We all need to find a reason to believe.

Ellis Park, Johannesburg, 2008. Photo: Brenda Gomez.

On the 27^th of August 2026, ex-General Ratko Mladić died in prison. The ‘Butcher of Bosnia’, the condemned perpetrator of the Srebrenica slaughter of eight thousand Muslims, boys and men, was no longer. His acts were his worldview, his perception of reality. Many mourners at his funeral still share Mladić’s perception of reality. A horrifying true reality for those that suffered.

This week the Guardian published an article about the Sharpeville Massacre near Johannesburg, one of the more horribly emblematic moments of apartheid South Africa. 91 were killed, and 238 injured. The precise figures are contested, but it was without doubt a peaceful protest; until it wasn’t. Apartheid was a cruel view of the world, graphically distinguished by its horrible simplification into black and white. As a believer that the world is full of greys, it is hard to understand. Again, perceptions of reality.

By pure chance, we sat down to watch Invictus the night before. Bren had seen it various times, and I had never seen it for some reason. Having numbed her mind with Inglorious Basterds, the well-known Tarantino romantic comedy, it was her turn. Inevitably. I loved the film, and it brought back so many memories. 

From 1986 to 1990 I would visit South Africa and Bophuthatswana on various occasions. My first visit in June 1986 was by far the most memorable. I was travelling with Kevin Anderson, a veteran of many of my stories, and this was one of our more exotic tours, starting in Madagascar, passing through Mauritius, South Africa, Kenya, and Zaire, now the Democratic Republic of Congo. For a taste of the Zaire leg, feel free to browse the Quintessential Quality of Mules. 

After an equally successful and enjoyable sojourn through Antananarivo and Port Louis we arrived in Johannesburg not knowing what to expect. In the UK, the television news was full of stories of a disintegrating society as events slowly moved towards their endgame. The violence was horrendous and graphic, white on black, black on black, black on white. Necklacing was all the fashion, the art of forcing a car tyre around the victim’s neck, dousing it in petrol, and setting it alight. 

The scenes were so bad that my mother felt compelled to call our company Chairman to see if we were still alive – African telephone systems in the 1970s and 80s were at best dysfunctional, and the fact that we were obliviously having a great time probably compounded our communication breakdown. 

The fact that we had no idea who we were going to meet added to the intrigue. Normally we would meet with National and State Lottery authorities, occasionally through intermediaries who were invariably linked to Shell. The influence Shell wielded in those days was a wonder to behold, and a source of extra income for its higher placed executives.  

Paradoxically in South Africa in those times there were no official lottery authorities, and we were due to meet with a group called JALC, an eclectic mix of nationalities whose forenames began with, you’ve guessed it, J, A, L and C. They assigned us a colleague of theirs, a Liverpudlian called Terry Eastham, who would pick us up every day and generally look after us. 

Terry was an essentially pleasant bloke, with two downsides. The most immediately noticeable one was that he had adopted an afro-perm hairstyle typical of Liverpool midfielders in the 1980s. The original footballing creator of this abomination was Kevin Keegan, and it was later studiously harnessed by Terry McDermott and even more bizarrely by Graeme Souness, who to be fair could still manage to look like a serial assassin even with his curls. 

Kevin Keegan, 1977. The original footballing perm. Photo: Comet Photo AG / ETH-Bibliothek Zürich, CC BY 4.0.

The other downside was that Terry had adopted the predominately Afrikaner government’s line on apartheid – that it simply did not exist. Anything, and everything, which clearly demonstrated its prevalence was the worst kind of fake news, decades before the term was ever invented. 

The opening scene of Invictus features a white South African boys’ rugby team training on a lush green field, and on the other side of the road, a bare-footed group of black boys playing soccer in a dust bowl, behind wire fencing. The symbolism is obvious, a society running on parallel lines – never the twain shall meet. 

Or maybe it isn’t so obvious. One morning Terry picked us up at the Sandton Sun, secure in a selective suburb of Johannesburg, and drove us to the JALC offices downtown. It was bright and sunny, and we chatted convivially, Kevin in front, me in the back. As we drove down one side of the six-lane highway, Terry turned to me and said with unblinking sincerity, ‘You see Tim, in South Africa there is no such thing as apartheid. The whites live on one side of the road, and the blacks live on the other side’. I have no idea what was greater, my speechlessness, or Terry’s obliviousness. A society in total disconnect. Keep your eyes on the road and your hands upon the wheel, Terry. 

If beauty is in the eye of the beholder, then absolute truth is often in the eye of the perceiver. Terry’s world view was reinforced by another two vividly contrasting incidents. The Sandton Sun Hotel was one of those high-rise buildings built on top of a shopping centre. The views from the 30^th floor were spectacular – or terrifying if you’re like me and won’t climb a one-story staircase without a parachute for just in case. 

The only bar in the hotel open at midnight was of course on the top floor. Having endured the escalator ride to the clouds, Kevin and I entered the brightly lit bar, and seeing a solitary guest at the bar and a solitary waiter polishing glasses behind the bar (one was black, the other was white, you can do the math), we turned to leave. A thunderous Afrikaans accented voice nailed us to the floor: ‘You two. Come here. You drink with me’. We looked back at him, back at the door, at each other, and without speaking reached the conclusion that we’d be dead before we reached the aforementioned door and so went to the bar to be introduced to Owen, a former member of the South African army and subsequently a mercenary. 

