 
MEMOIR OF AN APARTHEID COP

By Glenn Elsden

SMASHWORDS EDITION

Copyright 2010 Glenn Elsden

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Please be advised that this publication is not suitable for children, aged 17 or younger.

* * * * *

Foreword by the Author

Some of the words and facts you are about to read here have been lying idle for years in various folders scattered on my computer's hard drive, while others have remained locked in my brain, dormant but not forgotten. With the exception of the first few opening paragraphs, which deal with a few personal background facts and a brief history of South Africa, the personal account of events depicted here covers a time span of roughly 24 years, starting from 1978 and ending in 2001. This is my first attempt to go public with my story.

Although many South Africans, and particularly those who served in the various armed forces of the country, will easily relate to events mentioned in this memoir, there will also be many who did not fully comprehend what exactly was going on in the South African Police Force before, during, and immediately after the country became a Democracy in the year 1994.

This memoir fully accommodates readers who are not familiar with South Africa's past or present history, or who don't understand the Afrikaans language. English translations are provided in brackets whenever Afrikaans is spoken. As the timeline of the narrative unfolds, certain facts and additional information, which relates to events or persons mentioned in this memoir, will appear in _italic text_ in brackets. The extra information or explanations given in parentheses were intended to compliment the story, and should therefore not interrupt the normal progression of this memoir, or spoil the enjoyment of reading it.

Sensitive readers are warned that although strong language is used in this memoir, particularly in the first chapter, it is not vulgar and neither is it used excessively in the rest of the story. Some of the facts concerning crime scenes reveal horrific and gruesome details, which may upset sensitive readers. The warning on the first page advising readers that this publication is not suitable for children aged 17 or younger, may thus not be an adequate forewarning. Please bear this in mind!

Readers should also be aware that this publication is by no means an attempt to dispute the current worldview that the old South African Police Force was a brutal apartheid machine, whose sole purpose was to subdue, control, and oppress people. This is by no means my intention, as I will only be making a complete idiot of myself if I tried!

It does concern me though, that there are many warped perceptions in the world today concerning South Africa's past. One of the mistaken beliefs is that the conflict in the country was dominated by rivalry between Black and White races only. Another misconception is that the indigenous Africans were the only people who suffered hardship, pain, and sorrow. This chronicle will reveal that, although there is some degree of truth in these perceptions, the current worldview is excessively unbalanced and unjust regarding this issue.

The character and reputation of the old South African Police Force was ripped to shreds in countless publications and media reports, long before Nelson Mandela was released from prison. The words "Police Brutality" and "Police State" often featured prominently in news headlines at a time when there were hardly sufficient resources, and way too few policemen on the streets to combat terrorism, - never mind to 'serve' and 'protect' all the diverse communities. Some of the narratives in this chronicle will hopefully portray the true state of affairs in this regard.

I've also noticed lately that journalists and many authors are fond of using the repulsive term, "White Supremacist Apartheid Regime" in their writings when referring to South Africa's recent past. Vocal reports on the radio and television often place undue emphasize on the last four syllables of the word 'apartheid', and pronounce it as "HATE". This subtle but deliberate misrepresentation is particularly loved by foreign press reporters, and is fast becoming popular among a few local Black South Africans, who seem to have fallen into the habit of imitating everything the Americans do.

Although one can hardly classify this manner of speech as a form of hate speech or propaganda, it has planted a mistaken perception in the minds of millions of people. Today people will automatically and subconsciously associate the old Police Force, for example, and anything that vaguely resembles that era (such as flags, logos, emblems, etc.) with 'hatred'. I strongly believe that people have gone way overboard with this perception, as there were numerous police divisions in the old South African Police that followed the exact same ethical protocols and procedures, which were also adopted by other respectable police agencies worldwide.

Take note, that although I am not entirely comfortable with the title of this publication, I have chosen to use it because it immediately signifies what the contents of this publication are all about. I do not consider myself an "Apartheid Cop", and definitely not in the context as portrayed by the current worldview. Once you've read this memoir, you will understand why I feel this way.

### CHAPTER 1

A few background facts from years gone by...

I believe that a few background facts concerning the old South Africa are necessary, as it will place certain aspects of this memoir into perspective. I will not go into too much detail, and will only focus on factors that created animosity between the Afrikaner (Boer) and the English-speaking South African, as this aspect has a direct bearing on my past, present, and also my future.

I'll start off by quoting an extract, taken from a book called, "The First Boer War" by Joseph H. Lehmann, which will give the reader some insight into how the English perceived the South African Boer, about 130 years ago:

Way back in the year 1879 General Sir Garnet Wolseley, the chief troubleshooter of the British Empire and warrior of the Queens enemies, once confided to his sister Matilda; 'I confess I don't like colonies. They are mostly peopled by a money-grabbing people devoid of all higher feelings for the mother country. Worst of all were the Boers, who imagine the country is their special property, ignoring altogether the English settlers'. He described the Boers as 'the most incorrigible liars' and by far 'the most ignorant white people in the world'. The 'half-civilized Dutchmen' appeared so crude and unpolished that he could well believe the story that their tattered and filthy clothes never came off their bodies until they dropped off. Some were so stupid, he told the Duke of Cambridge, that they believed that all of the English soldiers had been killed by the Zulus and that Britain had no more to send.

(Extract from Page 64 - The First Boer War: 1972 by Joseph H. Lehmann. Jonathan Cape Ltd. 30 Bedford Square, London w01 ISBN 0 224 00686 x)

On 31 May 1902, when the Anglo-Boer War came to an end with the signing of the Treaty of Vereeniging, many Boers were unhappy with the political state of affairs. This is evident from the Boer diaspora that followed soon afterwards:

Starting in 1903, the largest group emigrated to the Patagonia region of Argentina. Another group emigrated to British-ruled Kenya, from where most returned to South Africa during the 1930s, as a result of warfare there with indigenous people. A third group, under the leadership of General Ben Viljoen, emigrated to Chihuahua in northern Mexico and to states of Arizona, California, New Mexico and Texas in the south-western USA. Others migrated to other parts of Africa, including German East Africa (present day Tanzania, mostly near Arusha). Some refugees went to Angola, where smaller and larger groups settled on the Bihe and the Humpata plateaus, respectively. _(Source:_ Wikipedia article on the Boer War diaspora _.)_

From what I've read about those bloody wars between Boer and Brit, it does not sound as if the British enjoyed a splendid victory. In other words, as James Bond would say, "It was not Britain's finest hour!" The following extract taken from another Boer War publication, written by Thomas Pakenham, is self-explanatory:

The war declared by the Boers on 11 October 1899 gave the British, in Kipling's famous phrase, 'no end of a lesson'. The British public expected it to be over by Christmas. It proved to be the longest (two and three-quarter years), the costliest (over 200 million pounds), the bloodiest (at least 22 thousand British, 25000 Boer and 12000 African lives) and the most humiliating war for Britain between 1815 and 1914.

(The Boer War: 1979 by Thomas Pakenham. Published in South Africa by Jonathan Ball Publishers P.O. Box 32213, Braamfontein 2017 ISBN 0 297 77395 X)

I was born on South African soil approximately one year before the Union became a Republic in 1961. I therefore cannot make any weighty assumptions concerning the politics of those old Union days, - and definitely not from any personal experiences. However, I believe that it is almost common knowledge today that the old Union was pre-occupied with uniting the White races here on African soil, mainly the British and the Boers. This fact has also been confirmed in several other published sources dealing with the politics of those days. I believe the name, "Union" says it all!

My birth was a by-product of that historic unity between Boer and Brit. The account of how my British father met my Afrikaans mother was often told as a bedtime story to my own kids. Obviously I added some flavour to the story when it was told to my children. I may just as well repeat the narrative here, without any additional flavours:

The British Royal Navy dropped my father off in Cape Town sometime in 1958, after he and a few other men experienced a naval accident on board their ship. Rumour has it that one of the naval guns on board had an accidental discharge. Apparently my father suffered from severe concussion, hence the reason why he was hospitalized in Cape Town.

Obviously I cannot say what thoughts were going through his mind when he finally recovered, but his actions indicate that he was determined to get back to his motherland. After several unsuccessful attempts to contact the Royal Navy and his relatives in England, he eventually purchased a motorbike and a 9mm P-38 Walther pistol at one of the pawn shops in Cape Town. From there he headed in a northerly direction with apparent intentions to cross Africa all the way to Cairo.

He managed to reach the small bushveld town of Alldays, in the northern province of the old Transvaal, about 1850km (1150 miles) from Cape Town. At that point in time my mother's side of the family were managing a farm a few kilometers west from Alldays. The farm also had a small supply store and a fuel depot.

Apparently when the dusty and weary young biker-sailor entered the store to pick up a few supplies, he was surprised to find the store wide open, but not a single human being to serve him. He heard a huge commotion going on in the backyard of the premises, and on further investigation discovered that the cause of the commotion was an enormous Puff Adder snake.

The strange traveller, who could not speak a word of Afrikaans, became an instant hero that day when he killed the snake with a well-aimed bullet, fired from his P-38 pistol, and that is more-or-less how my father met my mother! I find it quite odd that guns played a role in my life even before I was born!

(The farm up north bordering the Mogalakwena river between Tolwe and Alldays, was a magical bushveld paradise, where I spent most of my early formative years growing up. Besides my uncle, who inherited the farm, a dog called Leeu and a .22LR Mauser Rifle were my two best companions. The farm is currently under a government land claim dispute.)

On my mothers side of the family, her granny (my great-grandmother) spent considerable time in a concentration camp operated by the British during the Anglo-Boer War. My mother's father (my granddad, born in March 1910), was at some stage of his life a young commander in the Ossewa-brandwag (The Ox-wagon Sentinels). He also spent some time in prison in 1942 when he, together with a few other members and Mr B.J. Vorster, were arrested for their rebellious activities. The Ossewa-brandwag was an anti-British and pro-German organization in South Africa during World War II, which opposed South African participation in the war.

(According to modern-day standards, the Ossewa-brandwag would have been classified as a typical terrorist organization. They manufactured hand grenades from water pipes, and accumulated arms and ammunition, and also committed acts of sabotage and arson in the name of a National Socialist South Africa. Mr B.J. Vorster who was arrested and detained with my granddad, later became Prime Minister and then State President of South Africa.)

Evidently, my granddad, like most Afrikaners from that era, was not too fond of the English, but for some reason, unknown to me, he accepted my British father into his family as if he were his own son. The two apparently grew very fond of one another. Unfortunately I never had the honour of meeting my granddad, as he passed away on 14 February 1960, at the young age of 49, two months before I was born.

Maybe the fact that none of my father's relatives had ever fought in any wars against the Boers, played a role in that family union, and maybe also because my father later gave up his British citizenship to became a South African citizen by naturalization.

My late granddad's political views must have had some influence on my father, because it wasn't too long after my granddad's death that my father found himself in the company of the far-right clan. People like Jaap Marais from the Herstigte Nasionale Party (HNP) became one of his best friends.

It was only many years later, when I was much older and wiser, that I came to realize that my father's friendship with the Afrikaner far-right movement was a total farce, and that he had wasted precious time and energy in the company of those people. My father had an amazing knowledge on a variety of diverse topics. Politics and religion were his favourite subjects. Long before fate brought him to South Africa, he had already travelled the world as a sailor in the British Royal Navy. He had also served as a paratrooper in the Korean War. He was no fool, but yet these far-right Afrikaner buddies of his showed him little respect, and zero recognition for his efforts to promote their cause. In their eyes, he was just another dumb Rooinek, -- that's all!

After South Africa became a Republic in 1961, the English and the Afrikaners were largely left to make their own choices, without too much interference from politics. School attendance was compulsory, but parents had a choice whether to send their children to an exclusive Afrikaans-only public school, or to an exclusive English-only school. I ended up in an English Medium Primary School, and later in an English High School, where I completed my final school year (Matric). Incidentally, that was a few weeks before I enlisted with the South African Police Force, in January 1978.

During my early years of schooling it was quite apparent that the Afrikaners had no time for the English. The two opposing clans behaved as if the Second Anglo-Boer War (1899-1902) had never ended! The only time we really connected was on the sports fields, but I can honestly not recall a single friendly game between Boer and Brit, -- not in Primary School, nor in High School! I played cricket and rugby, and could never understand why they called these games friendly!

Although I broke a finger once while playing cricket against an Afrikaans school, it was during rugby matches with local Afrikaans schools where much blood was spilled. Many rugby matches (not all) turned into bloody fist fights, which sometimes continued long after the final whistle had blown.

I shared classes with many schoolmates who boasted Afrikaans surnames, such as Botha, Wolmarans, Els, van Deventer, etc.., a clear indication that their mothers had married Afrikaans men. Even these chaps were not liked by local Afrikaners, simply because they spoke English.

During that era the National Afrikaans Sunday newspaper (Rapport) published a cartoon story in their supplementary magazine called, "Ben, Babsie en familie". Most Afrikaners never missed one single episode of that popular cartoon sketch.

I also enjoyed the comic strip, but I can recall how some of the cartoons had my dad's blood boiling on many occasions, because of the blatant Anti-English propaganda depicted in some of the comics. One of the characters in the cartoon was an English chap called: "Rooinek".

Oddly enough, the creators of the Ben - Babsie cartoon were English South Africans known as Keith and Lorna Stevens, which just goes to show how shrewd the propagandist really is!

Military service was compulsory in those days. You basically had three choices to make after you had finished your final year at high school. The three choices were, either the SA Police Force, the Air Force, or the Army.

My decision to join the South African Police was welcomed by my father who strongly felt that the government of the day was acting rather callously by forcing young men to fight their wars for them.

(At that point in time my mother had little influence over my life as my father was my sole custodian. My parents got divorced about two years earlier when I was 15-years old. Although the court granted my father full custody, my younger sister chose to live with my mother, while I decided to stay with my father.)

One would think that when the universal threat of crime and terrorism raised its ugly head in South Africa, in the late 1970's and early 1980's, that it should have compelled White Afrikaners and English to accept and respect one another, and that the two should instantly have become one unified power. To the outside world that may have been the general perception, but on ground-level here in South Africa it was not the case!

Obstinate Afrikaners still wanted to show the English that they were in charge of matters. Thick-skinned Dutchmen with whom I shared a barracks in the South African Police College, still perceived the English as enemy number one! Many of my school mates who signed up with the South African Defence Force (SADF) experienced similar attitudes.

I found myself in a predicament because I was neither a true Brit nor a true Boer. I was a mixture of the two, - an English-speaking South African who happened to also speak "The Taal" with the exact same accent as the Afrikaner. The few Englishmen in my college platoon of 30-odd men, were totally outnumbered. Counting myself, there were only four English chaps in the platoon; three of those chaps originated from Durban, a seaport city situated on the East Coast of South Africa, in the province now known as KwaZulu/Natal, - (for those who don't know this!)

