Marianne Merten
Claims that a Calvinia farmer is conducting a reign of terror in the little Northern Cape town with the help of police to keep assault cases out of court are receiving attention from the provincial police commissioner.
After residents last month protested about violent assaults of farm and casual workers which, they say, are motivated by racism, Commissioner Johan Deyzel stepped in.
But despite several claims against Calvinia farmer and businessman Jaco Vlok, who is linked to the African National Congress, the official probe is limited to two recent beatings and a missing docket.
The Northern Cape office of the police watchdog, the Independent Complaints Directorate, is keeping an eye on the investigation.
The farmer at the heart of the controversy has laughed off these allegations, claiming they are part of a vendetta against him by local “layabouts, drunkards and criminals”. Vlok says those who claim he is paying the police must come forward with proof so he “can deal with them”.
Next month Pieter Skeffers celebrates his 21st birthday with a torn lip, a permanent reminder of a beating he claims he received for no reason from Vlok. Three weeks after the assault, there are still purple bruises on his face. He was hospitalised for more than a week.
On August 21, Skeffers was visiting friends. As it got dark, they noticed car headlights moving up and down a nearby road. Suddenly a group of men broke down the door, stormed in and started hitting Skeffers, his father and teenage brother.
Skeffers says he and his father were dragged into a waiting car and driven to an isolated yard where another farmer, Johan Barnard, allegedly led the assault. Skeffers’s father managed to run away. Later, Skeffers claims, Vlok arrived and beat him with a sjambok until he passed out.
“They kicked and beat me and it just went on,” he whispers. “They carried me to the road and left me there. I couldn’t hear. I couldn’t walk. I was like dead.”
On August 16 Pieter April did casual work for policeman Hendrik Brand. April claims he was offered a lift home, but instead, Brand dropped him off outside town where Vlok and his foreman, Viktor Hugo, picked him up.
April claims they drove to an isolated spot near the abattoir and handcuffed him to a windmill. After allegedly beating him, they dropped him back in town. A charge was laid, but the docket disappeared that week.
Vlok says April has a grudge against him because he was dismissed for stealing from his feed factory. Vlok also claims the case of the disappeared docket has been solved: the document was allegedly found under April’s bed and there are three farmers who are submitting affidavits to say the worker tried to sell it to them.
Despite the freezing temperatures in Calvinia last week, people gathered on a street corner, hoping to find casual work for the day.
A town official, who prefers not to be named because of fear of intimidation, says the high rates of unemployment and illiteracy have left hundreds at the mercy of farmers and the few employers in the area. Access to legal aid to defend claims is frequently scuppered by the alleged refusal of law firms to take on such cases. “The attitude is, I will give you money, but you will do as I say,” the official says.
Previous charges against Vlok – including one related to a brawl on the main road with a casual worker – have been withdrawn, allegedly after he paid the claimants to keep quiet. “Many suspect police complicity. Vlok has a lot of money he can dish out,” the official says.
Claims abound against Vlok, who owns 11 farms in the area and a feed company. Many in the local township are angry, saying Vlok is manipulating his contacts in the ANC.
The farmer and foreman have been charged and appeared in court on charges of kidnapping and assaulting April. They were released on bail of R1 000 pending their next appearance at the end of the month.
“I have never been found guilty in a court. Let justice take its course. We will see who is guilty,” Vlok says.
But for Skeffers justice may never come. Although three men have been arrested and charged in court on the basis of his statement, there is a twist.
The Calvinia police say Skeffers never mentioned Vlok in his statement, and they therefore cannot charge him. The youngster insists the farmer was there. Then it emerges the policeman who took Skeffers’s statement did not ask him to read it, but simply to sign it. Ignorance of the legal process and lack of access to legal representation now may cost Skeffers his recourse to justice.
“The man, he must go to jail,” Skeffers says quietly with his head bowed, self- conscious of his permanently disfigured lip.