore the manner in which Eugene Terreblanches murder was reported, interpreted and understood not simply as a case of crime and violence, but as one with strong political overtones and ramifications that dragged with it multiple histories. I shall examine the diverse productions and representations of knowledge about Eugene Terreblanches murder in the media, its appropriation and constitution as a significant, political and historic event. Such an examination may provide some insight into the complex relationship between narratives, texts politics and history.

The research shall argue that the lines between crime, violence, politics and even war have become very blurry in the post-apartheid epoch, and thus post-apartheid crime and violence cannot be understood in linear, abstract terms that assume a posture of simplicity and discreetness. The research also charges that the narrow approaches, understandings and studies of crime and violence that fail to engage with and to interrogate the very complex processes of knowledge production and constitution about crime and violence are problematic. As an informative tool and an instrument for social control and the dissemination of ideas, the media plays a very crucial and important role in crafting meaning to and understanding of violent and criminal activities that occur in contemporary South African society.

What the Terreblanche murder then does is to allow us to delve into the complex processes involved in knowledge production, meaning construction, and the negotiation of texts and narratives in a bid to represent the dead. The killing also allows us to explore the complex

relationship that exists between crime and violence, history and politics, texts and narratives in post-apartheid South Africa.

Using the killing of Eugene Terreblanche as a case study, the research examines and explores the manner and extent to which the Terreblanche murder was politicized, and also to demonstrate how these representations of and meanings attached to the Terreblanche killing were produced, what informed them, and the particular audiences for which they are developed and structured. Thus, the various involved groups that produce narratives around this killing, such as the media, politicians, members of the AWB, the accused farm workers and their lawyers and the police all were actors and performers in what appears to be a competition to represent the dead, a struggle to produce history about Terreblanches demise.

I will look at the different strand of narratives and representations that emerge from the Terreblanche killing and show how these were part of larger histories of colonialism and apartheid to show why the murder was perceived as a possible threat, not only to national security and stability in South Africa, but also to the idealistic notion of national reconciliation and foreign investment. The research shall further engage critically these narratives and voices to demonstrate the manner through which perceptions of violence and criminality are constructed, configured, negotiated, narrated and distributed through the prism of the past colonial and apartheid linguistic and racial categories even in contemporary discourses, thus reinforcing dangerous stereotypes that become projected, replayed, enacted and sustained as contemporary realities rather than social constructs.

Stuart Hall has thoroughly dealt with the issue of media representations in his book Policing the Crisis (1978), writing that the media do not simply and transparently report events which are 'naturally' newsworthy in themselves. News is the end-product of a complex process which
8

begins with a systematic sorting and selecting of events and topics according to a socially constructed set of categories7. In another of his scholarly works, Hall writes that representation is the production of the meaning of the concepts in our minds through language. It is the link between concepts and language which enables us to refer to either to the real world of objects, people or events, or indeed to imaginary worlds of fictional objects, people or events8.

In chapter one, I will give a broad and general layout of how the Terreblanche murder unfolded in the media, how it became represented. This chapter shall focus on the media coverage of the killing and trace and track the shifts, twist and turns that it acquired over time. In chapter two I will discuss the subsequent strands of narratives and meanings attached to these particular representations. I will also briefly give the socio-political background, climate and environment in which his killing came into being.

Hall, S., Critcher, C., Jefferson, T., Clarke, J. & Roberts, B., (1978); The Social Production of News in Policing the Crisis: Mugging, the State and Law and Order, The MacMillan Press Ltd, London, Pg. 53
8

Hall, S., The Work of Representation in Representation, The Open University, London Sage Publications Pg. 15, Accessed at www.scribd.com on 17/09/2011

Methodology This research seeks to explore the manner in which Eugene Terreblanches murder was reported in the media and generally understood not simply as an ordinary case of the violent crime that permeates through all sectors of South African society, but rather as a killing with strong political overtones and ramifications that dragged with it multiple histories.

Therefore, I used secondary data from academic literature (like peer-reviewed journal articles) as well as grey literature such as newspaper reports and online news sources on the Terreblanche killing.

The newspapers that I looked into in particular are: 1) The Star, 2) Mail & Guardian, 3) Rapport, 4) Sunday Times and 5) Saturday Star between the months of April and May of 2010, November and December 2011, February and April 2012. I analyzed these newspapers as well as broadcast and online news sources (through search engines such as YouTube), to lay out how the murder unfolded and how it was reported in the media.

10

Chapter 1 The Terreblanche Murder

As indicated in the introduction, the Eugene Terreblanche killing was from the very outset no ordinary murder as it carried with it many longer and complex histories. This chapter outlines the killing of Terreblanche as it unfolded and how it has been represented in the media.

When the initial news reports first surfaced and then permeated through the national and international media on the 03rd of April 2010, it was initially reported that Terreblanche had been killed in a wage dispute with two of his employees. On the 03rd of April 2010, just a few hours after the murder at about 23:14pm,t he Mail & Guardian online newspaper reported that:
a 21-year-old man and 15-year-oldboy were arrested and charged for his murder. The two told the police that the argument ensued because they were not paid for the work they did on the farm9. [My Emphasis]

This seemed like the ordinary, day-to-day reports on crime and murder that plague the whole of South African society, except that the victim of this violent crime was a well-known, prominent and high profile though infamous - political figure, Eugene Terreblanche, leader of the Afrikaner Resistance Movement (AWB).None of the alleged killers were identified by name. They were later identified as two farm workers, and the only established motive for the murder at this stage was that this was a wage dispute. But what is interesting is that the online paper went on to write that the official political opposition party, the Democratic Alliance (DA) had raised its outrage and concern10 over the killing of Terreblanche with its member of

http://mg.co.za/article/2010-04-03-terreblanche-killed-on-ventersdorp-farm on 29/09/2011 http://mg.co.za/article/2010-04-03-terreblanche-killed-on-ventersdorp-farm on 29/09/2011

10

11

Parliament Juanita Terreblanche alluding that an attack of this nature could be regarded as an attack on the diverse components of the South African democracy11. Here, the murder shifts from being a simple killing and becomes appropriated, not just an attack on the person of Eugene Terreblanche, but as an attack on democracy itself.

As the story unfolded in the following days and weeks, this initial story shifted and took different shapes and forms in the media, and particular interpretations and meanings were attached to the murder, linking it with broader public debates and discourses of crime, violence, history, politics, sexuality and race that gave the (implicitly or explicitly) perpetuated representations of an imminent civil or race war validity and authenticity as real, fact and true.

On the following day, Sunday 04 April 2010, the Sunday Times newspaper published a story entitled Eugene Terreblanche Hacked to Death in which it was reported that Terreblanche:

was found bludgeoned and hacked to death on Saturday at his farm in Ventersdorp. Two black farm workers involved in an apparent wage dispute with him were arrested at the scene. The two farm workers claimed that he refused to pay them their monthly salaries of R350 each. Police state that the workers, aged 21 and 15, smashed a window to enter Terreblanche's home and hacked him to death him with a knobkerrie and a panga. A police source told the Sunday Times the pair alleged Terreblanche had threatened to kill them when they went to his farm for their money12. [My Emphasis]

What we see here is that by the next day, while the basic outline and alleged reasons for the killing remained the same, much greater detail was added. The terms such as 'hacked,

10

http://mg.co.za/article/2010-04-03-terreblanche-killed-on-ventersdorp-farm on 29/09/2011

12

Sunday Times, 04 April 2010

12

knobkerrie and panga' evoked particular colonial imaginations. Perhaps one can also assume that these terms are what informed the statement by Juanita Terreblanche of the DA.

On Monday, the 05th of April 2010, The Star ran a front page news story about the Terreblanche killing. The paper dedicated the whole front page space to a report on the killing. In fact, the paper dedicated the first six pages to the killing, also providing graphic images of the deceased leader during his days of fame when he violently opposed South Africas transition into democracy. The front page of the newspaper read: Killing of Terreblanche stirs passions: AWB vows to avenge leader accompanied by a middle-sized picture of Terreblanche, with arms outstretched and a huge AWB emblem behind him, addressing a meeting of the AWB in Ventersdorp on October 10th, 2010 as he was reviving the infamous organization. The journalists Solly Maphumulo et al wrote:
Some cheered the death of a dog while others swore revenge. And yesterday police moved into Ventersdorp as tempers flared over the killing of right-winger Eugene Terreblanche13[My Emphasis]

The report went on to quote Andre Visagie, then secretary-general of the AWB, as saying that the organization would avenge the murder of Terreblanche. The article stated that Visagie had told the South African Press Association (SAPA) that:
we are going to finish with funeral arrangements and thereafter we have a summit conference on May 1 in Pretoria, where all our leaders and members of the AWB will come together and decide on what actions we will take to revenge Terreblanches death. Our leaders death is directly linked to Julius Malemas Kill the Boer song14 [My Emphasis]
13

Maphumulo, S., Molosankwe, B. & Germaner, S. (2010); AWB Vows to Avenge Leader, The Star, 05 April, Pg. 1

13

Consequently, what followed is that the Terreblanche murder was linked with the song Dhubula Ibhulu with various political leaders such as Helen Zille of the Democratic Alliance (DA), former South African president FW De Klerk and Pieter Groenewald, the Freedom Front Plus Member of Parliament, blaming Terreblanches murder on ANC Youth League president Julius Malemas defiant singing of this now banned anti-apartheid struggle song and urging and warning the ANC leadership to condemn the singing of the song because it incited violence15. Similar sentiments were raised by the founder of the Pro-Afrikaans Action Group (PRAAG) and communications chief for the Freedom Front Plus in Gauteng Dr. Dan Roodt who is reported to have said that: the ANC, especially its youth wing, has created a climate of hatred for Afrikaners in South Africa. As a result, South Africa already finds itself in a low-level ethnic conflict that is bound to escalate after a high-profile murder such as that of Terreblanche16. [My Emphasis]

The song was significant enough here because it was claimed by both conservative Afrikaner organizations like the Freedom Front Plus (FF+) and liberal ones such as the Democratic Alliance (DA)to be inciting genocide against white people in South Africa, whilst the song was also associated with a particular history of land dispossession and the black anti-colonial/antiapartheid liberation movements in South Africa.

14

Maphumulo, S., Molosankwe, B. & Germaner, S. (2010); AWB Vows to Avenge Leader

15

Davis, G., Seale, L. &Mkhwanazi, S. (2010); Zuma Appeals to Malema, Politicians for Calm, The Star, 05 April, Pg. 3
16

http://www.timeslive.co.za/local/article386066.ece/Roodt-blames-ANC-for-TerreBlanche-murder

14

But the ANC vehemently rejected claims that Terreblanches killing was related in any way with the song Dhubula Ibhulu (Shoot the Boer). Its national spokesperson, Jackson Mthembu, issued a statement in which he stated that the ANC condemns linking of the singing of the struggle song by Malema to Terreblanche killing17. Mthembu further wrote that any claim that Blacks intend to harm other race groups - particular our white compatriots - is baseless and devoid of all truth. Let us not be dragged into polarisation only desired by a few. In their preliminary investigations, police have not established any link between the killing of Mr Terreblanche and the singing of the ANC struggle song. In fact, police have gone on record to state that the death arose out of a wage dispute between Mr. Terreblanche and his employees. It is our belief that the continued linkage of the singing of the song by comrade Malema to the killing of Mr Terreblanche, is not only mischievous but also inciteful and meant to fuel racial polarisation in our country during a highly emotion-charged and sensitive moment18. In his concluding remarks Mr. Mthembu stated that the ANC on its part will do whatever necessary to contribute meaningfully to the earlier call made by President Jacob Zuma for calm - giving leadership at this time in our country to ensure that we are not going back to our painful past which we would like to keep buried19.

A report by The Star newspaper on the 05th April 2010 revealed that Julius Malema:
had promised to continue to sing the song in defiance of the courts and was further exacerbating tensions by openly supporting the anti-white racism of President Robert Mugabe and Zanu PF20.
17

http://www.politicsweb.co.za/politicsweb/view/politicsweb/en/page71654?oid=169329&sn=Detail&pid=71654 http://www.politicsweb.co.za/politicsweb/view/politicsweb/en/page71654?oid=169329&sn=Detail&pid=71654 http://www.politicsweb.co.za/politicsweb/view/politicsweb/en/page71654?oid=169329&sn=Detail&pid=71654

18

19

20

Davis, G., Seale, L. &Mkhwanazi, S. (2010); Zuma Appeals to Malema, Politicians for Calm, The Star, 05 April, Pg. 3

15

However, the ANC remained steadfast by its statement and adamant that the Terreblanche murder was in no way related to the singing of the struggle song Dhubula Ibhuluby its Youth League firebrand, Julius Malema, claiming that the songs reference to Ibhulu or the Boer was not meant to be taken literally but symbolically as it apparently made reference to the apartheid system of oppression, not the people of the Boer (Afrikaner) nation. Thus, according to the ANC, the song Shoot the Boer was not inciting violence against persons but was invoking an insurrection or an attack against the oppressive apartheid regime, which to many Black people was encapsulated in the single word Ibhulu or the Boer.

In the newspaper report Terreblanche was described and identified as a relic of the past who had now become the martyr of the right wing, with a picture of him at the center dressed in full camouflage military gear, surrounded by some of his fierce-looking paramilitary forces clad in black military gear bearing the AWB emblem. The headline to the story read: Some fear killing of AWB supremo could spark racial tensions as leaders appeal for calm. The article raised the sentiment that Terreblanches killing could galvanize a resurgence of support for the AWB and quoted an unnamed risk analyst as having stated that Terreblanches death could ignite those feeling politically marginalized and alienated21. It also quoted Professor Willie Breytenbach of Stellenbosch University as having agreed that:
Terreblanche wasnt a normal farmer but rather an icon for fragmented rightwing groups that have intermittently threatened the government with violence22 [My Emphasis]

21

Du Plessis, C. (2010); Relic of the Past Becomes Martyr for the Right Wing: Some Fear Killing of AWB Supremo Could Spark Racial Tensions as Leaders Appeal for Calm , The Star, 05 April, Pg. 6
22

The Star, 05 April 2010, Pg. 6

16

Breytenbach casts Terreblanche as a farmer who was not normal. It is also interesting to note that the acronym ET, used to refer to Eugene Terreblanche in many media reports also has a subtle reference to this abnormality; ET has deeper meanings and connotations than meets the eye. The same acronym is usually used in a general sense to describe extraterrestrials, which are often viewed as foreigners to our human world and wild aliens from other interplanetary spaces who pose a threat to our peaceful existence as a human species. Following the fall of apartheid in the early 90s, Eugene Terreblanches ideas and separatist politics had made him an alien in the context of the new democratic South Africa era. As a result, he had become a foreigner in the terrain of contemporary South African politics that assert inclusion, nonracialism, non-sexism, democracy and reconciliation. By the way, I am not suggesting that the acronym was being used for the first time because Terreblanche has been referred to as ET ever since his entrance into the public sphere as an active politician. All I am saying is that there are many meanings that can derived from ET.

This article is accompanied by two pictures, one of Terreblanche during his court appearance in July1992 for the assault on petrol attendant John Ndzima, and attempted murder of his black farm worker Paul Motshabi, and another of him smiling with his wife Martie in October 1983. Such references to Terreblanche as having been not a normal farmer, as Professor Breytenbach is quoted to have said, carry significance in that they foster a subtle and subliminal perception of Terreblanche as a social and political misfit in the contemporary South African political and social landscape, an abnormality and defect to the Tutu-Mandela envisioned rainbow nation.

Another article is placed within the same page bearing the title Born into staunch Afrikaner nationalism. This article is accompanied by a small image of Terreblanche shaking hands with an IFP official after signing a non-aggression pact in 1992. Next to this article is a quarter-size picture of Terreblanche hugging and kissing a child. The caption read Father Figure: Eugene
17

Terreblanche kisses a child of one of his supporters before heading for the cells on March 31, 2000.

The following day 06th April 2010, The Star published another story that raised controversy around the crime scene of the murder, alleging that some vital evidence, in the form of a tooth and mysterious blue underwear, had been left at the crime scene by police. The headline read as: Inside ETs house of death: Bloodstained bed frame, tooth still at Terreblanche crime scene. In this article the sentiments that Terreblanche had refused to pay his alleged killers is denied and denounced by his daughter Bea Terreblanche who is quoted to have said that:

He was not refusing to pay them. Thats not trueHe treated them like he would like to be treated as human beings23

The authors of the article went on to cite the comments of Pieter Steyn, a commander of the AWB, who claimed to have adamantly asserted that the Terreblanche murder was political, stating that since 1994 about 3100 farmers had been killed in premeditated and well-organized and planned attacks throughout South Africa. The article also mentioned that Pieter Steyn had retracted the organizations earlier threats to avenge the killing claiming that the statements were made in the heat of the moment.24

The article in The Star also referenced the accused minor suspects mother as having stated that her son had admitted to the killing, writing that:
when her son and his co-worker asked Terreblanche
23

Staff Reporters (2010); Inside ETs house of Death: Blood Stained Bed Frame, Tooth still at Terreblanche Crime Scene, The Star, 06 April, Pg. 1
24

The Star, 06 April 2010, Pg. 1

18

for their money, he told them to first bring in the cows. After they had brought in the cows, they again asked for their money, which he then refused to give them. The older worker went to a storeroom. He came back with an iron rod. He started hitting TerreblancheThen my son says he took the iron rod and hit him25 [My Emphasis]

On the 07th April 2010, the day when the two suspects were appearing in court, again The Star had more news on Terreblanche. Ndaba et al published a story entitled Barbed wire used to separate groups: Black and white communities clash outside court as two accused appear over Terreblanche murder26in which black residents are quoted to have lauded one of the suspects by calling him a hero. Describing the scene outside the court in Ventersdorp where the two alleged killers of Terreblanche were appearing, the authors of the article wrote that:
They shouted and chanted Hero, hero, hero! as one ofthem was bundled into an awaiting police Nyala.On-lookers punched their clenched fists in the air while others ululated, to the annoyance of a few white residents who remained outside the court.27[My Emphasis]

During the first court appearance of the two accused for killing Mr. Terreblanche an incident happened outside the court which was then taken and blown out of proportion by politicians, the media, and by police as demonstrated by their action of using barbed wire to separate races. What happened is that a woman supporter or sympathizer of the AWB squirted a drink at a group of people who were displaying support of the accused killers outside the court by singing the South African anthem Nkosi Sikelela28. The AWB supporters had also just selectively sung the

25

The Star, 06 April 2010, Pg. 1

26

Ndaba, B., Molosankwe, B., Van Schie, K., Germaner, S. & SAPA (2010); Barbed wire used to separate groups: Black and white communities clash outside court as two accused appear over Terreblanche murder, The Star, 07 April 2010, Pg. 3
27

The Star, 07 April 2010, Pg. 3 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i3PdtPJXE0o

28

19

Die Stem part of the anthem which dates back to the apartheid era, and the two groups were displaying some feelings of contempt for each other. As the woman squirted the drink to the singing crowd, there was a slight reaction of shouting and gestures of finger pointing.

Through media reproductions and representations of the incident, the country held its collective breath as police rushed in by their numbers and literally erected a barbed wire to separate the two groups. It was this symbolic act of literally erecting a barbed wire as a wall between the two groups that highlighted and exaggerated the situation in Ventersdorp, packaging the conflict in that space as a reality that defines racial relations in post-apartheid South Africa, and thus evidence of the polarized nature of the broader South African society. Instead of the actions of both groups outside the Ventersdorp court being condemned by analysts and reporters in the public space as irrational, immature behavior which reflects the infancy of South African democracy, the incident was blown out of proportion and used as a barometer for the predictions of an imminent civil war in the country.

At this stage the prime focus of media and social discourse in South Africa became the trial, which in itself was also marked by controversy due to the many postponements, further arousing sentiments amongst AWB members that there was a political conspiracy involved in the killing of Mr. Terreblanche, hence justice was being delayed. The perception portrayed here was that justice delayed equals justice denied. In the period between all these postponements, the popular print media seemed to have toned down the projection of sentiments of possible civil unrest. In fact, as soon as the World Cup festival came in June, the Terreblanche case was immediately relegated to the fringes of print newspaper coverage.

However, the debates and discussions around the issue continued to persist in online discussion forums, social networks, blogs and websites. The print newspapers only bothered themselves by
20

only simply mentioning the trial particularly during the weeks or just a few days before the date it had been postponed for, almost as a silent, subtle and swift reminder of an inherent, still unresolved threat to our peaceful diverse society, co-existence and national stability and security.

But the forceful tone and projection of a possible race war had been simmered, and Terreblanches death no longer seemed to be final straw to unleash the wrath, anger and vengeance of whites who believe there is a political conspiracy within the ranks of the ANC (and thus blacks) to commit genocide against them.

