Two things that struck me in relation to the mall incident, related earlier, which made me flash back to the days of the struggle and the accompanying repression.

In detention the first time, when I experienced physical torture, they were not interested in what I had to say because they wielded their physical power over me.

That was again what I experienced today, perhaps paradoxically through people who are meant to protect me. But as we know it is no longer really a paradox. I wonder how many others have had this extra-legal repression meted out to them, possibly in more extreme forms, in less visible places, by supposedly trusted protection forces.

Secondly, Nomboniso Gasa put it to me that I pass this place in exactly the same way almost every week, often more than once. I go to various places and then leave in the same way. Consequently the guards know my habits.

I was taught in the struggle not to go to places in the same way, especially in the period when assassination was a danger. I remember when I moved into a house in Bez Valley that was the day when David Webster was assassinated on May Day in 1989.I was under house arrest then so that if not hit at home I could be hit when I reported to the police twice every day.

Consequently I had to find different ways of getting to and from Jeppe police station every day in order to be relatively secure.

Does one need to use the same forms of personal protection against those supposedly looking after one’s safety?