During those years there was a stigma attached to Durbanites on the presumption that Durban was considered the drug capital of South Africa, where the best quality marijuana could be purchased for a few pennies on almost every street corner. The Natal province was also regarded as the only English province in the country.

The end result was that, from day one, these three English-speaking Durbanites were labelled as dagga-rokers, and were treated like white trash by the Afrikaners, simply because they boasted shoulder-length sun bleached hair on the day of their arrival, happened to speak English, and came from Durban!

Our Platoon Sergeant was Jannie Breedt, a well known celebrity-figure during that time, who also Captained the old provincial Transvaal rugby team (now known as 'The Lions'). As long as I live, I will never forget our first military inspection, conducted by Sergeant Breedt. For Sergeant Breedt it was obviously more than just a routine inspection. It was his first opportunity to meet and analyse every recruit in person. It was also the ideal opportunity to make it known to all present that he hated the English with an immense passion.

His inspection of the premises and his interrogation started with the first recruit standing at attention on my extreme left. The poor chap happened to be a typical Oxford type English-speaking fellow. All questions were posed in the Afrikaans language, but I'll provide the English translation in brackets, for readers who don't understand Afrikaans.

I can still see the scene as if it happened yesterday!

(Please excuse the f-words, and also take note that the name Gary Brogan is a fictitious name.)

"WAT is jou naam?" (WHAT is your name?) Sergeant Breedt spoke these words in such a loud booming voice that every single motionless body in the barracks shuddered for a split second.

The Englishman replied in a gentle but clear voice, that his name was Gary Brogan, but then the poor chap made the fatal mistake of addressing Sergeant Breedt as, "Sir".

"Luister nou mooi jou fokken klein Rooinek. Ek is NIE jou SIRRR nie! Jy sal my aanspreek as SERRRSANT, \- OKAY!" (Listen carefully you fucking little Red Neck. I am NOT your SIRRR, You shall address me as SERGEANT, - OKAY!)

In a rather placid reply Gary simply said: "Yes Serge!"

With that said, I was sure the barracks roof was going to cave in on us that day when Sergeant Breedt lost his temper. "SERSANT, fokken SERSANT. Is jy fokken doof?" (SERGEANT, - fucking SERGEANT. Are you fucking deaf?)

While Breedt was vending his wrath on Gary and each and every other Englishmen in the platoon, I couldn't help but wonder how the hell I was going to survive in a place ruled by crazy Dutchmen.

I can recall that by the time Breedt got to my little spot to inspect my bed, my boots, my uniform, - and also the fine hairs in my nostrils and my ears, I added a "van" in front of my surname, and confused the hell out of Breedt at that specific crucial moment in time. I suppose the fact that I spoke immaculate Afrikaans also saved my butt. I consequently never ended up on the floor doing 100 push-ups like the rest of the English chaps.

Two of the English Durbanites never completed their 6-month basic training, not because they were unfit or unqualified, but because of endless victimization by the Afrikaners. I refused to take part in all the conflict and hate-speech between Boer and Brit, and basically gave anyone who called me a "Blerry Rooinek" the cold shoulder. My nickname in college became "Die Engelse Boertjie" (The English Boer).

During my Police College days I played rugby for a while, but I quickly decided that it was far easier to take up the sport of amateur wrestling, where you only wrestled with one man at a time, and where the touching of balls were out of bounds!

Near the end of my 6 months basic training I was approached by a Captain who wanted to know if I was willing to attend an anti-terrorist course in Maleoskop. The training that took place there was similar to the modern-day course known as (SWAT) - Specialized Weapons and Tactical course. I told the man that I first had to discuss the matter with my father.

My father got quite upset when I told him about the decision I had to make. "What the hell is wrong with this government? Don't they have enough soldiers to fight their wars for them?" I tried pressing the issue, but it was hopeless. His final answer was crystal clear: "NO - Never, not even over my dead body!"

Our passing-out parade after 6 months basic training was quite a grand affair. It took place on the parade grounds of the Police College in the winter month of early July 1978. Some General, I cannot remember whom (it may have been General Geldenhuys), gave an excellent speech that day. He hammered on and on about the big terrorist threat that was looming on our borders and in our cities. He spoke about the communist rifles, limpet mines, and hand grenades that were illegally being smuggled into our country. He mentioned that the banned African National Congress (ANC) had changed their tactics, and were intent on making our lives as miserable as possible. He went into considerable detail how WE, the men in blue, were going to clean up the entire country, and restore law and order to our beloved land. WE were the thin blue line - the protectors of all citizens in South Africa. God was on our side, so there was no need to fear the enemy, bla, bla, bla, - and so forth! So much for my father's wishes that his "dearly-beloved-only-son" was not going to fight any wars for the government!

I can recall how oddly content I felt on that sunny winter's day as I stood on parade smartly dressed in my dark blue winter uniform, clutching my new companion with tender pride. I was sure that my squeaky-clean 7,62mm R1 rifle must have looked rather menacing that day, as its shiny-black barrel sparkled in the winter sun.

I did not care much about politics back in those days, and probably missed a large portion of the General's speech. I can still recall how I started humming casually and very softly that favourite Uriah Heep tune "July Morning", keeping to most of the original lyrics, but adding a few of my own words as I went along:

"There I was on a July Morning, listening to some General talking, with the strength of a new day dawning, at the sound of the first bird singing, I was leaving for home, with the storm and the night behind me, and a road of my own."

### CHAPTER 2

SA Police Randburg, 1978

From College I was transferred to the SA Police in Randburg. Back in the year 1978 it was an elegant brand-new, and modern complex. The station bordered on Bryanston, one of Johannesburg's affluent northern suburbs. Randburg was a busy station, and also served as District Headquarters for many smaller police stations situated in the northern suburbs. The holding cells at Randburg were also well-equipped to accommodate political activists, in other word, suspected terrorists!

There was a continuous hum of activity as various vehicles from the local traffic department and other police stations buzzed in and out the grounds. I can recall how I often surveyed my new surroundings from my bedroom window on the 4th floor of the barracks, and how the Dodge vans, and yellow-coloured Valiant sedans with blue lights on the roof cruising about reminded me of the New York taxi scenes. Not that I had ever been to New York at that point in time, but thanks to Hollywood, it was easy enough to make the comparison!

The first person who taught me the administrative ropes in the charge office was an elderly Black Warrant Officer, who had the amazing ability to write at the speed of a typewriter in capital letters. One of the first things we were taught was not to touch the loaded 9mm Uzi machinegun lying on a shelf under the main public serving counter. I did not fully understand that rule, but kept my mouth shut anyway. The second most important rule was that we were not allowed to communicate with the so-called 'security prisoners' who were kept in the most furthest holding cells, separate and far from the other detainees.

Beat work formed an integral part of our daily routine, as the government of the day realized that visible policing, day and night, kept most criminals of the streets.

(In those days it wasn't uncommon to see two smartly-dressed policemen, one White and the other Black, walking beat side-by-side. Is it not odd how things have changed in the New South Africa?)

When I was finally allowed the privilege of joining a crew on a patrol van, my new mentor, crew-member and driver, was a middle-aged Coloured man by the name of Sergeant Schoeman. He was a sturdy robust man with a joyful pleasant attitude. His huge build and his broad moustache, which he loved twisting upwards at both ends, gave him that typical authoritative military appearance. I have many pleasant memories about this man and can recall how thankful I was, on several occasions, that I had him as crew-member on patrol.

Sergeant Schoeman possessed all the qualities of a General, and I would often tell him that. Yet, he had no ambition to study further or to join the ranks of senior officers. In this respect he shared the sentiments of many other 'colleagues of colour' who firmly believed that it was the Whiteman's task to supervise and manage.

The enforcement of the much hated pass-laws were never a priority in my time. The police holding-cells were already full with drunkards, housebreakers, thieves, murderers and rapists. A passbook was one of the things we looked at while investigating a suspected terrorist. I can recall how Sergeant Schoeman and I arrested our first terry. We found him walking along Hendrik Verwoerd Drive, Randburg's main street, in the early hours of dawn. He carried an unloaded Russian Tokarev pistol hidden in a plastic bag crammed with newspapers. He did not resist arrest.

Once disarmed and thoroughly searched, the next step was to check the validity of the suspect's passbook. I can recall how we used to open the passbook at the centre pages, and fold it over until the front and back covers met. If the seams broke, the passbook was in all probability a forgery. The photograph and the stamp over the photograph also had to be inspected with caution. Other telltale signs of a suspected terrorist were the rucksack marks over the shoulders of the suspect.

The cold hard fact that any innocent looking Blackman walking in the street could be a trained terrorist, created somewhat of a dilemma for a South African policeman on patrol. Media headlines at the time announcing that police brutality was an evil that needed to be weeded out, confused my simple mind somewhat.

Many of us were going beyond our call of duty to "Serve and Protect". A big issue in those days was the illegal act of drinking in public. I lost count of the many drunken souls we saved through the simple action of patrolling the highways, when there were no other complaints to attend to. Most cops back then hated the job of attending an accident scene, especially when someone had been killed. Witness statements had to be taken, and plans had to be drafted. The administrative procedures were a time-consuming process. It made sense to pick up the drunken pedestrians, sometimes while off duty, and remove them to a place of safety before they were killed by a speeding vehicle. Once sober, these souls were immediately released and never charged. Obviously, there were also many of us who followed these procedures out of compassion, and not just because it was our duty to protect others.

The national media of the day often carried stories creating the impression that the police were an evil bunch of villains. By the time titbits of news filtered through to the international press, many stories had grown tales of deception. Sure enough, there were incidents where the police overstepped the boundaries of excessive force, and innocent lives were lost in the process. But the guilty were dealt with swiftly and many officers were dishonourably discharged. Details of these disciplinary actions seldom reached the media headlines. The press were only interested in sensational news, and over time they managed to form the impression that the entire police force was a massive White monster, whose sole purpose was to assist the "Apartheid Regime" in oppressing and victimizing the poor Black folk.

Menacing rumours often floated about in the smoke-filled airwaves of the local police canteen. The latest rumours concerned big trouble that was brewing in Soweto. At the time we were well aware of the alarming increase in MK operations in the country and that several police stations in Soweto had already been attacked. The rumours about Soweto were still fluttering about on the airwaves when the Police Station in Booysens, in downtown Johannesburg suffered a terrorist attack. This attack was too close to home, and the Station Commander immediately followed direct orders from Pretoria Head Office to issue all available policemen with sharp ammunition and R1 rifles. While we were still discussing the validity of rumours, all approved leave was suddenly cancelled, and strict orders were issued not to leave our barracks. Most of us did not fully understand the gravity of the situation, until the day we noticed a sign fixed to the canteen door, which read:

" **TOE TOT VERDERE KENNISGEWING"  
** (Closed Until Further Notice).

My official State issue was a 7,62mm rifle. It had a folding-stock, and was manufactured by FN (Fabrique Nationale) in Belgium. It was similar to the one I was issued with for the passing-out parade at College. The powerful 7,62mm bullet had a muzzle velocity of 838m/s and a maximum range of 3,5 kilometers. I really loved the weapon and enjoyed keeping it clean and in a serviceable condition.

The folding-stock made the weapon comfortable to handle in a vehicle. I was well aware that its firing power far surpassed the AK-47 rifle, and in my youthful foolishness I often wished that terrorists would attack us. I'm not too sure if I was the only one harbouring such reckless thoughts!

One late lazy Sunday afternoon while I was gazing through my bedroom window on the 4th floor of our barracks, I noticed a storm brewing in the north. It was approaching Randburg rapidly. The sound of rumbling thunder in the far distance had an ominous effect on the already menacing mood prevailing on our floor. The usual rowdy bunch of off-duty cops were strangely quiet that day. The only sound vaguely audible was a distant crackling voice of someone reading the news on the radio. The voice on the radio was soon muffled by the sound of raindrops and howling wind.

I was about to flutter into a relaxed day-dreaming mode when a loud roll of rumbling thunder, followed by the whipping crash of a lightning bolt and the yell of a Capetonian colleague, who hated thunder, as there was no such hideous noisy thing where he came from, jolted my thoughts back to the present. I can recall thinking that it was the perfect time to launch an attack on Randburg police station. I shivered at the horrifying thought that not even a thousand FN rifles would stop an RPG-7 rocket from blasting its way through the walls of our barracks. I realized that we were sitting ducks, waiting to be slaughtered.

A terrorist could easily fire three or more rounds from an RPG-7 from a concealed spot in any one of the private properties that surrounded Randburg police station, and still have sufficient time to make a successful escape. It also dawned on me that not one single senior officer at Randburg had ever thought of implementing dummy-drills to prepare us for a possible terrorist attack. The Uzi under the counter at the charge office was supposed to be utilized in the event of an attack. I wondered how such a flimsy little gun was ever going to stop an RPG-7 rocket?

It was while I was harbouring these thoughts that I heard the sound of clear and unmistakable gunfire. I can recall thinking that we needed backup urgently, and wondered if anyone had called the Task Force yet. I can also recall thinking that it was too late, and that we were all going to die!

I found myself kneeling on the floor next to my bed, clutching my Belgian companion as if she were the long lost love of my life! With a heart pumping madly out of control, I cocked my rifle and triple-checked that the safety catch was on 'FIRE' mode. I can recall thinking how strange the gunshots outside sounded. It lacked the mechanical rhythm one would expect from normal gunfire, the ones I had become accustomed to during shooting exercises on the range. I kept my body as flat as a Puff Adder, while I crawled to the window, and cautiously peeked outside.

As my eyes adjusted to the dim light, I recognized sheets of zinc roofing floating down from the rooftop of the building. A gusty wind ripped at the floating pieces of zinc, which at times appeared to hover like feathers in the air. While the wind played havoc with the flimsy falling zinc sheets, it created a clattering sound, very similar to the sound of gunshots.

It took me a few seconds before my numb brain finally realized that my mind had been conned by a stupid storm. The sudden commotion and outbreak of 'F' words on the 4th floor confirmed that I was not the only one tricked by the storm. Old one-eyed Rooies who had months of border experience behind him, was still convinced that we were under attack by terrorists. Well that was the impression he created anyway! "God is daar niemand dood nie?" (God is there no one dead?), he shouted, while running up and down the passage, clutching his R1 rifle with his trigger finger ready to fire. He checked each and every room on the 4th floor in true Rambo-style maneuvers, and then disappeared down the stairs to the next level of the building to continue his mission. I was not too sure if the redhead was serious, or drunk, or maybe bos-be-fok, or just playing the fool as usual.

