Remembering Sharpeville and Human Rights

The right to life - Section 11 of the Bill of Rights in the South African Constitution.

The Bill of Rights states, “Everyone has the right to life”. They have the right not to be killed. It’s part of being a human being. You don’t expect to step out onto the street one day and get shot. It’s just not something that happens. The right to life is one of the most important rights. No one has the right to take the life another person. Even the law should not be above this.

On 21 March, 1960 innocent people were killed. All they did was participate in protest march, and they lost their lives for it. Life may be overrated, but it is up to the individual to choose whether they wish to live or not (and up to nature as well). The Sharpeville Massacre was tragic, and it shows us just how brutal people can be, and which is why we need set laws in place to insure that people are kept in line.

Eugene Terre Blance

South Africa's history is dense with racism which sets a heavy undertone to much of South Africa's present. Fifteen years on of being a democracy and the horrors of apartheid still taunt us. In a country that is still recovering from apartheid, do we really need to focus so much attention on the likes of Eugene Terre Blanche ? Yes, he died, we regret the loss of a human being to the world, but do we really care? Does his death affect our daily lives in any huge way? Either way it was decided for us that his death would be a 'big deal' by the country, the media, by whoever the powerful forces may be. And so we take a look at Denis Beckett's profile of Eugene Terre Blanche.

Beckette seems unable to make a definite decision on whether he thinks Terre Blanche to be good or bad. Throughout the story there are constant flashbacks to his meeting with Terre Blanche. At the beginning Beckett describes him as "the arch vilain, the super-ogre, the ominous, foreboding figure so often depicted as the South African resuscitation of Hitler", yet at other times Beckett seems to relate to Terre Blanche and understand him and maybe even sympathize with him.

The title reads, “Eugene, the arch-ogre”, yet there we are not given anything which proves the man to be such. He comes across as a rather understanding person who is just set in his beliefs, which are a bit extreme. He helped the black people around his area and those who worked for him and he was against acts of violence towards black people. He just believed that blacks and whites should be separated. He wasn’t against non-whites; he was just pro white and pro Christian.

Beckett manages to remain reasonable and allows a different view of Terre Blanche. We can see him as a human being, as a father. The leader of the AWB does not come across very strongly, but we are constantly reminded of this as with the references to Terre Blanche’s public appearances and his ‘roaring’ speeches. Beckett goes back to where he started off with Terre Blanche though; Terre Blanch is not a good man. He comes to this final conclusion by the magazine, Sweepslag, which Beckett finds offensive. However, Terre Blanche comes off looking far from the likes of an ogre.

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