Forgiveness, to me, is sometimes hard to give.  I will often hold a grudge over the smallest things people do.  However, I have not always had good experiences in doing this.  One person in particular taught me that I don’t benefit in any way from holding grudges; it only makes it harder on the person trying to apologize to me.  After this conversation, I was so much better at accepting apologies and realizing that when something didn’t go my way, it wasn’t the end of the world.

In Pumla Gobodo-Madikizela’s book A Human Being Died That Night, she raises five moral questions.  In the first two chapters of this book, she recalls on when she interviewed Eugene de Kock.  De Kock was a police colonel during the apartheid era in South Africa and considered one of the darkest figures of this time, nicknamed “Prime Evil”.  During her interview with him, he tells a story about how a bomb was planted in a police car with three police men and one other man.  The bomb was set to go off with a remote and the men in the car unknowingly set it off.  De Kock then appeared before the TRC (Truth and Reconciliation Commission) and stated that he wanted to meet with the widows of themen he had killed.  This meeting was accepted with both parties inviting their lawyers.  During this meeting, one of the widows, Mrs. Faku, was extremely touched by him.  Both of the widows felt that he had communicated something he felt deeply about and that he had acknowledged their pain.  Mrs. Faku was overcome with emotion as she listened to his appeal and she forgave him.  She believed that there was still a future for de Kock and that there was still time for him to change.

 Was de Kock deserving of the forgiveness shown to him?  There is no right or wrong anwer to this; only opinions.  In my opinion, I believe that he was deserving.  From what I have read so far and from my previous knowledge of apartheid (which is not a lot), de Kock seems like a genuine person.  If he had the dignity to ask for a meeting with women who’s wives he had killed and apologize personally to them, what reason would they have to not forgive him.  No one can change what happened to the men.  I believe that forgiveness plays a large role in people’s abilities to move forward.  It is hard to moveforward with an event like this if forgiveness can absolutely not be given because the event will constantly be on one’s mind.

 Was evil intrinsic to de Kock, and forgiveness therefore wasted on him?  There is no right or wrong answer to this question either because it is impossible for anyone to prove.  I don’t think evil was intrinsic to de Kock because of the way he did his job.  He refused to kill women and children and, to me, this shows that he knew deep down within him that what he was doing was wrong.  Also, I don’t think de Kock wanted to do the things he did, he just felt like he had to.  I’m not justifying any of his actions but simply stating that everyone is worthy of forgiveness.

Forgiveness, in my opinion, is never wasted.  If someone feels the need or want to forgive someone, they have all the freedom in the world to do so. 

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