(Bos-be-fok is Afrikaans slang for someone who has experienced too much warfare in the bush. In other words, someone who is on the verge of madness.)

Apart from the barracks roof that needed serious repairs, a few private vehicles parked in front of the barracks, including my own recently purchased second-hand Fiat, sustained slight damage from the falling zinc sheets. A number of windows in the barracks also needed replacing. Apparently a few chaps did not bother opening their windows that day, and simply smashed the muzzles of their rifles through the glass windows, when the first sounds of so-called 'gunfire' alerted them that a possible attack was imminent.

I was hoping to spend Christmas with the family in Pretoria in December 1978, but my application for leave was again rejected. I was really getting agitated with this nonsense, and demanded from the leave clerk at the District-Commander's office, to supply me with valid reasons why my application for leave was always rejected. I wasn't the only one who felt that way, and before long a small uprising threatened to break out on the passage-floor of the District-Commander's office. The Station Commander, obviously sensing a looming mutiny, quickly called a general meeting and explained that he needed all available manpower to man roadblocks over the festive season. Only married men with school-going children would be allowed the privilege of taking leave over Christmas. Hillbrow was also suffering a manpower shortage, and arrangements had already been made to send a few reinforcements from Randburg over New Years Eve.

I witnessed the arrival of the year 1979 from a street corner somewhere in the rotten grimy heart of Hillbrow. It was my first official visit to that weird place, - a place populated by an assortment of nationalities and diverse cultures, and throngs of unruly crowds. I never realized that such a place ever existed in South Africa, and wondered why the government of the day allowed that small spot on the map to develop into such a pigsty in the first place!

Crime and violence, spurred on by the unashamed misuse of alcohol and drugs on a vast scale, eventually got me thinking that it would be best if the police cordoned off the place and locked the whole damn lot up! I understood then why our commanders had not approved any leave over that period. There simply weren't enough men in blue to control the masses. On the 1st of January 1979 I left that horrid place with a vow to only return in an armed vehicle of some sort, and only if it was absolutely and vitally necessary. I was also grateful to be back on normal patrol duties, attending to the relatively passive crime of Randburg and its surrounding suburbs, and thanked my lucky stars that I was not permanently stationed at SA Police Hillbrow!

By January 1980 my two year compulsory service was over, but by then I had become so addicted to my job, that thoughts of leaving never even entered my mind. On the political front things were looking somewhat shaky. Rhodesia (now known as Zimbabwe), bordering South Africa in the north, fell to the Marxists when Robert Mugabe won the elections on 4 March 1980. South Africa found itself in an extremely vulnerable position, surrounded by three Marxist states that could be used as springboards for guerrilla attacks by the ANC.

In early June 1980 the ANC's military wing, Umkhonto We Sizwe, (also known as MK for short) attacked SASOL, a large petroleum-from-coal installation in the province of the Orange Free State. The attack caused no loss of lives, but an estimated damage of approximately 66 million rands. The thick black smoke in the far distant south was visible for many days over Southern Johannesburg and Soweto. Roadblocks became the order of the day, and we were prohibited from taking leave unless someone in the family had died. Our Black colleagues apparently had an endless amount of family members who were passing away, so consequently they had no problem getting a few days off from duty.

I can clearly remember those freezing winter nights manning roadblocks in and around Soweto, and travelling in the chilly rear compartment of a Land Rover, back and forth from our barracks in Randburg to our base in Diepkloof, near Soweto. My colleagues, who shared the small confines of the Land Rover's rear enclosure, had absolutely no regard for non-smokers. The smell of smoke seemed to dominate those cold winter nights, and as time past on, lighting a cigarette eventually seemed the warmest and best thing to do under those dismal circumstances. I joined the ring of smokers with my first pack of Paul Revere at the age of 20.

It was more or less in that same period of time when a wave of petrol bombings and the distasteful act of necklacing were initiated. Black-on-Black violence became the order of the day. Necklacing was a particular cruel method of killing. The so-called "necklace" was a rubber tyre soaked with flammable liquid, usually petrol or diesel fuel. It was forced over the victim's head and shoulders, snaring the victim's arms in the process, making it near impossible to remove the burning tyre. Sadly, we usually arrived on these scenes far too late, and there was very little we could do to save the poor souls.

I decided to study for my BA Police degree through a correspondence course at the University of South Africa (UNISA), but soon realized that if I wanted to excel in my studies, and ultimately progress through the ranks of the SA Police, a noisy police barracks was definitely not the place where I was going to accomplish that with ease! Besides the intolerable late night drunken parties organized for men who had just returned from the war torn South West African border, or who were about to depart on another adventure somewhere on a hostile border, there were far too many other distractions. I simply couldn't concentrate and had difficulty completing my assignments on time.

One evening, while feeling rather frustrated with my inability to concentrate on study work, I made the grave error of allowing a friend to twist my arm and to drag me off to a local disco, where I happened to eye a very attractive lady, who was eyeing me too. I initially played hard-to-get, and ignored her. Now it's a common fact that most policemen on patrol subconsciously master the art of remembering names and numbers, so when the gorgeous woman flirtatiously whispered her name and phone number in my ear, the name and number simply remained stuck in my head!

Three weeks later I dialled her phone number. The Afrikaans-speaking lady, whom I shall refer to as Elmarie, clearly remembered who I was and kindly invited me over for coffee at her parent's home where she was staying at the time. I was pleasantly surprised by their beautiful and tranquil home, surrounded by a magnificent garden where tame peacocks strolled around freely. I gathered from the tennis court and large pool on the property that they were prosperous.

Besides her good looks, I'm not sure what magnetism kept me attracted to Elmarie. She displayed a rather domineering nature, and wanted my undivided attention most of the time. She did not approve of my police associates and friends, and I sensed a hint of nasty jealousy. At first I felt flattered and honoured, but as time progressed it became a source of irritation. I felt that my freedom was being sabotaged, as I continuously had to explain my actions to her.

"Where were you last night? Why didn't you phone? Why didn't you tell me?" I did not possess the skills to answer these questions in a manner that wouldn't provoke, aggravate or upset her, and I soon realized that being dead honest wasn't always the best answer either. What exactly kept the relationship going remains a mystery to this day!

My anti-riot days came to an abrupt end when 30 plus members of the infamous Lebanese gang of Johannesburg put a colleague and me out of action for a few weeks. The incident was a minor occurrence, but it ended up on the front pages of all the National Newspapers.

For no apparent reason the Lebanese gang decided to make Randburg their new playground. We were unaware of their presence in our town, when we decided one evening to take a casual drive down Jan Smuts Avenue. We were four policemen in the vehicle. One chap was a new man fresh from College. Our main purpose for the trip was to take the new fellow on a small introductory tour of the area. Robbie, the driver, was quite chuffed with his new Renault vehicle, which he had recently purchased. The Lebanese gang was gathered outside the Hydepark hotel, and one of the gangsters carelessly hurled an empty bottle of beer in our general direction. The bottle hit the front windscreen of Robbie's brand new Renault, and that was the last straw!

Before I could stop Robbie, he had parked his vehicle dead centre in the large company of half-drunk and aggressive youths. Robbie did not suffer much. His anorak was quickly pulled over his head, the moment he stepped out of the vehicle to inspect the damage to the windscreen. He was knocked out stone cold with a baseball bat before he knew what had hit him. He remained concussed for several days. The new young chap from the College and the other fellow with us fled the scene to call for help. Well that is what their official statements said!

I was left alone with this violent long-haired mob, and quickly gathered that there was no way that I was going to sweet-talk my way out of that little dilemma. Those mobsters hated authority, and anybody with short back-and-sides was considered a threat. My police tracksuit with the SA Police badge prominently displayed on my front pocket was a dead giveaway.

My wrestling skills did not help much to defend myself from the chains and baseball bats. Robbie and I recuperated in hospital for a week. During that time our revengeful colleagues back home waged war on the Lebanese gang. The incident caused a small tremor in parliament, as rumours of police brutality and other evil police deeds echoed in the media. The entire gang eventually ended up in the Randburg holding cells, - and unfortunately also in the hot and cold showers of our barracks, and goodness knows where else! The lawless behaviour of certain policemen ruined the official investigation, and only four members of the gang were charged, found guilty and deported back to Lebanon. A young police Captain was unlawfully discharged for his part in the "Lebanese-War".

My broken nose and other wounds healed in the comfort of Elmarie's serene home. Elmarie was obviously delighted and took full advantage of the situation. Her mother wasn't too pleased though, when she caught us sleeping together in the same bed one early morning. Echoes of the big speech she gave us about love, respect, and marriage are probably still rumbling in the universe somewhere. I tried in vain that day to explain to her enraged mother that nothing happened, and that due to my strict upbringing and Christian background, nothing was going to happen until we were lawfully married. I was obviously lying through my teeth, as I had absolutely no plans of marrying her daughter, or any woman until I was at least 25 years old!

I utilized my sick-leave to catch up on my studies. I also used my fractured nose, which was still fragile and sensitive to the touch, to excuse myself from riot duties in Soweto, and patrol duties in Randburg. Accordingly, I was assigned a pen-pushing job in the administration department of the District Commander's office. Not a day went by without Captain Neck enquiring about the well-being of my fragile nose, but by then I was wise enough to realize that his true intentions were not based on compassion or sympathy. It was evident that Captain Neck needed my services on the streets of Randburg where crime was threatening to conquer his kingdom. The blame for this state of affairs was squarely placed on a serious shortage of manpower. Willing and able young men in uniform had no place pushing pens behind desks, so as soon as I informed Captain Neck that my nose seemed to be perfectly healed, off I went - back to police patrol functions, where I belonged.

(The Captain's name was van Rensburg, but his nickname was 'Captain Neck' because he had an extraordinary thick and muscular neck.)

In my time most policemen on patrol carried 9mm Parabellum Walther P-38 pistols. We were also equipped with wooden batons and a set of steel handcuffs. _(The wooden batons were later replaced with lighter, more versatile, rubber version.)_ Only one FN rifle was assigned per vehicle, and although the arrangement was supposed to be a temporary measure, the practise continued for well over a year. Bulletproof vests were non-existent back in those early days!

Despite all the firepower we carried around, policemen on patrol in Randburg also had special permission to keep a shotgun in the police vehicle. This was due to the large volume of snake complaints from housewives, particularly in the newly developed Randpark Ridge suburbs which were expanding rapidly to the north and which fell under Randburg's jurisdiction. Shooting a snake from a distance using a pistol or a rifle required far advanced marksmanship skills, which most policemen, including myself, did not possess. When using a 12-gauge shotgun loaded with pellets, your odds of hitting and killing your target from a distance were greatly increased. I will share a few memories about snakes and shotguns in a moment, but let me first deal with the Lebanese vipers.

Although the leading Lebanese gang were crushed, I knew that many gang members were out their looking for me, greedy for revenge, for I as the one who positively identified their deported mates. My face was also easy recognizable, as it was splashed all over the front pages of several newspapers, with broken nose and all! I was thankful that I was armed with a 12-gauge shotgun at that time, when wild late-night drunken disturbances seemed to be the norm in Randburg. I can recall one specific incident when the party animals refused to unplug the hi-fi way passed four o'clock on a Sunday morning! There were about six to seven Lebanese chaps present at the party, all hanging around two teenage ladies who seemed to be wearing nothing but lipstick, leather belts, buckles and high-heels.

Normally I wouldn't make an entrance armed with a shotgun, especially at minor complaints such as 'Disturbance of the Peace' but that night the Lebanese gangsters were clearly out to provoke me, so I went back to collect the shotgun from my vehicle. I was not going to take any chances this time! The presence of the shotgun only aggravated matters, and at one stage I seriously considered calling for back-up, but changed my mind when I recalled how the previous incident at Hydepark ended up in parlement, and how the press just loved stories about police brutality. I was still pondering how I was going to handle the scene, when an arrogant little bastard suddenly appeared right in front of me. He slapped my police-cap off my head, spat on my shoes, called my mother all sorts of wicked names, and went back in to turn the hi-fi to its maximum volume.

I quickly followed the little prick and after establishing that he was the owner of the wired contraption making the racket, I sorted the hi-fi system out permanently with one well-aimed shot from the 12-gauge. The teens scattered home in haste shouting obscenities and threats pertaining to pigs and police brutality. While all this was happening, my Black crew-member stayed at the gate near the police vehicle, shaking his head in disapproval, and showing an absolute lack of enthusiasm to assist me in any way.

The little Lebanese prick and I made a deal. He wasn't going to report me for destroying his sound system, and I wasn't going to charge him for assault, defamation of character, obstructing justice, and disturbance of the peace. That episode was the final chapter in the Lebanese saga of Randburg. After a few minor skirmishes with other members of the Randburg police, who were a bit more forceful than I was, the gang moved their annoying operations to another suburb of Johannesburg where they pestered the local community and police for some time, before moving on again to repeat the cycle in another area.

(After attending numerous complaints in the Randburg area, it became a fact of life that having a Black crewmember with you on patrol was a rather hazardous obstruction. In many cases your personal safety depended on a quick response from your crewmember. The Black members sometimes refused to even climb out of the vehicle, and used the excuse that they were 'guarding' the FN rife. They were also extremely afraid of being bitten by dogs on private property. It was rather odd that Coloured members never displayed these qualities.)

Snakes and shotguns:-

The word "snake" conjures up many fond and not so fond memories of encounters I had with those evil reptiles. A snake was a creature of the field that I feared with utmost respect. Experiences on my uncle's farm with those wicked creatures when I was a young boy, laid everlasting foundations in my mind, which resulted in an extreme responsive reaction whenever I happened to come across any one of those creepy creatures.

So as a cop at the age of 20 and armed with a 12 gauge pump-action shotgun, I took no mercy on anything that slithered and resembled the appearance of a snake. So when helpless hysterical housewives called the police to report that a snake on the property was causing her distress, I responded with proficient zeal. I can clearly recall the day I once destroyed a harmless garden hosepipe in my eagerness to seek-and-destroy.

(The incident with the hosepipe took place while I was searching for a snake in the complainant's garden. The snake had disappeared into a bush of reeds on the property. It was while I was busy prodding around the reed-bush with a loaded shotgun, that my crewmember decided to play a practical joke on me, and pushed a thick black hosepipe into the bush. I almost had a mild heart attack that day!)

