Hannetjie van Zyl: just ordinary crime?

ByRiaan Roux

Hannetjie van Zyl, 55, was attacked while opening her farm gate on the Doornpan road outside Ottosdal in the North West on the evening of Monday 5 October 2026, and died of her injuries. It was the second attack on the same farm. After the first one, in July 2020, 3 suspects were released on a warning, and the police docket said nobody was assaulted and it was not a farm attack. FF Plus leader Dr Corné Mulder has asked President Cyril Ramaphosa to acknowledge and condemn farm murders. The police have arrested nobody.

Explain it to her family

The media, some political leaders and even whole parties want to frame farm attacks and farm murders as ordinary crime. I want those people to visit Hannetjie van Zyl’s family and explain to them, in person, that this is “just ordinary crime”.

This was brutal and cruel, and no-one deserves it.

The farm gate

On Monday 5 October 2026, Hannetjie van Zyl stopped at the gate of the farm on the Doornpan road outside Ottosdal. Ian Cameron, who chairs Parliament’s police committee, told Nuusflits she was attacked shortly after 19:00, after she stopped to open that gate. The sun had set at 18:15, so it was already dark.

Police spokesperson Kelebogile Morake told Maroela Media the police received a complaint of a possible farm attack that evening and went to the farm. By then her husband, Sarel van Zyl, had taken her to a hospital in Klerksdorp. She died of her injuries.

How she was attacked has not been confirmed, because it is described in 2 different ways. Morake said it is alleged that she was stabbed with an unknown object while she was opening the gate. Dr Corné Mulder, the leader of the Freedom Front Plus, said in his statement that she was struck over the head with great force, and Cameron said his information is also that she was hit over the head.

The police say they are still investigating what happened at that gate. They have arrested nobody.

The first attack, in her own words

This was the second time. On 24 July 2020, 3 men arrived on the same farm at about 09:00. Sarel van Zyl was sick and asleep in bed. Hannetjie told Maroela Media that same day: “The men tied up our gardener at the water tank and pointed a firearm at him. They then went into the house.”

One of the men dropped something and Sarel woke up. Hannetjie said: “When he opened his eyes, the men were standing at the bedroom door.” He grabbed his firearm from the bedside table and they ran. He went after them and fired shots into the air.

Before 12:00 that same day, farmers, members of the community and the police had caught 3 suspects. Hannetjie said: “My husband is very traumatised after what happened.” Her words are translated from Afrikaans.

That was Hannetjie van Zyl in July 2020, talking about the farm where she was attacked again on 5 October 2026.

“Nobody was assaulted”

The 3 suspects were 19, 23 and 27 years old. On 4 August 2020, less than 2 weeks after they were arrested, they appeared in court for bail. Henry Mamothame, the spokesperson for the National Prosecuting Authority in the North West, told Maroela Media the investigating officer did not oppose bail. He said the state asked for bail to be set, and the court released all 3 on a warning. They paid nothing.

Mamothame said that according to the police docket, “nobody was assaulted and it was not a farm attack”. The case was postponed for an identity parade.

The same reports have a gardener tied up with a firearm pointed at him, and 3 strangers at a sick man’s bedroom door. The official file had no assault and no farm attack.

That is what “ordinary crime” looks like once it is written into a file. It decides how hard the state works on a case, and on this farm it meant 3 suspects walked out on a warning.

Sarel told Maroela Media back then that he was still trying to get over the trauma of that morning. He said: “It is a shock to your body.” Farmers and members of the community went to the Lichtenburg police to ask why the men had been let go.

What is still unknown

There is nothing on record that connects those 3 men to the murder on 5 October 2026, and the police have arrested nobody.

I also could not find out how the 2020 case ended. The last report I found said it was postponed for an identity parade. The NPA in the North West can answer that with one sentence, and the Van Zyl family is owed that sentence.

What Mulder asked the President

On 6 October 2026, Mulder asked President Cyril Ramaphosa (1) to acknowledge and condemn farm murders, (2) to express his sympathy to Hannetjie van Zyl’s family, and (3) to personally speak out against the chant “Kill the Boer, Kill the Farmer”.

Mulder said people who tell the rest of the world about farm murders are being labelled unpatriotic or far-right. He said that in his party’s view, denying the problem keeps the violence going. He said the government fails in its first duty, which is to protect everyone in South Africa, for as long as it refuses to declare farm attacks a priority crime.

The same urgency

Mulder then pointed to the East Rand. He said that when a number of women were killed there recently, Ramaphosa condemned it and demanded that it be prioritised. That happened. On 15 September 2026, Ramaphosa said he had directed that the Kempton Park cases be prioritised.

Mulder said that is how any serious crime problem should be handled, and he asked why the killing of farmers does “not deserve the same urgency and official condemnation”.

The usual answer is that South Africa has murders every day and a family in a township grieves the same way, so a farm should get no special label. The President did not say that to the families in Kempton Park, and he was right not to. He saw women being killed in one area and treated it as a problem of its own, and no other victim counted for less because of it.

People on farms are asking for the same treatment. They live far from the nearest police station and the nearest hospital, and they are attacked at home or at the gate.

The chant and the offer

The United States Ambassador, Brent Bozell, told Fox News that the US asked Ramaphosa to condemn the chant. Newsday reported Bozell as saying Ramaphosa refused and pointed to the court ruling on it. Bozell asked: “How hard is it to say that people should stop chanting to kill farmers?”

A court decides whether words are legal. How those words sound to a family that has now been attacked twice on the same farm is a different question, and the President does not need a judge to answer it.

Bozell also said the US offered to help with technology for rural safety and to pay for the programme, and that the ANC-led government was not interested. That is Bozell’s account.

Dr James Myburgh, quoted by Newsday, said the ANC government did not build up the state institutions needed to fight this kind of violence. He said it dismantled specialised police units such as the murder and robbery units, and it abolished the rural commando system. Nothing as effective was ever put in the place of the commandos.

Who is doing the protecting

Mulder said AfriForum counted 184 farm attacks and 29 farm murders in 2025. He said those numbers would have been much higher if farmers and rural communities had not organised their own security, which is the government’s job.

Niels Nilsson, an independent rural safety researcher, told Maroela Media his records show 22 farm attacks in the North West so far in 2026, and 25 farm murders across the country.

Hannetjie van Zyl said in July 2020: “Some of the people drove very far to help and support us.” That year, the farmers and the community helped catch 3 suspects in less than 3 hours. The state took less than 2 weeks to let them go without bail.

The question for the President

Anyone who still wants to say “ordinary crime” should say it in Ottosdal, to Sarel van Zyl, who took his wife to hospital on 5 October 2026.

President Ramaphosa, on 15 September 2026 you made the Kempton Park killings a priority. What is different about Hannetjie van Zyl?

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