All copies of a new book that notorious apartheid murderer Eugene de Kock believes defames him and harms both his dignity and his reputation are being withdrawn from bookshops.
This follows a Pretoria High Court interim order two weeks ago after De Kock applied to the court to halt further sales of the book, White Power and the Rise and Fall of the National Party. The publisher, Zebra Press, and De Kock have since agreed to replace the page that De Kock considers is damaging his good name.
This week the author of the book, Christi van der Westhuizen, went it alone trying to overturn the interim order. The Pretoria High Court is due to hand down judgement on her application on Friday.
In 1996 De Kock was found guilty on 82 criminal charges, including six charges of murder, committed while he was commander of apartheid’s secretive interrogation and torture unit Vlakplaas. He was granted amnesty on some of the counts but denied presidential pardon in 2002. He is serving two life sentences.
The book quotes apartheid deputy law and order minister Leon Wessels referring to De Kock ‘braaing meat and drinking for hours next to a corpse that they [Vlakplaas operatives] had set on fireâ€. De Kock complained that this ‘harms his reputation, his dignity and is defamatoryâ€.
De Kock’s counsel, Marissa Barnard, argued that the quote is a blatant lie and that, although he had been found guilty of multiple murders he was still ‘entitled to his good name and dignityâ€. Hearing De Kock’s application, Pretoria High Court Judge Willie Seriti asked, if for example, it was not contradictory to say a person who is a serial killer has the right to a good name.
Van der Westhuizen’s counsel, Faizel Ismail, argued that De Kock could not be defamed because his reputation had already been ‘in tattersâ€. He quoted Judge Willie van der Merwe who sentenced De Kock in 1996 as saying: ‘He [De Kock] is a cold-blooded, calculating, multiple murderer who tortured and murdered his victims callously, mercilessly and without any compassion.â€
‘This quote has, however, been published several times in other newspapers, and De Kock has been silent on those publications,†Ismail observed. Van der Westhuizen’s case also rested on the contention that her book merely quoted Wessels, rather than using her own words, and that De Kock had not set out specifically what he considers to be defamatory.
The interim order was issued against Van der Westhuizen, the book’s publishers, Zebra Press, and the Inter Press Service, for whom Van der Westhuizen freelances. After the interim order was granted by Judge Willie Hartzenberg, Zebra Press and De Kock’s attorneys reached an agreement to withdraw the book and reprint the offending page.
The settlement was reached without Van der Westhuizen concurring.
She told the Mail & Guardian that blocking the book amounts to an infringement of freedom of speech. ‘It is important that these views are heard.â€
The book analyses the collapse of the National Party and its subsequent merger with the ANC. It also looks at South Africa’s economic power, which according to Van der Westhuizen, is still concentrated in white hands.
Van der Westhuizen considers accusations that the NP’s leaders betrayed its supporters and that they pursued their own rather than their supporters’ interests during the Codesa negotiations. The book uses interviews with former senior NP leaders and previously unpublished archival material.