The most embarrassing incident occurred when I actually located a real large python lying stretched out under the eroded foundations of a garden wall. The garden wall was constructed from bricks and was about one meter high. After several unsuccessful attempts to prod the snake out with a stick, I decided to use the shotgun loaded with AAA size pellets to exterminate the reptile. By then a large group of inquisitive bystanders had already gathered to witness the big event. Feeling somewhat nervous and self-conscious with all the people gathering around me, I fired one carefully aimed shot at the snakes head, and stood back in absolute disbelief to see the entire length of the brick wall collapse in a cloud of dust, ruining the housewife's precious flowerbed in the process.

Is it not strange how an unexpected event, such as a wall falling over, always seems to take place in slow-motion, and can be replayed back in your mind, like a video? I cannot remember whether I'd actually succeeded in killing the snake that specific day, or not. One's brain tends to forget the finer details of such embarrassing moments.

Although my seniors proudly regarded me as a jack-of-all-trades, I couldn't help but feel, at times, like a puppet on a string. I was reassigned time and time again to help out wherever an extra hand or two was needed. I was just adapting my own personal routine to a new schedule of shift-work, when I was called back to the Registration Department to sort out boxes of un-filed documents. There was no doubt in my mind that I was being exploited to the maximum! I hated sitting in a stuffy office doing paperwork, so with the intention of getting out as soon as possible, I'd work non-stop, not taking any tea-breaks or lunchtimes, until every piece of paper was correctly filed, every file clearly marked, index-systems updated, and the arsehole who messed up in the first place, correctly tutored and threatened not to mess up again.

So like a puppet on a string, I performed official duties in several different departments, until one day a new non-standard 'temporary' police unit came to light. This new unit was given the rather unusual name of "Raiding Squad", and consisted of a small group of men, whose sole purpose was to clean the streets of Randburg from illegal drugs and illegitimate liquor outlets (also known as shebeens). Members of the so-called Raiding Squad were allowed to wear casual civilian clothes. I found this aspect to be a plus-point, and a most welcome change from the blue uniform.

My only drawback was that I never owned a civilian-type pistol holster, and I consequently had to stick my P38 pistol in the rear end of my jeans, covering the weapon with my shirt. I was never fond of this cowboy-style method of carrying a gun, and regarded it as highly unsafe. To compensate for this hazardous factor, I never carried my pistol 'one-up', in other words, not with a loaded cartridge in the chamber!

It so happened that one Sunday afternoon I apprehended a young delinquent for dealing in dagga. The lawbreaker resisted and at one stage during the scuffle he suddenly grabbed my P38 pistol from behind my trousers and tried to shoot me at point blank range. When the suspect realized that pulling the trigger was just causing it to go, "Click, Click", and not "Bang!" he promptly threw the firearm away and ran like hell.

Judging from the distance my pistol travelled through the air that day, I'm sure the chap would have made a great cricket player! I can recall hesitating a moment, not knowing whether I should pursue the suspect, or whether I had to go find my missing pistol. Explaining a missing service pistol to the SA Police Force was serious paperwork! Dealing in dagga was a serious offence too, so I decided to do my loyal duty and pursue the suspect, - unarmed!

Many people were enjoying a relaxing barbeque in their gardens on that Sunday afternoon. I only managed to catch the suspect after destroying countless peaceful family gatherings, and goodness knows how many neat and pretty flower beds in the process. I cannot remember how many garden walls I scaled that day, or how many security alarms I set off, but there where many! A search party, consisting of ten-odd helpful citizens, managed to recover my service pistol after two hours intensive searching.

It was that specific incident that made me seriously re-evaluate my future as a cop. I had no intentions of dying young, and definitely not by means of my own service pistol. I shuddered to think of the consequences if that young dagga dealer knew the workings of a self-loading pistol. All he had to do was pull the slide back and a fresh round would have been fed into the chamber, - and "BANG", I would have been dead, or seriously injured!

The trusty old Dodge vans and Valiant sedans were eventually all replaced by a fleet of four brand-new Toyota Hilux vans, which quickly proved to be totally inadequate for police patrol work. The Hilux vans were top-heavy and lacked the road-holding ability of the heavier and more robust vehicles we had become accustomed to. As a consequence, SA Police Randburg experienced a chain of accidents in a very short period of time, and before long there was only one vehicle left to serve the entire district.

It so happened that I was driving the one and only patrol van at the time, rushing back and forth trying to keep up with a never-ending stream of complaints. My crew and I had just arrested a rather obese-looking man for attacking a woman with a panga. He had chopped up the woman so badly that we had to call an ambulance to the scene. We were both out of breath from the ordeal of wrestling the dangerous weapon from the man's tight grip, and the subsequent effort to get the big man to voluntary get into the rear caged booth of the van.

While travelling north along Hendrik Verwoerd Drive, I approached a sharp turn to the left, and applied breaks, but the Hilux refused to slow down. Realizing that the exhibit, the bloodstained panga, had slithered from the rear of my seat to the front floor section, wedging itself between the break and clutch pedals, jamming both controls, I was left with no option but to negotiate the left turn at a speed that was entirely too fast for any hope of success.

The fact that our hefty suspect in the back happened to be sitting on the right, or should I rather say, 'wrong side' of the van at the time, only made matters worse. While the immobile van lay on its side in the central business district of Randburg, and hundreds of onlookers had quickly gathered to see if we were still alive, the big man in the rear booth started screaming blue murder: "Help, the Boere are killing me, - Heeelp!" I had to unlock and open the rear door to check whether he was injured or not, but before I could get to the stage of actually opening the door fully, the man burst out and headed for a shopping mall across the street. I followed in hot pursuit, and quickly caught up with him but couldn't stop the man as he kept his course like a battle tank in full charge, knocking over everything in his path. In desperation, and not wanting to use my firearm in the crowded shopping mall, I jumped on the man's back hoping that my weight would tire him down.

That incident was another embarrassing moment which I will probably never forget. At the time I was furious that members of the public just stood wide-eyed staring at the spectacle, not making any attempt to assist me with the apprehension of a fleeing suspect. Only much later did I realize how crazy that scene must have looked from the public's viewpoint. It wouldn't have surprised me if newspaper headlines read: "Racist Cop rides a Blackman!"

By then my relationship with Elmarie had become quite strained. Her possessiveness had become a thorn in my flesh. During the December month of 1980, I met an English-speaking lady called Brenda, quite by accident literally, when she smashed her vehicle into the rear-end of police Bedford truck, the one we used for the Raiding Squad! Brenda was a few years older than I, but we soon discovered that we shared a common interest in almost everything under the sun. Before long, Brenda and I had a very special relationship going. I made a point of visiting her almost daily, and once a week we enjoyed a quiet evening dining at a local restaurant.

Brenda was aware that I was in a relationship with Elmarie, and that our relationship had progressed into a complex affair beyond normal friendship. For this reason we kept our relationship platonic and uncomplicated. When Elmarie found out that I was seeing Brenda, and occasionally dining out with her, all hell broke loose in the town of Randburg. Elmarie stalked me like a distant shadow day and night, often waiting for me at the police station as I was about to report off duty, no matter what time it was.

I felt trapped like a bird in a cage and my thoughts were soon focused on getting out of Randburg as soon as possible. During April 1981, a few weeks before my 21st birthday, a small miracle happened. The station commander at Randburg decided to send me to Benoni on an advanced driving course for six weeks, where I would also be taught how to drive heavy-duty trucks. During that same period, while I was attending the course, my dear mother decided to arrange a large family gathering in Pretoria in celebration of my 21st birthday. I had to regrettably decline the invitation as my instructors simply refused to give me one day off! By then I had logical reason to believe that there was a conspiracy of some sort going on, and that maybe my English name and surname had something to do with it. My mother simply could not understand why her son was unable to attend his own 21st birthday celebration. My explanations did not help much to calm her down.

While sorting out Randburg's disorderly filing system for the umtieth time, I came upon a new telex from Head Office in Pretoria. Head Office required someone to manage the admin in their Registration Department. At Randburg these telexes were never allowed to reach the eyes of subordinates, and in the few instances where someone did happen to react on a telex and apply for a transfer, the applications simply went from the Station Commander's desk directly to his wastepaper basket. I personally handed my "Application for Transfer" to Major Neck (who had just received promotion from Captain), and posted a copy of my well motivated application to the Commander of the Registration Department at Head Office in Pretoria.

Two weeks later Head Office sent a telex back to Randburg asking the Station Commander to supply reasons for the delay in my paperwork. Major Neck threw a fuming fit when he realized that I had sent a copy of my application to Head Office without his knowledge, but at that stage of my life I did not really care how many enemies I was making in Randburg. My thoughts were focused on getting away from Elmarie, and also on putting some more effort into my studies.

### CHAPTER 3

SA Police Head Office, Pretoria

Working at Head Office in the same building where the 'Top Brass' sat behind big wooden desks, making vital decisions affecting the entire SA Police Force countrywide, made me feel like an important wheel in the cog. I was told that the Registration Department was the heartbeat of Head Office, and that no errors whatsoever would be tolerated. My new Commander was an energetic grey-haired Colonel, a leader and perfectionist in all respects. He made it quite clear that I should feel honoured to be working in his department, and that if I couldn't keep up with his vigorous pace then a transfer could be arranged within a blink of an eye.

During my first few weeks I felt extremely restless, and wished that I was back in Randburg patrolling the streets again. I felt really odd without the usual attire of crime-fighting tools surrounding my waist. The enormous filing system at Head Office was incomparable to the one I was accustomed to in Randburg, but the numbering system was exactly the same. My direct supervisor, an old Warrant Officer, who displayed many scars on his face and an assortment of medal-lintels on his uniform, was pleasantly surprised that I could understand the workings of the registration system in a short period of only one day.

I soon felt relaxed and at home with the friendly people around me. We often played little pranks on each other, shared many jokes and laughed a lot. At times when the endless monotony of paperwork almost bored me to death, I would escape to the streets and large fancy shopping centres of the bustling city, never forgetting to proudly salute the many officers from various Armed Forces, who happened to pass me from the opposite direction. I also had more time to concentrate on my UNISA assignments, and was soon promoted from Lance-Sergeant to Full-Sergeant, after successfully completing the required exams. I felt quite chuffed with myself that I had finally caught up with my old mentor from Randburg, Sergeant Schoeman!

Every Friday morning I noticed a change in mood and dress at Head Office. Certain men arrived at the office wearing camouflage uniforms and armed with handguns. The men always seemed to be in jolly high spirits. By 12 o'clock those men had all left for some unknown venue, leaving vacant desks behind. Sometimes on the following Monday, I noticed that the desks of these men were still vacant, and that on occasion their desks remained vacant for the entire week.

"Those are the Elite boys of SA Police Head Office, known as Unit 19," my supervisor explained. There was a noticeable hint of sarcasm in his voice.

A pen-pushing job five days a week was definitely not my scene, and for many days I pondered on the issue of joining Unit 19. I had no idea how one was supposed to qualify to be a member of that unit. I presumed that so-called anti-terrorist training at Maleoskop was a requirement. Because I had no such training, due to the biblical command which stated, "Honour thy father...", I automatically assumed I that would not qualify, hence the reason I never even bothered asking!

When the news somehow leaked out that I had some anti-riot experience from my short stint of duty in Soweto, and that I also possessed a heavy-duty driver's license, I was summarily issued with two sets of camouflage uniforms, new boots, and all, and ordered to present myself in person at the next Unit 19 gathering, which was due to be held at the SA Police College on the following Friday.

The majority of men who formed part of that so-called 'elite' unit were much older than me, and many of them carried that distinctive protruding stomach one normally associated with heavy beer-drinkers. All the men spoke Afrikaans in a unique style only ruthless fighting men understood. It was also obvious that many were experienced in the art of conflict and battles, and that some were more battle weary than others. Nevertheless, most of the men were willing to accept 'The Rooinek' into their circle. I instantly became part and parcel of the entire crowd when they finally realized that the only Rooinek part of me was my name.

I now had something new and exciting to look forward to every week! From Mondays to Thursdays, I worked with piles of mind-numbing files and papers, but on Friday, from 12:00 onwards, it was Unit 19's training time. On that day we had the privilege of wearing the more comfortable camouflage uniforms and our handguns. We had much fun and laughter during our many training and shooting exercises. We regularly visited the local fire brigade, where we were taught to abseil with ropes down tall concrete structures. They also put us through our paces in the much dreaded smoke room, which was used as a training facility to equip firemen with the necessary skills to cope with blazing hot and smoky buildings.

The smoke room was a maze of brick walls, steel gates, and wire mesh. It was a pitch dark hell-hot place, with oil drenched smouldering tires that polluted the air with dense black smoke, making it impossible to see anything, not even your own hand when it was held in front of your face! It was also impossible to breathe without oxygen tanks and gas masks.

The experiences I had at Unit 19 were great fun indeed! Although the various activities put some spark back into my life, the activities soon started interfering with my studies. Every few weeks and quite often during exam time, the unit was required to restore order in some troubled spot in the land, or in some Black Neighbouring State. Although I was never forced to go on any mission, one specific senior officer in charge had the knack of making non-volunteers feel as guilty as hell.

The tasks I performed at Unit 19 were not always enjoyable. On occasion we had to force groups of young Black delinquents to return to their school benches. Many older kids challenged our authority, shouting slogans and throwing stones at our big ominous looking Caspir vehicles. Sometimes our duties were required by Heads of Homeland States when their juvenile delinquents also threatened to revolt and burn down buildings. We never returned home until our mission was accomplished. This normally did not take longer than 3 to 5 days, depending on how far we had to travel. In most cases it only took us a day or two to restore law and order.

In many instances our mere presence at the scene had a calming effect on the crowds, simply because the big Caspir vehicles and also our camouflage uniforms were feared in those days. Many tense situations were thus defused without us having to discharge a single cartridge of teargas. The use of sharp-ammunition was strictly forbidden, unless a specific order was given by the commanding officer. Any policeman who refused to comply with these orders faced a disciplinary hearing.

At one specific scene we arrived at a Putco bus depot where an unruly mob had just set a bus on fire. They used the flames and the smoke as cover, while hurling stones and empty beer bottles in our general direction. We were given strict orders not to shoot. In fact, our commanding officer's incessant orders not to shoot, became quite irritating indeed. Some of us decided to throw back the objects that were hurled at us. Our commanding officer did not like that either, and immediately ordered us to stop. I had just flung an empty bottle back, and it was still travelling through the air when the order was shouted. The bottle hit something and made a loud clamouring noise. "Wie het nie fokken ore nie? (Who does not have fucking ears?) the officer barked. Fortunately, I only received a verbal warning that day, after explaining what had happened.

The months and seasons came and went, and so did the time to say goodbye to Unit 19. A very somber looking senior officer suddenly pitched-up from nowhere, at one of our Friday afternoon braai-and-beer sessions. He quickly called a meeting and informed us that Unit 19 was going to be officially disbanded with immediate effect. We were soon replaced by a group of fit young and willing men from the Police College, who were appointed to represent Unit 19 on a permanent basis.

