18

 

Afrikaner fado

‘That we remain alive is our guilt.’

This quote by German psychologist and philosopher Karl Jaspers on a Facebook page came to mind when I recently went to see a movie at The Bioscope, a theatre in Fox Street in Johannesburg’s trendy Maboneng Precinct. The evening’s film was a surprise: The Terminator (1984), starring Arnold Schwarzenegger.

But when the scenes of fire, death and destruction started, waves of nausea washed over me. The film cut too close to the bone after all the stories I had heard over the past few years. The scene of a woman burned to a skeleton triggered images of Vlakplaas torture victims.

It felt as if an unbearable weight was pressing down on my Afrikaner chest. It was a wake-up call: I had strayed too close to the abyss.

On one hand I realised that if I had not climbed into the heart of the whore, as Dirk Coetzee put it, I would not have gained insight into Eugene the person, the soldier, the assassin for the state. I had to dive in head-first to complete a book about Eugene and the madness of the Vlakplaas era. On the other hand I felt I knew too much.

I needed to get out.

After three years on the trail documenting Eugene’s life, I think differently about many things. Nothing will ever be the same again. I view men – especially those who were in the SAP and the SADF in the apartheid era – with empathy and greater understanding. I am reminded of something I read in Antjie Krog’s Country of My Skull: ‘And suddenly I know: I have more in common with the Vlakplaas five than with this man [FW de Klerk]. Because they have walked a road, and through them some of us have walked a road. And hundreds of Afrikaners are walking this road – on their own with their own fears and shame and guilt. And some say it, most just live it. We are so utterly sorry. We are deeply ashamed and gripped with remorse.’1

I have listened to the stories of many former Security Branch members. Their brutal actions can never be euphemised. But once upon a time they were simply youthful foot soldiers of the government of the day, young men who believed they were fighting a just war. The apartheid system dehumanised the victims of atrocities as well as the transgressors who committed these crimes.

They lived a unique kind of hell, as Nick Howarth, a former sergeant in the East Rand riot unit described it: ‘For the riot policeman on the ground it was hell on earth. They were given the task of curbing the violence which entailed putting their bodies in the line of fire, loading many hundreds of corpses for the morgue (victims of township violence) and placing their own family lives on the sacrificial altar of duty. They were the only barrier between peace and an all-out civil war. They were shot at, spat at, blamed, maimed, killed, divorced and driven crazy by being exposed to the horror reality of non-stop violence.’2

In our polarised society today, it is more critical than ever for the recollections and voices of war veterans and former armed forces members to be heard. Former members need to talk to their loved ones about their experiences (as Eugene de Kock was able to in court and during his TRC amnesty hearing) – even if it is shocking to listen to their wild, primitive side that caused such damage and destruction. Marlantes says society must give former members and war veterans space to express all aspects of their experiences: the guilt, the sadness and the pride.3

Being an Afrikaner is a complex thing; for many years I felt ambiguous about it. As sweetly familiar my mother-tongue Afrikaans is, as culturally foreign some fellow Afrikaners are to me. I wanted nothing to do with their blinkered outlook, stubbornness and conservative culture. Yes, this is a gross generalisation. But try as I might to prove the opposite – we are by no means all the same – we still have the same blood flowing through our veins. We differ as widely as the heavens yet share an umbilical cord.

This is one of the most important insights I’ve come to. By squarely facing the past, I have learnt how, as an Afrikaner woman, I can face the future without guilt but with a heightened sense of responsibility, insight and respect. It took this revisiting and reassessing of the past to become a whole person, a whole Afrikaner, again. This time, for the first time, without any ignorance or pretence.

‘Afrikaner history embodies simultaneously a fatalistic anticipation of unavoidable collective loss and a mysterious vitality,’ writes historian Hermann Giliomee in his book The Afrikaners: Biography of a People.4

I hear the saudade, the call in which yesterday, today and tomorrow are united for us; our insignificance on the African continent as opposed to a fate that sways over everything. This is the Afrikaner fado that will echo in this wide and complex country until all eternity.

On 30 January 2015, a day after Eugene’s 66th birthday, Masutha announced that Eugene would be released on parole. At the media conference the minister began by thanking President Jacob Zuma for his advice and assistance. He stumbled slightly over his words and the microphone buzzed before he went on to say that he had taken cognisance of the various positive reports that had been submitted; Eugene’s continuous attempts to improve his skills; the assistance he had given to the Missing Persons Task Team and the National Prosecuting Authority; and the fact that Eugene had consulted fully with the family members of the victims.