Another article showed a picture of an Afrikaner man standing next to a cross with the old South African flag flowing from it. For the first time since the news of the murder was announced and reported, the identity of one of the accused is revealed in this article as Chris Mahlangu. However, the age of 27 given to him in this report differs from the initial reports in print and online newspapers that said he was 21 years old29. We are also informed that the two suspects are charged with murder, housebreaking with intent to rob and robbery with aggravating circumstances, crimen injuria and attempted robbery.

This article is also flanked by three other articles with the titles Gawkers point, stare at blood and splat of brain, which asserted that the house of Terreblanche was transformed into a tourist attraction sight days after his death as streams of people, sympathizers and supporters flowed to witness the scene in which Terreblanche met his fatal fate; Enough is enough, says AWBs new
29

This is significant as it exposes the aura of uncertainty and contradiction that have marked and characterized the Terreblanche case. From the very onset, contradictory information about the alleged murderers was published. The age difference is important because one of the accused is a minor. The age of 21 years which appeared in earlier reports gave the impression that both accused were very young, which would have made the case more complex than it was n that youthfulness would have functioned to associate the accused to the Youth League leader, Julius Malemas ideas, and thus calls for killing whites through the persistence singing of that condemned song.

21

leader which first announces Steyn van Ronge as the new leader of the AWB and then proceeds to quote him as saying: The line is drawn. Enough is enough. We will not go forward like this anymoreWe will not allow white farmers to be murdered 30; We want to meet Zuma, say Zille and Mulder in which the Democratic Alliance (DA) leader HellenZille and the Freedom Front Plus leader Pieter Mulder are said to have requested a meeting with Jacob Zuma to discuss Malemas hate speech.

In this article Zille is quoted to have said that Malemas singing of Shoot the Boer was not experienced as an attack on the apartheid system but as an expression of a hateful attitude towards farmers and Afrikaners in particular, and white people in general31; and Premier calls for CD of Struggle songs which articulated that Tshwane mayor Gwen Ramokgopa, Gauteng Premier NomvulaMokonyane and Arts and Culture Minister Lulu Xingwana sang the banned controversial anti-apartheid, struggle song DhubulaIbhulu or Shoot the Boer. The article quotes Mokonyane, speaking in Mamelodi at a ceremony where the home of Solomon Mahlangu , an ANC member who was hanged by the apartheid regime, was being handed over to the National Heritage Council as a heritage site as having said that, a nation that is not proud of its history and heritage is not really a nation. When we sing these songs, we sing them because they have significance to us32. These statements and actions of these government ministers and ANC members seem to utterly deconstruct what president Zuma and his spokesperson Mthembu were trying to do through the publishing of their statements asking for calm and reason. These are the very contradictions that are inherent in all nerratives.

30

Van Schie, K., (2010); Enough is Enough, Says AWB New Leader in The Star, 07 April, Pg. 3 Davis, G., (2010); We Want to Meet Zuma, Say Zille and Mulder in The Star, 07 April, Pg. 3 Magome, M., (2010); Premier Calls for CD of Struggle Songs in The Star, 07 April, Pg. 3

31

32

22

However this was by no means the end of the controversies and historicized drama associated with the Terreblanche murder as it unfolded and played itself out in the popular media. In an unexpected turn of events, the controversies around the Terreblanche murder became further entrenched through media reports that claimed that sodomy had sparked the murder33 and the consequent surfacing of the news that a used condom had been found on the crime scene, that the victims trousers were down on his knees and he had semen on him when the police found him.

On April 11, the Sunday Times newspaper published an article with the headline ET wanted to sodomise me, says accused34. Interestingly and worthy of mentioning here, a picture of a black man wearing an AWB khakhi shirt and shorts, socks, boots and hat with the title Black Boer Mourns Terreblanche, with a caption reading Staunch AWB supporter Piet Dlamini laments the death of his father Eugene Terreblanche at his Kwa-Zulu Natal home outside eMondlo, was placed next to this article. This is quite interesting because it also marks and shows some of the contradictions that are inherent in texts, narratives and biographies. I mean, who would have ever expected, or known, that Eugene Terreblanche had a Black supporter who could be even referred to as his father? The article stated that PunaMoroko, the lawyer of Chris Mahlangu, one of the two men accused of killing Terreblanche, claimed that Terreblanche had tried to sodomise his client, Mahlangu. Mizilikazi WaAfrika et al quote Moroko as having stated that:
my instructions from my client are that there was some sodomy going on and it sparked the murder of Mr.Terreblanche Terreblanches hacked and bludgeoned body with his pants down to his knees was found on a bed in his Ventersdorp farm last Saturday Moroko said his clients defence would be that the attack on Terreblanche was triggered by sodomy[My Emphasis]
33

http://mg.co.za/article/2010-04-11-sodomy-sparked-murder-of-terreblanche Sunday Times, 11 April 2010

34

23

The article went on to report that Moroko had also elaborated that Terreblanche had tried to get the two alleged killers drunk before he tried to have sexual intercourse with one or both of them35. The same day, the Afrikaans newspaper Rapport also ran a front news story with an article entitled Skokbeweringngs oor Terreblanche36 (Shocking News on Terreblanche). However, the Rapports story differed from that published by the Sunday Times. The Rapport story actually contradicted the Sunday Times report in that it dismissed the allegations that a condom had been found at the crime scene as untrue. The paper reported that:

Die polisie se ook bewerings gister in Koerante dat n kondoom op die toneel gekry is, is onwaar. 100% nee, nee nee, se kapt. Adele Myburgh, provincial polisie wordvoerder37 (The police say the allegations that appeared in the newspapers that a condom was found at the scene are untrue. 100% no, no no, said captain Adele Myburgh, provincial police spokesperson)[My Emphasis]

This news report reflects the conflicts, contradictions and uncertainties that enveloped and marked the Terreblanche murder in shrouded mystery from the very first day it was introduced into the public sphere. What are the readers of this text to grasp of it? What truth is contained in this claim, if any? Did Terreblanche really attempt to rape the accused? These claim, these allegations, these rumours or mystery about the condom that was found or not at the crime scene and the sodomy that took place or not before Terreblanche was killed are not to be dismissed or rejected as useless or simple lies; they tell us something. Luise White explains that the power

35

Sunday Times, 11 April 2010 Rapport, 11 April 2010 Rapport, 11 April 2010

36

37

24

and importance of the made-up and make-believe are precisely that they are made-up and makebelieve: they have to be constituted by what is credible38

A few days later, Moroko retracted the claims of sodomy saying he was not convinced enough by his clients evidence. And so did the police. However, as I shall elaborate later, the claim of sodomy has resurfaced as Mahlangus defense claims are that he acted in self-defense against Terreblanche. This claim of sodomy is further aggravated and concretized by the allegation that forensic evidence in the form of semen found on top of Terreblanche at the murder scene was neglected and not collected by the police or forensic experts when they arrived at the crime scene.

Even though the Rapport published this story refuting and contradicting the claim that there were possibilities of a sex crime in the Terreblanche case, during the second appearance of the accused in court on the 14th April The Star published a story in which these allegations were once again raised. The paper reported that:
It was initially thought a dispute over unpaid wages was behind the killing, but the Hawks confirmed they were also investigating the possibility of a sex crime39 [My Emphasis]

The involvement of the Hawks in this case is another interesting factor here. The Hawks deal with serious, organized and intelligence related crimes. So the killing is constructed as a highly sophisticated intelligence crime. Perhaps the states own fears that the killing would cause a racial civil war informed this involvement of the Hawks. We will never know. But what we
38

White, L. (2000); Telling More: Lies, Secrets, and History; History and Theory, Theme Issue 39; Wesleyan University, Pg 13.
39

The Star, 14 April 2010, Pg. 1

25

know is that we are able to read from this that the Terreblanche killing was a highly complex one to which no singular narrative exist.

The article also quoted Andrie Visagie, the AWB secretary-general as having said that he believed that the crime scene was not properly investigated by the police and forensic experts. The report by Rapport on the 11th of April 2010 also mentioned that police were also investigating the death of Terreblanches domestic worker named Rosie Nsako, who is said to have died on the 29th of March 2010.

The circumstances surrounding her death were initially shrouded in mystery, with allegations that she had been killed. But after investigations, the report revealed that police stated that she had collapsed on the road and died a day later in Klerksdorp hospital. Again, the rumour and speculation that surrounded her death is also significant when we consider that telling lies and proclaiming and keeping secrets are decisions to make certain information so charged that its value and importance is unlike that of other information. Lies and and secrets are explanations that are negotiated for specific audiences, for specific ends40.

On the 14th April 2010 The Star newspaper published an article in which the name of the deceased domestic worker is named as Rose Matheu, which differs from the name Rosie Nsako previously given in the report by Rapport. The Star also states that this said Rose Matheu died in hospital after having been hospitalized and admitted for six days, contradicting the earlier reports on the 11 April 2010 by Rapport that claimed she was hospitalized for one day and died

40

White, L. (2000); Telling More: Lies, Secrets, and History; History and Theory, Theme Issue 39; Wesleyan University, Pg 15.

26

suddenly41. These conflicting and contradicting views and representations of the Terreblanche murder formed part of the larger histories that were connected and attached to it through these very same varying and contradictory media reports.

Indeed, through these contrasting and conflicting views and representations that rendered the murder a terrain of contestation of knowledge and information, this murder was consigned and configured, not as a simple case of the everyday scourge of crime that haunts all South Africans, but rather as a complex web of mystery and obscurity, politics and crime, gender and sexuality, truth and lies, fact and fiction, history and the contemporary.

The Rapport, similar like other newspapers such as the Afrikaans Beeld, and the English liberal ones such as the Sunday Times, Saturday Star, Sowetan and The Star amongst others, paid much attention to the Terreblanche murder since its first pronouncement. However, the reports circulated in these various media platforms aroused fears, doubts, confusion and uncertainties about racial relations in post-apartheid South Africa, and also demonstrated the extent to which crime, politics and history are so intertwined and interwoven in contemporary discourses.

The Rapport also contained many other news stories regarding the Terreblanche murder, also accompanied by a collage of images depicting the murder scene (Terreblanches bloodstained bed in his bedroom), his grieving supporters carrying white crosses and pictures of their dead leader, white tourists at the airport wearing white t-shirts bearing the words Please Dont Kill Me, Im Only A Tourist, Not The Boer, a convoy of vans bearing the AWB emblem with young
41

In a controversial and high profile murder case like this one, these contradictions that appear on the media are important as they reflect the multiple narratives that have clouded all knowledge of what really happened to Eugene Terreblanche. The multiple identities given here to his dead domestic worker, and the contradictions around when she died, just like the issue of two different ages given to Chris Mahlangu show that the Terreblanche case is a very complex one to which no single, linear or organic narrative or truth can be extracted.

27

Afrikaner men holding the old apartheid flag, Julius Malema at Luthuli House during the press conference where he chased out the BBC journalist Johan Fisher, and the AWB Secretary General Andrie Visagie during his outburst on live television during a discussion with Lebogang Pheko about race relations in South Africa on Chris Marolengs program Africa360 which was broadcast on the e-news channel.

On the same day, 11 April 2010, the Sunday Times also ran extensive coverage on the Terreblanche murder. The front page of the review section of the newspaper was covered with a huge picture of Terreblanche addressing members of the AWB during the re-launch of the organization in 2009, with very little text. Also in the picture seated next to Terreblanche is Steyn van Ronge, the new leader of the AWB who has since replaced him. The title read Clown of the white earth42. Between van Ronge and Terreblanche flows a huge AWB emblem. The story followed on to page two with the title All style but no substance. There were also two pictures that bear an ironic resemblance. The one picture to the left of the page depicted Terreblanche in his early days surrounded by his supporters with both arms raised. The caption read Disruptive: Eugene Terreblanche with supporters at a National Party rally they had broken up in 1986. To the right of this image another picture was placed of AWB General Alwyn Wolfaardt with both his arms raised similarly like Terreblanche in the other picture. But lying next to him are the dead bodies of two other AWB members who were shot by the Bopuhuthatswana police during an AWB attempted coup there in March 1994.

The evident resemblance and irony in the pictures proves beyond doubt that they are structured and placed to portray and project particular meanings to the audience. One meaning that could be solicited from looking at the pictures is that the AWB had moved from glory, fame and
42

Sunday Times Review, 11 April 2010, Pg. 1

28

victory, as symbolized by Terreblanche in the picture where his arms are held high, to shame, dishonour and defeat, as symbolized by Wolfaardt and the dead bodies of his two comrades lying on the ground next to him.

In another article on the same edition the 11 April 2010 Sunday Times had the title Fear43 and loathing in ETs town: Eyeing each other across the racial divide but pockets of harmony. The article was also accompanied by a collage of images. The largest image depicted two young boys of different races playing together with a little toy construction vehicle. The caption read Building together: Neighbours Michael Rothman and Tuelo Digwamaje play together in a rare display of racial social interaction in Ventersdorp. There are also pictures of a bearded AWB member wearing a shirt with AWB emblem, a picture of Terreblanches widow Martie and his daughter Bea weeping, the white cross with old apartheid flag flowing and image of Terreblanche attached to it and a AWB member holding a placard written Julius Malema is an uneducated arrogant little piece of pig-shit44.

On the April 15, 2010 The Star again published a story that further perpetrated the contradictions and mystery surrounding the Terreblanche murder. The headline declared Now ET sex claims ditched: Lawyer says AWB leader throttled accused. In this article it was reported that the lawyer had confirmed that he had abandoned the earlier claims of sodomy meted out against

43

This notion of fear mongering is in line with some of the notion raised by many white South Africans concerning crime in the post-apartheid dispensation. As I shall show later, many white South Africans are reported to be fleeing the country due to fear of being prime targets of violent crimes committed by black criminals. But also, the use of this word in the popular media also serves not only to invoke, but also to perpetuate and entrench this particular emotion of fear of crime. In his book, Creating Fear: News and the Construction of Crisis, David Altheide engages more with the discourse of fear, fear as fear as an interpretative frame or optic through which people see the world, define the social situations they confront, construct identities (their own and others), and structure their interactions. He sees the discourse of fear as something that has become publicly more pervasive in recent years, arguing that there has been not only a quantitative increase in the frequency with which the term is used, but also a qualitative shift in how it is used in the media. 44 Sunday Times Review, 11 April 2010, Pg. 2

29

Terreblanche by the accused. Furthermore, the paper stated that the accused would plead not guilty on the basis that they acted in self-defense after a wage dispute with Terreblanche.

It was also reported that the accused minor was also comfortable at the place of safety where he has been held since his arrest45 and therefore was also not going to apply for bail. The authors of the article also quote the minors lawyer, Zola Majavu, to have said that the minor was happy where he was held as he was having experiences he had never had before. Majavu is quoted as having said of the accused:
He is sleeping on a bed for the first time in his life. He is also having three meals a day for the first time. He is also studying, something he was not doing while he was at his home, so there is no need to change the status quo. Even the social workers agree that he should be kept there. It is in his best interest that he stays there46[My Emphasis]

This is a very powerful political statement being made here. Majavu casts the minor as a victim of human rights abuses by stating that he is sleeping on the best for the first time and having three meals a day for the first time. He is appealing for sympathy. But also he is negotiating the political idea that many Black people, and youth in particular, are subjected to poverty and suffering due to either current or past human rights abuses. The accused is represented as a victim. So the unfortunate killing of Terreblanche opens up doors for opportunities for the minor as it is in his best interest to stay in prison.

45

The Star, 15 April 2010, Pg.1

46

Ndaba, B.,Molosankwe, B., Gifford, G. & SAPA (2010); Now ET sex claims ditched: Lawyer says AWB leader throttled accused in The Star, April, 15, Pg. 1

30

For the next days, South African newspapers continued to issue out reports everyday on the Terreblanche killing. Each day had a new story to tell; each story constructed and figured in particular ways and adorned with particular signs and symbols that consigned particular subtle meanings to it. After all, as the media reports continued to illustrate in the weeks and months that followed, this was not just a mere simple case of everyday South African homicide. This killing was rather political, sexual, racial and historic; posed a threat to stability, investments and a possible cause for civil unrest and racial war in the country.

This was a complex crime which demonstrated exactly the manner in which the line between crime, politics and history can become blurred through particular frames of reference and lenses of representation. According to the sentiments raised, projected and distributed in these reports, Mandelas democracy and Desmond Tutus rainbow nation had reached its doomsday. Reconciliation was just proved to be a myth, existing only in the fabric of our minds, but certainly not a reality, or so the reports would have made us to believe. Apartheid and racial hatred and prejudice were not a thing of the past, but a present reality still haunting democratic South Africa.

Historical background of Crime & Violence in post-apartheid South Africa

The advent of 1994 was deemed to be the dawn of a new era for South Africa, a country plagued and marked by violence for hundreds of years. The new South Africa would be an age of peace and stability. It was at the Congress for a Democratic South Africa (CODESA) negotiation tables in the early 1990s that the ANC elite leadership made particular historical compromises such as abandoning and totally discarding the nationalization project and the land question as key aspects of their policies, while opting for capitalist and market driven policies, thus shifting

31

away from its historic mission and fundamental struggle policies47. These compromises promised a peaceful transition into a peaceful, non-racial democracy. Through the institution of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC), the violence of the past was condemned, with the chapter and discourse of apartheid violence and conflict being pronounced a thing of the past especially that which had racial connotations attached to them. But various studies in the social sciences, news reports and the daily experiences of many people living in the postapartheid South African society have demonstrated that violence and crime continue to be a haunting feature of the South African society.

South African histories of violence have shown that the apartheid state used the concept of race as a means to justify institutionalized forms of violence. On the contrary most studies have shown that the concept of race in South Africa tracks back to late 19th century colonialism, and has always been closely related with the development of capitalism in South Africa. Thus, apartheid in itself functioned and operated within the framework of earlier historiesof race and segregation. Bronwyn Harris writes in her paper that the apartheid government created race as a mechanism for violence. Race, in and of itself, was the social and psychological reality through which repression and violence functioned48.

Consequently Simpson further elaborates by saying that one of the flaws of South Africas TRC project was its failure to properly engage with the complex nature of criminality. He states that not only did the amnesty process ignore many of the complexities consequent upon the historical criminalization of political activity, but it was also incapable of accommodating the

47

Van Wyk, J.A., (2009); Cadres, Capitalists and Coalitions: The ANC, Business and Development in South Africa, Development Leadership Program, Research Paper, University of South Africa, Pg. 7
48

Harris, B., (2004); Arranging prejudice: Exploring hate crime in post-apartheid South Africa in Race and Citizenship in Transition Series, Johannesburg, CSVR, Pg. 3

32

extent to which the politicization of crime represented the other side of the same coin49. In this regard then, the violence perpetuated in the pre-1994 democratic elections was loosely interpreted and classified as political, while acts of violence committed in the post-election period were reframed and classified as criminal. But certainly the Terreblanche killing literally represented a significant return to the political.

Valji et al attest to the challenge to democracy and national reconciliation posed by the fear of crime in post-apartheid South Africa. Their study concludes that this fear is fuelled by the mythology that whites are the primary targets merely because of their race. From this perspective, the racialized discourse of crime not only misrepresents whites as the predominant victims, but conversely portrays blacks as the primary perpetrators50. This attests to the fact that violence in the Southern African region is linked to identity51. It is important though that we also note cautiously here that the concept of identity itself is problematic in that it is not a natural, fixed entity bound in time and space, neither is it an absolutely fluid and shifting reality; but it is rather historically and socially constructed in changing processes of social interaction52. The fear of crime in post-apartheid South Africa is perpetuated and experienced within this framework of social identity formation.

This perception of whites being the prime targets of premeditated crime and violence in South Africa was also highlighted and brought before public platforms through media publication of the decision of the Canadian Immigration and Refugee Board to grant Brandon Huntly asylum.

49

Simpson, G., (2004); A Snake Gives Birth to A Snake: Politics and Crime in Transition to Democracy , CSVR, Pg.2

50

Harris, B., Valji, N. & Simpson, G. (2004) Crime, Security and Fear of the Other in SA Reconciliation Barometer, Vol. 2., Issue 1, Centre for the Study of Violence and Reconciliation, Accessed at www.csvr.org.za
51

Cock, J. (2000); Weaponry and the Culture of Violence in South Africa in TCP Series, Vol. 2, Pg. 78 Cock, J. (2000); Weaponry and the Culture of Violence in South Africa , Pg. 77

52

33

The Canadian Immigration and Refugee Board based its decision on the claims made by Huntly, that he was being persecuted by black South African criminals because of his race, and that the South African government was unable or unwilling to protect him53.

