Hateland (20 page)

    On one shift, I discovered in the truck's glove compartment a photo of a black man with his face covered in blood. Dougie said he'd taken it as a souvenir after attacking the man during a raid on a shebeen. He told me to keep it as a 'memento'. I didn't really want to, but he urged me to take it, so I put it in my jacket pocket to shut him up.

    On one of my first shifts, we were called out to a coloured person's house in the west of the city. The householder had reported five black youths trying to smash their way in. Apparently, they'd smashed his windows with sticks and were now trying to break down the front door.

    We pulled up leisurely at the address. The youths were still there, throwing rocks against the door and trying to shoulder it open. Dougie didn't say anything. He just jumped out of the truck and started shooting. The youths skedaddled. Dougie ran up the path towards the house, firing his pistol wildly at the fleeing figures. He wasn't just shooting in the air for effect: he seemed to be aiming his shots. Luckily for his targets, he couldn't shoot well on the move and, anyway, the juveniles were probably running faster than his bullets. I'd jumped out of the truck and was running behind him. His behaviour left me speechless. Everything was happening too quickly for me to say or do anything. We started chasing the only youth still visible. He was streaking down the road with the velocity of an Olympic sprinter.

    Dougie fired again. As he did so, a police car came round the corner. The terrified youth ran straight up to it. Without even stopping to talk to the policemen inside, he opened the rear door and jumped in. It must have seemed a better option than summary execution. For the second time in a week, I found myself back in John Foster Square police station. The fact that shots had been fired meant a bit of paperwork needed completion.

    I expected a hard time from police keen to discover why a security guard had been shooting at a member of the public in a residential area. But, apart from a few unprobing questions from a bored sergeant, no one seemed too concerned. We could have been reporting a stolen bike. I told the police I'd been talking on the radio when the shooting started. I'd only just got out of the vehicle as the police arrived, so I couldn't throw much light on the events. However, Dougie not only told the full truth, he also exaggerated the more illegal aspects.

    I knew security guards could get away with a lot, but I'd also been told the law was crystal clear about self-defence. You could shoot if you considered your life in danger, but not if that danger had passed. Someone whizzing gazelle-like down the road away from you could not be regarded as a threat.

    They released me. Dougie stayed to make a statement. I thought he'd be charged with something, and perhaps suspended, but next day he was waiting for me as usual at work. He said the police considered the matter closed.

    I now guessed they wouldn't have done anything even if he'd shot someone dead - so long as that someone was black. Dougie had obviously learnt early what he could get away with. What I'd thought were his tall tales had probably been faithful depictions of reality.

    One day, Colin and I found the lamp-posts outside our block of flats posted with flyers decorated with swastika-type symbols. They advertised a meeting for the far-right Afrikaner Resistance Movement (AWB). Its leader, Eugene Terre'Blanche, would be present. I didn't know that much about him, but I'd seen him described in the British media as a would-be South African Hitler.

    Colin and I decided to go along. Outside the venue, khaki-clad paramilitary types sat on horseback or stood holding flags decorated with the swastika-type symbols we'd seen on the flyers. Inside the packed hall, I spoke to Colin. A few people nearby moved away from us, muttering in Afrikaans. A few minutes later, a group of six guards stormed over and ordered us to leave immediately.

    Taken aback by their hostility, we asked why. An aggressive paramilitary with a beard said the British weren't welcome there - or anywhere in South Africa. He and his mates all carried firearms, so we decided not to protest at their racism. We made our way to the door, followed by the guards, who looked like they wanted to bash us. I think they were still bitter about the Boer War.

    I began to feel very uncomfortable working with Dougie. He had a spitting aggressiveness fuelled by paranoia, suspicion and hatred. I knew a lot of violent people, and I wasn't particularly gentle myself, but Dougie was different. I could never feel at ease with him. Not only would he start waving a gun about for little or no reason, he'd also threaten and beat blacks just for fun. His brutality would astonish me. I'd often tell him to ease off, but he'd just look at me as if I were mad. I think he regarded me as some sort of humanitarian goody-goody.

