Amnesty Hearings — Mmabatho — 1998-08-04

UNKNOWN: I am, Chairperson.   I would like to start by stating that we've had an informal discussion with my colleague on the other side, I'm more used, or I used to be more used to appear before him than appearing next to him, but we have basically decided that the main bone of contention, if I can put it that way, would be section 21(b), and that is whether there was a political objective.  It would seem that we are more or less in line on the rest of it, and I will basically concentrate on that.
	I am, however, going to request the committee and the chair to find that this was a political objective, that the whole incident that occurred was politically inspired and that 
	As far as the applicant is concerned, I believe it's on record that he was part of the SDU, whether we call it a self defence unit or a street defence unit, I think it's a matter of terminology, he was politically involved, there were problems in his community, and the reason why they decided to attack the Ledig Police Station was to get firearms so that if and when Inkatha attacks again, that they will be in a position to defend the people properly.
	He also mentioned that they also started feeling that, to be merely offensive was not the only way to go, but to be
basically offensive as well and to start pinning the Inkatha warlords down to the hostels, so that they could not attack the people.
	I don't agree with my colleague if he, what he attempted under examination of the applicant, to get it to a basic social structure.   I really cannot see how we can accept that that is a mere social structure.   Yes, it was there to defend people.   Why was it necessary to defend people?   It is obvious that it was because of what was happening in the area.   As it was put in sub-section 3(b) where it talks about:-
"Was part of a political uprising, disturbance or event, or in reaction thereto."
	They were attacked, it was political.   The attacks of Inkatha on the people there was not criminal, it was politically inspired.   So how can your defence then just be a social one.
	Further, I would request the honourable committee to look at the rest of the criteria which is mentioned in sub-section 3.   If we look at his motive, he was a young man, he was 23 years old, and he says that that was the reason why they went there.   I know it was touched on about Sun City and the money and things like that, but surely, I mean you don't go and attack a police station to get money, and they didn't have money, we know that, because whilst they were fleeing, they didn't have money to pay the petrol attendant there and... (intervention).

CHAIRPERSON: Would that not be indicative of extremely poor planning?

MR MULLIGAN: (Inaudible - mike not on) ...it was fairly badly planned, as such.   He also said that he'd only, he knew about firearms, but he'd never handled them, and it's quite strange, or not strange then that when they ran away, he lost the magazine of the firearm he was carrying.   So yes, it was shoddily planned, but we've got to look at, right from the start, the person who instigated it, who said that it should be done, was Phinda, or we have a couple of names for him, Motepa, they trusted him as an MK cadre, he said, "Right, we can get firearms", and Ledig was his idea, and I think to put into perspective some of the questions which came from the honourable committee member was, was it small, etceteras?   He had knowledge about it, because he was previously arrested there and he was detained there, so that's why he knew, most probably knew how many people were in that police station at any given time, and that's why they decided to hit it, because he had prior knowledge of what it would look like there and what they could expect to find there.
	But if we look at his motive, his motive, he said was, right from the start, was to get hold of firearms so that they can properly protect the people in the community where they were, and that was his motive.
	Yes, if we get back, it wasn't planned very well.   It's also sad that Kenneth lost his cool and started shooting, which was not the instructions given by Motepa to them.   The whole thing, in a certain sense, went sour.

ADV BOSMAN: But given your argument that at least one of the people had a good knowledge of the police station, wouldn't one then have expected better planning, in the light thereof?

MR MULLIGAN: (Inaudible - mike not on) ...that is also why he took the initiative, right from the start, and when they stopped there, he said, "Right, two stay at the gate, three go inside, one man with a weapon outside".   So it wasn't that it was planned badly in a certain sense, but in another sense he did take the initiative, so that the thing would proceed and go ahead.
	But from the evidence that we have, it's just sad, it seems that Kenneth just lost it.   He first shot the other guy, he later, and I think hearsay can be accepted here, he said to the applicant, "I saw the other person panic and I panicked", and he shot him, and then he started shooting indiscriminately at the door.   It's a person in panic and I think it's indicative thereof that he wasn't properly trained.
	As far as Motepa is concerned, we see him stay relatively calm until they start fleeing, and he then tries to cock the weapon and a couple of shots go off, but we must also remember that they were under fire from the third policeman from the vehicle at that stage, so it was a bit of panic stations.
	But I don't think we can get away from it that the whole thing was politically - the objective was a political one.
	One of the committee members, rightly so, and my colleague also asked the question, "But how would the people know?"   Well obviously an event like that you don't advertise beforehand, but afterwards we know that Motepa had relatives there, he had contact with the people in Ledig, and obviously afterwards it would have gone through the grapevine or in a way it could have gone through there that they were hit by the ANC, by an ANC cadre and other people with him.
	So it's my humble submission that, as far as sub-section 3 is concerned, that the applicant complies with the Act and that (i) and (ii), where it says:-
"Out of personal malice or for personal gain",
that it doesn't really come into the picture.
	And nobody touched on it, one could maybe say, "Wasn't there a bit of personal malice from the side of Motepa?", but when they asked him, "Why Ledig?", he said, "No, the people there needs a morale boost".   Now whether he lied to them, or whether that was the truth, we don't know, but he says that he trusted Motepa, he was an MK cadre, he was somebody that he looked up to, and that's why he accepted that, and it made sense to him, one would expect.
	If one says that it was not a political objective, the only other objective one can think of is a criminal objective, and if your objective is, which I think we can accept, is to get hold of firearms, I believe there are softer targets to hit than a police station, and we've seen that in the past, criminals hit soft targets, and he specifically also said that Ledig was too far away for him, he said it's too far away, and he was basically, he had to be convinced by Motepa that, "Let's go there because it will do the struggle a lot of good because those people are suffering under the Mangope regime and they need a morale boost".
	There's nothing specific, I think that concludes what... (intervention).

CHAIRPERSON: I take note from what you said at the commencement of your argument, but (inaudible - mike not on).

INTERPRETER: The speaker's mike is not on.