One Friday afternoon, on 20 May 1983 at exactly 16:00, I grabbed my briefcase and headed for the stairway to the exit of the building. I was eager to get home as soon as possible to catch up on my UNISA study assignments. The deadline dates for completion were looming again! By 16:30 I presumed that my bus was behind schedule due to the heavier traffic, which had become the norm on a Friday afternoon in Pretoria Central.

Suddenly a thunderous explosion rocked the foundations I was standing on. For a moment I thought that the biblical doomsday had finally arrived, as clouds of black smoke became visible from the vicinity of Church Street. There was a brief moment of deadly silence followed by the sounds of speeding police vehicles, ambulances, and fire brigades rushing to the scene. Rush hour traffic turned to chaos that fateful day, and I cannot remember at what hour of the night I finally arrived home.

Through the media we soon leaned that Pretoria had been hit by a massive car bomb, detonated in front of the Nedbank Plaza Building in Church Street, the location of the South African Air Force Head Quarters. At the time, I thought it was a rather foolishly planned attack. If I were a terrorist I would have planted a second bomb, blowing SA Police Headquarters to kingdom come as well. Maybe they did, and maybe the bomb was defused. I would never know. All I knew for sure, was that months after that massive explosion in Church Street I was still convinced that Police Head Office was next to be targeted by terrorists, and every day that uneasy and precarious feeling of fear and uncertainty dominated my life.

(Besides the two terrorists who carried out the attack, and were blown up in the blast, 19 other people were also killed. In submissions to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) in 1997 and 1998, it was revealed that the attack was orchestrated by a special operations unit of the ANC's Umkhonto we Sizwe (MK). The attack had apparently been authorised by Oliver Tambo, the ANC President. Many streets and buildings in several cities in South Africa were later re-named in honour of this man. The Johannesburg International Airport, known as Jan Smuts, was also re-named in his honour.)

The stricter security measures that were implemented at Police Head Office only served to frustrate me more. They were really pathetic! It bothered me that anybody with inside information could easily slip into the building and plant a bomb that would blow us all sky-hi! A few days after the Church Street bombing the Registration Department at Head Office procured a large and costly x-ray machine, through which all incoming postal articles had to be scanned. I just couldn't see the sense in scanning loads of sealed parcels, while not one of us were trained in the art of detecting an unstable explosive device. Hell, I wasn't even sure how to recognize a bomb concealed in a wrapped parcel!

It really baffled my mind how a machine was going to warn us of any impending danger. All delivered parcels lay waiting inside the building in our department to be scanned every morning before the documents were finally sorted, and then channelled from there to another sector in the building. To me, it felt as if the Registration Department were the guinea pigs in the cog! Suddenly the jokes made by certain clowns didn't seem funny anymore. "Listen to this one," said a young Sergeant, "it's making a funny ticking sound." And then the idiot would still shake the damn thing as if it were a new toy!

A small section of my study material dealt with the subject of Criminalistics. The subject fascinated me, and I knew then what the next step in my police career had to be. I had to do what doctors and other professionals did. I had to focus on a specialized field. I was quite sure that the Police Force paid forensic specialists far more than the average cop! I started making several enquiries about possible positions in the Police Forensic Department, or the South African Criminal Bureau, but ended up running around in small annoying circles. My career and my mind was stagnating at Police Head Office, and although I worked with a friendly jovial crowd of people, the good humour and silly jokes, which I had heard countless times before, started playing on my nerves.

I had just been promoted to the rank of Warrant Officer when, by pure chance, a memo advertising posts at the Ballistic Unit of the South African Criminal Bureau, landed on my desk. I immediately applied for the post, and miraculously my transfer was approved, on condition that the Commander of the Ballistic Unit found me to be a suitable candidate for the job.

I was nervous to some extent but also very excited during my first interview with Colonel van Schalkwyk, then Head of the Ballistic Unit. I arrived all prim and proper, smartly dressed in my dark blue Warrant Officer's uniform, carrying my briefcase, and also that funny little stick with me, a stick (also known as swagger stick) all Warrant Officers in uniform were compelled to carry back in those days. I can still recall how dominant the scent of gun oil and men's deodorant was that day when I stepped into the offices of the Ballistic Unit. It was a totally different atmosphere to the one I was accustomed to at Head Office. Bearded men in white overalls moved about in silent proficiency, while I stood anxiously waiting for Colonel van Schalkwyk to interview me.

"We service the entire Republic. We travel a lot to various shooting scenes all over the country," Colonel van Schalkwyk informed me. He spoke Afrikaans with that unmistakable heavy Dutch accent. "We are scientists. We do not wear uniforms," he said, while he gently smiled and leaned forward to touch a brass button on my chest. "Here we wear white overalls, and work with very sophisticated and very expensive equipment," he explained, as he pointed to a weird looking contraption (a comparison macroscope) standing on a table. The Colonel proceeded to flick various switches attached to the contraption, and the thing instantly sprung to life with two bright lights shining like a pair of robot-eyes. I noticed that the lights illuminated two 9mm cartridge cases that were fixed on a platform with plastic holders specially designed for the purpose.

The Colonel made a few adjustments as he peaked through an eyepiece situated in the centre of the contraption. He invited me to take a look through the eyepiece and asked me what I saw. "I see the firing-pin impressions of two 9mm cartridge cases," I replied without lifting my eyes from the eyepiece. The Colonel was notably impressed with my accurate answer, and I knew then that I was going to get the job.

I was also extremely grateful that I had already done some homework before the interview. George Dreyer, my old wrestling partner from the College days loaned me a book on Forensic Ballistics a few days before. He was employed at the Police Forensic Laboratory at the time, which was housed in a different building, separate from the South African Criminal Bureau. The Forensic Lab was then managed by the legendary General Lothar Neethling. I will be sharing some of my experiences concerning this man later in this same chronicle.

(General Neethling was the man who later, in the year 1993, instituted a court action for defamation against the independent weekly Vrye Weekblad. The newspaper alleged that General Neethling had been involved in illegal police 'death squad' activities, specifically in making poisons that were used against ANC members and other activists in the democratic movement. General Neethling won the case, but the editor of the Vrye Weekblad strongly believed that it was Generals Neethling's powerful influence in Pretoria's Afrikaner circles that had saved his butt. The General died in July 2005 from lung cancer. An article published one week after his death, written by the same editor, referred to General Neethling as "a pompous, bombastic, conceited and supremely arrogant man." – Sunday Times dated July 17, 2005.)

My knowledge on the subject of guns and ammunition, although not on the same par as Colonel van Schalkwyk, must have left a likable impression on the old man. He spoke to me as if I were already a part of his team and told me about a new training program that they were planning to implement, as soon as Head Office had approved the transfer of all the other applicants.

The Colonel further explained that he intended implementing a three-year in-service training program, which was based on a United States course designed by AFTE (Association of Firearm and Toolmark Examiners). I was dying to ask the grey man how much they were going to pay me if my transfer was approved, but I couldn't pluck up the courage. I did not want to appear too forward, or say something stupid, not on my first interview!

### CHAPTER 4

Ballistic Unit – Forensic Science Laboratory, 1984

My transfer to the Ballistic Unit was approved in November 1984. By then I was already married to the lady whom I had met while stationed at Randburg. No it wasn't Brenda the older English lady, but Elmarie - the possessive one! Don't ask me how that came about, - sometimes weird things just happen!

The fact that I was no longer required to wear a uniform caught me unawares, so I found myself dragging Elmarie off to help me shop for something civil to wear. We finally settled on the simple solution of three safari suits, each with a different colour. They were fashionable way back then, but only for a very brief period of time. Today you wouldn't even find a dead man wearing one of those! My farewell party at Head Office was arranged by two dear old ladies, who had adopted me as their own son. It was sad to say goodbye to the many beloved friends I had worked with at Head office, but I promised to return often for a cup of coffee and some gossip. I kept that promise for many years!

My first day at the Ballistic Unit was somewhat overwhelming. I felt odd without my customary uniform, police cap, and that peculiar stick I had become so accustomed to carrying with me all the time. I felt even more peculiar wearing that stupid safari suit! The office had an open plan design. Men in white overalls, some wearing very dirty and greasy ones, were carrying boxes of handguns in and out of the office. Other men were sitting at their desks cocking firearms and examining exhibits from all angles with a funny looking torch. I later learned that this funny looking torch was a bore-light, a tool ballisticians use to inspect the dark interior of firearm barrels for defects or blockages.

A few detectives were queuing outside the entrance waiting for their turn to deliver sealed boxes of evidence, which I presumed to be firearms. I discreetly approached a small open box containing a number of handguns, standing on a table near the exit door. As I was about to have a quick peek at the contents, a voice behind me sternly warned, "Moenie vat nie!" (Do not touch!). The voice came from a young Sergeant, who had already been formally introduced to me as Sergeant Andrè Buys. The junior's arrogance made me feel instantly offended, because were I came from a junior in rank wouldn't dream of speaking to a superior in that tone of voice.

Discipline seemed slack in my new surroundings. Andrè Buys took his little box containing firearms, and I dared ask him what he was planning do with them. His reply was short and to the point: "Skiet!" (Shoot!). I quickly got the message that rank meant nothing to these men. There superiority was measured in the knowledge they possessed and not in their rank. Rank only indicated that you earned slightly more pay. I further learned that in a world of firearms, bullets and cartridge cases, which you know nothing about, you simply did not ask silly questions, you just listened and learned. When I heard that there was an indoor shooting range and a bullet recovery tank somewhere in the same building, I couldn't hide my curiosity any longer, and on my second day I boldly approached Sergeant Buys, with an ever so polite request to take me there now! To my pleasant surprise he complied with my request without delay.

I was introduced to Sergeant Willem Fourie, one of the older men, much older than myself. It soon became obvious that the man was a walking encyclopedia when it came to guns and ammunition. I felt extremely thankful and also very honoured to share a desk right opposite this fine gentleman, despite the fact that he said, "O fok, nog 'n Engelsman!" (Oh fuck, another Englishman!) when we were initially introduced. Incidentally, Willem and I are still best friends to this very day!

It was while working in the environment of blood-stained bullets, cartridge cases and firearms, that I realized for the first time in my life how intense the communist threat in South Africa really was. We simply couldn't keep up with the workload, as spent Soviet AK-47 cartridge cases, bullets, and an assortment of firearms from Soviet and East-Block countries poured in at an ever-increasing rate. Due to the green lacquered steel composition of the AK-47 cartridge case, they were difficult to analyze microscopically, but with the help of two older men who had considerable experience in the examination of thousands of those exhibits during the bush war in Rhodesia, we soon became experts in the field of firearm identification and microscopic analysis.

(The correct term is MACROscopic, but for purposes of this memoir, I suppose it doesn't really matter.)

Senior members of the unit made it quite clear to us that it was only after the completion of a three-year internal training program that we were allowed to call ourselves "Ballistic Experts". It was just another way of saying that for three years we were going to be responsible for completing all the low-profile cases, and also all the donkey-work!

During December 1985 my wife and I decided to take a break from our busy schedules, and to spend sometime with here side of the family in their luxury seaside holiday apartment in Amanzimtoti, on the South Coast of Natal. It was my first long holiday since joining the SA Police. Considering that I did not have children yet, I was actually quite surprised that my leave was approved. It was quite obvious that the rules at the Ballistic Unit clearly deviated from the norm!

The holiday turned out to be a catastrophe! Busloads of Africans arrived from nowhere, and seized the entire beach area as if it belonged to only them, and no one else. A few rightwing supporters from the Afrikaanse Weerstand Beweging (AWB) also arrived and demarcated their portion of the beach with ropes, poles and Swastika flags. Any Blackman who dared put his foot in the demarcated area of the AWB was summarily beaten with whips until blood flowed. Before long total chaos ensued, and eventually police reinforcements were called in to disperse the crowds and restore law and order.

Sporadic clashes between gangs of angry Blacks and the AWB supporters carried on for about three days, and spoiled all our intentions of relaxing on the beach. Every morning I noticed that more and more busloads of Blacks were being dropped off near the beach area. It was quite obvious that someone had planned a mass action of some sort, with intentions of provoking violence. The AWB supporters remained wedged in their demarcated spots on the beach, everyday from early morning till nightfall, while police patrols kept a watchful eye on events.

Two days before Christmas, when everything seemed to be back to normal again, and while I was trying to enjoy a good book, I thought my ears were deceiving me when I heard the blast of a thunderous explosion somewhere in the near distance.

A fleeting moment of deadly silence was soon followed by the wailing siren of one solo police vehicle rushing to the scene. I can still recall that tense nauseating feeling in my guts, as my memory flashed back to the massive bombing scene in Church Street, Pretoria. While the menacing sounds of an ever increasing stream of emergency sirens navigated the airwaves, each with its own unique wailing tone of urgency, I glanced at my wife and can recall feeling quite angry with the damn communists, when I noticed the petrified expression on her snow-white face.

When I learned that a bomb had detonated at a busy shopping complex in Amanzimtoti's Beach Road, my mind raced with dozens of unanswered questions. When were we ever going to find peace in our lives? Were we always going to be intimidated by terrorists? When was all this going to end? Was it really worthwhile bringing a child into this crazy world? The following day, 24 December 1985, we heard that only five civilians were killed, and approximately 40 were injured in the blast. It was a miracle that there were so few casualties!

Conversations over the festive season were dominated by heated political debates. The general feeling was that the ANC were trying their utmost to make a statement, but that they were going about it in the wrong way. The cowards were not interested in military targets. They were determined to plant the seeds of fear in the minds of all South Africans, irrespective of whether they were Black, White, Coloured or Indian. Many people were noticeably upset that the ANC had chosen to bomb a civilian target two days before a sacred Christian day. My feelings were, God help us on the day they succeeded in their endeavours to take total control of our beloved land! Little did I know back then, that the Afrikaner was going to give the country away on a platter to those Marxist-Communists, without a fight!

_(It later became known that an MK terrorist, Andrew Sibusiso Zondo, detonated the explosive in a rubbish bin at the shopping centre in Amanzimtoti. In a submission to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC), the ANC stated that Zondo acted in anger at a recent SADF raid in Lesotho. The AWB actions on the beach had thus nothing to do with the bombing. See_ <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umkhonto_we_Sizwe> _for further details about other bombings by the ANC terrorists.)_

My wife and I arrived back home in Pretoria feeling more stressed-out than ever. In fact, my dear wife was never the same after that incident, and often experienced moods, which doctors later described as manic depressive behaviour. The moods sometimes continued for weeks, but she managed to cope with the daily routine of living by using and assortment of pills, whose names I could never remember, never mind pronounce or spell! Since that day in Amanzimtoti, I took an intense dislike in shopping complexes. For most women, shopping was a favourite pastime, but for me it was like going on a mission to certain death. Whenever I entered a shopping complex I couldn't help but scan the place for suspicious looking parcels or suspicious characters, and honestly believed that window-shopping was for the naïve and stupid! For the very first time in my life I even started hating my own country. The thought crossed my mind that I was making a big mistake by staying in a place where warfare was never going to end.

