North West public safety minister Howard Yawa on Monday warned the Afrikaner Weerstandsbeweging (AWB) against marching to the Ventersdorp Court on Tuesday.
A 21-year-old man and a 15-year-old boy have been arrested for allegedly killing AWB leader Eugene Terre’Blanche on his farm on Saturday. They were expected to appear in the Ventersdorp Magistrate’s Court on charges of murder on Tuesday.
Yawa warned that any person who participates in the illegal march would be arrested.
Yawa said the march had apparently been organised to demand the handover of the two suspects.
“Our constitutional democracy enjoins all of us to defend the rule of law at all costs” said Yawa in a statement.
Yawa welcomed the retraction of a threat to avenge Terre’Blanche’s death by the AWB.
AWB spokesperson Pieter Steyn retracted their threat to avenge their leader’s death on Monday after declaring war on Sunday.
Yawa described this decision as a “sensible and positive development”.
‘They did the killing’
The mother of a 15-year-old suspect said on Monday that her son struck Terre’Blanche with an iron rod after the farmer refused to pay him.
“My son admitted that they did the killing,” the mother said from her two-room cement home in Tshing township on the outskirts of Ventersdorp.
She said she spoke to the teenager at Ventersdorp police station on Saturday after he turned himself in along with his alleged accomplice.
The mother said her 15-year-old son told her that when he and his co-worker asked Terre’Blanche for their money, he told them first to bring in the cows. After they had brought in the cows they again asked for their money, which he then refused to give them.
“He said that the man told him to wait while he went to the storeroom. He came back with an iron rod. He started hitting Terre’Blanche, with four blows to the head. Then my son says he took the iron rod and hit him with three blows,” the mother said.
“My son was a person who doesn’t like to be in trouble,” she said softly, appearing a bit bewildered and scared.
Cool tensions
The African National Congress on Monday brushed off accusations of fuelling racial tension amid fears of a bloody backlash.
Anger over the death of the AWB founder has shifted to the singing of Ayesaba Amagwala [The Cowards are Scared], which is being blamed for triggering the leader’s death.
The provocative anti-apartheid song has been recently revived by ANC Youth League leader Julius Malema, who has sung it at public gatherings.
“Any claim that blacks intend to harm other race groups — [in] particular our white compatriots — is baseless and devoid of all truth,” the ANC said in a statement.
“Let us not add fuel to an already very sensitive atmosphere in the wake of Mr Terre’Blanche’s death by making unfounded and dangerous speculative statements,” the party said.
The youth leader has rejected the accusations which were carried on the front page of Monday’s Beeld newspaper with the headline, “The song is the culprit”.
“We have nothing to do with his death,” Malema told reporters in Harare on Tuesday while on a visit to Zimbabwe hosted by President Robert Mugabe’s Zanu-PF youth.
“I am not going to be terrorised by right-wingers in our country. I am not scared.”
The right-winger’s funeral on Friday is expected to draw hundreds of AWB supporters.
The extremist leader — found with a machete still embedded in his flesh — will be buried on his farm. – Sapa, AFP