ONE of South Africa's most ruthless policemen, Eugene de Kock, known to friend and foe alike as "Prime Evil", was given two life sentences in the Pretoria Supreme Court yesterday.
De Kock, a self confessed agent of state sponsored terror and a commander of the once secret but now notorious counter insurgency unit at Vlakplaas, near Pretoria, was sentenced to imprisonment for a further 212 years by Judge Willem van der Merwe.
The former police colonel whose thick lensed spectacles give him a curiously vulnerable appearance was convicted in August on 89 charges, including six for murder, two for conspiracy to murder and nearly 60 for fraud.
The double life sentences - imposed for the murder and conspiracy to murder - meant that he would spent the rest of his life in prison unless his planned appeal to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) for amnesty succeeds.
De Kock, who joined the police after his application to serve as a soldier was turned down because of a nervous 51 utter, had earlier announced his intention of seeking amnesty from Archbishop Desmond Tutu's TRC, contending that most of his nefarious deeds were politically motivated.
His evidence in mitigation of sentence was characterised by bitter recrimination against his superiors in the police and, more particularly, the politicians, whom he accused of making him a scapegoat. He was especially critical of the former president. Mr F.W. de Klerk, who negotiated the settlement which brought a black government, led by President Nelson Mandela, to power.
But the prosecution led by deputy attorney general, Mr Anton Ackermann, insisted that many of De Kock's actions were prompted by base criminal motives rather than misguided patriotism buttressed by ideological opposition to communism.
One of the men killed by De Kock was Tiso Leballo. He was one of six alleged robbers killed in an ambush outside town of Nelspruit. Leballo's body was blown up with explosives, a favoured Vlakplaas method of disposing of the bodies of victims.
The motive of the ambushers, led by De Kock, was to claim a reward for the interception of the alleged robbers.
De Kock, who once proclaimed that his motto was "death before dishonour", despised his predecessor at Vlakplaas, Mr Dirk Coetzee, for betraying his police comrades and defecting to the African National Congress.
Yet he himself gave evidence for the state in a major trial in June. In the dock were three white policemen accused of killing three of their black colleagues and an informer in a car explosion at Motherwell in the Eastern Cape. De Kock's evidence was undoubtedly a factor in their conviction.
Judgment in De Kock's trial yesterday served as a prelude to his pending appearance before the TRC and his bid to convince the three judges who serve on its amnesty committee that he is a contrite political offender, not a base criminal.
. South Africa adopted one of the world's most liberal abortion bills yesterday, amidst cheers from the ruling African National Congress and howls of protests from opposition parties and religious groups.
The bill, which allows women and girls to have abortions performed in the first 12 weeks of pregnancy, was passed by 209 votes to 87 with five abstentions.