The Brandon Huntly case pointed out and raised some of the concerns and issues that emerge in contemporary discussions and discourses of crime and violence in post-apartheid South Africa,
pointing in particular to the fear that exists amongst whites in general, and Afrikaners in particular, that they are the prime targets of crime and violence perpetuated by blacks for political reasons, i.e. retribution for the crimes and sins of apartheid. But the findings of the Afrobaromenter Study on Crime and Violence in post-apartheid South Africa refuted Huntlys allegations and claim that white

people are victims of crime and violence more than other population groups in South Africa, but instead states that fear of crime has declined amongst whites54.

The Afrobarometer Study on Crime and Violence in post-apartheid South Africa states that Huntly submitted newspaper reports of criminal attacks and statements by opposition party leaders as evidence that whites were being targeted by criminals and that the South African government responded with apathy55. He argued and contended that whites were being targeted by blacks in acts of crime and violence as retribution for apartheid, also asserting that he was discriminated against by the ANC government through its affirmative action policies 56. This fear of crime and violence perceived to be directed against whites still persists in South Africa. This
53

Sunday Times (2009); SAs Refugee Faces Deportation 06 September Sunday Times (2009); SAs Refugee Faces Deportation 06 September, Pg. 3

54

55

Afrobarometer Study on Crime and Violence in South Africa , Afrobarometer Briefing paper, No. 96, November

2010, Pg. 1, Accessed at www.idasa.org/media/uploads/outputs/files/afrobarometer_fear_of_crime.pdf

Afrobarometer Study on Crime and Violence in South Africa , Pg. 1

56

Harris, B., Valji, N. & Simpson, G. (2004) Crime, Security and Fear of the Other, Centre for the Study of Violence and Reconciliation. Accessed at www.csvr.org.za

34

has resulted in many people in the suburbs raising their fences higher and installing private security systems in fear of lurking, rampant and dangerous criminals, with some even raising calls for the return of the death penalty and justifying uncontained vigilante violence against perceived criminals57.

On May 17, 2010 the Christian Science Monitor published an article with the headline White South Africans use Facebook in Campaign to Return to Holland. Ian Evans wrote in the article that:
three hundred years after their forefathers left Europe for a new life in Cape Town, some Afrikaners are lobbying the Dutch government to grant them citizenship. The descendants of the Boer settlers are looking for an exit plan. They say white people have become targets of crime with tensions rising since the murder of right-wing Afrikaner Weerstandsbeweging(AWB) leader Eugene Terreblanche last month. They want the Dutch authorities to enact a "Jus Sanguinis" or right of blood allowing Afrikaners to return to what they claim is their original home58 [My Emphasis]

The article further elaborates that at the apparent fall of apartheid in 1994 many white South Africans left the country migrating to European countries like Canada, New Zealand, Australia, America and Britain fearing racial retribution by blacks. Similar sentiments were evoked after Terreblanches killing as some whites, and Afrikaner farmers in particular, feared South Africa was heading for Zimbabwe-style land seizures of their lands and property59.

Valjie et al conclude in their paper that this fear of criminal violence as well as crime itself threatens the reconciliation project in South Africa60.The murder of Eugene Terreblanche is one
57

Harris, B., Valji, N. & Simpson, G. (2004) Crime, Security and Fear of the Other

58

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2517113/posts http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2517113/posts 35

59

of the best examples that clearly demonstrate exactly how complex the nature of post-apartheid violence and crime really is, and proof of just how much media representations and (re)productions of issues relating to crime and violence in contemporary South African society can contribute to the development of fears and anxieties about threats to peace, security and stability in the country.

Media and Representation

The media play a crucial role in shaping and influencing public discourse around issues of crime and violence, like many other issues relevant to society. According to David Altheide the evidence is quite strong that mass media reports about topics inform public opinion and contribute in no small way to setting social and political agendas 61. Media also plays a significant and central role in formulating discourses of fear around crime and violence through its pervasive communication, spreading of symbolic awareness, and raising anxieties about danger and risk looming out there. Thus, the mass media play a large role in shaping public agendas by influencing what people think about62. Most importantly and in addition to that, the media also plays a crucial and significant role in shaping and influencing how people think about the particular issues it covers. It constructs meaning to what it represents.

The mass media enables its audiences - the public - to recognize various knowledge frames, codes and segments of information that provide a general, carefully structured and pre-meditated

61

Altheide, D. (2003); Mass Media, Crime and the Discourse of Fear in The Hedgehog Review, Pg. 16 Accessed athttp://www.iasc-culture.org/HHR_Archives/Fear/5.3CAltheide.pdf Altheide, D. (2003); Mass Media, Crime and the Discourse of Fear, Pg. 16

61

36

definition of what is (re) presented before us. The processes and practises involved in the selection, organization, inclusion and exclusion, and (re) presentation of particular information in the media configure and structure such issues (re)presented to its intended audiences along particular ideological (and sometimes political) lines.

According to Altheide & Michalowski, frame, theme, and discourse are also related to communication formats that, in the case of mass media, refer to the selection, organization, and presentation of information63. They explain that frames focus on what will be discussed, how it will be discussed, and above all, how it will not be discussed64. Therefore public perceptions and views on certain issues and problems are influenced, structured and fixed by media through its representations because the audiences derive and negotiate meaning from the media texts and images presented to them. Nonetheless, for many people, the mass media, and news reports in particular, are still perceived to be mere reflectors of real events as they happen in the world. This is problematic as we will see.

The media coverage of the killing of Eugene Terreblanche has played a significant role in constructing and shaping public perceptions and understandings about the causes and consequent (possible) effects of the murder along highly racialized lines. This research essay locates the far ranging and broad discourses, meanings and interpretations that emerged about and after the killing with the more elaborate and complex discourses on crime and violence in post-apartheid South Africa. One thing that is clear is that we cannot fix a simple, narrow, linear and final narrative of Eugene Terreblanches murder.

63

Altheide, D.L .& Michalowski, R.S. (1999); Fear in the News: A Discourse of Control, The Sociological Quarterly, Vol. 40, No. 3, University of California Press, Pg. 478
64

Altheide, D.L .& Michalowski, R.S. (1999); Fear in the News: A Discourse of Control, Pg. 478

37

How the murder unfolds

In order for us to analyze and examine the murder of Eugene Terreblanche more effectively - its representations in the media and the meanings attached to it, I will elaborate on how the Terreblanche murder unfolds in the media. The murder of Eugene Terreblanche came at a time when public discourse in South Africa, as championed by the media and politicians, was largely immersed in the case of Julius Malema, President of the African National Congress Youth League (ANCYL), who had been sent to court by a civil rights group AfriForum for allegedly inciting violence against white farmers through singing the controversial anti-apartheid struggle song called Dubula Ibhulu, translated as Shoot the Boer.

In March 2010 Malema was called to appear several times before the ANCs disciplinary committee for sowing divisions within the ranks of the ANC and bringing it into disrepute 65. The charges laid against him included singing the Dubul' Ibhulu at a number of gatherings, making public utterances and statements on Botswana, publicly attacking ANC president Jacob Zuma during an ANC disciplinary hearing, publicly supporting Zimbabwean president Robert Mugabe's Zanu-PF party and barring a BBC reporter from a press conference. Malema further caused great controversy and outrage when he fiercely and defiantly continued to publicly sing the controversial song repeatedly at rallies of the ANCYL and during his birthday bash which was attended by thousands of young supporters of the ANC.

AfriForum, an Afrikaner civil rights group reacted to this by sending a petition with a list of about 1600 victims of farm violence to Luthuli House, the headquarters of the ANC, but the
65

Arseneault, J., (2010);"Races Among Men: Masculinity and Interracial Community in South African Cultural texts", Open Access Dissertations and Theses, Paper 4210, Pg. 2, Accessed at

http://digitalcommons.mcmaster.ca/opendissertations/4210 38

ANCYL rejected the list and petition66. AfriForum then took the matter to court, and on Friday 26th March 2010 acting Judge, Leon Halgryn of the South Gauteng High Courts ruling resolved that the song Dubula Ibhulu (Shoot the Boer) constituted hate speech and that it was unconstitutional and inappropriate to sing the song within the current democratic dispensation67.The song Dubula Ibhulu was likened unto the fiery chanting of the popular 1980s revolutionary song Kill the Boer fiercely uttered by Peter Mokaba during a Chris Hani memorial rally in Cape Town a few days after his assassination in April 199368.

The singing of the song Kill the Boer by Peter Mokaba in that very fragile political atmosphere as South Africa was preparing for a transition to a democratic dispensation caused outrage amongst the Afrikaner farming community who asserted and claimed that the song incited violence and genocide against Afrikaner people69. Interestingly, there are parallels and ironies between the clear political assassination of Chris Hani in the early 90s and the mysterious murder of Terreblanche almost two decades later. When Hani was killed on his driveway in 1993, there were deep fears that his murder would cause an outrage amongst the Black population and that a civil war would break out in the country, thus deeming null and void the settlements and agreements that had been reached at the CODESA negotiation tables; when Terreblanche was killed, similar fears arose, with the media sustaining and perpetuating these fears through the production of contradictions, and its fixed, structured and organized circulation of news stories that evoked sentiments of revenge, war, racial conflict, civil unrest and polarization.

66

http://dailymaverick.co.za/article/2010-03-29-kill-the-boer-a-brief-history http://dailymaverick.co.za/article/2010-03-29-kill-the-boer-a-brief-history http://dailymaverick.co.za/article/2010-03-29-kill-the-boer-a-brief-history http://www.leadershiponline.co.za/articles/politics/496-kill-the-boer

67

68

69

39

In the same way that Hanis murder in 1993 had caused Nelson Mandela to issue out a public statement condemning the murder and urging for calm in the country on national television, the Terreblanche murder also caused the current South African state President, Jacob Zuma, to hastily issue out a public statement in condemnation of the murder, also calling and urging for calm in the country on national television. Perhaps the only vivid contrast between the two murders lies in the personalities and political ideas for which the murdered were known to represent during their lifetimes; with Hani deemed and constituted as a noble revolutionary and freedom fighter, a man of the people who had struggled to topple the oppressive apartheid regime, and Terreblanche represented as the man who defied and opposed democracy in favour of preserving the oppressive apartheid regime and the out-dated and insignificant racist ideas of white supremacy.

The killing of Terreblanche on the same Easter weekend eighteen years after Hanis assassination further entrenched fears and anxieties amongst Afrikaner farmers that indeed there was a political conspiracy amongst the ANC (blacks) to exterminate them. Thus, to the AWB, right wing groups and Afrikaner farmers in general, the Terreblanche killing was constituted not just a simple case of homicide, but as a political assassination designed, planned and orchestrated by the ANC, fostered through the inflammatory statements about nationalization of mines and ceasing of farm lands without compensation and the persistent singing of the controversial antiapartheid struggle song sung by its Youth League leader, Julius Malema.

In the video sharing network, YouTube, there are many videos that raise the very same claims of genocide committed by terrorist or communist blacks70 as represented by the ANC against white people. One video even shows Nelson Mandela in a funeral of a comrade with ANC cadres

40

singing the song Hambakahle which states : Hamba kahle mkhonto, we mknonto, mkhonto wesizwe, thina bantu bomkhonto sizmisele ukuwabulala, wona lama bhulu, translated as: Farewell spear, spear of the nation, we people of the spear, are willing and determined, to kill these boers71.

The video is used in a context where Mandela is accused of complicity in genocide against white people, and Afrikaners in particular, through his alleged singing of this struggle song in which the mourners bid farewell to their fallen comrade and pledge on his life to kill these Boers. However, if one observes the video closely and carefully, then one can clearly see that, though Mandela is standing in front as the central figure in the frame of the video, he is not singing the song, though his right fist is raised in the traditional Black Power salute. The people around him though, such as Ronnie Kasrils and Cyril Ramaphosa are singing boldly. Various groups on the social network Facebook and a number of other online blog sites also raise the very same sentiments of racial violence targeted against white farmers in South Africa72.

These fears and anxieties of genocide against whites are not an isolated, unique South African phenomenon, but are related to histories of most anti-colonial movements. This was also demonstrated in Kenya by the Land and Freedom Movement known as the Mau Mau (by the British) led by Field Marshal General Dedan Kimathi who became Kenyas first national hero. The Mau Mau fought fiercely against the British in Kenya and committed many civil atrocities, targeting white men, women and children, and ceasing some lands and properties73. The similar sentiments, fears, anxieties and insecurities arose in Zimbabwe when Robert Mugabes ZANU PF initiated a land redistribution program. Subsequent to that many white farmers were driven
71

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NKiePbTcAfY&feature=related http://afrikaner-genocide-achives.blogspot.com/ http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1375967/Kenya-Mau-Mau-atrocities-1950s-dossier.html

72

73

41

off properties and farms which they had occupied for many yearsby armed groups associated with the ZANU PF74.

Shoot the Boer, Crime & Violence: The Farm Attack Phenomenon According to Veronica Hornschuh farm attacks or acts of violence against farms and smallholdings as they are more recently termed, have been a national issue since 1997. Both government and Agri South Africa (Agri SA), the former South African Agricultural Union (SAAU), have been treating the attacking of farmers with the highest priority 75. She further elaborates writing that Agri SA, which is the largest representative of commercial farmers in South Africa, in turn focused attention on the plight of members of the farming community and on the detrimental effects attacks had on food production. It publicly condemned attacks on farmers, held talks with government representatives on a regular basis, drew up petitions and organized protests against farm attacks in all nine provinces76.

Both former State Presidents Nelson Mandela and Thabo Mbeki took note of the issue of farm attacks to the extent that on the 01 December 1997 the Rural Protection Plan was initiated with the aim of enhancing the efficacy of the security forces in rural areas, followed by the investigation into farm and smallholding attacks conducted by assistant Commissioner Britz and

74

http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/0308/feature5/

75

Hornschuh, V. (2007); A Victimological Investigation of Farm Attacks with Specific Reference to Farmers Perceptions of their Susceptibility, the Consequences of Attacks on Farmers and the Coping Strategies Employed by them after Victimization, M.A. Thesis, Faculty of Humanities, University of Pretoria, 1 Accessed athttp://upetd.up.ac.za/thesis/available/etd-07282008-094048/unrestricted/dissertation.pdf
76

Hornschuh, V. (2007); A Victimological Investigation of Farm Attacks with Specific Reference to Farmers Perceptions of their Susceptibility, the Consequences of Attacks on Farmers and the Coping Strategies Employed by them after Victimization, 16

42

Director Seyisi from the 01 January till 31 May 199877. A few months after this investigation was conducted, on the 31st October 1998 a Summit on Rural Safety was held to reach agreement on how to deal with the problem of farm and smallholding attacks78.

However, in spite of all these efforts to try and combat crime and violence perpetuated against farmers, the incidents of farm attacks did not decline79. As a result, the sentiment and suspicion amongst farmers that there was more to the attacks than just mere ordinary criminal activity grew. The organized and powerful farming community represented by structures such as the Transvaal Agricultural Union (TAU) which broke off from Agri SA, pointed at the increasing incidence of farm attacks, the cruelty often exhibited by the criminals, the military precision with which many of the attacks were executed, the fact that sometimes nothing was stolen during these heinous assault and murder attacks, and the inability of the security forces to deal effectively with the problem. From that they deduced that farm attacks were politically inspired and that the real aim was to drive the (white) farmers off the land so that the land could be occupied by the (black) majority. Some individuals went so far as to accuse the SAPS of a cover up, and even of complicity in farm attacks80.

Subsequently what followed is that on the 05 April 2001, the National Commissioner of Police appointed a Committee of Inquiry into Farm Attacks to investigate the phenomena of farm

77

Hornschuh, V. (2007); A Victimological Investigation of Farm Attacks with Specific Reference to Farmers Perceptions of their Susceptibility, the Consequences of Attacks on Farmers and the Coping Strategies Employed by them after Victimization, 15
78

Hornschuh, V. (2007); A Victimological Investigation of Farm Attacks with Specific Reference to Farmers Perceptions of their Susceptibility, the Consequences of Attacks on Farmers and the Coping Strategies Employed by them after Victimization, 15
79

Report of the Commission of Inquiry into Farm Attacks, Pg. 3 Report of the Commission of Inquiry into Farm Attacks, Pg. 4

80

43

attacksto establish the motives and causes for attacks against the farming community 81. The Freedom Front Plus (FF +) was the only political party that made a submission to the Commission proposing that farm murders were political and that the death penalty should be brought back82. As a follow up to this submission to the Commission, in 2003 the FF + launched a complaint with the Human Rights Commission (HRC) against the ANC for singing the antiapartheid struggle song with the words Kill the Boer.

The Human Rights Commission banned the controversial song, declaringthat the words contained in the song constituted hate speech and that the song should not be sung publicly or privately. The ANC opposed this decision, while supporting the ANCYL President Julius Malema, adamant that DhubulaIbhulu formed part of the heritage of the struggle against apartheid.83. Subsequently, the ANC launched an appealagainst this court decision, which they also lost as the song was once again declared to constitute hate speech.

Just three weeks before his death, Eugene Terreblanche is reported to have called the Beeld newspaper on the 11th March 2010 to inform them of an AWB Press Release about Malemaspersistence in singing this controversial song. In the statement he issued out Terreblanche stated that:
During an emergency meeting of the executive council of the AWB a decision was made that unless Malema is repudiatedby the highest authorities in the ANC, the AWB would consider Malema's 'Kill the Boere' statements asa declaration of war against the white manThe ANC and its lapdog, Julius Malema, must now accept that the

81

Report of the Commission of Inquiry into Farm Attacks www.vryheidsfront.co.za/english/farm_murders.doc http://www.citypress.co.za/SouthAfrica/News/ANC-defends-Kill-the-boer-song-20100311-2

82

83

44

AWB will not be able to stop the violence that will result, Should Malema not be silenced in singing Kill the Boere. As leader of the AWB I declare with contempt that the ANC government's so-called youth under Malema have indeed declared war against defenceless Boer women and vulnerable children. The new commando structure that the AWB is currently deploying, will indeed consider Malema and his blatant and irresponsible statements as the highest priority on its upcoming executive-board meeting84 [My Emphasis]

Terreblanche further made it clear in the statement that if the ANC did not stop Julius Malema from singing the song, the AWB would act, saying that the executive board of the AWB would have to decide on what action would be taken by the organization to defend Afrikaners against Malemas incitation. He elaborated by saying that at this stage we have more civilian farmers, women and children citizens under ANC rule, who have been murdered as civilian citizens under ANC rule, than there were soldiers who were slain during the three year war against the might of Britain85.

In the next chapter I shall elaborate more on the different narrative strands that have accompanied the various representations of the Terreblanche killing. I shall show how these narratives were informed and marked by larger histories of the South African past; how the media, politicians, the AWB, the accused through their lawyers and the South African government all consigned and configured the murder in particular ways to suit their own personal agendas thus appropriating it as a more historic/political, than merely a tragic event.

84

http://why-we-are-white-refugees.blogspot.com/2010/04/oom-eugenes-symbolism-white-supremacy.html

85

http://why-we-are-white-refugees.blogspot.com/2010/04/oom-eugenes-symbolism-white-supremacy.html

45

Chapter Two

In chapter one I have laid down the unfolding of the Eugene Terreblanche killing in the media, and newspapers in particular, both online and print. From the very onset the Eugene Terreblanche murder is not taken just as an ordinary crime, but as an extreme event that could have resulted in a bloody race/ethnic/civil war, thus, moving the state President to address the nation on national television urging for calm. Subsequent to the first media reports of the killing, the series of stories that later emerged around the murder were filled with many contradictions, tensions and conflicts, twists and turns, rumours and lies. The Terreblanche murder carried with it many different strands of narratives such as the Julius Malema saga around the song Shoot the Boer, the AWB race/ethnic/civil war threats that supposedly posed a threat to the countrys national security, the mysterious condom/sex/sodomy allegation and scandal, human rights concerns about treatment and exploitation of farm workers particularly by white farmers, the farm murder phenomenon with all its political associations, and the Terreblanche familys representations of the deceased. This murder provides a clear example of how the lines between crime, violence and politics in post-apartheid South Africa have become very blurry and closely linked to South African histories of race, colonialism and apartheid.

