Special Report Transcript Episode 83, Section 4, Time 35:56

I was born in the Eastern Cape in Uitenhage but I had spent wonderful early schooling years in a village where my mother was eventually the school principle of a church school and I had actually schooled there up to Standard four when I returned to Uitenhage, finished off eventually my high schooling in Uitenhage. Was then accepted into the medical school at the University of Natal in those days. Unfortunately I could not take up that immediately because of financial constraints and so on. In fact my father had died at a fairly early age, I think I was in Standard seven when he died. So my mother really raised the family as a single parent. So given that situation I decided to work for a year and I worked in Uitenhage for a year, which was quite a sobering experience for me and during that time I obviously had much more exposure to the real world out there. We’ve grown up in a rather protected environment. And it dawned on me that there is something which is more close to my heart really after I had sort of searched myself than medicine. And that is when I decided to study law. I was just finishing my university degree when I got married and as I say we settled in Cape Town. I in fact, I did my practical training in Cape Town as an attorney initially. I practiced as an attorney before I went to the bar as an advocate. So, because of the opportunities in Cape Town, there were virtually no opportunities in the Eastern Cape for me in those years – that was in 1979 when I qualified – there were no opportunities to do practical training as a lawyer for a black person in those years.

Notes: Denzil Potgieter

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