Human Rights Violation Hearings — Pretoria — 1996-08-12

CHAIRPERSON: Would Mrs Landman then please come forward.  Excuse me mam, no, there is still another witness before you on the list.  I missed it.  It is Mr Shandu.  My apologies to the both of you.  Please stand and take the oath.

ELIAS ZWELAKHE SHANDU: (Duly sworn in, states).

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very much.  You may sit down and I think Dr Ally will be available to assist you when you are giving us your testimony.

ELIAS ZWELAKHE SHANDU: I apologise before I say anything, I was born in 1908.  I cannot understand Sotho properly.  I am going to use Zulu that is Unguli language.

CHAIRPERSON: It will be on channel four.  Those who would like to follow the testimony of Mr Shandu there will be translation on channel four from Zulu.  You can flip that through your headphones and see which language you would like to follow.

RUSSELL ALLY: Good day to you Mr Shandu.  Can you hear me?  Good day to you.  You can hear me?  Are you able to follow the translation?

ELIAS ZWELAKHE SHANDU: Yes.

RUSSELL ALLY: Thank you.  Good day to you and welcome and thanks for coming.  You are coming to speak about your son, Walter, who died in detention in 1978.  I am going to ask you now please just to give an account of what you have in your
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statement.  Thank you.

ELIAS ZWELAKHE SHANDU: My son disappeared in 1978.  From 1978 I did not see him.  I do not know where he disappeared to.  I was looking for him day and night.  After that police came to my house looking for him, where he is.  They use to come during the day and the night.  After some times they came, there were white policemen and black policemen.  I think the black policemen were two, Radebe and Sewn.  They said to me if you do not tell us the truth we are going to kill you and I said to them you can shoot me, I do not know where he is.  The following day in the morning Radebe came again and said we heard where your son is.  Your son is in Botswana.  We know that he left to Angola or Tanzania and I said I do not know where he is.  They asked me if I want him if and I said if you could bring him that.
 After that I received a telephone from Mabopane Police Station.  They said you said you wanted to know where your son is.  I went with one of my friends who is called Manley and they took me to the police station.  They told me that he is dead and he killed himself, he committed suicide.  They said he committed suicide.  I went to fetch him in Zeerust, in the mortuary in Zeerust.  They said I should wait for the police to come where those police were keeping him in the police station.  There is a police station which is between the border gate and Zeerust and then the police arrived in the mortuary.  Then they identified him in the mortuary shelves.  He was having some marks on his neck and even on his shoulders to show that, to indicate that he was assaulted when you hold him.  I asked them what is happening, what happened?  They said he committed suicide with his own shirt.  I said to them, but it looks like a 
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wire and then I asked them if they could take me to the place where he committed suicide.  Then they said the police who were there are not here, they are off duty.  I continued asking them and they said do not ask us many questions because we know nothing.  
 Then we took him from the mortuary.  We buried him.  These police were there at his funeral.  They wanted to hear what we were going to say and then we buried him.  After having buried him police use to come and harass me.  They asked med was your son a member of the ANC.  I said I do not know and they asked me, what about you, are you a member of the ANC?  I said I was a member of the ANC before it was banned, but now I am a church goer.  They asked me where are some of your children.  Then I said to them I do not know where my other daughter is.  Then the police said they do not know where she is.  That was the last time I gave the statement.

RUSSELL ALLY: Thank you very much.  Mr Shandu, I am just going to ask you a few questions if you do not mind.  Walter, before he left, what was his political involvement?  Do you know?

ELIAS ZWELAKHE SHANDU: You would not know about young people back from the independence days.  He said that is not independence day.  I saw the South African flag and the flag of Bophuthatswana because independence, when there is freedom, you will see all the flags of many countries.  So that is not independence.

RUSSELL ALLY: And before he left, did the police ever harass him before he decided to leave?

ELIAS ZWELAKHE SHANDU: They use to come, but they could not find him.  Many police use to come to the house and I asked him when he PRETORIA HEARING TRC/GAUTENG
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came back and what did they do.  When he comes I will tell him to go to the police station, Mabopane Police Station.

RUSSELL ALLY: Thanks.  In 1978, that is when you think he left the country and you actually say that you were phoned by somebody in Botswana who actually told you that your son was in one of the camps.  Is that correct?

ELIAS ZWELAKHE SHANDU: Yes.  I received a telephone from police.  They said he is in Botswana.  He is coming back from Angola, he was coming back from Angola.

RUSSELL ALLY: But you said you also received a message from somebody who was a Recruiting Officer of the ANC.  Is that correct?  Somebody in Botswana, Mr Makgothe, who called to say that your son was in an ANC camp, Makgothe

ELIAS ZWELAKHE SHANDU: Yes, yes that is true.

RUSSELL ALLY: And did you ever hear what, that after your son had actually left that he came back into the country.  Is that when you think that he was actually arrested?  Do you know about his, have you ever been told anything by the ANC about what happened to your son after he entered a camp in Botswana?

ELIAS ZWELAKHE SHANDU: They never told me.  They told me that he was in Botswana, the time he was in Botswana.

RUSSELL ALLY: So the next that you heard was actually from the police then to say that you had to come and identify your son?

ELIAS ZWELAKHE SHANDU: Could you please repeat the question again.  I cannot hear properly.

RUSSELL ALLY: I am asking after you went to, you actually did go to Botswana to try and see your son, but you say you did not see your son.  That is correct.

ELIAS ZWELAKHE SHANDU: I never saw my son in Botswana.  I went to
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Botswana.  Even on my return from Botswana I feared crossing borders at that time because they use to harass me.  I would stand for two hours at the border asking, they asking me where I was going.  I would just tell them that I am going on holiday.

RUSSELL ALLY: Now you say the police told you that your son committed suicide.  Did they ever show you any medical records?

ELIAS ZWELAKHE SHANDU: They told me that they will fetch him, but he committed suicide, but there was no mark that showed that he committed suicide.  Marks that were despicable were only those inflicted by physical force that they applied on him.

RUSSELL ALLY: And do you know if an autopsy was done to establish the cause of death?

ELIAS ZWELAKHE SHANDU: I found that he has already been operated upon.

RUSSELL ALLY: And were you ever given any papers, any medical papers, records to say how your son had died?

ELIAS ZWELAKHE SHANDU: They gave nothing.  Not even a single document to show that.  They actually ignored me.

RUSSELL ALLY: And did you have any legal representation, any lawyer advising you during this time?

ELIAS ZWELAKHE SHANDU: I did have a lawyer.  They said if I wanted to get a lawyer, I must pay R20 000,00.  I did not have money that time.

RUSSELL ALLY: And who, did you actually bury your son?  Did the family bury your son after this?  Were you given the body back to bury your son?

ELIAS ZWELAKHE SHANDU: I cannot hear properly.