Vlakplaas (trans. "shallow farm") is a farm 20 km west of

Pretoria Pretoria () is South Africa's administrative capital, serving as the seat of the Executive (government), executive branch of government, and as the host to all foreign embassies to South Africa. Pretoria straddles the Apies River and extends ...

that served as the headquarters of

counterinsurgency Counterinsurgency (COIN) is "the totality of actions aimed at defeating irregular forces". The Oxford English Dictionary defines counterinsurgency as any "military or political action taken against the activities of guerrillas or revolutionar ...

unit C1 (later called C10) of the Security Branch of the

apartheid Apartheid (, especially South African English: , ; , "aparthood") was a system of institutionalised racial segregation that existed in South Africa and South West Africa (now Namibia) from 1948 to the early 1990s. Apartheid was ...

-era

South African Police The South African Police (SAP) was the national police force and law enforcement agency in South Africa from 1913 to 1994; it was the ''de facto'' police force in the territory of South West Africa (Namibia) from 1939 to 1981. After South Afr ...

. Though officially called Section C1, the unit itself also became known as Vlakplaas. Established in 1979, by 1990 it had grown from a small unit of five policemen and about fifteen

askaris An askari (from Somali, Swahili and Arabic , , meaning "soldier" or "military", which also means "police" in the Somali language) was a local soldier serving in the armies of the European colonial powers in Africa, particularly in the African G ...

to a unit of nine squads. The unit functioned as a paramilitary hit squad,The Role of Political Violence in South Africa's Democratisation
/ref> capturing political opponents of the apartheid government and either "turning" (converting) or executing them. Vlakplaas farm was the site of multiple executions of political opponents of the apartheid government. The unit is known to have carried out the murders of

Griffiths Mxenge Griffiths Mlungisi Mxenge (27 February 1935 – 19 November 1981) was born in KwaRayi, a rural settlement outside of King Williams Town, Eastern Cape. He was a civil rights lawyer, a member of the African National Congress (ANC) and a South Af ...

in 1981 and the so-called " Chesterville Four" in 1986, among many others. C1 officers were also notorious for allegedly routinely defrauding the state, siphoning off government funds to pay agents or for their personal use.

The farm

The land at Vlakplaas was bought by the police in 1979 and later transferred to the national Department of Public Works. When the police vacated the farm in the mid-1990s, it was left in the hands of a caretaker, named Louis Steyn. In 2001, the government held a traditional healing ceremony at the farm and announced its intention to transfer the land to the Department of Arts and Culture, in order to turn it into a museum. However, Steyn successfully challenged his eviction in the High Court. In August 2007, the Department of Science and Technology announced that the farm would be repurposed as a centre for healing. The centre would conduct research into plants used in

traditional medicine Traditional medicine (also known as indigenous medicine or folk medicine) comprises medical aspects of traditional knowledge that developed over generations within the folk beliefs of various societies, including indigenous peoples, before the ...

, and promote collaboration between practitioners of western

medicine Medicine is the science and practice of caring for a patient, managing the diagnosis, prognosis, prevention, treatment, palliation of their injury or disease, and promoting their health. Medicine encompasses a variety of health care pract ...

and traditional healers. However, years later, Steyn continued to inhabit the farm. He left in 2012, passing the land on to friends, who in turn passed it on to a Christian ministry, Kuriaké, which used it to establish an addiction rehabilitation centre. The ministry was evicted in June 2014, at which point the government planned to transfer it to the Department of Arts and Culture for use as a heritage site.

Commanding officers

C1 was commanded by: * Johannes Jacobus Victor (1979–80) *

Dirk Coetzee Dirk Coetzee (15 April 1945 – 7 March 2013) was co-founder and commander of the covert South African Security Police unit based at Vlakplaas. He and his colleagues were involved in a number of extra judicial killings including that of Griffith ...

(1980–81) * Jan Carel Coetzee (1982) * Jack Cronje (1983–85) *

Eugene de Kock Eugene Alexander de Kock (born 29 January 1949) is a former South African Police colonel, torturer, and assassin, active under the apartheid government. Nicknamed "Prime Evil" by the press, De Kock was the commanding officer of C10, a counterin ...

(1985–93)

References

External links

Witch Doctors 'cleanse' Vlakplaas

Vlakplaas proposed as museum

{{coord, 25, 49, 3.01, S, 28, 1, 41.44, E, display=title, type:landmark_region:ZA Apartheid government Defunct law enforcement agencies of South Africa

The farm

Commanding officers

See also

References

Further reading

External links