During March 1987, the Ballistic Unit started moving equipment to a new laboratory, situated in Silverton. The new ultra-modern Forensic Laboratory was named after General Lothar Neethling. In 1987 it was the most well-equipped, most modern, and biggest Forensic Science Laboratory in the southern hemisphere.

Neethling had his own individual style of managing the place. There was one way, and that was Neethling's way. It was, after all, his building. Even the pigeons were not allowed to shit on his building! I remember that little incident very well, because two Generals, Lothar Neethling and Piet Kruger, paid me an unexpected visit in my office one day, at the exact same moment I was busy feeding the pigeons who regularly sat on my window-sill.

There was a specific white pigeon that used to visit me daily. It was a welcome distraction, - good therapy for the soul! The two Generals took turns at shitting me out from a dizzy height. I cannot recall a word they spoke, except for the fact that it sounded like two dogs yapping away. Neethling's bark sounded like a gruff old Bull Mastiff while Kruger's sideline chirping sounded like a Fox Terrier's. At the next formal weekly meeting, there was no doubt in my mind that General Neethling was talking directly to me when he sternly warned everybody present that if he ever caught anyone attracting pigeons to his building, he would personally arrange a transfer to Pofaddersdorp.

(The town of Pofadder is a very small town situated in a place called Bushman's Land in the Northern Cape. It is situated in a semi desert region.)

On the 27th November 1987, a South African Airways Boeing 747 (The Helderberg: flight SA 295) crashed into the sea some 135 nautical miles east of Mauritius, killing all 159 people on board. The huge Boeing lay in the depths of the Indian Ocean approximately 5000 meters beneath the surface.

After a lengthy recovery exercise, bits and pieces of the wreckage arrived at our new modern laboratory for forensic analysis. All members of the lab, irrespective of whether or not you were a chemist, biologist, metallurgist, or a member of ballistics, climbed in boots and all to help with the offloading and safe storage of the wreckage. The Helderberg air-disaster came at a time when we were due to write our final third-year ballistic exams. It was truly a sad and gloomy time for all of us. The media headlines soon started with their wild speculations as to the true cause of the crash. The official finding determined that the aircraft crashed due to a fire caused in the cargo section of the plane, but it was never ascertained what the exact cause or nature of the cargo was that led to the fire.

Amidst the distraction of the 'Helderberg' disaster I, together with my fellow trainees, completed the three-year in service training course successfully. I was finally and officially declared to be a fully-fledged Ballistic Expert, and could proudly add that fact to my Curriculum Vitae. I waited eagerly for my promised promotion to Lieutenant, but soon sensed that there was a major riddle in the system somewhere. The promises made three years ago by Colonel van Schalkwyk, who was by then comfortably retired, proved to be fickle police rumours. I felt deceived, misused, and angry, and realized that if I had remained in my comfy pen-pushing job at Head Office, where I had ample opportunity to complete my BA Police degree, I would have been in far better and more secure financial position.

On the 1st of October 1988, almost one year after successfully completing the intensive AFTE course, I was eventually promoted to the rank of Lieutenant. Despite General Neethling's objections to the fact that forensic workers did not need lessons in police management, Police Head Office insisted that I had to first complete the compulsory SA Police Junior Management Course, before I could join the ranks of junior police officers. This pathetic state of affairs made infuriated me, but I also realized that no amount of fussing or complaining was going to improve my situation.

The management course was a piece of cake, and a total waste of precious time, thereby confirming General Neethling's viewpoint on the matter. The ballistic training course, coupled with my experiences as a State witness in a number of court cases, and familiarity with practical police work in Randburg, laid a professional foundation that gave me a slight advantage over the other young officers.

General Kruger summonsed me to his office on the same day I was promoted, and enthusiastically shook my hand. He also suggested that it was time I became a 'broeder' (brother). I automatically presumed that he was referring to the Broederbond, that old but mighty and secretive Afrikaner movement! I recalled a time when my father warned me that sooner or later someone was going to invite me to become a member of some secret organization, and that I had to be very discreet when such an offer was made.

My father firmly believed that Freemasonry was an evil that had to be rooted from this planet, and cautioned me to stay well clear from any dealings with such sinister cultures. He never spoke about the Broederbond. Accordingly, I did not know whether that organization represented good or evil, or whether it was connected to Freemasonry in any way. My Christian background and simple logic told me to stay away from anything secret or sinister. With many bewildered thoughts spinning in my head, I thanked the General for showing interest in my progress, ignoring his reference to "brothers", as if I had never heard him mention it.

(Although I initially though that my apparent ignorance regarding the Broederbond would boycott any progress in my career, it did not! Promotion to the rank of Captain followed two years later in 1990. Three years after that, in 1993, I was promoted to the rank of Major.)

My next unpleasant encounter with General Neethling occurred on a late Friday afternoon, while I was busy with an urgent case. The case concerned a member of Koevoet, who had shot and killed his buddy in Rundu, South West Africa (now known as Namibia). Koevoet was a name given to a special police counter-insurgency unit operating in South West Africa. The term "buddy" had nothing to do with friendship. It was simply a name given by Koevoet members to their informers and spoor-trackers. The so-called 'buddies' often carried the ammunition and heavier weapons.

It was no secret that Koevoet used unconventional methods against SWAPO guerrillas and SWAPO sympathizers. From the facts and evidence in my possession, and after flying up to Rundu to examine the scene of the alleged crime, it was obvious that the Koevoet member acted in self-defence, but UNTAG (United Nations Transition Assistance Group) did not think so. They were convinced that it was a cold-blooded murder!

I needed to fax my report to Rundu in SWA urgently, and the only fax machine in the entire building was situated in General Neethling's office. He controlled that fax machine with an iron fist! We normally worked through his secretary, but for some reason she was not on duty that day. My docket was complete, and all the official statements, documents, seals, and photographs were neatly stapled in my case docket. I knocked on General Neethling's door. "Kom binne,'' (Come inside) he ordered.

The General was clearly very annoyed with me, and couldn't understand what my urgency was. "Dringend se gat man. Wat kan so dringend wees?" (Urgent my arse. What can be so urgent?) he said. I handed him my docket, and waited while he paged through all the documents, reading my sworn affidavit with apparent thoughtfulness and care. I knew that he was looking for spelling mistakes and grammatical errors, as the man was a perfectionist, but I also knew that he wasn't going to find any. I checked that aspect thoroughly before placing my signature on the final report! While standing there waiting in suspense for the General to finish reading the lengthy report, I noticed a bottle of half-full Chivas Regal whisky standing on the Generals desk, and an empty whisky glass positioned close to his drinking hand.

The General spoke, "Ek sien niks dringend hier nie. Wie sê dit is dringend?" (I see nothing urgent here. Who says this is urgent?) I told the General that I was just following orders from my direct commander, who also gave me the fax number in Rundu. I handed him a neatly typed fax coversheet. Suddenly and without warning the General flung my docket aggressively on the floor. He threw the docket like an angry cowboy poker player would deal a card to his opponent on the far end of the table. The entire contents of the docket lay scattered on his office floor. "Tel dit op," (pick it up) he ordered.

I looked at the mangled mess of papers scattered on the floor, and made my stubborn decision: I was not going to pick it up! I did not even treat my dog with such disrespect! He could keep his fax machine, and stick it up his arse, I thought. I was sure the local chemist around the corner had a fax machine.

As I closed his office door, leaving the docket on the floor where he had thrown it, images of the town Pofaddersdorp flashed through my mind. I bumped into one of my work colleagues, Basil Young, as he was about to enter the General's office. It was no secret that Basil Young had a good relationship with the General, and often enjoyed a drink or two with the man on a Friday afternoon.

Basil noticed my frustration, and in a whispering tone of voice I quickly informed him what had just happened. General Neethling must have heard us fussing in the passage. His head popped out the door, and he invited us both in. The contents of my docket were still scattered on the floor. The General wanted to know if was going to pick the docket up, or not. I noticed how smugly he was sitting in his gigantic leather chair, contently twirling his thumbs, waiting for me to bow before him like a servant, while I picked up the scattered contents.

At that point in time, I was still feeling wildly angry and insanely reckless, and knew that I was gambling with my life when I told him that I would rather prefer it if he transferred me to Pofaddersdorp. The old General stared at me bluntly, without expression, not even a hint of humour, anger, respect, disrespect, - absolutely no emotions whatsoever! He gestured to Basil, and asked him who this hard-arse character was. It was obvious that the old General was unable to acquaint my face with the pigeon affair. I suppose if he did, then Pofaddersdorp was a definite certainty! I cannot remember what Basil told him, but I can recall Basil picking up my docket, collecting the scattered remains, and handing it to me with a big smile on his face. The General calmly handed me the coversheet and pointed to the fax machine without saying a word.

I do not know what made me speak to a General in that manner, especially a feared and respected man like General Neethling, a man with a string of impressive academic achievements behind his name, and richly accredited with countless other distinguished deeds. Maybe I subconsciously admired the man and his power, - I don't know! Nevertheless, I considered myself lucky that there were no serious repercussions after that incident. In fact, the old General and I understood one another quite perfectly from that moment onwards.

On of my most memorial experiences during that time was when General Neethling summonsed me to his office, to inform me that I had been selected to provide training to the Malawian Police. It was going to be a joint operation organized by ARMSCOR (Armaments Corporation of South Africa). I was well aware that the relations between the South African government and Malawi were excellent, and that Malawi, just like my country, was also experiencing sporadic insertions from Marxist terrorists, who were crossing the borders from Mozambique and Zambia.

It was going to be my first journey up north into the African continent, and I was extremely excited. Being a keen fisherman, I was also delighted by the prospects of possibly visiting Lake Malawi (also known as Lake Nyasa), one of Africa's largest lakes, which boasted more than 400 different species of fish. I couldn't wait to get my bags and my fishing rod packed!

My time was very limited. I had one week to train five men in the art of bullet and cartridge case identification, and to assist with the setting up of ballistic equipment, a near impossible mission to accomplish in such a short time! But I saw it as a challenge and I was eager to do my very best. The people of Malawi were extremely friendly, and I was soon speaking a few words in their own language. The first day was a bit confusing. I stayed in a hotel in the capital city of Lilongwe. Everybody greeted me with a word that sounded exactly like "morning". By late afternoon I was still being greeted by friendly faces using the same phrase. The friendliness continued until evening, but everybody was still greeting me with the word, "morning".

It was only on the following day that I learned that it was the common word used for greeting someone, irrespective of the time of day. It was pronounced as _moh-nee._ I quickly picked up other words such as _modibanzu_ (how are you); _seekoma_ (thanks) and _audi_ (excuse me). I instinctively knew that the expedition to Malawi was going to be a huge success, because the folk were quite different to the dark-skinned Africans back home. Their intellectual knowledge on the subject of firearms, courteous manners, and witty humour, was enough to convince me that it was indeed possible to accomplish quite a lot in a matter of one week.

It took me only five minutes to realize why the chaps were finding it hard to work on the comparison microscope supplied by the Germans. The contraption was fitted with the wrong lenses for examining fired bullets and cartridge cases, and the magnification was way too high. Luckily, most of the casework involved Soviet ammunition in the AK-47 calibre, which usually required a higher magnification during examination. I proceeded to instruct the men on how to locate the fine neck-marks on the spent cartridge cases. The high magnification was still inappropriate, but despite this drawback we did manage to take some excellent photographic evidence of cartridge case and bullet identification. Mr Chimphepo, the Ballistic Unit commander, and Mr Sibanda, a crime photographer and document examiner, became close friends and pen-pals for many years.

I also managed to enjoy a few greens and browns (Malawi beer produced by a German company) with my new companions on the shores of Lake Nyasa. Unfortunately my time was too limited to embark on any fishing expeditions. On my departure at the international airport in Lilongwe Mr Sibanda expressed the wish that I would be returning shortly to do some fishing. Unfortunately that never happened, but for several years we stayed in touch via the postal system, swapping photographs and music cd's.

When I arrived back home in South Africa it truly felt that I had been away on holiday. I even felt guilty that I my wife had not accompanied me to the beautiful and scenic country of Malawi. I was soon shocked back into the reality of things, and can stil clearly recall one specific crime scene that has remained entrenched in my memory forever. It was a particular gruesome murder scene in an upper-class home in the suburb of Brooklyn. A young attractive woman in her early thirty's was found dead on the double-bed in her bedroom. She lay on her back, and her legs and arms were spread out and tied to the four bedposts. The killer (I presume there was only one) had forced a 38-calibre revolver up her vagina and pulled the trigger, leaving the revolver in the same location. Although the scene itself was upsetting for me, the main reason why I remembered the scene so well was because I had just purchased myself a new English Pigskin leather jacket made by John Stephen - London.

I was on my way home after examining the scene when I realized that I had left my prized jacket on a chair in the victim's bedroom. When I returned to the scene, a police guard on duty outside the premises informed me that the body had not been collected yet. It was already dark by then and the old wooden floors in the large eerie home creaked ominously no matter high gently I tried to step. I nabbed my jacket from the chair as quickly as possible, but to this day I'm quite sure that woman's corpse winked at me.

I found it very difficult to share many of my 'crime scene' experiences with my spouse. Normally when she asked me what was wrong, or why I seemed so quiet, I usually just said, "Bad day at the office!"

(At this point I think it is important to inform readers that as forensic specialists we worked in line with a set of professional ethical codes and protocols. One of those protocols required that we kept ourselves distant from the personal details or circumstances related to the victims of crime, and also the suspected perpetrators. We also requested police personnel, who handed in sealed exhibits for examination, not to reveal the identities of those involved in the crime. This was one of several measures we took to ensure that we always remained impartial and objective while conducting an examination, and when presenting our findings to the court.)

At one point in time (I cannot recall exactly when), violence once again reared its ugly head in various black townships surrounding Johannesburg and Pretoria. The police management at Head Office were obviously experiencing a serious shortage of manpower, when they sent an urgent request to the Head of the Forensic Science Laboratory to commission each and every available policeman, who had previous riot experience, to report for duty at a central venue situated in Pretoria North. I was one of the officers who were assigned to Tembisa, a township situated near Benoni between Johannesburg and Pretoria.