At last, Eugene was on parole.

It’s over.

I walk around in Bedford Shopping Centre, looking for the linen and towels Eugene has requested for his room in the safe house that will be his home for the next year. Down pillows and a duvet, two sets of single bedsheets – everything cotton, in dove grey or dark blue. Two sets of towels. My small contribution to his first steps to freedom.

In a letter dated December 2012, Eugene outlined his wishes for the future.

What will life be like if I get out? I want to live simply and quietly and with as much dignity as possible.

To thank the people who stood by me through the years and even just yesterday and today. Everyone, each individual, has played a part in my survival, in maintaining my spirit, humanity, soul and body.

I will look around for something to do, and work. Must support myself at all costs.

I will even approach the press for difficult assignments they don’t want, or that others won’t do. The more dangerous the better, like second-by-second reporting from the very first vehicle on the frontline in Libya. I am not on a self-destruction mission, but don’t want to be idle and my experience can surely be put to use. Makes no difference what the salary is.

Simplicity will be the philosophy. A glass of good red wine, a light cheese, plenty of fresh, raw vegetables, a good, fresh slice of bread, nothing rich.

My clothes ordinary, serviceable, neat, workman/outdoor type, a pair of good Hi-Tec boots, etc. Nothing opulent or expensive; just good quality that lasts and lasts, but as little of it as possible. Have never been a man for jewellery etc.

Live simply, so if you get somewhere and want to stay there, you don’t have to go back to collect anything.

Good company, laughter, space, fresh air. I have always been like this. Not a person for crowds or being surrounded by people.

Walk, exercise, but the most enjoyable is always the simplest, nature; there from whence we all came.

And then write and write. Read what I could not get here [in prison]; lap up the good DVDs [movies]. Put up a bird feeder, not just for seed-eaters, but also put fruit out for the fruit-eaters. The fruit in turn attracts insects, so the insect-eaters come too.

I want to watch Scent of a Woman with Al Pacino, my favourite, six or ten times. The story, the depth of it and the never-give-up factor is really palpable. See it if you haven’t yet – you’ll be the richer for it. It is deeply human and authentic.

I want to see my two sons. Thank their mother for how well she has brought them up, and apologise for all her suffering, loneliness, hardship and isolation from all that was familiar once. They have made history in their own way; a deep story in itself.

There’ll be no celebrating, revelry or excess.

My time, biologically, is short, relative to those who are younger, and I want what I have left to be quality time.

If possible I want to thank everyone who has helped and supported me personally with a handshake. There is only one way to do this properly and that is to look the person in the eye.

Then I must see to my health. I have arranged with Dr Wouter Basson for all medical tests and whatever else needs doing. I will also ask his advice about other aspects, because although I am advanced in years I do not plan to go celibate to my grave. I don’t believe in that. Not at all! My role model is the late Dr Chris Barnard.

Walk through flea markets. Visit bookshops. Drink a cappuccino. Meander through art galleries and lose myself there.

See a Nataniël performance.

Sit in the pouring rain of a summer thunderstorm while the wind gusts and the thunder and lightning shake and light up the heavens.

Go walking with dogs, and hug them sometimes. Laugh at their tricks and attention-seeking.

Join a nature conservation project for a threatened species.

Answer honestly when people ask questions about the past.

Withhold answers about personal matters, past or present.

I can’t believe I ever took up a weapon for this Vervloekte land [cursed country], one book that FA Venter never wrote. There was Geknelde land, Offerland, Beloofde land – I’m not even sure any more. He forgot about this cursed fucking country when he wrote Die keer toe ek my naam vergeet.

I will never pick up a weapon for any country again. Never!

Early in the morning, four o’clock, just to go and sit quietly with my coffee and hear which bird starts chirping first. All the other birds then start, here and there. It’s never the same kind of bird, never in the same place. In the bush or the city, the birds are the same: they wait for one to start chirping first. Almost as if they’re reluctant to disturb the others, and wait, rather, for one to break the rule.

I want to sit quietly beside a stream and watch how the insects fall into the water and count the seconds down for a fish to take them from below.

Everything that made me a good hunter. Not of animals.