A six-month battle ensued in which Mureinik was particularly outspoken. He railed against "the present goal of putting any institution of importance under African control".Makgoba eventually gave up the post, admitting some of the claims in his CV were "open to misinterpretation". Whatever personal demons contributed to Mureinik's apparent suicide, his death has become a symbol of the growing dislocation and depression of the white liberal elite, who expected to play a full part in the new South Africa but find themselves marginalised and under fire.For this is a country where the once-cherished leaders of the white liberal classes are routinely denounced as racists, and accused of conspiring to subvert the "transformation" of higher education: even Mureinik, human rights champion, opponent of apartheid and drafter of the new Bill of Rights - a man of impeccable liberal credentials.Mureinik the liberal became Mureinik the racist at the end of last year when he and 12 colleagues - the "Wits 13" - questioned the qualifications of Professor William Makgoba when he was appointed the university's first black deputy vice-chancellor. In The violent unrest that has swept through South Africa's universities there is no shortage of ugly racism. In campus confrontations white students drape themselves in the old South African flag while the enemy - their black classmates - goad them back by chanting "one settler, one bullet" in chorus.

Rioting, looting and violence have become common on campuses from Johannesburg to Cape Town. As the black majority clamours for education long-denied, lectures have given way to sit-ins, demonstrations and the occasional invasion by police firing plastic bullets. It was against this violent upheaval that Professor Etienne Mureinik, 42, dean of the faculty of law at the prestigious Witwatersrand (Wits) University, booked into a Johannesburg hotel this month, took the lift to a room on the 23rd floor, removed his brown slip-on shoes and jumped out of the window.It was a tragic conclusion to the life of one of the country's most precocious academic talents: and it has shaken the white liberal establishment to its roots. If you have difficulty obtaining a copy, send a cheque or postal order, or a Visa/Access authorisation, to the Great British Railway Disaster, Ian Allan Ltd, Coombelands House, Coombelands Lane, Addlestone, Surrey, KT15 1HY (Tel: 01932 855909, ext 235/236.). Now the depots are all owned by different companies who will charge each other.The Independent on Sunday's 'Great British Rail Disaster' by Christian Wolmar, which includes more than 60 items from this column, has just been published by Ian Allan at pounds 5.99. South Wales and West operates only one train a day into Waterloo and therefore it has no maintenance workers or depot there.