Special Hearings — Mandela United Football Club Hearings — 1997-11-24

MR JOSEPH: I and going to abide by your ruling, I will not try and go any further and I have - my colleagues over here will take the matter further.

CHAIRPERSON: All right, thank you.  Any others over there?

MR KUNY: Just to inform the panel who I am Advocate Kuny, I'm representing Miss Xoliswa Falati.
 If I can just put the questions I want to ask you into some sort of context, I'm sure that many of the facts as have come out over the years will be known to you but on the 2nd of October this year, Mrs Mandela issued a press statement in which she very sharply criticises Miss Falati and in effect blames her for the kidnapping and subsequent death of Stompie. 
 Now, if I may just start by asking - the submission was made to you that the football club had already been disbanded by the time that you had come into the picture and had attempted to mediate in the crisis and my first question is: "Did Mrs Mandela give any of you the impression that the football club had been disbanded"?

CRISIS COMMITTEE: No, it wasn't given to us.    And I worked - as I said for me it wasn't whether those young people were playing soccer, it was the group of young people who were called by that name.

MR KUNY: If I understand your memoranda that you've submitted correctly - in fact of your - it was one of your important concerns that the football club in fact should be disbanded.

CRISIS COMMITTEE: That's true, that's what we said.

MR KUNY: The next question I have is for Mr Mokoena and it arises out of this question - this issue that you raised about notes and so-called diaries that have been presented before the Commission, it particular by Bishop Storey and you indicated that you had some problem with the fact that notes were being presented and you had some difficulty with this that it was not - in your words so to speak, direct evidence.  Could you just explain what was your objection?

MR MOKOENA: My objection is evidential, anybody can sit in an office and try and recollect, take a diary - a few diaries that are in my office there, and I can try - if I'm faced with a situation, to try and recollect, nothing prevents me from ...[indistinct] that diary and I'm not casting aspersions.
 Therefore if I present you with a diary which is untested, one cannot rely on that as ...[inaudible] it could just be hearsay, that was my problem.  I didn't have a problem with the notes per say but I have a problem with a point where the notes in the diary are elevated and given the status of credence.

MR KUNY: Can we just examine this for a moment?  Did you keep notes of the events as they were unfolding, at the time they were unfolding?

MR MOKOENA: No.   I was just making an example that I could be having diaries in my office and if I'm preparing a submission, I could go there and try and refresh my memory but I must say in all honesty that these are just my own notes that I jotted.  Those notes ...[indistinct] be elevated to the status of evidence because they're untested, they're just my recollections that I jotted down.
 The pages open let's say, on the 12th of 1977 or '78 and one will have to undergo forensic tests to test the ink to test the ink, how recent, what is the age of that thing, was that done yesterday or was it genuinely done on that day.  That is the complexity I'm trying to show.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you, I think actually most of the questions that you answer could be answered very briefly, could you try to do that?

MR MOKOENA: As my background as a teacher, thanks.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you.

MR MOKOENA: I always assumed that people don't understand.

MR KUNY: Mr Mokoena, if I may just ask you then, if Bishop Storey tells the Commission that at the time the events were unfolding he made notes of these events, do you have any reason to doubt the accuracy of his notes?

MR SEMENYA: Chairperson, can I with respect say in fairness to the witnesses, it must be pointed to them that one occasion Bishop Storey said there are two incidents under one date and they could not have happened on the same date, so we cannot project those dates to be contemporaneous and as fact necessarily - this information is useful for the witnesses to know.

MR MOKOENA: Not only that, I would say human beings are not infallible and with due respect our ...[intervention]

CHAIRPERSON: ...[inaudible] the chance to speak.  You keep bouncing in and I think you're making the proceedings rather unseemly, thank you very much.  Yes?

CRISIS COMMITTEE: Mr Chairman, I really just wanted to say that firstly an impression should not created that we are questioning Bishop Storey's bona fides as far as this diary is concerned.  When trying to recollect what happened, he had a diary that he could rely upon.  We were not relying on his diary because it was not collectively kept by us and him, therefore it might well be that as he was noting events, noting discussions with certain people, he used certain words which we feel may not reflect necessarily what we discussed with him.
 At no stage for instance, did he come to us and say: "I have recorded here that you said you have no mandate, do you confirm this as a true reflection of our discussion or not"?  I'm just giving you that as an example.  So, the point I'm making therefore is that to the best of his ability he reconstructed the events relying on his diary.  We should not for God's sake, be obliged to agree word for word with everything that he has recorded in his personal diary, I think that will be wrong.

MR KUNY: I want to refer you Mr Mokoena, specifically to an entry which Bishop Storey made on page 2 of his notes.  He states that Aubrey Mokoena goes to Mrs Mandela enquiring about the abduction and is told that the young people were not at her home.

MR MOKOENA: What about it?

MR KUNY: Do you have any reason to doubt the accuracy of that note?

MR MOKOENA: I've already said earlier on - unless perhaps if I didn't communicate or if perhaps you didn't hear me through the Chairperson, I refuted this, I denied this, I have no knowledge of this.  In fact I said so pro-actively, I didn't have to wait for this direct question.

MR KUNY: Are you saying that he completely misconstrued the fact that you went to Mrs Mandela's house on the 4th of January?

MR MOKOENA: You see the point is, I do not want to very categorical about dates but what I'm certain about are the facts contained here.  It could have been the 19th, it could have been the 25th but I deny the allegation that is contained here, that I went to Mrs Mandela's house and enquired about the abduction.  I explained that we were operating as a collective and a matter of this nature, I wouldn't have taken it upon myself to go there and leave everybody else behind.
 I would have gone there in a another capacity as a person who was assisting in the refurbishment and reconstruction of the house.  ...[inaudible] the people were working there, the paint was there, the material, etc., etc., that is explainable.  If this sentence read there that I went there and had a discussion about security and construction, I would never deny it.

MR KUNY: Mr Mokoena, let's not quibble about one or two days here or there, did you go to Mrs Mandela's house prior to the meeting which you have recorded ...[intervention]

YASMINE SOOKA: Sorry Mr Kuny, I think that you've put the question, the question has been answered and I'm going to ask you to actually move on.

MR KUNY: When did you first obtain information about the kidnapping of the young men from the Methodist Centre?

MR MOKOENA: ...[inaudible] complete?

MR KUNY: Yes.

MR MOKOENA: I thought it was comma.   We went there as a team - in our submission, to go and find out what was happening.