Two farm workers, aged 15 and 28, were officially charged with four crimes including the murder of former Afrikaner Weerstandsbeweging (AWB) leader Eugene Terre’Blanche in the Ventersdorp Magistrate’s Court on Tuesday.
National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) advocate George Baloyi said the accused, Chris Mahlangu (28) and a minor, who cannot be named, were formally charged with murder, housebreaking and robbery with aggravating circumstances, crimen injuria and attempted robbery with aggravating circumstances.
The charge of crimen injuria was explained by Baloyi: “[After the murder] … they pulled down his [Terre’Blanche’s] pants to his knees and exposed his private parts.”
The case was postponed to April 14. The two had not yet pleaded to the charges.
“We had two sessions today [Tuesday], one was informal and one was formal,” Baloyi said.
“In the informal session we outlined the charges we intend to bring against the two accused and the summary of facts we are relying on.
“In session two, we spoke about complying with the provisions of the new Act.”
He said the Act provided for the treatment of children who committed an offence and laid down the procedure that needed to be followed, adding that the probation officer had compiled a report as per the Act.
The accused’s rights were explained in court and necessary documentation, such as birth certificates, was handed over.
Baloyi said the inquiries were “all but finalised except for one issue”.
“That is the criminal capacity of the accused [the minor].”
The NPA had to determine whether the youth had the capacity to commit murder or whether he was acting on someone else’s instruction.
“It was postponed for seven days to finalise that issue.”
In camera
Baloyi said the entire trial would be held in camera, due to the age of the one accused.
“The law is very clear the trial must take place in camera,” he said.
NPA head Menzi Simelane confirmed that there would only be one trial, saying thus far “from the information, they are the only ones involved in the crime”.
He said there were sufficient provisions to move the case to the high court but certain matters had to be taken into account, such as the Ventersdorp community wanting justice “from here”.
He said people in South Africa generally respected court outcomes and although the case might take place in Ventersdorp, it was still in South Africa with a Constitution generally obeyed by the people.
Simelane said it was difficult to say when the trial would begin.
Asked why he had attended the case, he said: “I am at work like you are. I work from any court …”
The 15-year-old’s attorney, Zola Majavu, relayed a message from the youth to the community: “Please, please don’t hurt my family.”
The youth had not eaten on Tuesday and his mother was too scared to leave the courtroom, worrying about her safety.
“I am arranging the security for her,” Majavu said.
Earlier on Tuesday, police had to separate white AWB supporters and black onlookers in a fracas during the singing of Die Stem and Nkosi Sikelel’ iAfrika.
‘Pent-up rage and frustration’
Meanwhile, the murder of Terre’Blanche had unleashed a “tidal wave of pent-up rage and frustration” in certain sections of South African society, Democratic Alliance leader Helen Zille said on Tuesday.
Addressing the media at Parliament, she said it was time for President Jacob Zuma to “act like a president” and rein in his party’s youth leader, Julius Malema.
“For over a decade now, farmers and farming communities have been on the receiving end of escalating criminal violence, and 3 368 have been murdered.
“Most recently, the ANC Youth League’s sinister leader, Julius Malema, has made popular again an old struggle song, the lyrics of which include the phrase ‘[shoot] the boer’.”
Zille said pointing out, as the ANC had done, that there was no direct evidence linking Malema’s reported hate speech to Terre’Blanche’s murder was unhelpful, to say the least.
“We must acknowledge the fact that songs inciting people to kill others create a climate in which murder is legitimised and romanticised.
“We must understand why people are angered and alienated by a song that calls for their murder.
“We must understand why this is multiplied many-fold when the country’s president fails to take a stand, effectively condoning the flouting of a court ruling that declared these words to be hate speech.
“This song is not experienced as ‘an attack on the apartheid system’, which its apologists claim it is; it is experienced, [and I believe it is meant by those who sing it], as a contemporary expression of a hateful attitude towards farmers and Afrikaners in particular, and whites in general,” she said.
According to the police, Terre’Blanche was murdered, allegedly by two of his farm labourers following a pay dispute, on his farm 10km outside Ventersdorp on Saturday.
Symbolic
Zille said Terre’Blanche’s murder was “symbolic”, for a number of reasons.
“It shows how close to the precipice we are with people’s pent-up rage and anger … A symbolic murder can often be the match on the dry grass, and this is what Eugene Terre’Blanche’s murder threatened to be.”
Asked how big a “seminal moment” Terre’Blanche’s murder was in South Africa’s history, she replied: “It is a big one.”
However, she had been very pleased to hear the AWB had withdrawn its call for violence to avenge Terre’Blanche’s death.
“We cannot avenge violence with violence,” Zille said.
She also called on the ANC leadership to “take a formal decision at the highest level to stop singing the song that includes the words ‘shoot the boer’.”
Farm safety had reached crisis proportions in South Africa.
“When you compare the number of farmers who have been murdered in South Africa [with] the numbers that have lost their lives in Zimbabwe, you will see the sort of crisis it actually is; farm murders in Zimbabwe don’t enter triple figures, and ours are over 3 000.” — Sapa