November 18, 1997

Good Morning from the Zundelsite:

About a year a go, I was put on the mailing list of a South African patriot's group who were fighting for media coverage for the hunger strike of a man called Commandant Willem Ratte.

When I was contacted, Commandant Ratte was near death, having refused food, as I recall, for something like 40+ days.

The story around his political protest was not known to me, but I felt it to be my duty to make available his e-mail address to people who wanted to inform themselves on what was happening, and why a man with a young family (four children, as I remember it) would take such drastic steps.

Shortly thereafter, Commandant Ratte abandoned his hunger strike, having achieved whatever it was he had asked of his opponents. For me, the story ended with an e-mail that described him to be so weak that when his wife picked him up to take him home, he could no longer hold up his head.

A few days ago I received the following missive, announcing a SECOND hunger strike. Again, I want to stress that I know nothing of this man or of his struggle except the content of his letter, but I am passing it on nonetheless, and for the same humanitarian reasons as previous. The contact address is artinet@alpha.terranet.co.za

You be the judge as to what's going on. The only comment I want to add that it seems to me that when Commandant Ratte speaks of the "Azanian" government, he uses the term much like we would speak of Z.O.G. (Zionist Occupation Government).

Here is his letter, titled "A Letter from Prison":

Pretoria, 27 October 1997

TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN

In a news report mention was made of my hunger strike. The following comment was made, among others: "It is not actually known what Commandant Ratte wants to achieve with his hunger strike". May I explain?

WHAT I wish to achieve is possibly secondary in importance to WHY I decided to embark on this action. A decision that, I can assure you, was not taken lightly. Note that I have been in prison for 9 months to date while awaiting trial, mostly in solitary confinement. I have withheld myself from any drastic action, specifically because of the court case concerning the old 32 Battalion military "Pomfret" base in the Northern Cape. However, the issue at stake now is something else altogether.

You will recall that my previous hunger strike was directed against the unjustness of the current Azanian (New South African) legal system as currently applied, and the unacceptability of a foreign order, to whom our whole land was unrightfully handed over through process of cowardice and treason. The moment that I, a proud officer of the old South African Army, was stuffed in jail and branded a common criminal by this Azanian order, because of our rightful protest against the unparalleled sell-out of that for which hundreds of our sons died and thousands were maimed, the only form of honorable protest left to me was a hunger strike.

You also know how it ended: Fellow citizens demanded that I use my right to appeal, which would then free me on bail, till such time as the appeal verdict was announced. That verdict has now been delivered. While I appreciate the improvement in the verdict of the appeal judges, and give thanks to my legal representative for his hard work, I cannot accept any form of prison punishment as condemned criminal. If it is for 25 years or only for one year, the principle remains the same: An honorable officer of our proud South African Army is treated as a common criminal simply for expressing rightful, bloodless and honorable resistance against the unrightful sell-out and treason against everything that is dear, right and good for our nation: Namely our people's freedom, Christianity and independence. And this remains unacceptable to me, whether it was in June 1996, (start of the first hunger strike) or now in October 1997.
Unfortunately I do not have the mentality of those who yesterday saluted our orange, white and blue National Flag and sang the Call of South Africa, (our National Anthem) with fervour, and today salute the flag of the foreign oppressor and all that goes with it, also running to the witch-hunt commission (paraded as the so-called "truth" commission) to ask forgiveness for our rightful resistance to the threatened occupation by a gang of communists, Xhosas and their sidekicks.

Thursday afternoon, on 23 October 1997, my status here in prison changed from an awaiting trial prisoner to a condemned criminal. On Friday morning, as soon as possible, I informed the Azanian prison authorities of my decision to continue the hunger strike, which I interrupted last year. The only reproach that someone can address to me, is that I did not ignore the calls from my people last year and continue with my hunger strike. If anyone reproaches me for that reason, then I apologise.

I must confess, I am tired of all the cowardice, spinelessness, prostration, opportunism and treason in the ranks of our nation. But this was not my chief motivation. Precisely because we experience so much of this in our current times, it is of cardinal importance that someone, somewhere, makes a stand for that which was right, is right, and will ever be right: The right for a nation to it's own land, it's own Christian principles and independent future. This includes an own just judicial system. And there is, according to my own humble insight, not a better opportunity than especially the hostile and unjust verdict in the Fort Schanskop case (a case of non-violent protest).

This does not just concern myself. This concerns our people and the future of our children. Our generation has allowed our lovely land and our safe, good old South Africa to be handed over without fight or fury, in the most cowardly manner conceivable, to an Azanian, hostile, brutal, and totally incompetent Regime. It is our duty to do everything possible to wipe out this shame and restore our honour, so that we can once again lay claim to what is rightly ours. Everyone ought to do what he can, wherever he finds the opportunity. Before we produce proof that we can sacrifice and stand by what is right, there is no hope of the restoration of any of our people's rights. As long as we continue to care only for ourselves, to our own individual benefit, and prostrate ourselves before what the whole world can see is an illegal, unjust and corrupt, foreign order, - as long as we condemn our children to be delivered to the murder, rapine, humiliation and deterioration that has only just begun, but will, as in the rest of Dark Africa get worse, until our people have all been killed, have emigrated, or have become part of a typical third-world, heathen and foreign so-called nation.

You have said you do not know what I want to achieve. At the end of the day that which I can achieve is bound by a higher Hand. If I achieve nothing, then at least I know I have acted according to my conscience and done my best to bring the atrocious injustice, that exists in our land, to my people's attention and to the world. So many of us see what is happening around them, but raise their shoulders and accept it, in order to live in so-called "peace". Little do they realise that such an attitude helps the injustice to persist, just as communism persisted in Russia for 70 years.

May I conclude by mentioning a few examples that give us the fullest right to oppose the Azanian regime and it's skewed judicial system:

Our internationally recognised, free South African Republic has
been unrightfully, and through an act of treason, handed over to a foreign Azanian Regime. - Any verdict by an Azanian court is thus, ipso facto, the verdict of a foreign, illegitimate Regime. We may clench our teeth and use the foreigner's court as a platform to state our case, but the blatant application of one-eyed, skewed, hostile justice cannot just be accepted with goodwill.

I who stole nothing, hurt nobody, and did nobody any damage,
they brand and treat as a criminal, while Winnie Mandela's thirteen murders (mostly black children) are not even investigated, and she can laugh off the damning evidence in the book by Fred Bridgland. Nelson Mandela's (self-confessed) command to shoot to kill protesting Zulu's in the blood-bath at Shell-House is not followed up by a politically subservient and biased judiciary. An Azanian Brigadier openly brags about his gruesome order to slaughter women and children in a church. Not to mention the (Archbishop Desmond) Tutu-circus and the whitewashing of hundreds of brutal and abominable deeds of violence...

And just by the way... I have in any event already virtually
completed a full year in prison, which is equal to the imposed sentence.

Is it really so surprising that I cannot accept my new "status" as condemned criminal?

WILLEM RATTE

Thought for the Day:

"No man has come to true greatness who has not felt
in some degree that his life belongs to his race."

(Phillips Brooks)

Comments? E-Mail: irimland@cts.com

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