This chapter shall discuss these particular narrative strands emerging from the reports of the Terreblanche murder. I will demonstrate how these different controversies and narratives that have characterized and accompanied the(re) production of information, knowledge and meaning about the Terreblanche murder are part of longer, complex histories that continue to play out in contemporary South African society. These different strands of narratives were reflective of not only current persisting anxieties, insecurities, fears and political agendas amongst particular sectors of South African society; but also of the persistence of the past in influencing
46

contemporary perceptions and understandings of crime and violence - resulting in popular discussions among the general populace being centered and immersed around these issues.I shall show how something that at first value could have been deemed an ordinary case of homicide dragged with it big histories and was blown out of proportion and exaggerated beyond scope by differentvoices, each advancing and pursuing its own particular vendetta and thus subscribing its particular meanings to and representation of the killing. The Eugene Terreblanche murder showed the complex nature of the very intimate relationship that exists between crime, violence, politics and history in contemporary South Africa. Certainly, this killing illustrated the very complex and clandestine nature of democratic politics and social relations in the new South Africa.I shall not attempt to develop or concretize a simple, singular, narrow and absolute master narrative of the killing of Terreblanche. Really, I think this is impossible considering the very complex nature of any human being. There is no simple story to tell the story of a person. Mine is to examine the varied popular narratives that enveloped and emanated out of the dead corpse of Eugene Terreblanche.

I do not concern myself with the question of who killed Eugene Terreblanche simply because that question is too narrow and cannot assist us here in engaging with the more complex and broader questions, such as why so many voices compete to represent the dead body of Terreblanche? Of course, by now it is public knowledge that judge John Horn, the judge presiding over the Eugene Terreblanche murder, sentenced 30 years old Chris Mahlangu to life in prison; while his co-accused Patrick Ndlovu, who was a teenager in 2010 during the time of the killing, was only found guilty of housebreaking but acquitted for murder. So the question of who killed him is really a non-issue. The critical question here is why so many varied narratives emerge, what all these voices are competing for, how are these narratives constituted and negotiated? For me these are the questions that we as historians ought to put our minds to.
47

What we see is that through the dead corpse of Eugene Terreblanche we are drawn in to witness a world of contemporary South African politics at play; to see how contemporary voices and texts compete to represent the dead, to be the sole authorities over the life of the dead corpse over which they compete. Terreblanches dead body is a repository of varied conflict histories marked by an unstable interplay of truth and illustration where narratives mediated fears of violence and fashioned colonial imaginations86. The task therefore, as Ann Laura Stoler writes, is clearly not to identify a fixed and singular social context and then plot a constellation of biased and intentionally designed stories told to obscure it87. It is rather to understand what these narratives indicate, what they are speaking to and what they are echoing; to understand how to represent the incoherencies and contradictions and conflicts that mark the killing rather than construct a neatly packaged story.

Not a Normal Murder

Soon after the Eugene Terreblanche murder was reported on the national and international news media, it became clear that this was not an ordinary case of murder. It could never be ordinary because, to many South Africans, Terreblanche was not an ordinary personality. The great controversy that emerged around his killing and death can be said to be a mirror-projection of particular kind of controversial figure he was during his whole political lifetime. After Eugene Terreblanches murder was reported on the national and international news media, his dead body was immediately transfigured/transformed into a stage for political and historical contestations as various voices competed to speak on behalf of the cadaver and to represent their own versions of the truth about his killing. These were competing voices of various political parties including

86

Stoler, A.L., (1992); In Cold Blood: Hierarchies of Credibility and the Politics of Colonial Narratives , Representations, No.37, Special Issue: Imperial fantasies and Postcolonial Histories, University of California Press, Pg. 153.
87

Stoler, A.L., (1992); In Cold Blood: Hierarchies of Credibility and the Politics of Colonial Narratives , Pg. 153.

48

that of the deceased, news media houses, government, the police, farm workers, unions, the Terreblanche family and general South African civilians through general discussions on public transports, at work, in communities and via discussions on online social network groups each voice (re)producing and advancing its own version of Terreblanches demise. It is imperative for historians to interrogate these contending voices in order to understand how they are constituted and negotiated, and most importantly, why. This could never have been an ordinary murder because, to many people in South Africa and the world over, Eugene Terreblanche was a very controversial and complicated personality and politician during his lifetime; but to some, even more so in death. The fact that he was killed during a period of tension and unease in the national discourse of South African politics due to the daunting public performances staged by politicians of all sorts around the singing of theShoot the Boer struggle song by former ANC Youth League president Julius Malema, meant that his death could never be understood or explained with simplistic, narrow renderings. The fact that Eugene Terreblanche was an Afrikaner farmer who advocated for the racial politics of separate development or apartheid, a notorious figure popularly known as a racist and a white supremacist; coupled with the fact that the two accused of killing him were two young Black males whom he employed on his farm; and the later scandals about and accusations against the dead corpse by Chris Mahlangu, one of the accused, all this meant that this could never be an ordinary, simple murder. Surely, apartheids racial politics, the notorious politics of South Africas right wing, human rights notions about the harsh conditions under which Black farm workers work, live and are treated in white owned farms, the longer and far more complex colonial histories, and obvious actors like Julius Malema all these factors could not escape being written into the killing of Mr. Terreblanche.

49

Moreover the rumours, speculation, contradictions and lies that continually marked the Terreblanche murder trial, ranging from allegations of sodomy by the accused, to claims that a used condom was found at the crime scene, to accusations of a botched crime scene by police, to the inconsistent and seemingly unreliable testimonies in court by the police who were involved in the investigations of the killing these factors also meant that the killing could never be an ordinary case. At the same time, these very same inconsistencies and contradictions, these lies and rumours, these conflicts and tensions tell us something more complex about social, political and economic relations in post-apartheid South Africa. The rumours and lies and the apparent contradictions and great suspense that mark the whole Terreblanche case are echoing voices of (re)constructed histories which cannot be ignored or dismissed as insignificant. This especially true if we consider that narratives are necessarily emplotted in a way that life is not. Thus they necessarily distort life whether or not the evidence upon which they are based could be proved correct88. Luise White, in her paper Telling More: Lies, Secrets and History, writes that lies and errors enabled historians to understand the overarching patterns and pathologies of colonial ruleWhether a rumour or gossip is true or false isnt what is important about it. What is important about rumours is that they come and go with great intensity... Historians could read in the inaccurate, the fantastic, and the constructed a world of colonized peoples we would not otherwise see89. Thus, the apparent rumours, speculation, contradictions, shocking allegations and outright lies that emerge from the Terreblanche killing ought to be read as by us historians as a window into a realm of knowledge which is not easily accessible, a world veiled by the very nature of democracys diplomatic formality which tends to be organized and structured to the

88

Trouillot, M-R., (1995); Silencing the Past: Power and the Production of History , Beacon Press, U.S.A, Pg. 06.

89

White, L. (2000); Telling More: Lies, Secrets, and History; History and Theory, Theme Issue 39; Wesleyan University, Pg 13.

50

benefit of the interests of white capital primarily, i.e. the drivers of the economy. For me, the critical question here is not which narrative story is particularly true or false. What is important is what the plausibility of a particular story reveals about a particular audience90. The Terreblanche killing showed that crime and violence in post-apartheid South Africa is linked to the broader South African histories of colonial dispossession and apartheid racial and economic oppression, and the subsequent nationalist struggle to relinquish these evils. All these histories come to life from the dead body of Terreblanche.The speculation, rumours, lies and contradictions that emerge from the narratives of the killing are all crafted and packaged for particular audiences, and they not only conceal, but also explain. They are appropriated for particular audiences which are responsive to these claims; to them these rumours and lies sound reasonable and give meaning to events.

What makes this killing not an ordinary murder is all this peculiar baggage it carries with it; the varied narratives, perspectives and social imaginations it evokes, the competing voices over the dead victim, the contradictions, rumours and lies that mark it, the ability of the dead to become a site for political and historical contestation these are all factors that render the killing somewhat extraordinary. This murder is not ordinary or perhaps extraordinary than others because it gets written and inscribed into many other complex South African histories. Through it, contemporary political figures, media agents, and ordinary citizens all come together to enact the past; the dead corpse of Eugene Terreblanche being the stage or the site where all this is played out. After all, although South Africa definitely has one of the highest rates of crime in the world91, its not every day that a homicide case is deemed a threat to the countrys national

90

White, L. (2000); Telling More: Lies, Secrets, and History; History and Theory, Theme Issue 39; Wesleyan University, Pg 14.
91

Centre for the Study of Violence and Reconciliation (CSVR)for the Justice, Crime Prevention and Security (JCPS) cluster Submitted to the Minister of Safety and Security, (2009); Why does South Africa Have Such High Rates of

51

security. And after all, as Professor Willie Breytenbach said: Terreblanche wasnt a normal farmer92.

Who is Eugene Terreblanche? This question seems simple, yet it requires no simple answer. There has never been one simple and straight forward answer to tell the biography of individuals, let alone that of a figure so controversial as Eugene Terreblanche. Eugene Terreblanche, like many politicians in general, was a multifaceted character who had multiple biographies: an articulate, eloquent and poetic political orator, a staunch Afrikaner nationalist, a feared right-wing politician, a racist whitesupremacist, an exploiting employer, a saved Christian, a loving family patriarch, husband and father. We cannot fix a singular particular narrative of Terreblanches biography, derived either from the archive or from any other source, and claim it to be the absolute life history of the man as historians of the past tended to approach life histories.

In his paper entitled The Individual, Auto/Biography and History in South AfricaCiraj Rasool explains that in the past life histories produced within social history continued to document lives in realist frames of recovery93. In writing about Terreblanches demise I will not attempt to produce all-embracing real history of the mans life. I dont think that one can be able to recover and/or to construct a singular, absolute and neatly packaged life history of individuals. This research transcends the usually overly simplistic, orderly and realist approach to telling the life history of a man to discover and explore the far more complex, broader and interesting
Violent Crime? Supplement to the final report of the study on the violent nature of crime in South Africa ; Pg. 02. Accessed at http://www.csvr.org.za/docs/study/7.unique_about_SA.pdf
92

The Star, 05 April 2010, Pg. 6

93

Rasool, C., (2004); The Individual, Auto/Biography and History in South Africa ,A dissertation submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in History, University of the Western Cape, Pg. 04. Accessed at http://etd.uwc.ac.za/usrfiles/modules/etd/docs/etd_init_2781_1175238139.pdf

52

narratives of the life of quite a significant andcontroversial figure in the South African political history as Eugene Terreblanche.

Writing about the complex life of a controversial man as Terreblanche is not an easy task. Drawing from Rasools work, the intent here is to understand the complex relationship between life and narrative, the dialogue between biographical processes and autobiographical traces, and the narrative worlds of institutions such as political formations, which have given rise to storied lives94. So, in answering the question who is Eugene Terreblanche it is important that we appreciate and acknowledge the dynamism and multiplicity of individuals, knowing that no ones life is ever simple, static or fixed in one particular time or moment as human beings in general are continuously engaged in the process of being and becoming.

Thus, we must appreciate the fact that any effort to document or to understand the life history of Eugene Terreblanche and his demise would, and actually should, be marked by multiple, varied, contending and even contra-dictory biographical narrations and renderings of the man, each produced, fashioned and constituted for particular purposes and packaged for specific targeted audiences. And as historians we must understand that there exists no singular narrative to the life of human beings; Eugene Terreblanche was no exception. We must understand as Rasool states that all life histories are (re)constructed and are productions95. He writes that this would mean going beyond conventional, untheorised approaches to life history as chronological narrative, where the major research challenges are understood as archival and empirical. It is important to open up alternative approaches to biography that challenge historys resistance to theory, and

94

Rasool, C., (2004); The Individual, Auto/Biography and History in South Africa , Pg. 05. Rasool, C., (2004); The Individual, Auto/Biography and History in South Africa, Pg. 12

95

53

pose questions about narration and selfnarration, gender and biographys relationship with autobiography96.

It is in this context then that we ought to approach our answer to the question of who Terreblanche is. Through the life of Terreblanche historians are able to scrutinize and engage more intimately with issues of representation whether through archived material, narration, texts, gender issues and (auto) biographical constructions. Terreblanches life seems to have been a site for a broad contestation of narratives and texts, a battle-ground for competing voices to shape, represent and define events, a terrain for political, social and economic negotiations for control of the past. Surely, there can never be one simplistic and linear approach to tell the life of such a man. There can be no greater explanation of Terreblanche than a newspaper headline which appeared in the Daily Dispatch: A Man of Contradictions: Terreblanche Believed He Was Not A Racist97. Therefore, in attempting to recover the life history of such a man, we cannot therefore rely solely on the archived material or search for recorded facts, for all archives and all knowledge production processes are distorted, structured, fixed, negotiated and are not to be regarded as sites or repositories of absolute truths, but as social constructs98. We must read in between the lines and listen to all voices, search for the narratives within narratives and not allow ourselves to construct a biased version of what we would deem history. We must understand that history means both the facts of the matter and a narrative of those facts99

96

Rasool, C., (2004); The Individual, Auto/Biography and History in South Africa , Pg. 12 Daily Dispatch, 19 June 2010, Pg. 01

97

98

Cook, T. & Schwartz, J.M., (2002); Archives, Records, and Power: The Making of Modern Memory, Archival Science, 2, Kluwer Academic Publishers, Pg. 03.
99

Trouillot, M-R., (1995); Silencing the Past: Power and the Production of History , Pg. 02.

54

Well, a biography published by The Star newspaper states that Eugene Terreblanche was born in Ventersdorp to staunch Afrikaner nationalist parents on the 31st January 1944100. The article goes on to state that after matriculating he served as a policeman under the apartheid regime, spending time in the Special Guard Unit that protected the government figures, including the countrys prime minister. While in the police he was also chairman of the Polices Cultural Group, and took part in many of that groups drama performances. Perhaps this is where he gained his articulate oratory and public performance skills with which he captured and ceased his all white audiences during the height of his political career.

The Boerevolkstaat website writes that Terreblanche was raised in a deeply devout traditional Boer Protestant household. His grandfather was one of the Cape rebels - those Afrikaners who took up arms for the Boer cause during the Second Boer War of Liberation (1899 - 1902), although they lived in the British controlled Cape Province and not in the independent Boer Republics - and settled in the Transvaal after the conclusion of the war101.

Author and senior journalist Shafiq Morton wrote on the Voice of the Cape website that Terreblanche was also a staunch supporter of the Nationalist Party (NP) until 1969 when he disagreed with what he deemed the liberal policies of Prime Minister B.J. Voster102. He then resigned from the police force and became one of the founding members of the HNP (Herstigte Nasionale Party - Reconstituted National Party for which he also stood unsuccessfully for parliament. Then in 1973,Terreblanche and six other men, Jan Groenewald, brothers J.J. and D.J. Jordaan, Piet Preller, Renier Oosthuizen and Kobus Strydom formed the Afrikaner
100

The Star, 05 April 2010

101

http://www.volkstaat.net/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=805:eugeneterreblanche&catid=47:personalities&Itemid=108
102

http://vocfm.co.za/blogs/shafiqmorton/?p=214

55

Weerstandsbeweging (Afrikaner Resistance Movement otherwise known as AWB), a fundamentalist Calvinist-orientated103 Afrikaner nationalist right-wing organization, largely inspired by the despicable German Nazi as clearly epitomized in the resemblance of their triple seven emblem to Hitlers Nazi occult swastika.

Initially the AWB claimed to be opposed to the liberal policies that were being adopted by the NP towards blacks at that time, but later with the historic changes that emerged in South Africa in the early 90s, their prime opponent and enemy became the ANC (black) government which they politically and strategically appropriated and constituted as a communist terrorist organization characterized by the MK and its coalition with the South African Communist Party (SACP); the ANC was its sworn enemy104. Terreblanches AWB also claimed to be against racial assimilation, miscegenation, social integration and the economic system of international capitalism.

Popular renderings would state that Eugene Terreblanche was a controversial figure in South African politics who once posed a real threat to a peaceful transition from apartheid to democracy in South Africa when he led armed members of his AWB to disrupt a Congress for a Democratic South Africa (CODESA) meeting of the negotiations between the Nationalist Party government and the ANC at the World Trade Centre building in Pretoria inJune1993105.

In the early 90s,as it became clear that the apartheid demon would have to be exorcised out of South Africa to ensure a stable social, political and economic life and peace talks commenced at
103

Schnteich, M. &Boshoff, H., (2003); Volk Faith and Fatherland: The Security Threat Posed by the White Right, Monograph No.81, Pg. 36. Accessed at http://www.iss.co.za/pubs/monographs/no81/Content.html
104

http://vocfm.co.za/blogs/shafiqmorton/?p=214 http://www.c-r.org/our-work/accord/public-participation/southafrica-multiparty-process.php

105

56

CODESA negotiations with Mandela and FW de Klerk as the key figures and players trying to agree on an inclusive post-apartheid constitution, Terreblanche and his armed paramilitary AWB group threatened to bring the country into war and chaos rather than allow Afrikaners (whites) to be ruled by an ANC (black) government106.

Members of the AWB, led by Terreblanche, then stormed into the Kempton Park World Trade Centre by breaking through the glass front of the building with an armoured car, parading in military uniform inside the negotiation building and armed to the teeth, with some AWB members looking like bandits in balaclavas, waving flags and banners of the AWB and apartheid South Africa, their hate and anger evident to all who encountered them there as evident in the video footage of those events107.

Schnteich and Boshoff reveal in their book that during the run up to the election AWB members set off a series of bomb blasts, targeted mainly at taxi ranks, bus stops and terminuses where black people usually congregated, and at polling stations, ANC and National Party offices, and the Johannesburg International Airport, killing about two dozen people and injuring some 200. Some of the bombs used (in excess of 100kg explosives) were the largest that had ever exploded in South Africas history108. In explosive speech held at an AWB rally in 1994 after the bombings Terreblanche, wearing full military gear, declared that the world must know that we cannot live without freedom. If we must, we will take freedom with violence109.

106

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9v_d6dLTKVs&feature=related http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9v_d6dLTKVs&feature=related

107

108

Schnteich, M. &Boshoff, H., (2003); Volk Faith and Fatherland: The Security Threat Posed by the White Right, Monograph No.81, Pg. 18.
109

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PPvuAVO2-NI&feature=related

57

When a March 1994 Bophuthatswana invasion failed and ended up in disaster with three AWB general shot dead in front of news media camera, Terreblanche denied all responsibility, and instead claimed that the AWB tried to help and were willing to die for black people, for an independent black state Bophuthatswana. How can I feel myself responsible110? This event, coupled by Terreblanches response to and comments about it amongst others things, arguably dealt a decisive blow to the political posture of Terreblanche, and the morale of the rank and file of the AWB throughout the country as the support for the organization waned and declined and the organization was driven into the periphery of South African politics.

On the 23rd April 1997 Terreblanche was convicted on two counts, for attempted murder and assault on two black men. And on 17 June 2001he was sentenced to six years in prison for which he served three handed down on charges of assaulting Mr. Paul Motshabi who worked on his farm as a security guard. The attack left Mr. Motshabi left mentally and physically handicapped for life. Motshabi was beaten by Terreblanche because he was allegedly eating on the job111.Terreblanche was also sentenced on charges of attempted murder of Mr. John Ndzima who worked as a petrol attendant in Ventersdorp. Terreblanche had assaulted and set his dog on Mr. Ndzima who was bitten and suffered severely from the incident. In 2003, while he was in prison, he was sentenced to six years for terrorism but the charges were suspended on parole, for the terrorist bombings performed by the AWB in 1994.

110

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PPvuAVO2-NI&feature=related

111

www.sahistory.org.za

58

However, Terreblanche and the AWB rejected all these accusations against him claiming that there was a conspiracy against him because he was considered a threat to the new democracy in South Africa, and that the charges against him were part of the conspiracy that sought ways to isolate him from the social and political landscape. A biography written by Amos van de Merve and published just 18 months before the murder goes as far as stating that Terreblanche maintained that he had been jailed unfairly112 and that he knew the identity of the actual culprit. For many others though, these charges metted out against him served as proof and evidence of his and the AWBs hatred and intolerance of black people. But certainly, others had different views as the Boerevolkstaat website claimed that Terreblanche and the AWB had always expressed and fought for a southern Africa that would guarantee freedom and independence to all nations who historically inhabit it113. The funny thing here though is that this statement sound so familiar to one of the declarations contained in the ANCs Freedom Charter which states that South Africa belongs to all who live in it. It seems as though the AWB and the ANC were fighting a different fronts for the same thing after all: freedom and independence for all.

When Terreblanche was released from prison on 11 June 2004 he emerged claiming to be a born-again Christian who had modified his racist views, even though he still sought to continue to fight and agitate for a separate Afrikaner nation-state and against the killing of white farmers by black criminals. According to Van der Merwes biography, Terreblanches life changed when he was in prison; the whole attitude of the book is much more in line with forgiveness and reconciliation than I think the average person would expect114. The Eddie Botha quotes him as
112

http://www.griffel.co.za/eugeneterreblanche_my_side.html

113

http://www.volkstaat.net/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=805:eugeneterreblanche&catid=47:personalities&Itemid=108
114

http://www.griffel.co.za/eugeneterreblanche_my_side.html

59

having stated to Van der Merwe that if we do not accept them (other people) too as South Africans, we alienate them, their right to a heritageI grant to the Zulu and Xhosa the same benefits I want for my people. Therefore my battle is their battle too. We must stop fighting each other and start fighting for each other115. Bothas article goes on to state that Terreblanche later exclaimed that it is important to accept, that among all the different South Africans included in this country, there is one nation that towers above the others. This exemplifies the very contradictory nature of the personality and character that Terreblanche was.