    Over the next few weeks, I came to realise the law didn't exist as something blacks could call on for help. I witnessed officialdom's contempt for black lives every hour of every day. I saw a policeman kung-fu kick a black man in the chest on a crowded street for no reason; I attended an incident where a white man who'd knocked down a black man in his car was asked by the policeman if the victim had caused the vehicle any damage. It was an odd, brutal world that seemed on the brink of boiling over into a bloodbath. For the first time since my arrival, I started thinking about leaving Africa altogether. I just couldn't stomach the misery and injustice I was witnessing. I saw a black family living in an abandoned car surrounded by corrugated iron. I watched black women and children sharing a meal of thin gruel from the paint tin they'd cooked it in. Yet only a few miles away, white families lived in bloated luxury. I was beginning to think like a Guardian reader. I thought I was cracking up.

    One night, Dougie and I were on duty, but had been whiling away our shift drinking outside The Moulin Rouge. We should have been patrolling the streets in our truck. We had pagers, with which the company contacted us in emergencies. Claire was sitting with us. Normally, she tended to avoid me when I was drinking. But she'd arranged to meet someone, had arrived early and didn't want to wait on her own. My pager started bleeping. We were being called to a reported burglary. The address was just round the corner. We got up to leave. I told Claire we wouldn't be long. She asked if she could come along, because she didn't fancy sitting on her own. Foolishly, I let her jump in with us.

    We arrived quickly at the address. A young white woman told us the offender had only just run out of the house. She gave a brief description of a black man wearing jeans and a T-shirt. Dougie ran one way; I the other. I bolted down the street and round the block, but couldn't see anyone. After a few minutes, I made my way back to the house. A few hundred yards away, I could see Dougie frogmarching someone towards me. Before long, the two of them reached me. On Dougie's face was a smirk; on his black prisoner's, was blood. Then Dougie suddenly belted the man across the back of the head with his pistol. He crumpled to his knees. Dougie started pistol-whipping him. I said, 'Leave it out, Dougie. Leave it out, man.' But he was in a real frenzy.

    'Dirty kaffir, dirty fucking kaffir,' he spat as he booted the man, who by now had curled up into a defensive ball. I heard the sound of pounding on a window. I looked up. It was Claire. She'd been watching everything from the truck. She looked distraught. Banging on the window with both hands, she was crying her eyes out, shouting at Dougie to stop.

    Dougie eventually tired, and stopped. He pulled his blood-smeared victim to his feet and forced him up the path to the house he'd allegedly burgled. Dougie rang the bell. The young woman opened the door - and let out a scream. She didn't scream because she recognised the quivering man. She screamed because his face was a mask of blood. Dougie told her to call the police.

    In a few minutes, they arrived in a van. Dougie said, 'I've got a burglar for you.' The police didn't ask how the alleged burglar had ended up in such a state. Trivial points like that didn't interest them. Dougie said he'd attend the station to make a statement. The police pushed the man into the van and drove off.

    We drove Claire back to The Moulin Rouge. She was still upset, but had stopped crying. She asked Dougie why he'd had to hit the man like that. He said, 'He was a burglar.' We dropped her off and drove on.

    I didn't feel well. It struck me that the man hadn't been wearing jeans and a T-shirt. He didn't fit the householder's original description. I asked Dougie if he could be sure he'd got the right man. I said, 'Do you really think he's the burglar?'

    Dougie laughed, 'Don't be stupid. Of course he isn't.'

    He said he'd seen the man walking up the road with his girlfriend. He'd asked him where he'd been and he'd 'got lippy'. Dougie had then pistol-whipped him on the spot. He added, 'Fucking kaffir. His black bitch got a kicking too.' He claimed that as he was kicking her, she'd wet herself. Her urine had gone all over his boots and trousers. 'That's why he got what he got.'

    I felt sick, just sick, and dirty. I asked myself what I was doing with such an animal. I was holding the shotgun in my hands. I felt like smashing the butt into the side of his head. I really wanted to damage him, but I didn't. He was white. The law would have punished me severely for harming even a hair on his head.

