Human Rights Violation Hearings — Witbank — 1977-06-05

UNKNOWN: It's because the majority of people in Ogies found themselves facing some kind of problem because of my being inactive in the group.  There was chaos after that.  I'm apologizing because people lost respect for me completely and the suddenly took me negatively, as someone who was collaborating with the police.  It there is anyone that I wronged as the Chairperson, I would like to apologize now.

MR MALAN: Do you have any specific wrongs in mind when you say that?  You say, if there is anyone, so it's an open plea, it's an open apology, not knowing what you're apologizing for, is that what you're saying to us?  It's very difficult, I'm trying to help you and lead you because I can see your pain of having been rejected from the community but I don't see how we're going to set the record straight.  I'll leave it for the moment.  I'm just telling you it's very difficult to follow.  Just a last question.  You did say you're not politically active.  Did I hear you correctly, you said that your occupation was that of a teacher?

UNKNOWN: Yes, I'm a teacher.

MR MALAN: You still teach.

UNKNOWN: Yes.

MR MALAN: Where and at what school and what subject?

UNKNOWN: Umpukweni Secondary School and I teach commercial subjects such as Business Economics and Accounting.

MR MALAN: Since when have you been teaching?

UNKNOWN: 1986.

MR MALAN: At the time of the events, you were already in teaching?

UNKNOWN: Yes.

MR MALAN: At the same post?

UNKNOWN: Yes.

MR MALAN: Thank you very much Chairperson.

DR RANDERA: Miss Mkhize?

MS MKHIZE: Again I'm sure I will just ask questions -  in a clear picture.  How old were you at the time when you started being politically active?   I will try within a twinkling of an eye to get the incidents you encountered with the police and how you were tortured by the police as my colleague said.  According to our statement, there were things that were not mentioned, that you've just mentioned now.

UNKNOWN: I started being politically active at Tembega High School in Nelspruit.

MS MKHIZE: Were you affiliated with a certain group politically?

UNKNOWN: I always kept company with the students.

MS MKHIZE: The position that you're talking about, the Chairperson.  Was it the first position that you had politically?

UNKNOWN: Yes.

MS MKHIZE: When you were a student did you ever once have an ......... or argument with the police?

UNKNOWN: Yes, I would say so because I was expelled from Tembega High School in 1980 and I was in Standard Nine then.  I was expelled around September.

MS MKHIZE: Why did the police intervene?

UNKNOWN: The police would come and interrogate me.  There were students that went to attack one of the lady teachers' house, who was working with the School Body Master and my name was implicated, even though I didn't take part.  Because I come from the Reef, that qualified me that I should have participated in some way and I was expelled due to that.

MS MKHIZE: At the time, were you military trained?

UNKNOWN: No.

MS MKHIZE: When you say you were an ANC Chairman, you've explained to us, even though we don't have this in the statement, that you came across this girl lying on the ground.  Exactly how does that correspond with your atrocities?

UNKNOWN: To see a young girl lying in the road at night made me feel so bad that I had to enquire about that child because it could have been one of the students from my school even though she was in the dark, I tried to see.  I wanted to see exactly who the child was and what had happened.

UNKNOWN: When you came across the police were you once detained for even a longer period?

UNKNOWN: Yes, I was detained in Black Park as I mentioned before.

MS MKHIZE: Were you tortured or harassed in any way?

UNKNOWN: Yes, they came to me every night to interrogate me and harass me and after I had met my lawyer, that subsided.  On Friday, Saturday, Sunday and on Monday I was released.  These other three days I went through hell.  They kept me in a cell with a twelve year old boy and when I asked this boy how he got there, he told me that he was selling in the location with a certain Indian guy and he was arrested but the Indian guy was set free.

MS MKHIZE: Besides that were you subjected to some sort of torture?

UNKNOWN: No.

DR RANDERA: Thank you people, can we just ...

MS MKHIZE: When you look back in retrospect, you were suspected of collaborating with the police.  What could have made that possible?

UNKNOWN: I don't understand you question but... I don't understand your question.  When they kept me in the cell, they fabricated a story that I was generating a relationship with them and they made that to appear to be so.  Two of the people.  I told the Comrades who came to visit me what the police said but they would go back to the location and give their own fabricated version of the whole thing.

MS MKHIZE: Maybe, as you have already said, there is a lot of other things that we don't have in your statement, like what you have said, that the police portrayed some kind of picture as well.  That they were collaborating with you. We don't know whether they gave you some money.  You may want to submit another statement because this one is missing a lot of information which you have already told to us to-day.

DR RANDERA: Richard, thank you very much for coming.  You raise a lot of questions, more questions from what you've said to-day and in your statement.  I think the one important issue, a very important issue regardless of the difficulties of your statement, which is how two communities come to reconcile with each other relating to issues which have taken place in that community.  I think that is what you are struggling with to-day and probably have been struggling with for the last few years.  I hope that by coming here to-day and having spoken publicly about your difficulties and if  there are people from your community to-day who are listening, they will take that back to your community and something can be done to bring about reconciliation for you and the community.  Thank you for coming.

UNKNOWN: Thank you.