He claimed to adhere to the sacred tenets of Christianity which propounds the noble idea of the brotherhood of man and the universal fatherhood of one God, while simultaneously unashamedly denouncing these very same sacred tenets through his advocacy of apartheid policies, the separation of races/ethnic groups. This flawed perspective of Terreblanche fails to see man as his brothers keeper, obstructs the notion of the singularity of humanity and rather perpetuates contention and division between racial or ethnic groups by advocating for separate states and borders between groups along fluid and shifting categories that are conjured up as naturally occurring, rigid and static. Furthermore, his view advances the idea that even though there is equality amongst nations, but some nations are more equal (tower above) all others. Nonetheless, Terreblanche continuously insisted that he was not concerned about race, nor was he advancing racial supremacist views, nor was he a bigot; he was primarily concerned about his faith, culture and language116.

But Eugene Terreblanche was also a gifted poet and skilled orator. His undeniable poetic talents were acknowledged by Van der Merwe in his biography which contains a number of his poetical
115

Daily Dispatch, 19 June 2010, Pg. 01. Daily Dispatch, 19 June 2010, Pg. 01.

116

60

writings. Most biographies of the man generally state that he had undoubted talent for drama and poetry117. Prior to the 1994 elections, his Afrikaans-language poetry works were on the state syllabus of Natal schools118. He used his poetic abilities very skillfully to deliver his message to his audiences with captivating essence. The Boerevolkstaat website explains it thus: there is certainly no doubt that Terreblanche's oratory was unsurpassed by any of his contemporaries, left or right Terreblanches voice was part of the secret - it was deep, rich and overpowering. His normal delivery was loud and deep, building to a screaming crescendo with rhythmic repetitious and long sentences. A favourite tactic was to suddenly drop his voice to a whisper so that the audience literally held its breath so as not to miss a word, and then to suddenly launch into a loud crescendo119. Upon his release from jail, he is said to have quoted Wordsworth's poem I Wandered Lonely As a Cloud in expression of how he felt about his arrest. In the late 90s he released Tolbos Poesie, a CD collection of his poetry read by himself in his bold, captivating oratory voice and most recently a DVD. The DVD was named "Inktrane", which is directly translated to English as "Ink Tears"120. Most of his poetry was packed with images of wide farms, dry riverbeds, windswept veld, frolicking gemsbok and scratching guinea fowl121.Tim Cohen of the Daily Maverick asks an interesting question though writing that Terreblanche fancies himself a poet but is it only a pose122? The answer to this, we will never know. Poses or no pose, the man had the ability to captivate his audiences under the sound of his tongue.
117

http://www.volkstaat.net/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=805:eugeneterreblanche&catid=47:personalities&Itemid=108
118

http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:fS8dojxP5mkJ:myfundi.co.za/e/Eug%C3%A8ne_Ney_ Terre%E2%80%99Blanche:_Profile+ink+trane+terreblanche&cd=3&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=za
119

http://www.volkstaat.net/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=805:eugeneterreblanche&catid=47:personalities&Itemid=108
120

http://www.klanke.co.za/prom/inktrane.htm http://www.economist.com/node/15865250 http://dailymaverick.co.za/article/2009-10-12-TerreBlanche-rides-again

121

122

61

At the time of his gruesome murder, Terreblanche was busy with revival of the AWB. In 2008 he began holding meetings with his groups and publicly announced that the AWB had restarted mobilizing again; this time the enemy was farm killings and Julius Malemas incitation to violence through singing of the controversial Shoot the Boer song. Among other initiatives, the AWB was willing to submit documents to the International Court of Justice of The Hague against Malema and the ANC, and to claim the right of the Boer nation on some lands in southern Africa123. It was during this time that his killing occurred.

Ilana Mercer, a libertarian author, columnist and blogger appropriates Terreblanche as one of many victims of the phenomenon called farm killings in Mandelas South Africa, as she put it in her article War on White South Africa 124. According to her, Mr. Terreblanche and all 3149 farmers murdered since freedom were slaughtered in ways that would do Shaka Zulu proud and he was a victim of a farm murder, plain and simple125. She constructed an overly simplistic and too linear narrative of Terreblanche as a victim of the largely South African phenomenon branded as farm killings. Well, in fact Terreblanche was a white Afrikaner farmer, and his alleged assailants were two young Black males. At face-value, the pronunciation of the incident as a farm killing seems plausible enough, and thus, justified. But the problem I have with this approach is that Mercer plays the blame game, constructing a simplistic victim/perpetrator narrative, rather than seeking to understand the more complex reasons why such an unfortunate incident would occur 18 years into democracy.

123

http://www.volkstaat.net/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=805:eugeneterreblanche&catid=47:personalities&Itemid=108
124

http://www.ilanamercer.com/phprunner/public_article_list_view.php?editid1=543 http://www.ilanamercer.com/phprunner/public_article_list_view.php?editid1=543

125

62

And to a certain extent Mercers representation of Terreblanche resonates with and has affinity to the general views expressed by the AWB which asserted that Terreblanches killing was a political assassination and that he was one of many white Afrikaner victims of ANC-inspired killings. To the general supporters and sympathizers of the AWB and its cause, Eugene Terreblanche was undoubtedly viewed as a true patriot and a true Christian, a born leader, brave (and not just with words), used to being at the forefront, able to speak to people, and to rise his nation126. To his wife and family, Terreblanche was a a clam, God-fearing man127. When Martie Terreblanche testified in court during her husbands murder trial she told the court that Terreblanche was no monster. He was great to people who worked for him128.

It is these contradictions that make up the person Eugene Terreblanche. As said earlier, human beings do not have chronological, neatly written histories. Individual lives are marked by contradictions and conflicts. As Rasool writes in his paper, merely to impose a narrative structure on events in the reconstruction of the past, as a chronological history of events or as a life history, in realist mode, placed in a historical context, is not enough. Rather, we should recognize the existence of multiple narrations intersecting and crosscutting each other, paralleling and contradicting each other as they compete for the creation of historical meaning129.

126

http://www.volkstaat.net/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=805:eugeneterreblanche&catid=47:personalities&Itemid=108
127

http://www.iol.co.za/news/crime-courts/et-was-no-monster-says-wife-1.1224680#.UKehJlsub08 http://www.iol.co.za/news/crime-courts/et-was-no-monster-says-wife-1.1224680#.UKehJlsub08

128

129

Rasool, C., (2004); The Individual, Auto/Biography and History in South Africa, A dissertation submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in History, University of the Western Cape, Pg. 49. Accessed at http://etd.uwc.ac.za/usrfiles/modules/etd/docs/etd_init_2781_1175238139.pdf

63

The biographic narrations of Terreblanches life we see above construct specific frames or lenses of imagination through which to read and understand both the complex social and political worlds in which he existed. Here we are given a hint to the possibilities of socialization processes that may have shaped him up or influenced him, the political circumstances that may have impelled him towards his ethos and political views, and see what the man was understood to be by others.

What we see here is that there is no singular answer to the question who is Eugene Terreblanche. He was many things, at many different times, to many different people/audiences. He was loved and hated; raised hope and awe. Eugene Terreblanche was a multifaceted man: a child born into a nationalist family, a gifted poet and skilled orator, a staunch supporter of the Nationalist Party (NP), an apartheid policeman, a founder and leader of a radical right-wing organization, a threat to democratic transition, a violent white supremacist, a brave and true patriot, a born again Christian, a reformed racist, a victim of politically-driven farm murders, and a God-fearing husband, brother and father. There is no neat, chronological and linear biography to tell the life history of such a man.

The South African Government Reaction to the Killing

My view is that the governments reaction to the Terreblanche killing was characterized by three particular actors; President Jacob Zuma, the Police and the National Prosecuting Agency (NPA) and Lawyers. It is through these distinct, yet related, bureaucracy offices that the governments reactions or response to the killing can be analyzed and assessed.

64

The first reaction of the government to the news of Terreblanches killing was an obviously hasty public television performance by the President Jacob Zuma who made an extensive statement condemning the killing. In his statement Zuma appropriated the killing as a labour dispute and called on South Africans to remain calm. As far as he was concerned it was time for us to unite all of us, black and white and put the nation and the country first. He called on politicians, leaders and organizations not to use Mr. Terreblanches death to score political points but to rather work harder to unite our people.

President Zuma, overtly or covertly, through the act of public appearance on national television urging for calm, was subtly informing South Africans that this killing was an unusual one with perceived unusual circumstances. For his office, the name Eugene Terreblanche resounded woes to the successful peaceful democratic project; this incident of his killing at the hands of two Black labourers was beyond any usual one. It was a threat to the countrys national security. Thus Zumas statement was geared towards preventing possible anarchy, a perceived bloodbath that would ensue if political leaders and actors acted irrationally, childishly and in divisive manners. For Zuma, this was no time to score political scores at the expense of the nation, but a historic time to rally the nation for unity and reason.

From the very moment that President Jacob Zuma appeared on national television addressing the nation and urging for calm, he immediately constituted the killing as a sophisticated, high profile case appropriating the killing as a possible threat to the countrys national security and international image, especially as this drama was taking place just less than two months before the country would be hosting the first ever FIFA soccer world cup to be held on the African continent130.

130

This fact alone meant that the eyes of the whole world were on South Africa during this time as many people all around the world were bracing themselves and preparing to come to the first world cup festival to the held on the

65

Zumas swift move to address the nation at this critical historic moment in time, strongly condemning the killing of Terreblanche and urging for calm and reason rather than irrational reaction and sensationalization, was informed by knowledge of the broader complex histories and politics attached to both the deceased and his two alleged murderers. The highest office in the country understood very well that there was no simple answer to this crime.

The staging of a public television appearance by Zuma was thus an act of diplomacy by the statesman, aware of the tempestuous climate aroused by the killing, to prevent the possibility of deadly chaos and anarchy the outbreak of a violent and bloody racial/ethnic/civil war. Zumas public address to the nation was also a pronunciation to the world that, regardless of the prevailing circumstances, the South African project of national reconciliation had not failed, but was rather on standing trial, being tested.

The government staged another performance when Minister of Police Nathi Mthethwa Commissioner of police Bheki Cele, North West province premier Maureen Modiselle, and other high ranking police officials, and a number of senior politicians visited Terreblanche's family in Ventersdorp the morning after the murder to express sympathy with the family131. They were apparently well received by the family and Terreblanches daughter, Beya132. This unusual performance by government officials, an obviously politically motivated display of solidarity and sympathy towards a man deemed a thorn on the backside of the ANC government, and even democracy, itself is probably one of the most spectacular public performances of the
African continent. South Africa could not afford to tarnish its international image by having high racial polarization while preparing to welcome international guests and visitors.
131

http://article.wn.com/view/2010/04/05/South_Africa_leaders_visit_Eugene_Terreblanche_family/ http://mg.co.za/article/2010-04-04-zuma-calls-for-calm-after-terreblanche-murder

132

66

reconciliation project the post-apartheid dispensation has ever witnessed. Or at least thats the impression the actors were giving. Both Nathi Mthetwa and Bheki Cele reportedly assured the Terreblanche family that they would get to the bottom of this133.

Another police performance was displayed during the trial of the alleged killers. A news report stated that racial tensions flared as police were forced to use barbed wire to separate a crowd of hundreds of blacks and whites outside the court134 . According to the report, armed police with rifles and riot shields, rushed in to separate the two groups of AWB and the alleged killers supporters when a middle-aged white woman sprayed an energy drink on the black group, sparking a scuffle. The two groups were then literally contained using barbed wire. It seemed as though apartheid was back again.

The police act of constructing a literal boundary between Blacks and Whites using barbed wire speaks volumes, not only about the police perceptions of this case, but also of the fragmented nature, and what I call a deranged psyche, of post-apartheid South African society. The polices action sought to prevent any possible outbreak of a fight between the two groups. But the question is: was it necessary to use barbed wire to separate the people gathered outside that court? What informed the polices decision to use this method? This is important because, even though they thought they were preventing a fight, they were constructing a literal picture of a polarized society. For what other imageries could reflect a deeply defected and polarized society than images of population groups separated by barbed wire and heavily armed police? The other aspect of the governments reaction to this killing was through the National Prosecuting Agency (NPA) which acted as prosecutors in the case and the lawyers of the accused

133

http://mg.co.za/article/2010-04-04-zuma-calls-for-calm-after-terreblanche-murder

134

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/africaandindianocean/southafrica/7560357/South-Africa-policeuse-barbed-wire-to-separate-whites-and-blacks.html

67

who acted as the defendants. What interests me here firstly was the ability of the state to become both prosecutor and defendant; its ability to have two faces all at once, its ability to normalize its apparent contradictions. Secondly, the government was seen here negotiating its own legal processes to harmonize a tempestuous atmosphere. The state represents Terreblanche as prosecutors; but also the state represents his alleged killers as lawyers.

All-in-all narrative, the underlying narrative developed and constructed by the South African government was that this was not just an normal day-to-day criminal murder, but rather an event that could jeopardize national security and damage the international image of the country, a case that could pose threats to peace and stability in the country just two months before the country would host the first ever World Cup tournament to be held in Africa. For the Zuma government this killing brought back memories of Chris Hanis assassination on the Easter of 1993 which had been viewed as a possible threat to national security, peace and stability in South Africa just a few months before the countrys first democratic elections. For Zuma, Nathi Mthethwa, Bheki Cele, this was a matter of national security, and maintaining peace and stability in the country.

It is thus that the South African government responded to the murder with urgency, showing its prioritization of the murder by the immediate and symbolical heavy police presence at the trial and at the funeral of Terreblanche days and weeks after the murder. President Zumas urging call for calm in the country, saying police should be allowed to do their work and that political parties should not use the Terreblanche killing to gain political points was in itself an
68

appropriation of the murder as a significant event that could jeopardize all the miraculous reconciliatory efforts for which South Africa is internationally renowned.

AWBs Reactions to the Killing

The AWB responded to the news of the Terreblanche murder by blaming the ANC government, and Julius Malema particularly, for being responsible of inciting blacks to kill whites in general, but Afrikaner farmers specifically through the singing and defense of the anti-apartheid song Dhubula Ibhulu (Shoot the Boer). The AWB casted Terreblanche as a direct victim of Malemas singing of this anti-apartheid struggle song and his fiery, forceful and militant rhetoric on South African land policies and on the nationalization of mines, claiming that the assassination of Terreblanche was also part of a broader ANC political conspiracy to drive out whites from South Africa. To them, this was a political assassination. Again, at first glance, this position seems very much plausible. But our role as historians is not to merely absorb and swallow these claims and write them out as history, but to investigate further what they are speaking to. We must remember that the Terreblanche killing evoked many voices competing for historical authority and the construction of meaning for and about it. Ours is to understand how these histories are constructed and negotiated, thus we cannot exclude in advance any of the actors who participate in the production of history or any other sites where that production may occur135. No individual narrative can explain or give meaning to this killing. All voices must be heard and analyzed because all historical narratives are also a bundle of silences, the result of a unique process, and our role as historians is to deconstruct, not only the heard voices, but also the silences they evoke.

135

Trouillot, M-R., (1995); Silencing the Past: Power and the Production of History , Pg. 25.

69

The assertion that the Shoot the Boer song led to ET's murder assumes that his killers are literate, that they read newspaper readers or, at the very least, watch the news on television and so would have been knowledgeable of these debates and discourses around race as they appeared in the media. This narrative was largely influenced and motivated by the widespread concern amongst Afrikaner farmers, and white people in general that they are targets of crime and violence for racial and political reasons. But the right-wing itself has never really had any faith in the ANC government from the very onset as Terreblanche once vowed in the early 90s that he would never accept an ANC government warning the ANC to never try to put your hands on this fatherland, we paid too dearly for it136.

The song Shoot the Boer carries with it a long, complex history of the struggle against colonialism and apartheid in South Africa. The song emerged at the height of the armed resistance against apartheid amongst the ranks of Poqo or Azanian Peoples Liberation Army (APLA), the Pan Africanist Congress of Azania (PAC) military wing. One of the chanting slogans of Poqo/APLA had been One Settler, One Bullet Kill the Boer, the Farmer. Poqo had been responsible for many bombings and killings of white civilians during the armed struggle era in South Africa and had often used these type of slogans to galvanize support and encourage commitment to the struggle from the blacks who heard them, but also the songs were used to raise terror, anxiety and fear from the general white population which was seen as part of the oppressive apartheid regime137.The militant Africanist Poqo/APLA managed with a minimum of formal leadership and organization, to create widespread fear among whites, who saw it as a

136

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iHCspCSCJwA

137

Truth and Reconciliation Commission of South Africa Report, Volume Two, Accessed at http://www.justice.gov.za/trc/report/finalreport/Volume%202.pdf

70

local version of the dreaded Kenyan Mau-Mau138 who were led by the guerrilla fighter FiledMarshal General Dedan Kimathi.

The term Afrikaner word Boer, or the Xhosa iBhulu or Zulu iBhunu, though meaning farmer in its direct formal translation, came to symbolize not only white farmers, but all white people and the apartheid establishment in general as symbolized by the government, the army, the police, corporate business and the church the primary pillars of the apartheid system. It was Peter Mokaba, the charismatic and controversial leader of the ANC Youth League in the early 90s who reignited the slogan One Settler, One Bullet Kill the Boer, the Farmer when he chanted it during a fiery ANC rally held to honour Chris Hani shortly after his assassination in 1993 by members of the right wing, Janus Walus and Clive Derby-Lewis. Mokabas chanting of this song as the country was preparing for a peaceful transition to a non-racial, democratic South Africa caused outrage and sparked fears and anxieties amongst white people, Afrikaners in particular, who asserted that his rhetoric was inciting blacks to commit genocide against whites (Afrikaners) in South Africa or to drive whites out of the country.

However, the song Shoot the Boer and the slogan One Settler, One Bullet Kill the Boer, the Farmer were not the only songs sung by the liberation movements as there were many others such as Hamba KahlemKhonto we Sizwe (Farewell Spear of the Nation) also sung at Hanis funeral by the then Sam Shilowa, now MbazimaS hilowa. The lyrics of the song Hamba Kahle Mkhonto state that:
Thina bantu bomkhonto sizimisele Ukuwabulala wona lama Bhulu (We people of the spear are determined to kill these Boers)[My Emphasis]

138

Gerhart, G.M. (1978); Black Power in South Africa: The Evolution of an Ideology , University of California Press, Berkeley, Pg 252

71

Other songs also sung by the soldiers of the South African liberation movements Umkhontowe Sizwe (MK) and Poqo/APLA was Dhubula Ngembayimbayi(Shoot with the rifle), Lawula Ngesabhamu (Rule with the Gun) and South African President Jacob Zumas favourite, uMshiniwam(My Machine Gun). These songs and many others, not only spoke of the pain, suffering, trials and tribulations of African people suffered at the hands of Boers (the apartheid regime/white people), as people and families were dispossessed, displaced and destroyed, children and young men and women fleeing their homes crossing borders into exile, joining the liberation movements and their armies to wage war against the oppressive racist South African regime; but they also encouraged and motivated the enthusiasm of the soldiers of the liberation movements to hold fast and continue with their struggle against the oppressive racist apartheid regime.

Historically, during the apartheid era, these types of songs were used as a means of solidarity amongst the exiles, the soldiers in the underground camps and political prisoners. But they were also sung by the general black masses in the rural areas, ghettoes and townships of South Africa during the apartheid days. And these kinds of struggle songs were not a uniquely South African phenomenon as similar revolutionary songs could be found and heard amongst all liberation movements in Mozambique, Zimbabwe, Namibia and throughout sub-Saharan Africa. However, in South Africa the one that has come into prominence and fame in contemporary post-apartheid discourses is the song Shoot the Boer, perhaps due to the threatening charge of violence towards a specific and identified target and enemy, iBhulu (the Boer/whites), that it invokes and subliminally compels its listeners to perform. However, one cannot escape the irrefutable fact that these songs were in reality literally evoking the killing of whites who were all regarded as amaBhulu.