The situation had then become extremely volatile as black-on-black violence in the townships escalated to alarming new heights. It was obvious that radical elements were intend on spreading horror and terror in the townships. We were briefed at the Tembisa police station, and were ordered to "shoot to kill" any bastard who vaguely looked as if he was going to throw a petrol bomb into the crowds. The petrol bombs were crudely manufactured from an empty bottle filled with flammable liquid and fitted with a rag wick. (In some countries it is also known as a Molotov Cocktail).

As part of our briefing we were paraded past a line of about 20 dead Black men, whose mutilated bodies lay stretched out naked on a concrete slap near the Tembisa mortuary. I couldn't help but notice how many of the mens' genitals had been savagely cut off. By then I was quite accustomed to seeing dead people, but there were many younger policemen present who had never witnessed such horrors in their lives before. The sight of that repulsive scene convinced those men that we were not dealing with normal criminals, but savage terrorists.

We spent the entire night and the most part of the following morning moving systematically in small groups from one house to the next in search for illegal weapons and ammunition. Fortunately there were no fatal shooting incidents while we conducted our search, but by the time we had finished our task, an enormous mountain of illegal weapons had been recovered. About one month after that, the spacious modern exhibit-safe at Ballistics became so swamped with firearms, that we did not know where to store all the AK-47 rifles and ammunition that were recovered in similar operations throughout the country.

### CHAPTER 5

The war-torn province of KwaZulu/Natal, 1993

By December 1993, I was firmly established in the war-torn province of KwaZulu/Natal, where I, and a number of other senior colleagues, were tasked with the responsibility of establishing a new Forensic Ballistic Laboratory.

Between all the commotion of trying to set up a temporary base, and running around looking for quotations for equipment that we desperately needed, I also attended so many crime scenes that I didn't even bother diarizing the details in my private journals. Despite the fact that most of the killings were taking place in typical warlike fashion, every single shooting incident in the province still had to be professionally managed as if it were a crime scene, and not a war zone. Many crimes scenes were attended while wearing bulletproof vests!

It wasn't uncommon to find 300 or more spent cartridge cases scattered all over the place on one single shooting incident. I had serious doubts whether South Africa's first democratic elections scheduled for 26 to 29 April 1994 were going to be a peaceful event. The ANC and Zulu Inkatha supporters were doing their very best to wipe each other off the map using AK-47 rifles as the chief weapon of mass destruction. According to my observations, it seemed as if the Zulu Inkatha supporters were losing the bloody conflict!

There is no doubt in my mind that the National Media of the day also contributed to several civilian deaths in the KwaZulu/Natal province, as the vast majority of the public were not aware that the place was a crime-infected nest, and that some regions were war zones. For years Durban and its surrounding beaches had always been the most favourite holiday spot for many South Africans who lived inland. Adverts in glossy brochures, magazines, and newspapers, still boldly promoted Durban and surrounding areas as the ideal family holiday spot.

It was during a holiday season sometime in the year 1994, when a family from the Free State, accompanied by their two young children, decided to travel down to the East Coast. They were apparently on their way to the more upmarket region of Umhlanga just north of Durban, when nature called one of the kids. The father made the fatal mistake of pulling off next to the road so that the nagging kid could relieve himself. The father was shot in the back and lay wounded on the side of the road, while the savages raped his wife, and then shot her too.

We arrived on the scene within minutes, roughly at the same time emergency services also made their appearance. We found the two traumatized kids sitting on the side of the road next to their unconscious and bleeding parents. The mother was naked and her bloodstained clothes lay scattered in the road. Emergency personnel immediately rushed the entire family to the nearest hospital. It appeared to us that the savages first tried to break into the trailer to steal personal belongings, but were unable to smash the locks. They then attempted to steal the car, but only managed to travel about 200 meters before the car's immobilizer cut the engine. As a consequence of this, the crime scene had to be cordoned off and protected along the entire perimeter of 200 meters, - a rather difficult task, considering that it was already dark, and that a stream of holidaymakers from the interior provinces were congesting the traffic.

It was while we were examining that specific scene, that we noticed a vehicle standing on the opposite side of the highway. On closer inspection we discovered that the sole occupant, sitting behind the steering wheel, had been shot dead in the head. The entrance wound resembled the typical .38 or 9mm calibre.

A thorough search of both scenes revealed no spent cartridge cases lying around, and the conclusion was drawn that a .38 calibre revolver was used. From the scene I immediately travelled to the hospital, where I learned that the father had died, and that the mother was in a critical but stable condition. I never had the opportunity to see the two young children again, so my last memory of those two kids were their dazed expressions I saw on their faces at the scene of the crime.

(The specific crime scene mentioned above was solved when detectives managed to arrest two suspects in possession of a .38 revolver. A fired bullet removed from the deceased father, and another removed from the body of the occupant of the other vehicle, both matched the revolver. The revolver had apparently been taken from the man during a botched hijack attempt and then used to shoot the Free State couple when the thugs noticed their vehicle pulling off on the side of the road. To this very day the images of that scene refuse to leave my mind, and will sometimes bring tears to my eyes if I think about it for too long.)

I suppose the volatile and often chaotic events preceding the April 1994 elections in South Africa can be the subject of a comprehensive book. While compiling these words, I can recall so many horrific scenes, but let's leave the dead to rest in peace! The point is, our first democratic elections were NOT peaceful! Besides the political killings taking place, the African savages were also exploiting the state of affairs by committing other crimes that were unrelated to politics. Many of those savages were simply sorting out age-old tribal vendettas, and killing entire clans, including dogs, goats, cows, and all, - in acts of satanic revenge. I could never understand what the various media agencies were doing on our crime scenes, at a time when news reports concerning all the violence and killings were hardly ever published in the newspapers!

The unpredictable and tense state of affairs, is best described using an example from personal experience. The following narrative should sketch the picture:

Three Ballistic Experts and I were renting a small apartment, on a temporary basis, in a block of flats in Gillespie Road, situated basically in the centre of Durban's holiday spot. We were on standby for crime scenes on a 24-hour basis, and had our hands full trying to keep up with the workload. I finally convinced my commander in Pretoria that we needed more reinforcements in Durban. Without hesitation, they sent me another young and willing Ballistic Expert. Take note: Just one chap, - while we in fact needed at least four more!

The day after the new chap's arrival the two of us rushed off to another attack on a taxi mini-bus. My new partner stubbornly refused to wear the spare bulletproof outfit, which I had kept in the boot of the car just in case someone needed it. I suppose the young chap was not accustomed to the warmer weather and higher humidity levels on the East Coast, hence his refusal to wear the bulky and uncomfortable protective gear!

We were stuck in a traffic jam at that point in time, and I noticed a bus up ahead in the right lane. A few black youths were hanging out the windows jubilantly displaying their AK-47 rifles for the entire world to see. My young partner had his head buried in a map-book and didn't notice the screenplay up ahead. I was wearing my bulletproof vest. I was taking zero chances!

Our vehicle slowly caught up with the overcrowded bus in the right lane, and suddenly my passenger reacted with panic-stricken horror written all over his face, "Fok, kyk daar, die kaffers is gewapen!" (Fuck, look there, the kaffirs are armed!). I could not help but burst out in a fit of uncontrollable laughter, as I watched the poor chap frantically scramble through the backseat of the vehicle, almost ripping the backseat to pieces in the process.

By then we were parallel to the bus transporting the rowdy bunch of youths, but I was still unable to contain my laughter as I watched my new partner struggling to get the bulletproof jacket on his body in the small confines of the vehicle's interior. I never paid much attention to the finer details of the AK-47 rifles that were pointed at us that day by those bunch of arrogant kids. I also cannot recall whether they may have been harmless replicas, or not (they probably were), but the problem was, one never knew for sure whether or not a real AK-47 loaded with real ammunition was going to feature among the replicas. I suppose the fact that we worked in plain clothes and travelled in unmarked vehicles saved our butts on many occasions.

One morning I was summonsed to an urgent meeting at the SA Police Head Office in Durban. Two Generals were furious because the international press were beating us to every crime scene. Where they got their sources from remains a mystery to this day. Somebody on the inside, in the SA Police, was obviously tipping the press off! I can still remember the exact words spoken by a General in Afrikaans: "Die hele wêreld kyk na ons, en ons lyk soos 'n klomp ape!" (The whole world is watching us, and we are looking like a bunch of apes!).

I suggested that my men be picked up and transported by helicopter to the crime scenes by the Police Air Wing. I was prepared to drop my men off at the Air Wing, based at the Durban International airport, and to collect them later. I was surprised when both Generals agreed to this costly suggestion.

I was even more surprised when I radioed the pilot one late evening to confirm what time I had to collect my men. "Don't worry," the pilot said, 'I'm busy landing on the roof of your flat this very moment!" At first I thought the pilot was playing the fool, but five minutes later when my two colleagues arrived at the front door of our apartment, sun-scorched, worn-out, stinking-filthy, and armed to the teeth, it struck me that there really was a small war going on, and that the bunch of liberal-minded civilians living in our block of flats had better get used to the idea.

I can remember watching the crowds with a pair of binoculars from the top balcony window of our small apartment in Durban. We had been following the April 1994 election results on television, and it was just moments after the final election results were announced. The racket in the streets that day was a sight and sound I will never forget! A mass of thousands-upon-thousands of Blacks stormed up the streets, chanting jubilantly and using everything from dustbin-covers to car wheel-caps as drums and symbols to make an ear-deafening racket. I was thankful that our one-and-only State vehicle was safely locked up in the basement that night, while I watched in amazement as looters smashed windows and randomly plundered unoccupied vehicles parked on the side of the road. I can recall thinking how outnumbered we were. The words, "God help us!" also flashed through my mind.

The killings did not stop after the elections. In fact, crime and violence soared in all provinces of the country at such an alarming rate that temporary ballistic labs were established as a matter of urgency in all provinces, except the Free State. I suppose Nelson Mandela's decision to release thousands of criminals from jail was a most likely reason why crime soared to new groundbreaking, or should I say revolutionary heights!

The manual searching and comparison of fired bullets and cartridge cases became an impossible task to manage. There simply wasn't enough manpower or time to analyze those exhibits according to the established protocols. A Canadian firm, Walsh Automation, offered a solution and soon every ballistic lab in the country had an automated system installed, known as IBIS (short for 'Integrated Ballistic Identification System').

The system was networked to other laboratories worldwide, where similar systems were operating. Our small ballistic lab in KwaZulu/Natal soon found itself competing with huge laboratories in the USA and other countries. In record time we were recording the highest "Hit Rate" in the world. A "Hit" occurred the moment we managed to identify that a specific bullet or cartridge case found on one shooting scene was linked to exhibits found on another scene.

The news spread like wildfire among police agencies worldwide, even those who did not have the IBIS-System installed. Police friends whom I had met during overseas visits in the USA, Canada, and also in the United Kingdom, wanted to know from me if the 'new' South Africa was under siege, or not. The wanted to know if the high levels of violent crime were always like that, and if the Apartheid Regime had suppressed the stats, or not. My reply depended on who was asking the questions. To close friends, whom I trusted, I told them that the country had been handed over to a bunch of ruthless Marxist terrorists, and that the situation was going to get far worst! To most of the Americans and Canadians, whose ways of thinking were inclined towards the left side of the political sphere, I simply told them that IBIS was making it easier for us to record "Hits", hence the reason why the crime rate appeared higher than normal.

I don't even want to talk about the Australians! Those sly buggers slipped silently into the country through a backdoor somewhere, and 'recruited' about five of our best fully-qualified youngsters, leaving the rest of us in quite a predicament.

Robert (Bob) Walsh, from Walsh Automation, offered me a job in Canada. The offer came a few months after I was promoted to the rank of Lieutenant-Colonel. At the time I honestly thought that there was a slight possibility that I could maybe retire one day as a General. How mistaken I was! Little did I realize then that I was going to be stuck on that same rank for the next six years, with little hope of progress.

Major transformations suddenly started happening in the SA Police Force in apparent attempts to demilitarize the police. Military ranks such as Sergeant and Warrant Officer were combined into one and were called "Inspectors". Majors and Lieutenant-Colonels became "Superintendents"; a full Colonel was referred to as "Senior Superintendent"; a Brigadier became "Director"; a General was a "Commissioner", and the word "Force" was replaced with "Service". Even the name of old familiar units such as Riot Squads, had their name changed to "Public Order Policing", because it sounded more civil, and less aggressive, or should I say, force-full!

(I find it rather peculiar that after 16 years of democracy, the ANC Government decided to change the police rank-system back to the way it was during the apartheid era. The changes were adopted on 1 April 2010.)

Today I seriously regret that I never accepted Mr Walsh's offer. Instead, I fell hook-line-and-sinker for all the positive talk about how democracy was going to 'free' South Africa and make it a better place for everyone. I hung on to that hope and even promised myself that I was going to do my best to make things work in the country.

I saw no reason why I could not prosper in the new South Africa, as I had no guilt feelings whatsoever, and all the ambition in the world to make a success of my life. I was never part of any subversive operations, and had no idea what Vlakplaats men like Eugene de Kock (also known as Prime Evil) were up to. I was not once involved in the wheeling and dealings of the Security Branch, and believed that it was through their many covert operations and stupendous blunders that the South African Police got such a bad reputation over the years.

(Eugene de Kock is a former police Colonel and Commander of C1 unit based at Vlakplaas, a counter-insurgency group, well known for killing anti-apartheid activists and terrorists, which according to de Kock were exterminated on instructions from his superiors. He was dubbed "Prime Evil" by the media. Although he gave testimony during the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, and confessed that he was responsible for many ANC deaths, he was refused amnesty. He was sentenced to 212 years in jail for his part in so-called 'crimes against humanity'. The 89 charges included six murder charges. Although there have been rumours of his release, De Kock is still in prison at time of publishing this memoir.)

I only realized much later that I was not thinking straight, and that I was terribly naïve when I believed that I was going to prosper in the new South Africa. I also realized that the only reason why I, or members of my immediate family, had not become victims of crime yet, was purely because we were always subconsciously preparing to defend ourselves.

We were thus living a life constantly in defence of a possible car hi-jack, a break-in, a robbery, - you name it, without even realizing it! I had become so fine-tuned to that way of living and thinking, that I even refused to switch on the interior light in my vehicle when it was dark, just in case some evil character lurking in the shadows had his gun-sights aimed at my head. When I entered a public toilet where there were strangers present, I immediately retreated to find a safer place to relieve my bladder. All exterior lights at my home were directed at places where criminals would possibly lurk in the shadows. Locking doors and gates in and around my home became an instinctive, almost unconscious daily routine.

