Barbed wire stops race clash
Cops keep white and black apart at Terre'Blanche murder trial
April 06, 2010 Edition 4
Staff Reporters and Sapa
POLICE had to use barbed wire to separate black and white community members in front of the Ventersdorp Magistrate's Court, where two suspects were to appear this morning in connection with the murder of Afrikaner Weerstandsbeweging (AWB) leader Eugene Terre'Blanche.
Police wedged themselves in-between the groups and then pushed the black group back and began putting up the barbed wire.
Supporters of Terre'Blanche started singing Die Stem, the apartheid-era national anthem. The black crowd sang the old version of Nkosi Sikelel' iAfrika in reply.
A physical confrontation apparently started when a white woman sprayed Kool-Aid on a man in the crowd.
Themba Mbatha, from Ekurhuleni, the target, said: "We are not here to fight and the worst thing that they did now is to separate us with barbed wire."
He said they came in solidarity with farmworkers, because they understood their battles.
As the police were unrolling the razor wire from their armoured vehicle, they drove into a ditch and got stuck, setting off the singing of the Afrikaner folk song O, Help 'n Bietjie Daar (Oh, lend a hand there), with some of the white people shouting, "Find a boer and a tractor", and laughing at the police as they struggled to separate the two groups.
Hundreds of people turned up for the two farmworkers' court appearance this morning.
They had handed themselves in to the police on Saturday after Terre'Blanche was murdered in his bedroom, apparently over a pay dispute.
Many white people wore khaki and military fatigues with the AWB emblem. Some held Vierkleur flags and placards. One read, "Bokker die Sokker, Ons Bloei" (Bugger the soccer, we are bleeding). Another read, "Hunting Farmers, Free Licences Issued by ANC".
Police were out in full force at the court and at intersections of roads leading to the court. A police helicopter was hovering above.
Tiaan Theron, a sheep farmer from Beaufort West, had driven all the way from the Western Cape to be at court this morning.
He said Terre'Blanche had united Afrikaners, and blamed FW de Klerk for the murder.
"FW let us down because he believed in democracy, which doesn't work for us, the minority. The solution is to have our own homeland, where we will govern ourself. We can't expect the ANC to prioritise us because we are a minority. We are blaming him for everything that has happened after 1994.
"The question is, when will it be my turn to die as a farmer? The tragedy is that Terre'Blanche's death is just one of 3 000... since 1994," he said.
Hester de Wit had brought her children from a nearby town. Though not an AWB supporter, De Wit said she was there "to show that the boers are still here and will fight back. We can't let them murder us."
Bombo Matinyane, the regional chairman of the SA National Civic Organisation, expressed anger at the display of the Vierkleur, and said he was worried that the murder would raise racial tension.
"We are concerned about violence (that may break out). You can't politicise this incident. It is a criminal activity," he said.
Some of the black people in the crowd said Terre'Blanche deserved to die the way he did, accusing him of committing similar crimes.
Shoes Nsibande, a member of the Young Communist League from Joburg, arrived wearing a red T-shirt bearing the face of assassinated SACP leader Chris Hani.
"I'm here as a concerned citizen of South Africa," Nsibande said, adding that there was no justification for the murder, but that Terre'Blanche added no value to the democratic discourse.
One man said: "If you keep calling us baboons and intimidating us, and killing us in hit-and-runs, then we'll keep killing them."
Just before 11am, North West police spokeswoman Captain Adele Myburgh told journalists outside the court that the proceedings would be held in camera. "Nobody from the public, including the media and family members, can be allowed in the court."
The accused were brought to court using the back entrance.
AWB graffiti defaced road signs along the N12 between Joburg and Potchefstroom. Myburgh said police knew of the graffiti but no case had yet been opened. She added that the graffiti was "definitely new". About 25 to 30 road signs had been defaced with slogans such as "AWB War" and "777" - a form of the party's swastika-like emblem.
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