72

When Julius Malema resurrected the song in 2003, and his persistence in defying the court rulings until recently, caused great outrage and concern amongst right-wing Afrikaners particularly, and many other organizations and sectors of the South African population like AfriForum, the FF+, DA and Agri SA which perceived his rhetoric to be inciting violence against white people and bringing division and discontent in the democratic rainbow nation. Since then, a battle emerged between Julius Malema and the ANC versus the neoliberal media, Afrikaner civil rights groups such as AfriForum, agricultural organizations such as AgriSA, opposition political parties such as the DA, and conservative and right-wing organizations like the FF+ and the AWB.

And the persistence of Malema and some ANC officials to sing the song after it had been declared to constitute hate speech by the South African Human Rights Commission (SAHRC) only served to further entrench the Afrikaner right-wing narrative of an ANC political conspiracy to wage genocide against whites in South Africa. For what other reason would propel members of the ruling party to sing a song declared unconstitutional by the courts of the land other than a wider conspiracy high up the corridors of power? In reference to Malemas persistent singing of the song Shoot the Boer and the ANCs defense of this controversial song as being part of the South African national heritage three days after the Terreblanche killing, the spokesperson for the South Africa Institute of Race Relations (SAIRR) Frans Conje issued out a statement in which he stated that it is plausible to consider that the ANCs exhortations to violence may be a contributing factor to the killing of Mr. Terreblanche. Certainly the ANCs exhortations to violence have created a context where the killings of white people will see a degree of suspicion falling around the party and its supporters. It is possible that the killing of Mr. Terreblanche will greatly strengthen the hand of a new hardened right wing in South Africa139.

139

www.sairr.org.za

73

However, Ziwaphi newspaper reported that the Mpumalanga branch of the ANCYL reacted with anger to the statements by opposition parties and civil rights groups linking Malemas singing of the controversial song Shoot the Boer to the death of Terreblanche with its provincial secretary, Hamzar Ngwenya, saying that it is also not right to link ANCYL president Julius Malema to this killing. He is not a murderer but a leader ... All those that are saying our president should be associated with this killing must wake up from their dreamland. There is no way we would succumb to the political failures of the opposition parties by allowing them to make our president their subject matter140.

Another article in the same newspaper written by Maviyo Ndinisa, provincial spokesperson of the Young Communist League (YCL), showed that the YCL also reacted with disdain to the comments and allegations by opposition parties blaming Malema for inciting blacks to kill whites through his singing of the controversial and banned song. Ndinisa defiantly wrote that we never revenged the death of Chris Hani and many more innocent South Africans who died in the hands of white people. We condemn the opposition parties for sensationalizing this matter as racial polarization, they must remember that their organizations were formed on the pillar of racial and class segregation, that is DA, FF+, ACDP and COPE and they started racial polarization. We warned all those who seek attention by diverting this matter by linking it to comrade Julius Malema will lead to serious defiance by young people and they will sing this song if irresponsible leaders continue to incite them by continually undermining our history and our liberation movement141.

140

Masinga, S., Julius Malema is a Leader, Not A Murderer, Says Mpumalanga YL, in Ziwaphi, Vol. 4, No. 7, 22 April 2010, Pg. 4, Accessed at www.ziwaphi.com
141

Ndinisa, M., Dont Blame ETs Death on Malema YCL, in Ziwaphi, Vol. 4, No. 7, 22 April 2010, Pg. 4, Accessed at www.ziwaphi.com

74

Commenting about to the controversial song sung by Malema, the Afrikaans singer Steve Hofmeyr reacted by saying that if you understand the hate speech of (ANC Youth League president Julius) Malema, you must understand why I cannot enter a stadium named after Peter kill the boer Mokaba. More recently Hofmeyr also caused further controversy by singing a pro-AWB song with the racist and derogatory word kaffir142.

In an article published on his website Hofmeyr is quoted as having stated that its time for Julius Malema to admit to the sometimes mutual incompatibility between hate speech and traditional songs, the way Afrikaners had to sacrifice traditional terms like kaffir. He cannot have his cake and eat it. If some can chant Kill the Boer, others will gladly reciprocate by revoking the vocable143. According to the article Hofmeyr confirmed that the word kaffir144 does appear in the lyrics of his new song Ons sal dit oorleef, but only in a certain context.

Hofmeyr justified his use of this racist word by saying that he used it in a particular context and that it was not meant to be derogatory towards blacks. In this way Hofmeyr was emulating Malema and the ANCs stance on the song Shoot the Boer when they argued that the words of the song were not literal, but could rather be understood in a particular historic context and that the word Boer in the song was not a reference to individual white people but to the whole system of apartheid.

142

http://why-we-are-white-refugees.blogspot.com/2011/05/steve-hofmeyr-uses-kaffir-in-proawb.html
143

http://why-we-are-white-refugees.blogspot.com/2011/05/steve-hofmeyr-uses-kaffir-in-proawb.html
144

According to Gabeba Baderoon the word Kaffer or Kaffir is originally derived from the Arabic Qafir or Kafir which literally means unbeliever or infidel. However during apartheid this term was corrupted, re-appropriated and used in a derogatory manner to denote Black people in South Africa, disavowing Black humanity similarly to the way the derogatory term nigger was used in the United States of America by whites to refer to Black people.

75

The White Genocide Narrative

The AWB thus used the killing of its leader and icon to galvanize more support for the organization from the many sympathizers, and to justify their demand for an independent Boer state within the borders of South Africa, with its secretary general Andrie Visagie threatening that the killing of Terreblanche was in fact a political assassination, a declaration of war by blacks on white South Africans and that the AWB would avenge the killing Terreblanche145. Jan van der Merwe, a small scale farmer and a member of the AWB was also reported to have said that none of us are safe. White farmers are always been murdered in this country, but now they have killed our leader, there must be consequences146.

These threats were, however, retracted by the new leader of the AWB Steyn van Ronge. But Van Ronge cautioned though that, with Terreblanches murder, the line had been drawn; this was the final straw, and they as AWB members would not allow white farmers to be murdered anymore, and that they were developing a security plan to fight farm murders147.The Star article further quoted Margarite Dreyer, a lifelong member the AWB as having said that:
it is not that we dont like the blacks, it is just that we want to be apart from them. We have our God and our ways, and they have their ancestors and the things that are important to them. God did not want us to be mixed like this. It is not a coincidence that Oom Gene (Terreblanche) died at Easter. He died so that we may be saved - so that God will give us our own homeland at last, so that the Afrikaners may be alone, like the people of Israel148[My Emphasis]

145

http://mg.co.za/article/2010-04-05-terreblanche-killing-awb-vows-revenge http://mg.co.za/article/2010-04-05-terreblanche-killing-awb-vows-revenge The Star 07 April 2010 The Star 07 April 2010

146

147

148

76

Thus, not only did the AWB construct and develop a narrative of a supposed genocide by blacks against whites in South Africa, but they also appropriated and represented Terreblanche as a martyr, as the Jesus Christ or Messiah of the Afrikaner ethnic group through whose blood sacrifice the salvation and aspirations of the Afrikaners for an independent Boer volkstad would be ensured and realized. Its aspirations for racial segregation in South Africa and its outright advocacy of policies tantamount to racism- apartheid is also evidenced by the above reference to Israel as a model to be emulated by the Afrikaners, as though the prevailing war and conflict between the Israelis and the Palestinians were insignificant. This statement by Dreyer also attests to the gross racist beliefs and aspirations of the AWB for South Africa, their dreams and fantasies of the resurrection of an old, dead, damned and rotten carcass the apartheid system. The statement also reveals much about the AWBs use of religion to justify their racist beliefs and aspirations.

The right-wing claim of a political conspiracy by the ANC government to commit genocide also received international acclaim and validity as the Saturday Star also ran a story about members of the Swedish Resistance Movement (SRM) in Stockholm, a neo-Nazi organization that burned the South African flag during a protest in Stockholm against the alleged continuing genocide of white people in South Africa149. These protesters were reported to have also carried and paraded the streets of Stockholm with the old apartheid flag while also carrying large portraits of Eugene Terreblanche, in solidarity with AWB and white South Africans. The article written by the South African Press Association (SAPA) further states that the protesters placed a leaflet at the South African embassy in Stockholm which read:
Since 1994 more than 3000 white farmers have been murdered in the rainbow nation South Africa. This summer will you be watching soccer in a country where the government is urging on the genocide of whites?
149

Saturday Star 24 April 2010, Pg. 5

77

Will you ignore the murders of your race kindred?150 [My Emphasis]

As the saga continued, on 25 May 2011 Eye Witness News reported that in another effort to bring these claims of an alleged conspiracy by the ANC government to commit genocide against Afrikaner farmers in particular and whites in general, the civil rights organization Pro-Afrikaans Action Group (PRAAG) laid charges against Julius Malema at the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague151. The report stated that PRAAG alleges that he (Malema) called for the extermination of the Afrikaner nation through his songs, public statements and other utterances152. However this was not the first complaint against Malema at the ICC as retired SA-Dutch journalist Adriana Stuijt had also written an open letter on the 11 November 2008 to the ICC complaining about the alleged Afrikaner genocide committed by the ANC (black) government in South Africa153.

On the 18th of June 2010 an anonymous Rustenburg farmer also lodged a complaint of genocide at the ICC against Malema and eleven other ANC leaders and government officials including President Jacob Zuma, SAPS minister Nathi Mthethwa, SAPS Commissioner Bheki Cele, former national police commissioner Jackie Selebi, Minsiter of agriculture, forestry and fisheries Tina Joemat Peterson, Defence minister Lindiwe Sisulu, Intelligence minister Siyabonga Cwele, exIntelligence minister Ronnie Kasrils, African National Congress partys secretary-general Gwede Mantashe, and the ministers for rural development and for land affairs, Gugile Nkwinti and Pali Lehohla154.And on April 05, 2011 Paul Kruger of the Verkenners (Afrikaans scouts) movement

150

Saturday Star 24 April 2010, Pg. 5 http://www.ewn.co.za/Story.aspx?Id=66484 http://www.ewn.co.za/Story.aspx?Id=66484 http://afrikaner-genocide-achives.blogspot.com/2008/11/letter-to-international-criminal-court.html http://whatishappeninginsouthafrica.blogspot.com/2011/05/twelve-sa-leaders-charged-with-genocide.html

151

152

153

154

78

also lodged a petition at the ICC, requesting the international body to investigate the charges of genocide against the ANC. All these were attempts of bringing international attention to the perceived threat of genocide perpetrated by black South Africans against whites.

However, besides these more liberal and diplomatic means of raising international attention to their perceived threat of an imminent genocide against whites, some sectors of the Afrikaner farming community, aligned with the right-wing, opted for more radical steps by undergoing a farm-attack prevention course in which white families, including women, young girls and boys were being trained in the use of lethal weapons like rifles and fire arms to defend themselves155.

Just a week after the Terreblanche killing an article published by the Sunday Times revealed that the Vryheid Suidlanders, an organization led by AWB founding member Danie Roberts, have identified easy-to-defend farmland around the country and are waiting, with packed bags, emergency rations, weapons and tents, for the signal from their leaders156. The report further stated that the Suidlanders have found a stretch of land on the banks of the White Umfolozi River, bordered by a mountain range, for when the situation becomes another 1838.They believe the land, on a cattle farm, is safe and can easily be defended by members with military training against an onslaught157.

On the same breath, PRAAG leader Dan Roodt also published an article with the headline Eugene Terreblanche and the Symbolism of War in which he wrote that the murder of
155

www.boycott-2010-world-cup.co.nr http://why-we-are-white-refugees.blogspot.com/2010/04/suidlanders-awb-legally-prepare-for.html http://why-we-are-white-refugees.blogspot.com/2010/04/suidlanders-awb-legally-prepare-for.html

156

157

79

Terreblanche is symbolic in nature and was necessary to stir the nation into a state of turmoil and racial polarization, so that South Africa's "uhuru" can begin. Malema has just consulted with Zimbabwe for military support of the Zimbabwean army in the goal of fighting South African farmers for their farms. The arms arriving from China will be used to arm a large number of Zimbabweans and black South Africans with the goal of robbing white farmers of their property. Even cities may be attacked. During the de-weaponising process of the past few years, the ANC ensured that white weapon owners were intimidated to hand in their weapons. Large numbers of people are now defenceless against the next phase of whatever the "national democratic revolution" entails158.

In an open letter written to the state President Jacob Zuma, Jan lamprecht, who is author of the book Government by Deception and owner of the African Crisis website, further expressed these sentiments of an impending racial war, stating unequivocally to the President that:
if you desire a racial war against us white people, and against the Afrikaners in particular, then lets not play games any more just come out and say you want to go to war against us. If you have been making clandestine preparations for our genocide and for a series of moves that will lead to our genocide, then so be it... Julius Malema is your agent. He works for you. If you do not shut him up with immediate effect, we will regard this as a clandestine declaration of racial war and intent to genocide against us by you159 [My Emphasis]

Thus, in this manner the killing of Terreblanche was appropriated as a benchmark for an imminent racial/civil war, and used as a rallying cry to bring international attention to the plight of white people who felt that black criminals, inspired by political or racial motives, were targeting them for crime with the intention of forcing them to flee the country. What we see here is not necessarily perceptions of what was expected in future, but actually a performance of the
158

http://why-we-are-white-refugees.blogspot.com/2010/04/oom-eugenes-symbolism-white-supremacy.html http://why-we-are-white-refugees.blogspot.com/2010/04/oom-eugenes-symbolism-white-supremacy.html

159

80

past. The talk about racial war, clandestine genocide and political conspiracy was obviously less about the future but more about the past. These imageries were not reflecting necessarily legit fears, but they were largely informed by the past and in fact were invocations of that past more than concern for what was perceived would happen in future. The AWB has always been known for advocating racial war particularly against Blacks.

It was interesting to see and to hear them claim to be victims of the very same racial war which they received infamy for advocating. For the AWB, Terreblanche is just one out of many thousands of Afrikaner victims of ANC-inspired genocide against whites in general and Afrikaner farmers in particular. For them, the murder was not an unfortunate incident, but a well thought, carefully planned and crafted assassination which forms part of a larger chain of white genocide perpetuated by the ANC government. In this manner Eugene Terreblanche is made to stand for the collective social and economic experience of white Afrikaner farmers in postapartheid South Africa. He becomes the significant symbol of their culture and collective identity, a symbol of their power and ability to raise the fears and grab the attention of the highest office in the country.

The Homosexual/ Condom Scandal

Another narrative that emerged with the Terreblanche murder associated him with homosexual practices with his alleged black assailants. During the first court appearance of the two accused murderers of Terreblanche it emerged in media reports that a used condom had been found at the crime scene and that Terreblanche had been found with his pants down to his knees, genitals exposed. Subsequently, Chris Mahlangus lawyer Puna Moroko had stated unequivocally in a statement to the media that his client claimed Terreblanche had sodomised him and that the

81

sodomy sparked the killing160.The Hawks and Police also confirmed the allegation that they were also investigating the possibility of a sex crime on the news stories that emerged on the newspapers. However, in a dramatic turn of events, the following day Moroko retracted everything concerning the sodomy claim. The Saturday Star report quoted him as having said that:
he (Mahlangu) mentioned sodomy to me, but the consultation was very short. It didnt satisfy me; it just did not make sense to me. Thats why I abandoned it. I am not satisfied that there was sodomy, and my client accepted my advice161 [My Emphasis]

Thus Moroko then stated that he would argue that his client, Chris Mahlangu, had argued with Terreblacnhe over wages and that he had acted in self-defense. To add on to the drama and mystery in this case the police and the Hawks also suddenly retracted from the claim that they were investigating the possibility of a sex crime and denied having claimed that a condom had been found on the crime scene saying that the original investigators on the scene had told them they had not seen any condom162.This was very strange and suspicious considering the fact that news reports had stated that when the dead body of Terreblanche was found his trouser had been lowered to his knees with his genitals exposed, and that he had semen on him. So, how could all these serious allegations, accusations and claims just vanish and disappear into thin air? What truth, if any, was contained in them or how contained were they of truth? The answer to these questions is that we will never really know.

The Star newspaper also reported that he had been seen with the two accused buying alcohol at a local bottle store163. But as the trial commenced, none of these sex allegations were raised, no

160

Saturday Star 17 April 2010 Saturday Star 17 April 2010 Saturday Star 17 April 2010 The Star 12 April 2010

161

162

163

82

condom or forensic reports were brought before the courts as evidence. Instead, the two suspects were also charged with crimen injuria for allegedly having lowered Terreblanches trousers and demeaning him after allegedly killing him. These homosexual allegations against Terreblanche sparked anger and outrage from the AWB and other right-wing organizations, with many claiming that it was part of the ANC political conspiracy to secure the release of Terreblanches suspected killers, encourage more acts of violence against Afrikaner farmers in particular and white people in general, and demean the moral character and integrity of Terreblanche and thus discourage recruitment of the AWB.

Many leaders of the right-wing groups such as Eddy von Maltitz of the Resistance Against Communism (RAC) claimed that Terreblanche was a good Christian and that these allegations were raised simply to dirty his good name. The Saturday Star quoted him as having said that this man was a Christian, and youll be cursed if you say he was a homosexualits disgusting that a good Afrikaner would be thought of as a homosexual. I think it sucks164.This statement speaks a thousand words because it tells us what the right-wing groups such as the AWB and Malitzs Resistance Against Communism (RAC) think of issues of human sexuality. The statement underlines the fact that the right-wing is still deeply entrenched in the old outdated prejudices against homosexual lifestyles. Regardless of all the struggles to eradicate the negative stereotypes associated with and stigmatization of homosexuality, the right-wing still has perceives homosexuality to be a curse.

As if giving a historical justification for the allegations of a possible sex crime and the implication of immorality that it conjures , The Star also ran a story titledBoys, Booze &That Blonde which revealed the story of an extramarital affair Terreblanche had with Jani

164

Saturday Star 17 April 2010

83

Allan, then a Sunday Times columnist, that appeared in the early 90s. The Star also ran a story revealing in the 1980s Terreblanche was implicated in reports of a sex crime when the then South African weekly newspaper, Vrye Weekblad published the story of an AWB bodyguard who made claims that he woke up one morning, after having partied heavily the previous night,to find the huge AWB leader on top of him trying to molest him165.

The bodyguard laid a complaint within the AWB and was promptly kicked out of the organizations for daring to lay such claims against its leader. He then approached the the Vrye Weekblad which was the only newspaper that ran the story. Neither Terreblanche, nor the AWB reacted to the publishing of this story. Max du Preez, founder of the Vrye Weekblad stated in an interview with The Star newspaper that its not a complete secret that Eugene had some of these tendencies166.

The Saturday Star also ran a story talking about Kay Smith who quit the AWB and exposed Terreblanches tendencies which had apparently become an issue amongst parents whose children were members of the AWB youth. The Saturday Star even stated that during the time of his murder there were still concerns about two AWB boys who had grown close to Terreblanche. One of these boys was 17 year old Leon Geldenhuys, a former leader of the AWB youth who is said to have revered and emulated Terreblanche but was soon taken to Australia by his father167.

If indeed its not a complete secret that Eugene had some of these tendencies as Max du Preez put it, could knowledge of this have influenced in anyway the allegations that were raised against
165

http://www.inthenews.co.uk/news/world/africa/eugene-terre-blanche-tried-to-rape-men-accused-of-hismurder--$1370647.htm
166

The Star 12 April 2010 Saturday Star 17 April 2010

167

84

him by his two suspected killers through their lawyers? Could the accused have known this aspect of Terreblanches life? Were the accused influenced in any way by any other anonymous third party to raise such claims? And why did the police change from the claim that there was a possibility of a sex crime and that a condom had been found on the crime scene? Anyway in reading these stories and versions of truths, whether they be true or false, facts or fiction about Terreblanches demise we must remember that historians can read in the inaccurate, fantastic and constructed worlds which otherwise would never be known of or spoken about168.

Surely all this drama, marked by controversies, conflicting and contradictory statements and claims made by the police, the Hawks, the suspects through their lawyers, and journalists through their news reports in the media, raises suspicions of conspiracy as the AWB and Afrikaner farmers were claiming; and the role played by all parties implicated and involved ought to be interrogated by scholars and by historians in particular, in order to understand the complex histories that have shaped the production processes of these claims.

Would it not bring him dishonor and shame amongst his own people and followers (who claimed to be a born-again Christians), and humiliation from his opponents and enemies if a staunch white nationalist like Terreblanche were discovered to have actually been cheating his wife and having sexual intercourse with his black male workers? If such a claim were to be found true the implication would be that Terreblanche was actually a hypocritical liar and had never really stood for the principles of racial segregation he had preached and became infamous for advocating. His Christian claims and all his work as a radical extremist right-winger would have

168

White, L., (2000); Telling More: Lies, Secrets, and History, History and Theory, Theme Issue No. 39., Wesleyan University, Pg. 13.

85

just been a vain drama that had neither essence nor sincerity at all. The AWB would be proved to be really a non-significant and foolish mistake and his reputation would be in tatters.

