MEDIA BULLSHIT ABOUT EUGENE DE KOCK

Every fool and his aunty have an opinion about Eugene de Kock. The media is mostly biased, and in more cases than not, barking up the wrong tree. Where the journalists get their information from is anyone’s guess. I think most of their information is taken from snippets that they read here and there, or bits that are overhead in conversations between idiots. While things that are so ridiculously untrue that a kindergarten child would pay no attention, there are two issues that irritate me tremendously.

The New York Times of 6^th February 2015 has made the most concise and truthful statement about Eugene. It states: “Eugene de Kock, 66, was granted parole last week. It was arguably the greatest single act of mercy to emerge from the anguished debate in South Africa over reconciliation and justice that also seizes many other societies seeking to heal the scars of their past, from Rwanda to Northern Ireland”. And in that beautifully constructed article we find the first of my irritations. “His friends say that, having once been an abnormal man in abnormal times, he is seeking a normal, if anonymous, life”. His friends? No!! Only one person said that.

Having watched and worked over a number of years on the release of Eugene de Kock, I have found that there are circles upon circles around him. It is as though he is overlapped by dozens of Venn diagrams. Each of those circles are to be headed by one or more groups of concerned people. Our Facebook group, FREE EUGENE DE KOCK, is one such circle. Piet Croucamp is another such circle. Each circle has worked on its own modus operandi for the benefit of Eugene.

My issue is with the above sentence which states that “His friends say that, having once been an abnormal man in abnormal times, he is seeking a normal, if anonymous, life” was coined by Piet Croucamp. Dr Piet Croucamp does not have a degree in psychiatry. Via Social networking and in comments to all newspapers carrying that statement, I disagree ferociously. No one has the right to call another person abnormal. Even a psychiatrist or psychologist would not repeat such a statement in private, and certainly not in public. From that one statement, the news has spread around the world that Eugene is abnormal. This is bullshit.

Eugene was a normal man in an abnormal society doing a normal and unquestionable job, becoming the highest decorated policeman, in the history of the country. He is still a normal man, having gone through 20 years of prison for doing a normal job in an abnormal society. He will be affected by being imprisoned for so many years, he will be affected by having seen the evil of the apartheid government, he will be affected by his superiors denial that they knew nothing of what he did, he will be affected by the colleagues who stabbed him in the back to save their own miserable skins, he will be affected by the unfairness of being the only one to be punished for the crimes of an entire government, he will be affected by having requested and then asking forgiveness from the families of the victims, he will be affected by the continual lies spoken about him now he is paroled. But all these effects are normal. He is still a normal human being.

Abnormal is the behaviour of those who let him down and of those Judas's that on oath said they knew nothing of Vlakplaas. Abnormal is the behaviour of those who have befriended him and benefitted in any way from his imprisonment. Abnormal behaviour is from those who had a different modus operandi than wanting him freed on compassionate grounds. Abnormal behaviour is the media who have published death threats on front pages, naming Eugene as the target and naming the person who wants to kill him.

Eugene de Kock was a normal man and is a normal man. Calling him an abnormal man in an abnormal society is unacceptable. If that is true; then we were all abnormal in an abnormal society. That statement that Piet Croucamp gave the media that Eugene de Kock is abnormal has become another one of the misconceptions about Eugene that is going around the world at a rate of knots.

In Jacob Dlamini’s book, Askari, Dlamini argues that Sedibe, the main character, occupied one position along a spectrum of betrayal and deceit. He faced choices many ordinary black (my italics) South Africans faced and was thus, in a sense, ordinary. It is a startling and powerful argument, one that required of its author enormous reserves of intellectual steel.

The second issue I have with the media is calling Eugene de Kock, “Prime Evil”. It is a derogatory term coined by Jacque Pauw when the story on Vlakplaas broke, and for the last twenty years, Eugene has been called Prime Evil in any media report. I have a huge problem with that, and I believe that Jacque Pauw owes him an apology. Labelling someone as Prime Evil is prime evil behaviour. The adage comes to mind – you have to be a thief to catch a thief. We recognise in others what is in, or what we have the potential to have, in ourselves.

I have never met Eugene de Kock. But I have come to know him from the inbox messages I have received from hundreds and hundreds of men who describe him as anything but prime evil. He has been described as humble, honest, and loyal, gentle, an inspiring leader in the field, a fearless warrior, and exceptionally brave. There is no one who is so good that they don’t have a little bad in them and no one so bad, that they don’t have a little good in them. And the last sentence refers to me and to you.