A Just Defiance. Peter Harris

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СКАЧАТЬ was your trip here?’ Jabu asks.

      ‘Not bad, but you know they’re redoing the highway and at times it can be frustrating. Are you okay here? How is your health?’

      ‘Here it is much better, at least there are rules, although the weather is very hot.’

      ‘Are you getting any exercise?’

      ‘There’s an exercise yard, but it’s very small.’

      ‘You look in good shape,’ I comment.

      ‘Not bad, not bad,’ says Ting Ting politely.

      Ending it, I say, ‘I think it’s important before we start for you to know who I am and where I come from, so that you can make a decision about whether we should go forward together.’

      I know that many prisoners in their position are only too overjoyed to have someone come and visit them, never mind represent them. But these guys are different. At ease with their situation, they will make their own decisions, and anyway, I want them to know that they have a choice.

      I tell them I’m from the law firm Cheadle, Thompson and Haysom. That it’s a human-rights firm that started a few years back. Most of us came from the big established law firms. In the early 1980s, we felt there was a need to build a practice that would represent resistance organisations and individuals needing representation in their battle against the apartheid government. At that stage, there’d been only two or three firms, small ones, prepared to do political work. In fact, this kind of work was tough, poorly paid and made you unpopular in certain circles. All good reasons why most lawyers avoided it.

      I tell them about Halton Cheadle who specialises in representing the black trade union movement. Banned and under house arrest in the 1970s, a brilliant lawyer. Fink Haysom, a former Nusas president frequently detained and held in solitary confinement. Also Azhar Cachalia, one of the leaders of the United Democratic Front, detained more times than I can remember. All fine lawyers. I talk about the cases the firm has handled, including the big treason trials like the Maritzburg Treason Trial and the Alexandra Treason Trial, both run by Norman Manoim, one of the partners.

      I mention a few of the cases I’ve handled, trying to pick on those that show my experience and expertise in these areas. They listen intently, occasionally putting questions. It turns out they know some of the accused we’ve represented, many having been trained in the same MK military camps in Angola.

      We’re using valuable time but the links need to be made. As in most new relationships, the sniffing out is important, how you relate to the client, the way you speak, avoiding legalese and jargon, not being flashy with your knowledge but showing enough, revealing political sense but not taking your clothes off or dropping too many names. Just saying enough to show you have some connection.

      I have to see it from their point of view. They’ve probably been inside for some time, been tortured and maybe face serious charges. Then in walks this white boy in a suit (although, unlike some colleagues, I’ve never been a snappy dresser) who says he’s been told to assist them. Hell, I could even be in the pay of the security police. In their shoes, I would be cautious if not suspicious. Although simply being asked to represent them is an indication of some degree of credibility. But who knows?

      For me, it’s important that I like my clients. They may irritate me, which some of them do, but it isn’t enough to have a working relationship. I need something stronger. I need to be motivated, otherwise it becomes a chore and I get bored. This isn’t just a job.

      Out of the blue, Ting Ting, who has been quiet, asks me what car I drive. I’m taken aback. I know that a lot of clients like their lawyers to drive large, fancy cars. I reply sheepishly that I drive a Honda Ballade. Ting Ting’s silence is telling. After a moment, perking up, he says, ‘We were driving the latest Audi when we were caught.’

      ‘Sies man,’ I exclaim. ‘That’s the car of choice of the security police.’

      ‘I know,’ says Ting Ting, ‘that’s why we drove it. But it didn’t help.’

      We laugh and move into other areas. Family stuff. I need the details of parents and contact addresses, phone numbers, financial obligations. Girlfriends? They laugh and look at each other.

      ‘Do we have time for that?’ Neo asks.

      I leave it there for the moment. I need to find out what we’re facing. ‘Do you have a copy of the charge sheet?’

      ‘No,’ says Jabu.

      Typical, they have been given nothing.

      ‘Okay,’ I say, ‘then tell me some of the details so I can get a sense of it.’

      They exchange glances and Jabu says, ‘They say we have done everything.’

      I lean forward. ‘Help me to understand. “Everything” is a big word.’

      ‘Everything means undergoing training, possession of weapons, sabotage, assassination and murder, planting landmines and a bomb.’

      Shit, I think, they are right, there is nothing else. I clear my throat, which has gone tight. ‘The assassinations,’ I say quietly, ‘give me an example.’

      Masina looks me in the eye. ‘Have you heard of Brigadier Molope?’

      I go cold. ‘Yes, I’ve heard of him.’

      We are in trouble.

       6

      Driving back to Johannesburg thinking of the policeman Brigadier Molope, I am in another place, a prisoner of memory. I remember the Winterveld massacre, as it became known.

      Winterveld is an arid and dusty area of mud houses outside Pretoria, part of the Bophuthatswana Bantustan. In Winterveld there is one hundred per cent unemployment, no running water or electricity. It is an empty dust bowl of hunger.

      On Wednesday 26 March 1986, the people of Winterveld protested against the detention and torture of their children by the Bop police. There was speculation that the chief of police would come to the soccer field to speak about the detainees. Some residents said they had heard the police announcing the meeting the day before on loudhailers.

      The people, mostly women and children, gathered slowly on the gravel soccer field in the middle of the settlement. There were a few men, but most had gone to Pretoria looking for work. A tattered barbed-wire fence surrounded the field. It was a windy day and dust swirled across the field and the surrounding houses. In some of the tiny gardens people had sparse vegetable patches but the soil was too hard and dry to produce much greenery.

      By nine o’clock, the crowd numbered more than five thousand, their ranks swelled by curious schoolchildren. Also people from adjacent settlements and some of the youth had come from the nearby township of Garankuwa. Trucks arrived and police and soldiers dismounted. More police arrived in armoured vehicles. They wore full riot gear and were armed with R4 combat rifles. The mothers and elders realised that the situation was explosive and tried to calm the crowd. Opposite them, the police formed a defensive line.

      The area police commander arrived and conferred with his subordinate. The police were now facing the crowd, rifles at the ready but pointed down. The commander admonished the gathering through a loudhailer and a rumble of annoyance went through СКАЧАТЬ