But also, the homosexual scandal also raised issues of gender, masculinity and race in the largely patriarchal society that is South Africa, showing how particular bodies such as that of Terreblanche have come to symbolize particular masculinities which continue to defy the societal change associated with gender and sexuality. From the followers and supporters of Terreblanche it becomes clear to see that the AWB detests homosexuality and deems it an abominable curse which their leader could never have been associated with169. Moreover, the homosexual narrative also disrupts the rigid stereotypical definitions of heteronormative masculinity and race, challenges the normative standards of sexuality to which the AWB subscribes and adheres to, while also subverting the patriarchal politics of the AWB. The homosexual charge also raises a crucial and interesting debate about sexuality between white and black bodies as a terrain of oppression and conflict.

The Farm Workers Narrative

Another narrative strand that emerges in this killing is that of the farmer workers that is also closely related to the issue of Terreblanches reported ill treatment of his workers and past convictions for these crimes. In the post-apartheid epoch there have been many reports of human rights abuses by white farmers on their black employees. Many studies, such as the report by Farmworker Justice and Oxfam America, have shown that the life of a farm-worker is difficult. Not only is the work physical and in many cases dangerous, but farm-workers, a marginalized

169

Saturday Star 17 April 2010

86

population without a voice, are often abused and exploited in the agriculture system170. Many farm workers suffer human rights abuses, unfair retrenchments; physical abuses such as beating, racism, and despicable working and living conditions and evictions from their employees. They very often do not have access to any legal aid structures as many of them are poor and even illiterate.

The abuse of farm workers by white farmers is a widespread phenomenon in South Africa. Farm workers usually work long hours under extreme weather conditions, are exposed to dangerous and toxic pesticides, receive the lowest of wages, and have no access to basics such as water or toilets. A report by the Human Rights Watch (HRW) entitled Ripe with Abuse reveals that farm workers in South Africa earn some of the lowest wages in the entire region, are usually denied legal benefits and are subject to insecure land tenure rights, making them and their families at risk of eviction or displacement, and in some cases, from the very land which they were born on171.

These abuses occur in varying degrees on different farms throughout the country, and are perpetrated by white farm owners who are subject to regulation by the South African government, but do not comply with the laws set for them172. Yet, these studies prove, that the South African government has also failed to protect the rights of farm workers and farm dwellers, or to ensure that obey the set laws regarding their employees. The HRW report also states that there are attempts by farmers to stop farm workers in the Western Cape from forming Unions. A government document also reveals that there also were reports that white employers
170

Weeding Out Abuses: Recommendations for a Law-Abiding farm Labour System, A Report by Farm-worker Justice and Oxfam America, Accessed at http://fwjustice.org/files/immigration-labor/weeding-out-abuses.pdf
171

http://digitaljournal.com/article/311327 http://digitaljournal.com/article/311327

172

87

abused and killed black farm laborers and complaints that white employers received preferential treatment from the authorities173.

According to the HRW report, farm workers in the Western Cape work under the most dreadful conditions but the South African government has failed to protect them from exploitation and abuse, even though their work contributes largely to the economic coffers of the country. On the contrary, the government has shown more concern for the white farmers who claim that they are targets of racially/politically motivated crimes and violence as proved by the government initiative to set up a Commission of Inquiry into Farm Murders due to the many complaints and concerns of white farmers; while no such efforts have been made to address the plight of black farm workers who are exploited, oppressed and subjected to all manner of human rights abuses in these white owned farms.

More recently there are many cases that have emerged in the South African media of conflicts between white farmers and black workers. One such case is the killing of Nelson Chisale by his the farmer Mark Scott-Crossley. Chisane is said to have been beaten with machetes and dumped in a lions den by his employer and two of his other employees Simon Mathebula and Richard Mathebula174. Another incident that was also flashed all over the news is that of Jewell Crossberg who shot and killed Jeolous Dube on a farm in Musina in 2004 and also shot at four other black employees after he had accused them of being lazy175. Then there was also the case of the farmer Marcel Nel who shot and killed eleven years old Sello Pelleclaiming he had believed him to be a dog that had been killing his prized impala bucks176. Even Eugene
173

http://www.state.gov/documents/organization/160145.pdf http://www.iol.co.za/news/south-africa/chisale-was-dead-before-lion-s-den-witness-1.235211 http://www.newzimbabwe.com/pages/asylumsa37.16227.html http://www.iol.co.za/news/south-africa/farmer-accused-of-shooting-boy-gets-bail-1.285834

174

175

176

88

Terreblanche himself had once been convicted of the assault on Paul Motshabi, an employee on his farm who became permanently disabled from the head injuries he suffered from Terreblanches attack.

Reports of violence against and ill treatment of farm workers by their white employees is not uncommon in post-apartheid South Africa. So, when the Terreblanche murder flashed all over the news the Azanian Peoples Organization (AZAPO) issued out a statement stating that Terreblanche died in the same manner in which he killed black defenseless farm workers in Venterdorp177. AZAPO spokeman Funanika Ntontela further stated in the statement that:
we are sad that Mr. Terreblache died in the manner in which murdered in cold blood. Sadly, this is how he killed black defenseless farm workers in Venterdorp Here is a man whose entire life was dedicated to seeing black people remaining endlessly dwarfed in the land of their birth; a man who never pretended to be anything but a racist and a murderer178 [My Emphasis]

Here AZAPO constructs a false claim stating that Terreblanche had killed black defenseless farm workers in Venterdorp, which is obviously untrue. But they are obviously speaking and appealing to particular sentiments and a particular audience which believes in what this rhetoric evokes. Terreblanche was never found guilty of any murder of any person. For AZAPO, Terreblanche was merely a racist and a murderer, and thus somehow, his killing is justified.

The Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) also issued out a statement saying that Terreblanche was also typical of the worst type of employer on South Africas farms. The

177

http://www.iol.co.za/news/south-africa/azapo-terre-blanche-is-a-killer-1.479431 http://www.iol.co.za/news/south-africa/azapo-terre-blanche-is-a-killer-1.479431

178

89

reported circumstances of his murder speak volumes about the appalling state of labour relations on farms179. Patrick Craven, national spokesperson for COSATU went on to state that:
the alleged killers were farm workers - one of them 15 years old and therefore employed illegally -- demanding unpaid wages of a paltry R300 a month. While their alleged violent actions cannot be excused, they illustrate the depth of many farm workers frustration at their deplorable working conditions. We assume that these two young workers were so desperate that the only way they could see to get justice was to allegedly bludgeon their boss to death180 [My Emphasis]

Here we see COSATUs own version of events as they lay emphasis on the labour conditions of the alleged killers to somehow justify the killing by claiming that the accused minor was employed illegally, thus making Terreblanche himself a criminal. The intent here is to incriminate Terreblannche with breach of law, to justify the actions of his killers by claiming that killing him was the only way they could see to get justice. The narrative line here is that Terreblanche was not only a victim, but a victimizer himself.

Furthermore, on the 9th April 2010 the SAPA ran a story entitled COSATU NW Crowd Sing Shoot the Boerin Tshing181. The article reported that residents of Tshing Township just outside Venterdorp had said that Terreblanche would be remembered as a person who persecuted black people182. The article quoted a resident named Sibongile Links as having said that he inflicted pain on us, calling us names. He enjoyed it, now its for us to rejoice, while another resident Gert Booi stated that the accused killers of Terreblanche should be granted bail

179

http://links.org.au/node/1605 http://links.org.au/node/1605 http://www.politicsweb.co.za/politicsweb/view/politicsweb/en/page71619?oid=170457&sn=Detail&pid=71619 http://www.politicsweb.co.za/politicsweb/view/politicsweb/en/page71619?oid=170457&sn=Detail&pid=71619

180

181

182

90

saying that I am happy that he is dead, let him goFarmers assaulted and killed people, they are granted bail in court, what stops the court to grant the two bail? We want them out183.

The provincial secretary of COSATU Solly Phetoe was also quoted in the article as having stated that they were planning to hold a provincial march to highlight the exploitation of farm workers at the hands of some racist farmers. Phetoe also criticized government representatives like Agriculture Minister Tina Joemat Pettersson who attended the Terreblanche funeral saying that none of them have been at the funeral of a farm worker killed by a farmer, what is special about Terreblanche184? What we see here is that both AZAPO and COSATU construct a narrative which seeks to incriminate Terreblanche in violations of human rights and to foster a subtle justification of his killing; they both appropriate the killers as either avengers or victims.

The lawyer of the minor accused of involvement in the Terreblanche killing, Zola Majavu, decided to use the argument that the minor was employed illegally and was subject to gross human rights violations on the Terreblanche farm. He was reported by The Star to have said that the minor was comfortable at the place of safety where he has been held since his arrest185. Majavu also stated that since his arrest, the minor was now enjoying luxuries like sleeping on a bed, eating three meals a day and studying all of which he had never been exposed to when he was employed on Terreblanches farm186. By saying that he minor was comfortable under arrest Majavu was suggesting that the minor had been in a position of discomfort or even oppression while working for Terreblanche. For, how can the harsh and brutal realities of a

183

http://www.politicsweb.co.za/politicsweb/view/politicsweb/en/page71619?oid=170457&sn=Detail&pid=71619

184

http://www.politicsweb.co.za/politicsweb/view/politicsweb/en/page71619?oid=170457&sn=Detail&pid=71619 The Star, 15 April 2010, Pg.1 Saturday Star 17 April 2010

185

186

91

South African prison ever be a comfortable place for a juvenile to be in than the life of freedom living in a South African farm unless the realities of life in that farm were subhuman and in direct violation of human rights?

By representing the minor as a victim of Terreblanche, Majavu was also subtly suggesting that since this child was faced with this oppression and exploitation at the hands of the deceased, his alleged involvement in the killing was thus justified or understandable under the circumstances. This was the underlying message that Majavu was sending across. In his statement he also emphasized that the minor should not have been employed in the first place and that Terreblanche had broken the law by having employed him in the first place. Here Terreblanche, though victim in this case, was presented as a law breaker. Thus, in this manner the alleged minor perpetrator is appropriated as a victim of the dead Terreblanche.

The Saturday Star article titled New ET Death Shock also revealed that police had found three minors at the crime scene and that one of them had given himself up as one of the killers187. The article further stated that the other two boys were sent to a place of safety because they were either witnesses to the murder of Terreblanche or were victims themselves188. In reference to these two mysterious boys and the one implicated minor in Terreblanches killing, Ann Skelton of the Centre for Child Law at the University of Pretoria is quoted in the same article as having commented that:
If they are working on the farm as farm labourers below the age of 15, they must be referred for investigation by a social worker. They may also have been exploited or living in circumstances conducive to exploitation. Finally, they may also have been living in or exposed to circumstances which

187

Saturday Star 17 April 2010 Saturday Star 17 April 2010

188

92

may seriously harm their physical or mental health189 [My Emphasis]

Thus, just as Majavu had appropriated his client as a victim of the dead Terreblanche, Skeltons analysis also resonated the very similar sentiment, but even beyond that, suggested that circumstances in Terreblanches farm may have even caused the minor(s) to be mad.

The newspaper reports stating that black people had shown their support for the accused murderers during their court appearance by ululating, clenching Black Power fists and calling them heroes show that the Terreblanche killing was layered with multiple historical narratives and interpretations indeed. Certainly, the long history of abuses of human rights on commercial farms in South Africa played a huge role in influencing the appropriation of these representations and meanings to the killing. And certainly, Terreblanches own notoriety and complicity in the commission of some of these human rights abuses on farms also played a huge role in influencing these types of reactions to his killing primarily by farmworkers and black residents within the Ventersdorp area. However on the other side, these reactions to the killing this only served to further exacerbate the AWB and other right-wing groups sentiments of a bureaucratic conspiracy to set the alleged killers free.

The history of relations between black farm workers and white farmers is a very long and complex one. It dates back to the colonial era; firstly, to the arrival of Jan van Riebeeck and the early Dutch settlers in the Cape, then to the arrival of English settlers in South Africa; and secondly, to the period when the colonialists introduced particular legislations amongst the indigenous peoples in order to force them to perform hard labour in the diamond and gold mines and in the white owned farms190. During the colonial era, both Dutch and British settlers set up plantations in the best agricultural areas in South Africa and other parts of the region. The
189

Saturday Star 17 April 2010 www.sahistory.org.za

190

93

account of how these settlers had acquired these lands through brutal force, violence and robbery is well recorded by early 19th century historians, such as John Phillips two volume Researches in South Africa. According to Andrew Bank, as the first systematic account of interaction between European colonizers and Africans from the arrival of Jan van Riebeeck in 1652 up to the 1820s, Philipss interpretive framework was one of violent dispossession, hopeless bondage, wrongs and outrages inflicted on the innocent and defenseless. The early chapters describe how the poor natives were deprived of their country and reduced from a state of independence to the miseries of slavery191.

However, these European settlers in South Africa, either disillusioned or deliberately lying to themselves and the world in order to foster their political agenda of expansion, have advanced the false propaganda that they did not really conquer or dispossess the indigenous peoples because they arrived and settled on vacant land. According to J. Sakai this is a lie put forward by the white Afrikaner settlers, who claim that South Africa was literally totally uninhabited by any Africans when they arrived from Europe. To universal derision, these European settlers claim to be the only rightful, historic inhabitants of South AfricaWe can hear similar defences put forward by the European settlers of Israel, who claim that much of the Palestinian land and buildings they occupy are rightfully theirs, since the Arabs allegedly decided to voluntarily abandon it all during the 1948-49 war192.

Similar arguments of the vacant land myth have been put forward by the European settlers in America who decimated and murdered the indigenous Americans (the Arawak) to almost extinction and then occupied their land and claimed sovereignty over it. Terreblanche himself
191

Bank, A. (1997); The Great Debate and the Origins of South African Historiography , Journal of African History, 38, Pg. 263
192

Sakai, J. (1989); Settler Mythology of the White Proletariat: A Short Course in Understanding Babylon , Morningstar Press, Chicago, Pg. 8

94

made this vacant land claim just a month before he was killed in interview screened on SABC 3saying that these peoples forefathers didnt come from South Africa. They came from the North193.This is the false claim used by the European settlers in South African to justify their vacant land lie. With this claim Terreblanche was trying to justify his support for apartheid policies and his demand for a return to such divisive draconian policies expressed through the stern advocacy for a separate state for Afrikaners or Boers.

The European settlers in South Africa then used the conquered lands and plantations to produce cash crops such as sugar, maize and tobacco, to sell locally and for international export. These white-owned farms thrived on cheap labor from the conquered Africans, as well as imported Indian indenture workers. With the passage of time, primarily after the Second World War, these farms became multinational agribusiness corporations, with mainly British and American capital. By 1913 the South African government introduced the Natives Land Act which ensured that the whiteminority owned and controlled about 90% of the most rich and productive land in South Africa, while the black majority was confined to 10% of the land in designated spaces and areas194. Through this Native Land Act blacks were not allowed into the so-called white areas unless they were working for some white baas195.

In this process large numbers of rural residents were forced to leave their homes for urban areas and farms in search for work. Significant numbers of these people became proletarianised and
193

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XaOfZVLaHgQ

194

Ntsebeza, L. & Hall, R., (2007) The Land Question in South Africa: The Challenge of Transformation and Redistribution, HSRC Press, Pg. 3, Accessed at www.hsrcpress.ac.za
195

The word Baas is the Afrikaans equivalent for the English word Boss or employer. Under colonialism and apartheid, many black people who worked for white people (even if they were not of the Afrikaner ethnic group) were systematically brainwashed to refer to their white employers as baas and to their children as Klein Bass (Young Boss). Even today, under the new democratic system, though to a lesser degree, some black people still refer to their white employers as Baas. Moreover, in the new South Africa one can still find some poor black people doing hard labour or menial jobs like gardening or cleaning, contaminated with an inferiority complex, often referring to their black employees as Umlungu Wam(My White Man/My Boss/My Employer ) if its a black man or Mam (Madam) if its a black woman.

95

others became migrant workers196. The Union of South Africa parliament argued that the Act was passed in order to limit conflict between whites and blacks, but blacks believed that it was aimed at meeting the demands of white farmers for more agricultural land, and thus a system designed crudely to force black people to work as labourers for whites. Under this brutal and racist labour system the wages of the black workers were set lower than those of the white workers who performed the same jobs as their black colleagues197. Ntsebeza and Hall write that the colonial strategyshifted from promoting a class of African farmers to compelling Africans to becoming wage labourers. The first legislative measure in this regard was the promulgation in the Cape Parliament under the premiership of Cecil John Rhodes of the notorious Glen Grey Act in 1894. After the Union of South Africa in 1910, some of the provisions of the Glen Grey Act were incorporated in the Natives Lands Act of 1913. This Act forbade Africans to buy and own land outside the 7 per cent of the land that was reserved for their occupation. It also abolished the sharecropping system and labour tenancies198.

In the years that followed, other laws such as the Natives Urban Areas Act of 1923 were enacted to further entrench segregation and control of the African populace. Thus, through colonialism and apartheid African agriculture was undermined, blacks reduced to serfdom and peasantry, while white farmers developed effective models for commercial farming through government subsidies199.And obviously, this was to become a recipe for discontent, conflict, protest and, at worst, war and bloodshed. Since those early days, the relations between blacks who work on white-owned farms and their white employees have always been tempestuous and uneasy.
196

Ntsebeza, L. & Hall, R., (2007) The Land Question in South Africa: The Challenge of Transformation and Redistribution, HSRC Press, Pg. 3
197

http://www.sahistory.org.za/dated-event/native-land-act-was-passed

198

Ntsebeza, L. & Hall, R., (2007) The Land Question in South Africa: The Challenge of Transformation and Redistribution, HSRC Press, Pg. 3
199

Ntsebeza, L. & Hall, R., (2007) The Land Question in South Africa: The Challenge of Tra nsformation and Redistribution, HSRC Press, Pg. 3

96

Thus, the narrative of the farm workers relates, not only to the contemporary issues that deal with issues of human rights abuses, but stretch back to and outlines the longer complex histories of colonialism, apartheid, land politics, dispossession in South Africa. But more importantly, this narrative reveals much about post-apartheid South Africas challenge at addressing past injustices relating to politics of the land, such as issues of ownership, insecure land tenure systems and discriminatory land use regulations which marginalizes rural and urban poor peoples who are predominantly black. This narrative reveals much, not only about the world of South Africas farming community and labour relations in that sector, but also about the complex challenges that face the general South African political, social and economic landscapes. The Terreblanche murder has illustrated that the new South Africa is still faced with many challenges that relate directly or indirectly to the countrys old, long and complex histories of violent conflicts and confrontations, colonialism and apartheid.

Conclusion

The killing of Eugene Terreblanche provides the most potent example of the complex nature of crime and violence in post-apartheid South Africa. There is no neat, linear or singular narrative to this murder, it is enveloped by many voices competing to produce history. What we see here is the production of varied histories, competing voices for authority of meaning over Terreblanches dead corpse, a bitter struggle to represent and to speak for the dead. These conflicting texts are all significant as they all represent an unstable interplay of truth and illusion where narratives mediated fears of violence and fashioned colonial imaginations200. Each one of these narratives points out to a particular fracture in our society. They are produced from fragmented knowledge and constitute competing hierarchies of credibility through which the Terreblanche killing was read.
200

Stoler, A., (1992); In Cold Blood: Hierarchies of Credibility and the Politics of Colonial Narratives , Representations, 37, University of California, Pg. 153.

97

These narratives show that when writing what could be said to be the history of Eugene Terreblanches demise, our approach as historians cannot be simplistic and narrow; we cannot construct a neat and linear narrative of Terreblanches murder. We just cannot dig into the news media reports as seen on television, newspapers and the internet and write that out as history. If history was merely about copying and swallowing whatever the media, individual, groups and archives have to say about particular event, then there would be absolutely no need for the profession. But history is far more complex than that. So we must search for the stories within the stories, narratives within the narratives that we encounter. What is important to remember is that each of the voices we hear seeks to silence others and each one is constructed for particular audiences. And as Trouillot writes, history is messy201.

The Eugene Terreblanche murder was populated by many different characters and actors: farm workers, politicians, trade unionists, police, lawyers, journalists, right-wing groups, musicians and ordinary citizens, each constructing their own narrative and meaning of Terreblanches demise. Each of these actors read the killing through particular selective lenses and frames, resulting in multiple narratives that display a theatrical replay of the past. Through these voices we are drawn in to larger complex issues relating to crime, violence, land politics, labour disputes, police work, court processes and general social relations in post-apartheid South Africa. These narratives tell us something more complex, more sophisticated than the murder itself. Actually, I would even go as far as saying that most of the voices we hear here are silent about the murder itself. Rather, they speak to and expose the imagined social worlds of the several actors and characters who stage these historical performances. It is actually this element that makes this killing historic.

