Human Rights Violation Hearings — East London — 1997-06-13

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Basopu.  We welcome you Sir.  Thank you for your patience.  We know you are busy.  Will you please take the oath?

MIKE BASOPU: (Duly sworn in, states).

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you.  I will hand you over now to Mrs Crichton who is going to direct a few questions to you or do you have a prepared statement?  Mr Basopu, do you have a prepared statement?

MIKE BASOPU: No.

CHAIRPERSON: So we will just direct questions to you.

MIKE BASOPU: Yes, I have got points.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you.  Mrs Crichton will do that.

JUNE CRICHTON: Thank you Mr Chairperson.  Mr Basopu, good morning to you.  I see that the focus of your statement here before us today deals with an incident in June in 1986 when you were in Fort Glamagin Prison.  Are you hearing me?

MIKE BASOPU: Yes.

JUNE CRICHTON: Apparently and according to the statement you were arrested under the State of Emergency.  Is that correct?  And while you were in Fort Glamagin there was an incident that happened that you want to tell us about in terms of medical treatment.  Would you tell us what happened please.

MIKE BASOPU: Thank you Chairperson.  First of all, I would like to greet the Commissioners and I would like to salute the Truth and Reconciliation Commission by giving me this opportunity.  Secondly, what I would like to say to the Commission is that as the freedom fighters we were struggling.  We knew the consequences.  What I am trying to say is that when we were fighting against the Whites, when we were fighting against the Boers we knew that we were going to be harassed.  Thirdly, it is clear that in that process the Boers harassed us and they tortured us.  That is why we have to come before the Commission to explain what happened to us.
 I am not going to tell what happened at the time before we were taken to prison, because I am sure that when the Commission was in Duncan Village to hear about the Duncan Village massacre those details were explained, but I am going to talk about what happened to me and the treatment I received in prison.  There are a lot of people who were treated this way, but some of us think that because we were engaged in the struggle we were supposed to be treated the way we did.  
 On the 12th of June 1986 when we were arrested in Duncan Village, normally people would be arrested by the security officers, but what was happening was that the police were together with the soldiers.  They would take you out of the house, arrest you and hand over to the soldiers.  It was difficult to try and fight against the soldiers.  Because we were arrested under the State of Emergency of 1986 it was difficult for the security officers to keep us in the police cells.  They took us to prison to Fort Glamagin Prison.  The leadership of the organisation was kept in the police stations.  They were not taken to prison.  We would eat porridge and black tea every day.  We said that we do not see a reason for them to give us this food, because we did not kill anyone.  We were pressuring them to give us proper food.  For that reason they then took us to prison.  
 In prison what was important to us was that we have to continue with our struggle.  We saw this as the opportunity to teach our own people about our struggle.  When we were in prison we were teaching others about the struggle and what was to be done.  There was an integration in terms of this regulation.  We would find that a prison warder, prison warders would treat us badly although they were just supposed to look after the prisoners.  They knew our names in prison.  They were not policemen.  They had nothing to do with us.  They were not supposed to know our names.  I am giving this picture that these prison warders were trying to treat us badly so that if we were released from prison we would not be able to continue with our struggle.  
 We went to a hunger strike.  We were engaged in a hunger strike.  Some of us were not strong enough and they became ill.  That is when I was also affected.  I suffered from stomach aches.  It would be difficult for me to eat again, I would vomit.  I had pimples all over my body.  In prison there would be doctors who would come and visit us.  In our situation there were three doctors who were treating us.  The doctor said that he is not aware of what was wrong with me, he does not know what was wrong with me.  In such situations they would take us to the Frere Hospital.  Most of the times it was difficult for us to interact with these doctors in a normal way, because in our understanding a doctor has to ask you questions and your background.  In our situation that was not our case.  As a result it was difficult for me to know what was wrong with me.
 This doctor prescribed a chemical in a small bottle.  It was written phordophylin and I am sure that I have mentioned this in my statement.  The instructions which were given were that this chemical was very dangerous.  If the medical officer was to apply this chemical, he would not use his bare hands, because the chemical was very dangerous.  The person who was going to apply this chemical was in prison.  He was a prison warder.  He was a medical officer in prison.  The instructions were given to the police of how to apply this chemical.

JUNE CRICHTON: Sorry Mr Basopu, I just want to ask you a question at this stage.  This medication was prescribed at Frere Hospital.  Was this prison warder present when the doctor advised you how it should be applied?  Was he actually present with you at that time?

MIKE BASOPU: When you would be taken to hospital the prison warders would be left in prison.  Security forces would take us to hospital.  When this chemical was prescribed the prison warder was not there.  It was only the security officer who was present, but he was not going to be the one to give me this chemical in prison.  I do not know how this security officer related to this prison warder.  In our situation, however, this man would not be able to apply the medication.  I threw the small window onto me.  We would have to go to a room that if it was not in prison would be referred to as a consulting room.  He would take me to an office where he kept medication.  This man would not use a cotton bud to apply the medicine.  He would take a cloth, put the chemical on and therefore it would spread.  He applied it in such a way that it would not only be applied onto my genitals and referred to as the genital ward.  When you open this chemical, when you open the bottle there would be gas coming out as it had, it contained hydrochloric acid.  I am just trying to show you how dangerous and explain to you how dangerous the chemical was.

JUNE CRICHTON: Mr Basopu, I just want to tell you that I know about phordophylin and I know what a dangerous chemical it is and that is why I am going to be asking you some questions about it.  When you had this applied by this prison warder who had not instructions, correct instructions from the army officer that accompanied you to the hospital did you ask to see the doctor who visited the hospital to say that you were concerned?