    I felt like going to the police and telling them the man was innocent. But I guessed my intervention wouldn't have made any difference. The man was black: he was already guilty. It seemed to me that so long as some black man was in custody for an offence, it didn't matter to the police if he was the wrong one. Dougie would make his statement and 'the burglar' would probably receive a lengthy prison sentence. The next day, I went into the office and told them I didn't want to work on patrols any more.

    Some people might think I'm exaggerating the way things were for blacks. I'm not. The more independent papers were full of stories of astonishing official cruelty. One story in particular has stuck in my mind. It involves the so-called 'Pabello 26'.

    Pabello is a black township. A policeman had been murdered outside his home by demonstrators who'd just been dispersed from a nearby football pitch with tear gas. He'd been struck on the head with his own rifle after he'd shot indiscriminately, paralysing an 11 -year-old boy. The courts convicted 26 blacks of having played a part in the murder. Six received community service, six were sent to prison and fourteen were sentenced to death. The controversial law of common purpose had been used to convict all of them, but the trials never established who'd actually struck the policeman.

    It subsequently emerged that five of the blacks sentenced to death had only been arrested by chance. They'd been stopped at random in the street seven months after the murder and asked to make up the numbers in an identity parade. The police witness had picked out all five of the innocent men. Despite the public outcry, all were hanged.

    I knew too that the state didn't reserve injustice for non-whites alone. I heard enough stories to know that anyone who displeased the authorities could be locked up without charge, fitted up and even, in extreme cases, murdered.

    The boss found me another nightclub. Neither as big nor as busy as the last one, it shared a similar biker clientele. The bikers, mostly older men in their mid-30s to early 40s, involved themselves in most things criminal. Mercifully, however, my new manager didn't indulge in provocative and irrational behaviour, so life became easier.

    On my second weekend at the club, Colin visited me for a drink. We shared more than a few beers together over the next couple of hours, until the manager came over. He said a group of men had started bothering customers outside the club. Even though Colin wasn't working, he went with me to the door. Rather foolishly, I left the shotgun behind at the reception desk upstairs.

    To my undelight, I recognised the troublemakers - four of the Portuguese men I'd last seen on the landing near my flat. This time, I didn't have my shotgun to hand. Their number didn't include the knifeman I'd battered with the butt. I hoped he was still in hospital. I explained politely that they should return forthwith to their slums.

    One of them stepped forward and kicked in the glass door. The others ran at us. We backed off into the foyer. They ran in after us and picked up chairs and tables. Furniture was soon flying through the air towards us. I grabbed one of the chairs and began to smash it over anyone within striking distance. Unfortunately, in the confusion I smashed Colin over the head too. The blow knocked him out - and down a flight of stairs. Now alone, I knew I could lose. Only my shotgun could save me. I ran back up the stairs to reception, grabbed the gun from behind the counter and spun round to level it at the Portuguese charging up after me.

    The police arrived before the situation could deteriorate any further. They'd drawn their guns. I felt pleased to see them, but I sensed the feeling wasn't mutual. I think they'd had enough of me, the English holidaymaker. They ignored the Portuguese men and arrested me. I saw Colin still lying comatose downstairs as the police marched me out to the van.

    Once again, I found myself standing in front of the desk sergeant in John Foster Square police station. I felt I'd been treated unjustly. I was also worried about Colin. These feelings combined to make me less polite and respectful than usual.

    I kept interrupting the desk sergeant, who then said something insulting about my mother. I lunged at him but, before I could grab him, his colleagues brought me down to the ground with a crash. Several of them dragged me along the floor to the cells, punctuating my journey with kicks. They opened a heavy metal door and shoved me into what seemed more like a cage than a cell. The door slammed shut and for a moment I lay still on cold concrete. Looking up, I could see the stars in the night sky. The architect had forgotten to sketch in a ceiling. Only the security bars offered protection from the weather.

    The cell was about six paces wide and twelve long. At one end sat a broken, stinking toilet. At the other, a small round hole in what appeared to be a coal bunker. In fact, the hole formed the entrance to the sleeping area, which contained no beds, only a few manky blankets. Crawling through the hole made me feel like a dog entering its kennel.