201

Trouillot, M-R., (1995); Silencing the Past: Power and the Production of History, Pg. 110

98

Each one of these narratives is an attempt to produce a particular version of history about the Terreblanche killing; the murder ceases to a normal day-to-day unfortunate crime and rather becomes a historical site in contestation, it invokes multiple imagined histories. These narratives, when read alone, can never be completely understood. When read collectively, they represent and constitute the killing as an archive, more than a tragic incident. Some of these narratives not only fix race as a natural and actual social reality, but they also entrench it a significant factor in the killing. Even those voices that appear to be against this racialization do not escape constructing a singular history which suppresses another which it deems untrue or less true. My concern here was not so much about which stories are true or false but to understand what each of these stories speaks to, how these stories are produced, how they are constituted and negotiated to their particular audiences. Whether the stories were true or not is of no importance to me because even the imagined is constructed out of what if socially conceivable202 and historians routinely negotiate between contradictory accounts203

Writing about the Chitepo killing, Louise White determined that many of the confessions that arose from that killing were articulations of a world of politics and relationships. She realized that the each of the confessions was an attempt at silencing other confession or make them seem unreal204. She writes that in writing the book she was in pursuit of history, of how narratives about the past are produced and reproduced205. Similarly, David William Cohen and Atieno Odhiambo in their book The Risks of Knowledge about the death of Robert Ouko use a postmodernist approach to reveal the turmoil and untidiness beneath the smooth surfaces of historical narratives developed around his killing. They explain that their work is not so much
202

White, L. (2000); Telling More: Lies, Secrets, and History; Pg 18 White, L. (2000); Telling More: Lies, Secrets, and History; Pg 18

203

204

White, L. (2003); The Assassination of Herbet Chitepo: Texts and Politics in Zimbabwe, Indiana University Press, U.S.A., Pg. 02
205

White, L. (2003); The Assassination of Herbet Chitepo: Texts and Politics in Zimbabwe , Pg. 02

99

about investigating who killed Ouko, but rather to examine processes involved in the production of knowledge206. It is from the lines of arguments developed by these authors that I draw my argument in the Terreblanche murder.

Here I have attempted not to produce a coherent, neat, chronological narrative of Terreblanches demise, but have sought to represent the incoherent, the contradictory, and the conflicting narratives to derive their source of origin and to understand them, rather than to dismiss others above others or all of them. I have not sought to sort out the multiplicity or narratives to produce one singular absolute narrative of the killing. Rather, I have sought to understand how these multiple voices are produced, and how they are negotiated for particular audiences. The narratives we see emerging out of the dead corpse of Terreblanche tell us something far more complex, more sophisticated than the actual killing itself, opening up avenues of colonial and apartheid histories, fused with the inherent imagination of those that propound them. Each of the narratives we see in the Terreblanche case historicizes the killing; each of them is an attempt to produce a particular history.

Needless to say, regardless of all the progress that has been made in the country since the fall of the official racist policies of apartheid we still hear of racial polarization and hatred within communities. Inequality, poverty and access to justice remain key obstacles to establishing a human rights culture. High levels of violence continue to mark the society; and mistrust, suspicion and fear define many inter-personal relationships. Contrary to the popular representation of South Africa as a "miracle" nation, high levels of violence testify that a post-

206

Cohen, D.W. & Odhiambo, E.S.A, (2004); The Risks of Knowledge: Investigations Into the Death of Hon. Minister John Robert Ouko in Kenya, 1990, Ohio University Press, Pg. 221

100

apartheid South Africa is not conflict-free207. According to Elmari Whyte the establishment of a liberal-democratic state in South Africa has not prevented almost 300 000 murders from being committed between April 1994 and April 2007 (SAPS 2004: 1, 2007: 7), and murder is only the most extreme form of violent crime208.

Most certainly, the long socio-economic legacy of colonialism and apartheid and the deeper psychological effects it has had on the peoples of South Africa, combined with what Whyte calls a culture of violence which resulted from the constant struggles against these evils, effectively made the country fertile ground for the high levels of violent crime it now experiences. Evidently, the physical and structural and violence of the racist apartheid regime created a new South African society plagued by deadly violence and crime. The result has been that in the postapartheid South African society the experiences of violence and crime occurring in different communities are still represented in highly racialized terms. In her paper Harris states that some white people in South Africa perceive crime to be structured along racial lines, and consider whites to be the primary victims For them, violent crime represents the most powerful component of a broader assault against the white population, and particularly white males209.

The varied responses to the Terreblanche killing attested to this notion as many whites; Afrikaners and right-wing groups in particular, saw the killing as a declaration of war by blacks against whites. On the other hand, studies such as the Report of the Committee of Inquiry into Farm Murders have shown that black South Africans tend to suffer more from violent crimes than white South Africans who are more likely to become victims of property crimes than violent
207

Harris, B., (2003); Spaces of Violence, Places of Fear: Urban Conflict in Post -Apartheid South Africa, Paper Presented on the Conflicts and Urban Violence Panel, Foro Social Mundial Tematico, Cartagena, Colombia, Pg. 1
208

Whyte, E., (2010); Aluta Continua: The Struggle Continues in South Africa Against Violent Crime, School of Political Science and International Studies, University of Queensland, Pg. 3
209

Harris, B., (2003); Spaces of Violence, Places of Fear: Urban Conflict in Post -Apartheid South Africa, Pg. 4

101

crimes. Crime and violence experienced in post-apartheid South Africa is very complex and linked to the broader histories of violence and conflict the country has experienced over the past three centuries. Crime and violence in post-apartheid South Africa can never be understood, studied or analyzed through linear and narrow spectacles as it is tightly knit and related to the very broad and complex histories of both colonialism and apartheid. Any study of post-apartheid crime and violence ought to take this into cognizance.

The representations of crimes and violence experienced in this new epoch also reflect this as they very often draw on these complex histories, as the Terreblanche killing has clearly demonstrated. Time and place, gender and sexuality, labour and exploitation, culture and heritage, facts and lies, politics and history all these varied aspects were very important details that characterized and marked the Terreblanche killing. The killing not only brought with it varied, long and complex histories of colonialism and apartheid as evidenced by the different narrative strands outlined above, but it also highlighted many obscure and complex socioeconomic, and political aspects and challenges that face contemporary South African society . The killing also served as the crudest example of the manner in which the line between crime and politics has become blurred in the new South Africa. This leaves one wondering what then is so new about the new South Africa as a contestation between the past (colonialism/apartheid) and the contemporary (freedom/democracy) continues to take hold of centre stage in most discourses of crime, violence, gender, race and politics.

In his paper Jesse Arseneault makes a very important and powerful point when he writes that Malema's evocation of an apartheid-era struggle song rekindles a particularly violent masculinity once mobilized in the service of liberation. If that is the case, if leaders return to earlier logics of liberation from racial segregation at the same historical moment that a prominent
102

white supremacist figure from South Africa's past is killed, we are left questioning the extent to which the hype of reconciliation in the early years of the post-apartheid period has been successful210. The Terreblanche killing raises critical questions about the idealism of the early post-apartheid period as prominent politicians like Malema and Terreblanche have added their own chapters to the many layers of polarization in the country. The killing challenges the idealistic rainbow nationalism of Tutu and Mandela. But moreover, the killing raises questions about the nature and circumstances surrounding the occurrences of crime and violence in postapartheid South Africa. It is to all these issues that the killing speaks.

In this research I have focused not on a whodunit question around Terreblanches killing, but have rather dealt with the stories told about the killing by various actors and performers. I have sought to discuss the relationship between politics and text, to understand how and why various texts, narratives and voices compete to represent the dead and to establish the political realm in which the killing took place. All the voices we hear and see in this murder are powerless, biased and unreliable when read alone. But a collective reading of these voices opens up other avenues of investigation into the complex relationship between narratives, texts, voices, actors, performers, truth, lies, rumours, crime, violence, politics and history. My focus has not been aimed at validating any other narrative over another, but to understand what the plausibility of each singular claim reveals about the particular audience for which they are (re)constructed. All these narratives also tell us something about the politics of the time in which Terreblanche was killed. It is these texts, narratives, voices and actors that come together to construct a history of contemporary South Africa read from the dead body of Terreblanche. Indeed, Terreblanche was a controversial man, both in life as in death.

210

Arseneault, J., (2010); Races Among Men: Masculinity and Interracial Community in South African Cultural texts,Open Access Dissertations and Theses,Paper 4210, Pg. 02 Accessed at http://digitalcommons.mcmaster.ca/opendissertations/4210

103

Bibliography

Afrobarometer Study on Crime and Violence in South Africa, Afrobarometer Briefing paper, No. 96, November 2010, Pg. 1, Accessed atwww.idasa.org/media/uploads/outputs/files/afrobarometer_fear_of_crime.pdf

Altheide, D.L .& Michalowski, R.S. (1999); Fear in the News: A Discourse of Control, The Sociological Quarterly, Vol. 40, No. 3, University of California Press

Altheide, D. (2003); Mass Media, Crime and the Discourse of Fear in The Hedgehog Review, Pg. 16, Accessed at http://www.iasc-culture.org/HHR_Archives/Fear/5.3CAltheide.pdf

Arseneault, J., (2010); Races Among Men: Masculinity and Interracial Community in South African Cultural texts, Open Access Dissertations and Theses, Paper 4210, Accessed at http://digitalcommons.mcmaster.ca/opendissertations/4210

Bank, A. (1997); The Great Debate and the Origins of South African Historiography, Journal of African History, 38

Beeld, 06 April 2010, Terreblanche Family Devastated, Accessed at www.news24.com

Blok, A. (2001); The Meaning of Senseless Violence, in Honour and Violence, Polity Press, Cambridge

Cohen, D.W. & Odhiambo, E.S.A, (2004); The Risks of Knowledge: Investigations Into the Death of Hon. Minister John Robert Ouko in Kenya, 1990, Ohio University Press,
104

Cook, T. & Schwartz, J.M., (2002); Archives, Records, and Power: The Making of Modern Memory, Archival Science, 2, Kluwer Academic Publishers

Cock, J. (2000); Weaponry and the Culture of Violence in South Africa in TCP Series, Vol. 2

Daily Dispatch, 19 June 2010

Davis, G.; We Want to Meet Zuma, Say Zille and Mulder in The Star, 07 April 2010

Davis, G., Seale, L. & Mkhwanazi, S.; Zuma Appeals to Malema, Politicians for Calm, The Star, 05 April 2010

Du Plessis, C.; Relic of the Past Becomes Martyr for the Right Wing: Some Fear Killing of AWB Supremo Could Spark Racial Tensions as Leaders Appeal for Calm, The Star, 05 April 2010

Gerhart, G.M. (1978); Black Power in South Africa: The Evolution of an Ideology, University of California Press, Berkeley

Hall, S., The Work of Representation in Representation, The Open University, London Sage Publications, Accessed at www.scribd.com

Hall, S., Critcher, C., Jefferson, T., Clarke, J. & Roberts, B., (1978); The Social Production of News in Policing the Crisis: Mugging, the State and Law and Order, The MacMillan Press Ltd, London
105

Harris, B., Valji, N. & Simpson, G. (2004) Crime, Security and Fear of the Other in SA Reconciliation Barometer, Vol. 2., Issue 1, Centre for the Study of Violence and Reconciliation, Accessed at www.csvr.org.za

Harris, B., (2004); Arranging prejudice: Exploring hate crime in post-apartheid South Africa in Race and Citizenship in Transition Series, Johannesburg, CSVR

Harris, B., (2003); Spaces of Violence, Places of Fear: Urban Conflict in Post-Apartheid South Africa, Paper Presented on the Conflicts and Urban Violence Panel, Foro Social Mundial Tematico, Cartagena, Colombia

Hornschuh, V. (2007); A Victimological Investigation of Farm Attacks with Specific Reference to Farmers Perceptions of their Susceptibility, the Consequences of Attacks on Farmers and the Coping Strategies Employed by them after Victimization, M.A. Thesis, Faculty of Humanities, University of Pretoria, 1 Accessed at http://upetd.up.ac.za/thesis/available/etd-07282008094048/unrestricted/dissertation.pdf

Magome, M.,;Premier Calls for CD of Struggle Songs in The Star, 07 April 2010

Mail & Guardian online, 2010-04-04, Terreblanche killed after row with workers Accessed at http://mg.co.za/article/2010-04-04-terreblanche-hacked-to-death-after-row-withworkers

Maphumulo, S., Molosankwe, B. &Germaner, S.; AWB Vows to Avenge Leader, The Star, 05 April 2010

106

Masinga, S., Julius Malema is a Leader, Not A Murderer, Says Mpumalanga YL, in Ziwaphi, Vol. 4, No. 7, 22 April 2010, Pg. 4, Accessed at www.ziwaphi.com

Ndaba, B., Molosankwe, B., Gifford, G. & SAPA; Now ET sex claims ditched: Lawyer says AWB leader throttled accused in The Star, 15April 2010

Ndaba, B., Molosankwe, B., Van Schie, K., Germaner, S. & SAPA; Barbed wire used to separate groups: Black and white communities clash outside court as two accused appear over Terreblanche murder, The Star, 07 April 2010

Ndinisa, M., Dont Blame ETs Death on Malema YCL, in Ziwaphi, Vol. 4, No. 7, 22 April 2010, Pg. 4, Accessed at www.ziwaphi.com

Rasool, C., (2004); The Individual, Auto/Biography and History in South Africa,A dissertation submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in History, University of the Western Cape

Ntsebeza, L. & Hall, R., (2007) The Land Question in South Africa: The Challenge of Transformation and Redistribution, HSRC Press, Pg. 3, Accessed at www.hsrcpress.ac.za

Rapport, 11 April 2010

Report of the Commission of Inquiry into Farm Attacks

Sakai, J. (1989); Settler Mythology of the White Proletariat: A Short Course in Understanding Babylon, Morningstar Press, Chicago

107

Saturday Star, 17 April 2010

Saturday Star 24 April 2010

Schnteich, M. &Boshoff, H., (2003); Volk Faith and Fatherland: The Security Threat Posed by the White Right, Published in Monograph No.81, Pg.13 Accessed at www.scribd.com

Sunday Times (2009); SAs Refugee Faces Deportation 06 September

Simpson, G., (2004); A Snake Gives Birth to A Snake: Politics and Crime in Transition to Democracy, CSVR

Staff Reporters; Inside ETs house of Death: Blood Stained Bed Frame, Tooth still at Terreblanche Crime Scene, The Star, 06 April 2010

Stoler, A.L., (1992); In Cold Blood: Hierarchies of Credibility and the Politics of Colonial Narratives, Representations, No.37, Special Issue: Imperial fantasies and Postcolonial Histories, University of California Press

Sunday Times Review, 11 April 2010

Sunday Times, 11 April 2010

The Star, 15 April 2010

The Star 12 April 2010

The Star 07 April 2010

The Star 07 April 2010

The Star, 05 April 2010

The Star, 14 April 2010

The Star, 15 April 2010

The Star, 13 April 2010

Trouillot, M-R., (1995); Silencing the Past: Power and the Production of History, Beacon Press, U.S.A

Truth and Reconciliation Commission of South Africa Report, Volume Two

White, L. (2000); Telling More: Lies, Secrets, and History; History and Theory, Theme Issue 39; Wesleyan University

Van Schie, K.,;Enough is Enough, Says AWB New Leader in The Star, 07 April 2010

Van Wyk, J.A., (2009); Cadres, Capitalists and Coalitions: The ANC, Business and Development in South Africa, Development Leadership Program, Research Paper, University of South Africa

109

Vena, V. (2010); Anatomy of a Farm Murder, Mail & Guardian online, Johannesburg

Weeding Out Abuses: Recommendations for a Law-Abiding farm Labour System, A Report by Farm-worker Justice and Oxfam America

Whyte, E., (2010); Aluta Continua: The Struggle Continues in South Africa Against Violent Crime, School of Political Science and International Studies, University of Queensland

http://afrikaner-genocide-achives.blogspot.com/

http://afrikaner-genocide-achives.blogspot.com/2008/11/letter-to-international-criminalcourt.html

http://afrikaner-genocide-achives.blogspot.com/2008/11/letter-to-international-criminalcourt.html

http://article.wn.com/view/2010/04/05/South_Africa_leaders_visit_Eugene_Terreblanche_famil y/

http://dailymaverick.co.za/article/2009-10-12-TerreBlanche-rides-again

http://dailymaverick.co.za/article/2010-03-29-kill-the-boer-a-brief-history

http://digitaljournal.com/article/311327

http://links.org.au/node/1605
110

http://mg.co.za/article/2010-04-03-terreblanche-killed-on-ventersdorp-farm

http://mg.co.za/article/2010-04-04-zuma-calls-for-calm-after-terreblanche-murder

http://mg.co.za/article/2010-04-05-terreblanche-killing-awb-vows-revenge

http://mg.co.za/article/2010-04-11-sodomy-sparked-murder-of-terreblanche

http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/0308/feature5/

http://vocfm.co.za/blogs/shafiqmorton/?p=214 http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:fS8dojxP5mkJ:myfundi.co.za/e/Eug%C 3%A8ne_Ney_Terre%E2%80%99Blanche:_Profile+ink+trane+terreblanche&cd=3&hl=en&ct=c lnk&gl=za

http://whatishappeninginsouthafrica.blogspot.com/2011/05/twelve-sa-leaders-charged-withgenocide.html

http://whatishappeninginsouthafrica.blogspot.com/2011/05/twelve-sa-leaders-charged-withgenocide.html

http://why-we-are-white-refugees.blogspot.com/2010/04/oom-eugenes-symbolism-whitesupremacy.html

111

http://why-we-are-white-refugees.blogspot.com/2010/04/suidlanders-awb-legally-preparefor.html

http://why-we-are-white-refugees.blogspot.com/2011/05/steve-hofmeyr-uses-kaffir-in-proawb.html

http://www.citypress.co.za/SouthAfrica/News/ANC-defends-Kill-the-boer-song-20100311-2

http://www.c-r.org/our-work/accord/public-participation/southafrica-multiparty-process.php

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1375967/Kenya-Mau-Mau-atrocities-1950sdossier.html

http://www.economist.com/node/15865250

http://www.ewn.co.za/Story.aspx?Id=66484

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2517113/posts

http://www.griffel.co.za/eugeneterreblanche_my_side.html

http://www.ilanamercer.com/phprunner/public_article_list_view.php?editid1=543

http://www.inthenews.co.uk/news/world/africa/eugene-terre-blanche-tried-to-rape-men-accusedof-his-murder--$1370647.htm

112

http://www.iol.co.za/news/crime-courts/et-was-no-monster-says-wife-1.1224680#.UKehJlsub08

http://www.iol.co.za/news/south-africa/azapo-terre-blanche-is-a-killer-1.479431

http://www.iol.co.za/news/south-africa/chisale-was-dead-before-lion-s-den-witness-1.235211

http://www.iol.co.za/news/south-africa/farmer-accused-of-shooting-boy-gets-bail-1.285834

http://www.klanke.co.za/prom/inktrane.htm

http://www.leadershiponline.co.za/articles/politics/496-kill-the-boer

http://www.newzimbabwe.com/pages/asylumsa37.16227.html http://www.politicsweb.co.za/politicsweb/view/politicsweb/en/page71654?oid=169329&sn=Det ail&pid=71654

http://www.politicsweb.co.za/politicsweb/view/politicsweb/en/page71619?oid=170457&sn=Det ail&pid=71619

http://www.sahistory.org.za/dated-event/native-land-act-was-passed

http://www.state.gov/documents/organization/160145.pdf

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/africaandindianocean/southafrica/7560357/SouthAfrica-police-use-barbed-wire-to-separate-whites-and-blacks.html

113

http://www.timeslive.co.za/local/article386066.ece/Roodt-blames-ANC-for-TerreBlanchemurder

http://www.volkstaat.net/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=805:eugeneterreblanche&catid=47:personalities&Itemid=108

http://www.volkstaat.net/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=805:eugeneterreblanche&catid=47:personalities&Itemid=108

http://www.volkstaat.net/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=805:eugeneterreblanche&catid=47:personalities&Itemid=108

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9v_d6dLTKVs&feature=related http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9v_d6dLTKVs&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i3PdtPJXE0o

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iHCspCSCJwA

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NKiePbTcAfY&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PPvuAVO2-NI&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XaOfZVLaHgQ

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZpP5AfjQf_M
114

www.boycott-2010-world-cup.co.nr

www.sahistory.org.za

www.sairr.org.za

www.vryheidsfront.co.za/english/farm_murders.doc

115