Saturday 31 October 2009

A crime less easy to disguise

Hetta and Leon Steyn

Apart from those employed in the media, who's job it is to suppress and distort news coverage which does not comply with the official message of a thriving, multicultural paradise, joyfully freed from that shackles of an oppressive racist regime, and those who have regular contact with friend and relatives still living beneath the battered rainbow, regular readers of this blog are amongst a tiny minority of Westerners who are aware that all is not well in South Africa.

The official crime statistics are heavily massaged by the corrupt, and sometimes complicit, ANC government, and their staggering lies reported unquestioningly by a media, who earlier this actually reported with a straight face that crime rates were higher in Britain.

However, there is no hiding the fact that South Africa is rapidly becoming one of the most crime ridden nations on earth. Robberies ranging from street muggings to violent gun crime are commonplace. South Africa is often referred to as the rape capital of the world with one male in four admitting to having committed the act . Even that horrifying statistic disguises the fact this is not confined just to acts of sexual violence against adult women, child rape is at epidemic levels, with a recent report estimating that a South African child is raped every three minutes, which is to say that there are 530 children raped there every single day . In addition, although not recognised as a crime, South Africa has one of the highest rates of violent male on male rape in the world, a fact which should be born in mind by male football fans planning to visit for the world cup in 2010.

Victims of crime often find little help by turning to the police, as they are frequently not much better than the criminals they are paid to catch, as white mother of three Martie Olivier discovered just this month when she was repeatedly raped by two uniformed police officers who had arrested her husband Sarul Oliver without explanation, but presumably as a ruse to extort money from the couple.

The rainbow nation is also a world leader when it comes murder, ranked second only behind Columbia amongst those nations which are not actively at war. Although the majority of the victims of murder are black, hidden away within the statistics is the fact that a disproportionate number of victims are white people, who are over represented to a massive degree given their shrinking numbers in the country.

Given how heavily the ANC Government seek to suppress information it is difficult to track down an exact figure however, some estimates state that between 27,000 and 35,000 whites have been murdered since the end of Apartheid in 1994. my guess is that the true figure may be closer to 10,000 but could. well be much higher. One figure which has been widely substantiated, however, is that of these, well over 3,000 killings fall into the category of “farm murders”, the killing of, white, usually Afrikaans farmers and their families.

As has been detailed here previously, these killings seem to have little to do with crime, as frequently no property is taken whilst the degree of torture and brutality involved would lead anyone, who is not completely blinded by their agenda, to conclude that what is taking place are hate crimes, and that a systematic genocide is taking place. An example earlier this year, was the murder of Mrs. Allice Lotter (78) and her 57 year old daughter Helen, which involved such a degree of torture and cruelty that it caused outraged protests amongst the Afrikaans community, albeit receiving virtually no publicity outside the local area.

Compare this to the recent events where white university students were accused of pretending to urinate into a stew prepared for a group of blacks, which made the main news across Europe and America, showing that when it comes to news coverage, what the students pretended to do, the world media do for real.

This of course is the point, the only reason that these murders are able to continue unchecked without turning South Africa into a pariah state and decimating both its tourist trade, and its chances of hosting next year's world cup, is that news of anti white crimes is almost totally suppressed by the local South African media , and completely censored by the outside world.

This has been possible, because, in the main the victims have been ordinary people, known to their loved ones but not to the community in general.

However, a double murder which took place this week will be somewhat more difficult to hide, as the victims were a little more high profile. Leon and Hetta Steyn were a well known couple who ran a popular and award winning restaurant and guest house near Sabie, a small country town nestled in the majestic Drakensberg escarpment mountains of the Mpumalanga province. Their Restaurant, The Artist's café, is located in a refurbished abandoned railway station dating back to the 1920's and appears in many of the top tourist guides to South Africa

According to press reports “Leon and Hetta Steyn were shot with an R5 rifle shortly before 07:00 on Thursday morning in their guesthouse at the disused Hendriksdal Railway Station. Next to their house was their well-known restaurant, The Artist's Café, which was highly popular among locals as well as foreign visitors.”

Sabie police said the motive appeared to be robbery because the house had been somewhat ransacked, but the robbers fled before they could take anything because they were disturbed by neighbours who came to investigate immediately after hearing the shots. (Note: The police always attribute the motive to robbery, even when only a cell phone is taken preventing the victims calling for help, or as in this case where nothing is taken – so much more convenient than admitting race hate could have played a role.)

Acting provincial police commissioner Rex Machabi's spokesperson, Captain Leonard Hlathi, said the case had now been transferred to the Mpumalanga Organised Crime Unit in Nelspruit. "No person has been arrested yet. We are also appealing to the community to assist the police in tracing down these cold-blooded killers," he said

Given the fame of their restaurant, and their own high profile, it will be very difficult for the authorities to bury news of Mr and Mrs Steyn;s death, and already the possible impact is causing concern. Department of economic development, environment and tourism MEC Jabu Mahlangu labelled the double murder "shocking and cruel" and lamented that it took place "while the world is watching us". He added "Tourism is our goldmine in this province, and such barbaric acts could deter people from visiting us. And here we are one of the host cities for the 2010 FIFA World Cup,”

"This could make potential visitors think twice before using our facilities. We cannot accept this to continue. We hope that the police will leave no stone unturned to bring the perpetrators to book," said Mahlangu.

Were the world to be aware that Leon and Hetta Steyn's tragic deaths were just the latest in a string of thousands of such killings, and that, horrific as their killing was, theirs was a comparatively swift death, which escaped the inhuman brutality which ended the lives of so many of their fellow victims, many would think more than twice about visiting South Africa next year.

However, they will not think twice, because they will not be told, they will not be warned. Even if the media and the South African Authorities are unable to bury news of the Steyns's murder, it will be passed off as an aberration, a one off incident, horrid and violent, but a rarity. Then it will be forgotten. Next year thousands upon thousands of football fans and tourists will travel there, unworried, and unaware of what could be awaiting them.

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Hat Tip: Dina

3 comments:

MrsJ said...

I do wish that more people could know about these horrific murders, and stay away. If the tourist trade was hit, perhaps something would be done, although I suspect there isn't the political or moral will to do anything about it.

We were warned off visiting about three years ago by a state employee, especially when she found where we wanted to go (my mother-in-law's birthplace, Mthatha). Her voice was quavering when she said: "you can't, you just can't - white people go there, they die. The only way is in an armoured car bristling with weapons and never stop, not even for red lights."

Needless to say, we didn't go.

Anonymous said...

'who's job' -> 'whose job'

who's = 'who is'

IlluminatedOne said...

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If you want to discover the truth, then I recommend you start with this book:

The Culture of Critique by Kevin Macdonald.



Open your mind - click on my name and be illuminated.