White supremacist released on parole

(11 Jun 2004)
1. Various exteriors of the Potchefstroom Correctional Community Centre
2. Various of people waiting outside
3. Various of far-right wing supremacist leader Eugene Terre'Blanche leaving the building and being welcomed by supporters
4. Various of Terre'Blanche getting on horse and riding away
5. Supporters waving flags of Afrikaner Resistance Movement
6. Exterior of hotel where news conference was held
7. Terre'Blanche at podium
8. SOUNDBITE (English) Eugene Terre'Blanche, South Africa Supremacist Leader:
"I believe I am deeply changed in the knowledge that I am only man, and my creator, Jesus Christ, the father, the son and the holy spirit, from now on will give me the right commands to live my life as an honourable citizen who also knows his duty to his people, his Boer folk (farmers), his community."
9. Terre'Blanche's wife Martie and daughter Bea
10. SOUNDBITE (English) Eugene Terre'Blanche, South Africa Supremacist Leader:
"I have to work as hard as ever, I am going back in my dreams, with the help of God that I can to buy back my farm and I believe in my land and I believe in my ground. And I believe that my farm will be good to me and that it will put me in the position that when I die it will still be lands of the Terre'Blanche's."
11. People listening
12. Wide shot-pan of Terre'Blanche addressing the crowd outside

STORYLINE:

Eugene Terre'Blanche, the white extremist who tried to sabotage South Africa's first all-race election a decade ago with a bombing campaign, was paroled on Friday after serving three years of a five-year prison sentence.

Terre'Blanche was imprisoned for attempted murder and assault in the savage 1996 beating of one of his black workers for eating on the job. The man was permanently disabled.

While in prison, Terre'Blanche pleaded guilty last year to charges he led a bombing campaign that tried to sabotage the 1994 election that brought Nelson Mandela to power as the country's first black president. He was given a six-year suspended sentence.

About 400 supporters, including one waving the old apartheid-era South Africa flag, gathered outside the Correction Services office and cheered Terre'Blanche when he was released for good behaviour in Potchesfstroom, 120 kilometres (75 miles) west of Johannesburg.

While the crowd cheered, Terre'Blanche mounted his horse Atilla and rode to a nearby hotel to hold a news conference.

The former leader of the neo-Nazi Afrikaner Resistance Movement once struck a fearsome pose on horseback as he led his uniformed men through the streets. But he was also ridiculed once when he fell off his horse during a parade in Pretoria.

His group has said in the past that it seeks an autonomous state for the white descendants of Dutch settlers who ruled South Africa during the apartheid era.

But Terre'Blanche insisted on Friday he would not return to politics and instead would resume farming.

Terre'Blanche said he would attempt to get his family farm back - it was repossessed after his conviction.

Smuts Ngonyama, a spokesperson for the ruling African National Congress, dismissed the threat posed by Terre'Blanche and his followers, who make up a tiny percentage of South Africa's 45 million people.

Terre'Blanche, who had been described by prison officials as a model inmate, said he believed his imprisonment helped strengthen his Christian faith.

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