Special Hearings — Health Sector Hearings — 1997-06-17

IVY GCINA: No she did not receive any treatment Honourable Commissioner.  As a result we could see that she was just given aspirin.

GLENDA WILDSCHUT: And the request from yourself and Mrs Lesani was that she should get a special diet and she never got that special diet is that so?

IVY GCINA: No she did not get the special diet.  We asked Sheila what she was supposed to get.  She said that she was only getting a thigh and samp, mealie rice and samp only.

GLENDA WILDSCHUT: When was the first time that she was seen - from the time of her arrest when was the first time that she was seen by any medical person be it a nurse or a doctor or somebody?

IVY GCINA: When you are arrested, when you go to prison Commissioner, you would be taken to a doctor as a person who - Sheila was the person who saw her first.  I am sure that a doctor examined her because it was the prison policy that when you are arrested you have to go and see a doctor.  But I am sure it is Sheila who can say that because they were arrested on the 12th of June.  They came to our cell on the 12th and after that she did not receive any treatment.

GLENDA WILDSCHUT: You talked also about the fact that Captain Nel said that he was taking her to hospital, do you believe that she was taken to hospital, because it seems as though you were talking about her being very bruised when she came back from that visit somewhere?

IVY GCINA: I didn't believe that she was taken to hospital.  What I knew was that she would take her out of our cell to a single cell pretending to take her to hospital.  When you are a detainee you would be taken by a prison warder to hospital so we were not aware of whether she was taken to hospital or not.

MILDRED LESANI: I would also like to add something on this matter, the question of whether Bani was receiving treatment or not.  When Bani arrived in prison she had her medicine with her.  From a single cell, in Cell 2, she was receiving treatment.  She was receiving insulin and I was helping her in that.  But when we were taken to Cell 14 they said that she was well, she was not given any treatment, she was only given these pills.

GLENDA WILDSCHUT: Thank you very much for your presentation to us today.  I don't have any more questions, I will hand over to the Chair.

CHAIRPERSON: We thank you ladies.  I am very interested in your story, and I am very pleased for what you have done for us, but I would like to ask my colleagues whether they have any further questions.  Wendy?

WENDY ORR: Perhaps it's better that you don't answer this question now in terms of the legal implications, but if you do know the names of any of the doctors whom Elda saw we would be very grateful if you could give those names to us.   And I would also like to point out that the doctor in charge of the district surgeoncy in Port Elizabeth at that time was Dr Ivor Lang, who was supposed to take overall responsibility for the health of all detainees and he has in fact been notified that he will be named at this hearing.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you.  Any other?  Would you like to add something?  Ms Walaza.

NOMFUNDO WALAZA: I think like me I hope that - I am sure that you will all find this story remarkable, remarkable because of the strength of these women to fight the health care for one of their sisters.  Remarkable because of the absolute intransigence of the authorities to provide adequate care for Elda Bani.  And remarkable because of the way in which the forensic pathologist who conducted the post mortem failed to understand that Elda Bani's pulmonary embolism was most likely a result of being unconscious in a prison cell without adequate nursing care.  And lastly remarkable because Elda Bani's death was probably preventable.
 If we are to honour the testimony that we have heard today, and if we are to honour  the memory of Elda Bani and thousands of other detainees, what steps can we take to ensure that there will never again be a situation where detainees die as a result of medical complicity?
 As a group of health professionals committed to human rights we would like to suggest five measures.  We ask the TRC to reopen the investigation into the medical care offered to Elda Bani and thousands of other detainees.
 We ask the TRC to call upon the professional health organisation to hold their members accountable and possibly levy sanctions against those who participated in the death of Elda Bani, and who were complicit in the detention and torture of thousands of other activists.
 We ask the TRC to facilitate reparations to the family of Elda Bani, not only from the President Reparations Fund but from the professional health organisations and their members.
 We urge the TRC to recommend to government that the health care of detainees no longer be a matter of custodian care but of health care.  That the responsibility be shifted from the Police and Prisons to the Department of Health where it rightly belongs.
 And finally we ask the TRC to propose that the statutory council adopt new and forceable codes of conduct for health professionals working in prisons and police stations so that we can ensure that Elda Bani's death in detention was not in vain.  And so that we can restore the honour of the caring profession which failed, not only this woman, but so many detainees and thousands of others.
 Thank you.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very much.  I just want to express again a very deep, deep appreciation to yourselves, but particularly I want to pay a very warm tribute, it is inadequate but it is from the heart, to pay a warm tribute to you, our mothers, for the incredible resilience that you demonstrated.  I have said before that the freedom that we gained would almost certainly have been impossible without the quite remarkable contribution of our women folk, and we have had here testimony again of just what wonderful people you and other women who suffered and paid a very, very heavy price.
 And I would just hope, I mean that our children and others listening and hearing your story, reading about your story will realise that we have a very precious thing, bought at very, very great cost, this freedom, and that we will cherish it as a precious thing that it is. And for those who sometimes seek to take it for granted it will be salutary for them to know that they are free because of people such as yourselves.  Thank you.

NOMFUNDO WALAZA: Thank you Commissioner.  Dr Wendy Orr had a question and we did not answer this question, that who was the doctor responsible at this time.  What happened in prison was that they were not called by their names.  It was a tall doctor, a hefty tall doctor.  If I am not mistaken it was Dr Rensburg, I am not sure.  But what I knew in prison they were not referred by their appropriate names.

CHAIRPERSON: I think it's probably better to take what Dr Orr said, that we want to be quite certain, we don't want for you to implicate someone when we are not certain.  I mean we want to be as certain as possible and not undermine or impugn somebody's integrity when it might not have been that person.  You were saying it - thank you.
 SUBMISSION ON STEVE BIKO

WENDY ORR: It now gives me tremendous honour, and it is with great humility that I welcome Mrs Ntsiki Biko and Mr Kaya Biko, who is Steve Biko's brother, to these hearings.  We are indeed most grateful to have you here, and the Archbishop and I will now come and greet you.
 We now ask Professor Peter Folb, who is the head of the Department of Pharmacology at UCT to come forward to give a narrative account of the circumstances surrounding and following the death of Stephen Bantu Biko in detention and Advocate Denzil Potgieter will be facilitating his evidence.

ADV POTGIETER: Good morning Professor!

UNKNOWN: Good morning.

ADV POTGIETER: Welcome.  I would ask you to take the oath first before we listen to your testimony.  Could you give us your full names for the record.