Murder trial of Terre’blanche’s killers commences

Murder trial of Terre’blanche’s killers commences

The trial of two blacks, accused of hacking to death South African white supremacist leader Eugene Terre'blanche started on Monday amid tight security.

Chris Mahlangu, a gardener at Terre'blanche's farm, and a 16-year-old, not identified for legal reasons, were charged with the April 2010 murder of Terre'blanche in a wage dispute at his farm.

Terre’blanche’s case has highlighted continuing racial tensions, 17 years after the end of the apartheid system that Terre'blanche had fought to preserve.

Racial violence

Many in the country still scarred by its brutal apartheid past, were worried that the murder of Terre'blanche, who led the hardline supremacist Afrikaner Resistance Movement (AWB), would spark racial violence.

Police however said the motive for the crime was likely unpaid wages rather than anything political. As such, the case has not led to any major fallout.

Supporters

A handful of AWB supporters gathered outside the courthouse in Ventersdorp, a farming community about 125 km (80 miles) west of Johannesburg. They flew the AWB and former Transvaal flag -- symbols of the apartheid regime.
"We are here to support the Terre'blanche family and see that justice is done. We don't want special treatment, the person who killed our leader should get a trial; there is a place for the AWB. The whites are getting threatened in our own country, we are getting murdered on our farms", said AWB member Johan Potgieter.

Brief profile

Terre'blanche was a prominent figure during the dying years of apartheid but then lived in relative obscurity, particularly since his release in 2004 after serving a prison sentence for beating a black man nearly to death.

The AWB is seen as a fringe group with little influence, but many still say that remnants of the white-minority apartheid state linger in the country, where about half of the black majority live in poverty.

A local black resident, who only wanted to be identified as Sello, said: "The ANC may be in government but in Ventersdorp, the whites are still in charge."

Reuters/Ehimen/Ekata