{"id":12811,"date":"2012-07-27T01:34:03","date_gmt":"2012-07-26T23:34:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/07\/s-african-boeremag-mastermind-guilty-of-treason\/"},"modified":"2012-07-27T01:34:03","modified_gmt":"2012-07-26T23:34:03","slug":"s-african-boeremag-mastermind-guilty-of-treason","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/s-african-boeremag-mastermind-guilty-of-treason\/","title":{"rendered":"S.African &quot;Boeremag&quot; mastermind guilty of treason"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t<span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>* Plots hatched around barbecue<span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>* Fringe group wanted to kill Mandela and drive out blacks<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>* Verdicts awaited on 21 others<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>JOHANNESBURG, July 26 (Reuters) &#8211; The mastermind of a white<br \/>\nsupremacist plot to assassinate Nelson Mandela and drive blacks<br \/>\nout of South Africa was found guilty of high treason on Thursday<br \/>\nafter a trial that started almost a decade ago.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>The verdict on former university lecturer Mike du Toit was<br \/>\nthe first member of the &#8220;Boeremag&#8221;, or &#8220;Boer Army&#8221;, a rag-tag<br \/>\nmilitia of apartheid loyalists, in connection with a botched<br \/>\n2002 coup attempt in Africa&#8217;s biggest economy.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>He will be sentenced at a later date. Verdicts on another 21<br \/>\nare expected over the next few weeks.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Under du Toit&#8217;s plan, concocted around barbecues and in<br \/>\nfast-food outlets, the Boeremag would force South Africa&#8217;s black<br \/>\nmajority &#8211; roughly 40 million people &#8211; over the border into<br \/>\nZimbabwe with food parcels, while its 1.2 million Indians would<br \/>\nbe put on boats back to the subcontinent.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Witnesses testified that the group also planned to<br \/>\nassassinate Mandela, who became South Africa&#8217;s first black<br \/>\npresident in 1994 and acted as a unifying force after decades of<br \/>\nwhite-minority rule.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>The Boeremag also intended to shoot whites who opposed their<br \/>\nvision of a racially pure nation.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Despite racial tensions in Mandela&#8217;s &#8220;Rainbow Nation&#8221;,<br \/>\nradical white groups such as the Boeremag have very little<br \/>\nsupport among South Africa&#8217;s five million-strong white<br \/>\npopulation.<\/p>\n<p> (Reporting by Peroshni Govender; Editing by Ed Cropley and<br \/>\nAndrew Roche)<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"copyright\">\n<p>         \t\t\u00a9 Thomson Reuters 2012 All rights reserved<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>* Plots hatched around barbecue * Fringe group wanted to kill Mandela and drive out blacks * Verdicts awaited on 21 others JOHANNESBURG, July 26 (Reuters) &#8211; The mastermind of a white supremacist plot to assassinate Nelson Mandela and drive blacks out of South Africa was found guilty of high treason on Thursday after a [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[830,2370,183],"class_list":{"0":"post-12811","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-south-africa","7":"tag-news","8":"tag-reuters","9":"tag-south-africa-2","10":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12811","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12811"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12811\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12811"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12811"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12811"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}