Human Rights Violation Hearings — Queenstown — 1996-07-23

REV XUNDU: Sir, back to you.

BONGANI FINCA: Welcome here Eunice Oliphant, we are going to hand you over to Tiny Maya and she will lead you in your evidence.

MS MAYA: Thank you.  Thank you Mr Chairman.  Ms Oliphant, I would like to greet you.  In the statement before us, we see that you will testify in connection with the death of your husband, Mr Welile Alfred in 1992.
 In the statement there is something that says he was a member of an organisation and he was accused of being a member of the ADM at that time and it was said that the ADM had a part in his killing.
 Tell us a bit about your husband so that we can know why he was accused of killing a member of the ADM.

EB OLIPHANT: What is it that you want to know?  Do you want to know who he was, what he was?  He was a member of the ANC.

MS MAYA: Tell us everything about him.  About his membership in the ANC, what he did as a person and in the community as well.

EB OLIPHANT: The main cause of the ADM being after him was that because while we were staying there, the people in town did not want to be controlled by Headmen, so they asked the Magistrate to please authorise that they should not be under QUEENSTOWN HEARING TRC/EASTERN CAPE
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Headmen.
 The Magistrate said that while he was going to forward the request to Bisho, that somebody should represent these people in the interim, while this request was being handled.
 My husband was appointed as the representative of the people on the part of the ANC.  There was then this conflict between the ANC and the ADM and people did not agree, the Headmen did not agree because there was someone from the ANC who was representing the ANC people.

MS MAYA: Just to take you a bit back, please explain to us what the ADM was all about.  What kind of organisation was it, who did it consist of and tell us more about the ADM.

EB OLIPHANT: The ADM was an organisation of people under the leadership of Brigadier Oupa Gqozo, the African Democratic Movement.
 After all this, after my husband was appointed on the ANC's part, there were these Headmen who were part of the ADM.  They never used to conduct meetings and tell people that if you've got complains, bring it to us, they used to, when they had a meeting, it became apparent that  Sponda did not like this, and he would go and report it to the police and they would come and arrest him.
 He is the person that used to the complaints of the people and whenever there was a meeting, he would be arrested.
 On a particular day the children when to Mr Xabendlini's house and burnt it and there was just friction there.  I wasn't present, I was at work.
 Thereafter the people of that house had to be admitted to the hospital.  The man of the house there was assaulted and when he got to the hospital, he passed away, Mr Richard 
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Xabendlini.
 The children who were responsible were arrested because the people at the hospital gave a statement to the effect that the children were responsible for this deed.
 Fortunately I was going to be off the following day and I went home.  The day I got home, the morning of the following day, the children were going to go to school, but the police had stopped outside in a Kombi and they had come to arrest my husband.

MS MAYA: Where were these policemen from?

EB OLIPHANT: I am not sure whether they were the Tendergate policemen or the Wittlesea policemen.  There is a police station there by us in Rocklands and there were also policemen from Wittlesea, so I cannot differentiate which police these were.
 My question when they arrested him was, because when the statement was being given at the hospital, I was present by the people who were assaulted.  My question was why they were arresting him and they said we are not going in accordance with the statement, we are going according to this list and they took out a list which they got at Xabendlini's.

MS MAYA: This list according to your knowledge, what did it have?

EB OLIPHANT: It contained names of people who was supposed to be arrested.

MS MAYA: Why were they going to be arrested?

EB OLIPHANT: They were the ones that killed and they said my husband was the one that finished off Mr Xabendlini.  They said the reason that Mr Xabendlini is no longer with us, is you.
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 So they took him and took him away.  After they had left, there were other men there because there were no children, only men were arrested and locked up and the Kombi came back to come and fetch all the youth in the village and they were locked up.
 But in the afternoon of that day they were brought back and my husband also came back that day.  They were told to come back and they would be informed as to when the trial would be conducted.
 I once again had to go back to work, so I don't know what happened after that, but there were rumours that the ADM had said, sworn revenge and when Mr Xabendlini was being buried, Mr Oliphant's body would be at the mortuary and that is exactly what happened.

MS MAYA: I would like us to come to the 27th of August 1992 now.   What happened on this day there?

EB OLIPHANT: On this day of the 27th in 1992, I was not there, I was not at home, I was at work.  I had left on the 26th to go to work, because I was going to be on duty on the 27th.
 According to what I heard from neighbours when they told me, they said that they were afraid to come out because most of the people around me were old people and widows and they said that there was a shooting incident and when I got home, I saw that there were bullet holes in the window.

INTERPRETER: The interpretation service will continue once the witness has regained her composure.  Fortunately no one was sleeping in the room into which they shot because since these rumours, we had heard these rumours, we had to move our things, because they said that they were going to burn our things, so I had asked a neighbour and taken all my
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furniture in the house and kept it there.  I did this on the day that I was off and he kept it in his garage, so we just left a few things at home and since, when they shot my husband was not in our bedroom, the one they know us to sleep in.  
 But he was sleeping in the children's bedroom which is towards the back.

MS MAYA: Was there someone that saw who was shooting by any chance?

EB OLIPHANT: I cannot lie and say that there was, but the neighbours heard the shots.  My children were not at home, because ever since this thing started, my husband did not want our children to sleep at home, he wanted to be at home alone.
 And even when I was off, he wanted me to go and sleep at my parental home, but I refused to I wanted to be there to see what was going to happen.

MS MAYA: What happened after the shooting?

EB OLIPHANT: They shot and then he must have stayed there, but I think the reason he came out must have been because they set fire to the place.
 They threw petrol there, because even the mat in the room was smelling of petrol and the front portion burnt.  The house was black to show that there was a lot of smoke.
 I am sure that he ran towards the back door, because his corpse was found at the back and that is where is was found.
 He was found outside at the back and that was in the morning, because nobody had come during the night to come and look at what damage had been done.  He was found the morning.
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MS MAYA: And what was seen as the cause of his death?

EB OLIPHANT: A bullet wound.  There was no sign of him having been assaulted, because even when he was taken to the Doctor thereafter.

MS MAYA: Was anyone arrested after your husband's death?