This was the kind of life my family and I had been living for goodness knows how long. It was no wonder my dear wife became a nervous wreck, and ended up spending most of her married life in various psycho wards, where they treated her for suicidal depression.

(Elmarie and I finally decided to divorce in late 1994. A Supreme Court Judge decided that I was the best parent to take sole custody and care of our two children. My two lively boys, aged 5 and 7 years accompanied me when the police transferred me permanently to KwaZulu-Natal.)

It was rather odd to think that the tranquil seaside resort of Amanzimtoti became the new home for me and my two kids, - the same place where their mother and I spent a disastrous holiday back in December 1985, before our eldest was born. Little did I know at that time that my future in the town of Amanzimtoti was going to take a nasty twist. If I had only known what my future held in store back then, I would have accepted the Canadian job offer without even blinking once!

(Only now, after many years have passed, and while I'm still stuck in this godforsaken place they call South Africa, do I realize that a crazed demonic influence had been unleashed on this country, and that no one, including myself, was thinking straight at a time when crucial decisions needed to be made!)

I suppose the worst mistake I ever made in my life was to fall in love with a younger woman, who had twice the amount of personal baggage I had. I met Veronica (not her real name) sometime near the beginning of 1998, while I was still recovering from an assortment of scars left by the trauma of my divorce from Elmarie, and also - without any doubt, the abnormal circumstances under which I performed my official police duties.

By early 1998 the new ballistic lab was comfortably accommodated in the town of Amanzimtoti in a modern new facility, which boasted spacious air-conditioned offices overlooking the magnificent Indian Ocean. We were no longer required to travel to Durban everyday where we, for more than two miserable years, shared a rather shabby and unsafe premises on Durban's waterfront with the old Riot Squad and Task Force members in Point Road.

(Point Road was commonly known as "the red light district" of Durban, were HIV infected prostitutes, Nigerian drug lords, and hundreds of homeless people hung out. It wasn't a pleasant route to travel to work and back. Mahatma Gandhi would probably turn in his grave if he knew that Point Road had been renamed in his honour!)

My home, my kids' school, our church, shops, and my office, were all conveniently situated in a radius of approximately 5 kilometers. I almost started believing that heaven on earth could in fact become a reality, and that we were all going to be blessed with an abundance of peace, prosperity, love, and all things wonderful. These extraordinary thoughts lingered in my mind even before Veronica walked into my life!

Veronica was also recently divorced, and although she was much younger than I, she was a well travelled, well-spoken, very mature woman. Although we initially both expressed the desire to take things slowly, by December 1998 the passion between us reached such uncontrollable proportions, that we both became totally irrational, - and ultimately inseparable! Although I now realize that I was not thinking straight back then, and that my balls were ruling my brains, and that no demonic power could carry the blame for that, it seemed a good idea at the time that we lived together as one happy family. Veronica and her three-year-old son moved in with us, and from there nature took its course, while we blissfully shared the duties of running a household and caring for our respective children.

I often expressed my concern about the age difference between us. I was almost 12 years older than her, but Veronica always dispelled my concerns by complimenting me on my youthful and healthy appearance. I finally decided to marry her in June 1999. Our beautiful little daughter was born nine months later.

A few months after our daughter's birth, Veronica and I purchased a rather dilapidated bank repossessed house in the peaceful suburb of Doonheights, also situated in Amanzimtoti, as our little apartment on the beachfront, although quite convenient and cosy, had become way too small for all of us. In the new home each child in the household enjoyed the privilege of having their own bedrooms. My new father in-law became part of the furniture, and not a day went by without him popping over for a visit. At first I didn't mind his company and welcomed his helping hand while renovating the home, but as time went by his disregard for our privacy became a major source of concern.

(I intend telling the rest of this story about Veronica and her insane drive to ruin everything I had worked for all my life, in a separate publication, -- that is if it is God's will that I can accomplish that task! Thankfully, Veronica and our precious daughter are now safely living in Australia, far away from the savages of Africa!)

### CHAPTER 6

Black Empowerment, Equity, and Transformation

In January 2000, South Africa's first Black National Police Commissioner, Jackie Selebi, took over the reigns from George Fivaz, who held the esteemed position of National Commissioner since 1995.

(Jackie Selebi managed to hold onto his post for nearly eight years, until it came to light that the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) were investigating the man for alleged corruption, fraud, racketeering, and defeating the ends of justice. In January 2008, Selebi was put on extended leave. He was finally found guilty of corruption on 2 July 2010. Although he was sentenced to 15 years imprisonment on 3 August 2010, he was released on bail, while his lawyers prepared an appeal. It is unknown how long the appeal process will take, and at the time of writing this memoir the man has still not seen the inside of a prison cell.)

By the year 2000 there was still no turning point in the violent crime rate in the country. The bulk of my time was spent on the training of two Indian fellows and a whole gang of new Black recruits, - some of whom who were unable to load or cock a firearm, never mind fire the thing!

The official policy of the new South Africa was littered with fancy keywords such as, 'Black Empowerment', 'Equity', and 'Transformation'. These keywords, were the secret to instant fame and fortune, but only if you belonged to the group classified as 'previously disadvantaged'. The new government automatically assumed that White people did not fall into that category!

The majority of my Black recruits quickly realized that becoming a fully-fledged Ballistic Specialists was no walk in the park. There was also a tremendous language barrier, as most of the technical terms we used did not exist in any of the Black languages. In Zulu a bullet was called _inhlamvu;_ a firearm was a _isibhamu,_ but there were no names to describe a fired cartridge case; it was simply called 'e-doppie'. Some of the words had a phonetic resemblance to the English term, such as _itekisi_ which meant taxi, but there were no words for a microscope, and all the attachments that went with it. I shuddered to think how my new recruits were going to present a case in the courts, and how defence counsel were going to rip their expert testimony to shreds!

It was a nightmare trying to teach these new recruits from forensic textbooks that used sophisticated English descriptions! I suggested to my seniors at Head Office that maybe it was time that we compiled a comprehensive English-Zulu dictionary of technical terms. I thought it was a brilliant suggestion, but not one single human being, not even the Zulu folk who were employed in our laboratory, shared my enthusiasm.

By then new government policies required that we all had to re-apply for the ranks we were holding. All the paperwork regarding this issue didn't make sense at all, as I had already worked hard for my current position! Senior posts were advertised internally as well as in the National Media. I was short listed on three occasions, and on three occasions I had to travel up to Pretoria for the interviews. By the third interview I realized that the SA Police Service had become the biggest circus in the land! The last question in every single interview was, "What are you going to do if you don't get the post?" It was a trick-question, because your reply would indicate to the panel of judges how dedicated you were to the new SA Police Service, and whether your attitude was positive or negative. By then I was so demoralised, that I was unable to conceal my negativity. The panel of judges obviously got the message quite clearly!

I finally decided to apply for the government severance package, when I realized that there was no hope in hell that I was ever going to progress further in my career, and that I was probably going to be stuck in the minor rank of 'Superintendent' for the rest of my life! Applying for an immediate discharge was not a financially feasible option at all!

Inflation started shrinking the value of our miserable salaries by the hour. The last two weeks of every month were the worst! At that time of the month the grocery cupboards started running dry, and we had to scratch around for loose cents to buy bread and milk. Luxuries such as cheese, ham, and treats for the kids, were scratched from our grocery lists. The only consolation was that everyone, who happened to have a white skin, were in the same boat. Although we supported one another the best we could, the memories of those days were not pleasant ones. To me it felt as if we were being forced to adapt our lifestyles as a form of punishment, so that 'whitey' could feel what it was like to live as a poor disadvantaged citizen. For the first time in my life I started feeling the symptoms of mental depression, and also realized what misery my first wife must have endured.

I started cashing-in my life policies one by one, to pay for outstanding rates and taxes, and other unforeseen expenses. Near the end of October 2000, I decided, "To hell with this!" Veronica's 28th birthday was coming up, and I had decided that I was going to treat her, come hell or high water! Veronica insisted that I do not buy her any gifts, but suggested that an outing at the local Spur restaurant with close family, including her parents, would be accepted as a special birthday treat.

I was really looking forward to an evening of fine wine and dining with the family, and was about to be seated at the table, when I received a call on my mobile phone. The call was from a detective who needed me urgently on a crime scene in Phoenix, an Indian district on the north-western side of Durban approximately 70 kilometers away. Two high-profile political figures had apparently been ambushed and assassinated in their vehicle. They needed a senior Ballistic Expert on the scene before removing the bodies or any of the evidence.

I hadn't been summonsed to a crime scene in weeks and felt really irritated by the fact that this had to happen on my wife's birthday. I had no choice but to leave immediately, as high-ranking police officers were on the scene waiting. I excused myself and told everybody to go ahead and enjoy the evening without me. I knew the crime scene would keep me busy for a long time, as political murders always did!

Although the crime scene in Phoenix was pretty gruesome, it did not qualify as the most gruesome scene I had ever witnessed. Despite this fact, I could not help but feel terribly nauseous when I was confronted with the bloody scene. The two dead victims, two Black men, lay on top of one another on the front seat of the vehicle. They had been ambushed from various angles by attackers armed with AK-47 rifles. The attackers made 100 percent sure that their victims were stone dead. Close to ninety spent 7,62x39mm cartridge cases lay scattered in the vicinity of the bullet-riddled car, covering an area of approximately 30 square meters.

I made sure to photograph the scene from every possible angle and direction. That fact that the two dead men had multiple gunshot wounds, is an under statement, -- they were absolute mincemeat! The victims were also armed with 9mm Norinco pistols, and had managed to fire a few shots back at their attackers. Their evidence also had to be collected for ballistic examination. I had scratched around on many occasions in pools of thick fresh blood looking for spent cartridge cases and bullets, but on that specific night I didn't feel like doing it! I really had to force myself to stay focused. It was dark but the scene was well lit with huge spotlights placed in strategic positions. The scene was also well cordoned off. I noticed a large group of high-ranking Black police officials standing behind the yellow police barrier tape. It was quite obvious that they were eagerly waiting for me to finish my examination and to deliver a preliminary report.

At that point in time I was well aware of the precautions one had to take in order not become infected with the HIV virus. I must have gone through at least two boxes of disposable gloves that day, while I searched the blood soaked carpets and seats of the vehicle for every bit of ballistic evidence I could find. I can recall how it started raining quite heavily that evening, and how the rain washed the blood off my last pair of gloves, before I could remove them. I can also recall thinking that if one single officer on that scene told me to hurry up, that I was going to explode!

While driving back home that night, feeling tired and hungry and soaked to the skin, I cursed my job, the new Police Service, the new Government, and also the black African savages, who seemed to have no idea how to live a civilized and peaceful life on the African continent. My severance package was only due on 30 April 2002. I still had one year and six months to go, but I simply couldn't see how I was going to survive that long.

Just when I thought that I had seen it all, a rather bizarre incident occurred at our laboratory, which convinced me that Africa was indeed a strange, mysterious, and utter corrupt continent. The IBIS-System made a "Hit" on a firearm that was supposed to be in safe police custody at our local police station in Amanzimtoti. As with all "Hits" made by the system, everything still needed to be double-checked manually, using a comparison microscope. Protocols required that even our final conclusions, after a manual check on the microscope, whether positive, negative, or undetermined, needed to be manually confirmed by another qualified analyst. Sure enough, three 9mm cartridge cases found at a murder scene in Umlazi near Durban, showed a definite positive match with test samples that were stored on the IBIS-system! The test samples were fired in a pistol that was previously sent in for ballistic examination and testing with all fired exhibits on record. The firearm was sent back with a negative report, meaning that we could not connect it to any outstanding crimes.

The paperwork confirmed that a local detective signed for the firearm on collection at our administrative section. What concerned me was that the murder scene in Umlazi occurred after the date on which the firearm had been collected! This was a most unusual state of affairs, as never in my entire career, nor in my wildest dreams, did I ever imagine that a firearm could possibly be involved in a crime after the police had taken custody of it! The standard procedure was to keep the firearm in safe police custody until all legal matters pertaining to ownership and court cases had been finalized. The new Firearm's Control Act made it near impossible for owners of lost or stolen firearms to get their firearms back once it landed in police custody. Most firearms were destroyed after a certain amount of time had elapsed.

As I've mentioned previously somewhere in this memoir, a missing firearm meant serious paperwork, but that was in the old South Africa! I felt downright upset when I realized that, in the new South Africa, nobody really cared about such major occurrences. Although in this case it was not really my problem, I still felt frustrated that we had connected a firearm to a serious crime, and no one, not even the big chief in charge of the Amanzimtoti police station, or the detective who collected the firearm from our lab, could tell me where the firearm was. "Eish, I don't know," were the only major words of intelligence the detective could utter, when I questioned him. In other words, the firearm was missing!

Although it was not my problem, I still made a point of sending out written reminders, every second week, to everyone involved. I never received any response back, not even a phone call, and as I had no authority to investigate the matter further, I eventually reported the incident to the Independent Complaints Directorate (ICD), who were supposed to investigate complaints of criminality and misconduct against members of the South African Police, but they also never bothered to give me any feedback. The matter finally faded into convenient oblivion, as I got myself entangled with other tasks that required my undivided attention.

(According to several media reports, including an online report on news24.com, dated 2 June 2010, more than 5,300 firearms had been lost or stolen from police stations around the country over a period of just two years. I shudder to think what the real figure is if all the lost and stolen firearms in police custody, dating back to April 1994, were accurately determined. The same report mentions that action had been taken against 56 police officers, of whom 33 had been found guilty in disciplinary inquiries.)

I suppose I can count myself lucky that I managed to get out of the Police Service without the medical condition of "post-traumatic stress disorder" or some other psychological scars that people would immediately notice. My severance package was eventually approved in May 2001, much earlier than I had expected! I was forced to sign the final papers, which included, among many other things, a ridiculous clause, stating that I was never allowed to work for any South African government department ever again, - almost as if I had committed some awful deed while in their service!

Hundreds of policemen were officially boarded on medical grounds between the years 1994 and 2000. I also had myself medically and psychologically examined, while waiting for my severance papers to be approved, but not one medical practitioner believed that I had sufficient psychological damage to qualify for a medical discharge. The only conclusions I can make, is that the doctors involved were either not thorough enough, and possibly feared the cumbersome procedures associated with a state medical board, or that maybe I was simply too proud, and managed to conceal whatever scars there were.

This concludes my memoir. Although there are many gaps in this chronicle, and many more stories to share, I think I've said quite enough, for now!

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Connect with the author:

Email: glenn.elsden@gmail.com

Blog: http://tia-mysoa.blogspot.com

