Coligny: Where a handful of stolen
Simmering racism in the North West town has boiled over after the alleged murder of a black teen
Matlhomola Moshoeu was born on a sunflower farm in Coligny 16 years ago. Two weeks ago, he died on a sunflower farm after stealing one for its seeds. Sunflower seeds mean big money for farmers but are also nourishment for Coligny’s poorest residents.
Matlhomola’s death ignited a race protest in the small North West town and has further divided its black and white communities.
This week, three farmhouses were torched after Phillip Schutte and Pieter Doorewaard, accused of murdering Matlhomola, were each released on R5 000 bail.
Coligny residents had earlier taken to the streets after the teenager’s death last week. Shops were burned and looted.
Matlhomola is alleged to have been killed by the two men, who caught him and a friend stealing sunflowers on a farm belonging to Doorewaard’s uncle, Pieter Karsten. The farm is just across a dust road from the cluster of shacks where the teenager lived.
Prosecutors pursuing a charge of murder against the pair accused them of throwing Matlhomola off a moving bakkie and beating and intimidating the only witness who came forward to implicate them in the death.
But Doorewaard and Schutte insist the 16-year-old died after jumping from the bakkie when they slowed down to turn a corner while taking him to the police station. In court, police confirmed that, over the past six months, the pair had brought in a number of children for the same offence.
Matlhomola had left the Scotland section of the Tlhabologang township at the beginning of the school holidays and was presumed to have been staying with his friends on one of the neighbouring farms, as he usually did, said family friend and community activist Stanley Mnyakama this week.
“He usually visits his friends on the farm during holidays. He was born there and his parents actually thought he was still there, when actually he had died,” he said.
Days after the teenager’s death his identity was still not known. Mnyakama, as a community leader, was tasked with visiting each of the farms surrounding the Scotland section to find out who his parents were.
As the days passed, the teen’s death increasingly angered people in the area who have “grown tired of the racist farmers”, he explained.
During the holidays, children in the area are known to play on the farms and, without any recreational facilities, they often land in trouble with farm owners over the theft of sunflowers and maize.
During term time, with better education being available in the neighbouring town of Lichtenburg, most learners walk 20km to and from school every day when the buses aren’t running.
Cutting through the farms to save time and eating the sunflower seeds and maize along the way had therefore become common practice, according to Tlhabologang resident Aaron Matshidiso.
“It’s a long walk to the schools, so you just pass through the farms and eat some mealies and these seeds because we don’t have food. But you can be sure that, if the farmer sees you taking a shortcut, his dogs will chase you down and, if he catches you, you’re getting klapped,” says Matshidiso.
“They get mad because when you plough, they scatter some seeds and the ones that are left, his cows or chickens eat it. So he would rather let the animals eat it than us.”
Matshidiso (26) says he worked as a farm labourer for five weeks. When his index finger had to be amputated after an accident while ploughing the fields, he was exposed to the anger of his “white master”.
“The top part of my finger was cut off by the machine. The farmer just shrugged and told me I’d better take myself to the hospital and not come back to work. I did open a case and reported it to the department of labour, but nothing happened to him,” he says, adding that he was not surprised that someone had allegedly been killed over a simple sunflower theft.
This kind of treatment has been going on for generations. At Matlhomola’s funeral, his uncle, Joe Mosweu, recalled how he had been chased down by dogs and beaten in the late 1970s.
“It happened to us a lot. Living here, you know it’s going to happen; it’s obvious. We used to steal mealies to take home and they would send COLIGNY the dogs, or catch us and beat us very badly. I was beaten very badly on these same farms,” Mosweu said.
North West Premier Supra Mahumapelo has repeated the view that Doorewaard and Schutte’s actions were racially motivated, asking how they would have responded if the person caught stealing sunflowers was white.
“Kids make mistakes, man. Why couldn’t they have just taken the boy to the parents and told them what he did. That’s how you are supposed to treat the youth. If it was a white boy who did that, would they have responded in the same way?” the premier asked.
Members of rival political parties the ANC and the Economic Freedom Fighters were briefly united by their anger towards the white community, which local activists said was preparing to intimidate the black population and defend the two men accused of murder.
“When they were appearing in court for the first time, these boere were carrying guns. They came to show us they aren’t scared of us. In fact, they’ve united us as black people through their Afrikaner racism,” protest leader Thabo Matshila said.
The racism in the small town has become intolerable over the past six months, said residents of the Scotland section. The rage triggered by Matlhomola’s death was acknowledged when the Coligny magistrate’s court ruled on the accused’s bail applications on Monday.
Magistrate Makgaola Foso refused to begin his judgment without Matlhomola’s family being present,