Owen’s stories were graphic, and his treatment of the waiter was horrific; a reflection of a perversely unjust world. The waiter was a picture of resigned stoicism. Whilst Kevin and I looked for ways to retreat gracefully (alive), Owen launched into his party trick. When he finished his beer, he ate his glass, piece by piece. I really don’t know why the waiter bothered polishing them beforehand. 

The following evening was a polar opposite, or the same side of the coin, depending on your perspective. As we finished our evening, we decided on a last drink definitely not in the vicinity of Owen. We asked a young black man for directions and got talking to him. Mistakenly, we asked him if he wanted to join us. The look of fear and suspicion which appeared in his eyes was vivid, but he relaxed when he saw that both Kevin and I were totally surprised by it. He then politely declined, saying it would not be safe for any of us. 

So, despite the denials, euphemisms and justifications of P. W. Botha, de Klerk and Terry as to apartheid’s existence, it was clear to see in action every day in every way, depending on your perception of reality. A stark reminder of this was my not-too-successful attempt to broker a friendship between the then Presidents of the Luxembourg and the Burundi National Lotteries.

The Luxembourg Lottery was my first real responsibility at Opax, probably because the country was the company’s smallest customer and because the President Jean-Pierre Thill was cantankerous at the best of times, which didn’t come around very often. I was a fresh-faced lanky twenty-two-year-old and he was a battle-lined squat sixty-year-old, a match made in heaven. I was desperate to impress him, and he was resolute in his refusal to be impressed. So, on the first morning I was with him, one or two minimal papers sorted by eleven o’clock, he suggested we go to a bar. Six hours later, we left, and for the next few years, the pattern would be repeated. Of course, over that amount of time we got to know each other quite well.

In 1986 we started getting garbled telexes from a certain Tharcisse Nzigamasabo in Burundi, urgently asking for someone from our company to visit him for the printing contract with the newly formed Lottery. Central Africa being my watch, I was it. So, I combined the trip with Zaire and Cameroon, and off I went. I’ve documented elsewhere the violence of Zaire in those times, and I expected Burundi to be more of the same. Well, what do you know. When we landed, I was surprised by the lack of a threatening military presence, and even more so by the solitary immigration agent with his head on the desk, fast asleep. A few gentle shakes of the shoulder later, he languidly stamped my passport.

Outside, Tharcisse was waiting with his Toyota, and slowly a true friendship was born. We would spend days together in Burundi, England and elsewhere – I met his family, and he was my family’s welcome guest, in Leicester of all places. Of course, over that amount of time we got to know each other very well indeed.

Tharcisse, Toni, me. June 1990.

So, what did I get to know about these two very different people? Well, Jean-Pierre Thill had been a high-court judge in the Congo during the 1960s and had witnessed countless atrocities perpetrated by the locals on the colonials. He had condemned many to die. In his own words, all blacks were ‘savages’. Without exception.

Tharcisse on the other hand had seen his country suffer at the hands of those same Belgian Colonial forces and had a visceral hatred of both the Belgians and the French, or at least what their institutions represented. He particularly abhorred the way his region had seen political borders tear apart essentially tribal accommodations. A horrible irony considering the Hutu and Tutsi massacres of the 1990s.

Hence his desperate telexes – he wanted an English supplier, despite lobbying by the Belgian and French embassies. Lucky me.

Now despite M. Thill’s and Tharcisse’s different worldviews, I thought I could bring them together. So, one night I took them both to dinner. It was pleasant and civilized, at least. I doubt either of them really enjoyed it, and my naivety embarrasses me now. The road to hell is paved with good intentions.

It’s so easy to do. I saw the surface, they both respected me, in Tharcisse’s case I was truly a brother to him. Great. But that veneer, and relatively shallow depth, can never supersede centuries or decades of resentment, or better put, perceived, or true, realities.

FairNotPlay, Escobar, Buenos Aires 2026.

Fast-forward to today, and I observe with a somewhat weary eye the developing diplomatic spat between Argentine and the British. Brokering the difference in perceived realities is tiring. Today I went to see my daughter’s team play football, and after their precarious victory, she introduced me to a new team-mate, who had scored a great goal and to her infinite credit is a die-hard Jamie Vardy fan. A bit more negative was her question about my political opinion on the Malvinas, to which I answered with my much versed: ‘I will answer that question when they rescind Maradona’s ‘Hand of God’ goal.’

Smiles all round, but the incompatible perceptions of reality remain.

Ellis Park Stadium, Johannesburg, August 2008. Photo: Brenda Gomez.

Inevitably, back to Invictus. Bren will always try to have the last word. On the ninth of August 2008, she was at Ellis Park Stadium. The game was between the Springboks and the Pumas, in honour of Nelson Mandela’s ninetieth birthday. The opening photo demonstrates more eloquently than thousands of words what can be achieved. Perceptions of reality can be changed.

Maybe.