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A review by amarj33t_5ingh
A Just Defiance: Bombmakers, Insurgents, and the Treason Trial of the Delmas Four by Peter Harris
5.0
Some books are so visceral that they ingrain themselves in your very dreams for all time to come. A Just Defiance is one of those books. What makes it all the more lucid, all the more riveting is the fact that it is based on a real event.
The author Peter Harris, a lawyer by nature, undertakes to defend four anti-apartheid resistance fighters in segregation era South Africa in the process inviting the wrath of the entire political machinery against him. Harris is white, his fellow advocates are white and black while the fighters are black. A more combustible mix has never before or since graced South Africa's judiciary.
Against society's better judgement, Harris undertakes to represent the four fighters epitheted as the Delmas four. In the process it is revealed that they are the ANC's (African National Congress's) most effective saboteurs. However, the most brutal revelation is reserved for policeman turned defector Dirk Coetzee who justifies the existence of government sanctioned death squads operating with impunity.
The most conspicuous aspect of this book is the fact that Harris avoids all legal jargon as well as immersion in technicalities to convey his points. Ultimately, the case progresses from being one of waging war against the state to questioning what consists a just war in terms of combating political resistance.
For me, the most poignant moment is at the end when Harris admits that he misses his fellow lawyer who died in an assassination attempt initially targeting him.
The author Peter Harris, a lawyer by nature, undertakes to defend four anti-apartheid resistance fighters in segregation era South Africa in the process inviting the wrath of the entire political machinery against him. Harris is white, his fellow advocates are white and black while the fighters are black. A more combustible mix has never before or since graced South Africa's judiciary.
Against society's better judgement, Harris undertakes to represent the four fighters epitheted as the Delmas four. In the process it is revealed that they are the ANC's (African National Congress's) most effective saboteurs. However, the most brutal revelation is reserved for policeman turned defector Dirk Coetzee who justifies the existence of government sanctioned death squads operating with impunity.
The most conspicuous aspect of this book is the fact that Harris avoids all legal jargon as well as immersion in technicalities to convey his points. Ultimately, the case progresses from being one of waging war against the state to questioning what consists a just war in terms of combating political resistance.
For me, the most poignant moment is at the end when Harris admits that he misses his fellow lawyer who died in an assassination attempt initially targeting him.