Human Rights Violation Hearings — Queenstown — 1996-07-22

UNKNOWN: The police wanted to know are you coming to us Ms Batyi now that your children are here.  It became apparent that I was a laughing stock and I then asked them to please give me a truck so that I could load my things onto it and they said no, the truck is broken.
 I went to Van Tonder and Van Tonder said his trucks were being stoned in the location, he cannot give me a truck.  We ended up leaving.

REV XUNDU: Where did you go to?

UNKNOWN: We went to Ezibeleni.  We went to Gali's place at Ezibeleni and put up a place for ourselves.
 There were two people there, Mrs Nonqobela and Zolile Gali that had homes there in the location, but couldn't come to their homes, because they were housing informants.
 They could not come to the location, because they were going to be burnt and people were creeping up on them at Ezibeleni, but Laviza did not want anyone there, the police 
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were watching them.
 I had friends at Ezibeleni  who had told the police about us and that we were guarded and the police were told to guard us as people that had laid a charge.

REV XUNDU: On the day of the 22nd of September at 8, you Temba and Vuyo went to that house in Queenstown?

UNKNOWN: Yes.  We had dogs that were left behind.  We did not take anything, I just left on my own without anything.

REV XUNDU: Tell the Commission what happened on that day.

UNKNOWN: On that day we went to attend to the dogs and Temba came out.  After that he got into the car, Vuyo was with me in the car and Temba said I've got to go and tell Sipiwa something because we left without my seeing him.
 He stays on the other side.  We went around and stopped the car and Vuyo said that there was a friend of his that he used to play soccer with that he wanted to tell something.
 I remained in the car and Temba came in, Temba hurried back.  We were waiting for Vuyo.
 As he was getting out boys came, they had seen us.  We didn't realise that they were coming to us, but they came to the car and whistled and there were many of them.
 And we saw Louise and other boys that we didn't recognise as well as Boy-boy Mashinwana and Samson Mabanga.
 As well as Zola Majikela.

REV XUNDU: Was this in the evening after 8?

UNKNOWN: No, it was before 8 in the evening.  It wasn't, it was getting dark, it wasn't very, very dark, it was about eight o'clock in the evening, but there were
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electric lights that were on and Temba had the car's lights on as well. 
 They came to in front of, they stopped in front of us, Vuyo was coming on and they called him and they said Vuyo, he stopped and looked around and they came to him.
 And he ran when he saw that they were attacking the car.  Temba made a U-turn and I said Temba, let's go to the police and we rushed off to the police station.
 When we got to the police station and reported that this is what happened, Vuyo ran away and it is, we were being chased, they wanted to burn us and a hippo came out and Temba followed it.
 It had been a little while after that.  I kept going to the police and then Temba said I see many people.  I see a lot of people, but I can't really see anything.
 I went in again and I heard the police saying that Vuyo was in the hospital, that he had been burnt.  I went to hospital and I saw that Vuyo had been burnt.

REV XUNDU: Was he still alive when you got to the hospital?

UNKNOWN: Yes, he was, he could still talk and I asked him what happened and he said I was burn by Samson and them.  The nurses said that I should leave and I left.
 He was crying and he said that I should come back the following morning.  I came back the following day and I was told that Vuyo was going to be transferred to East London.
 I came back the following day with his father and I saw that he was swollen, but I didn't speak to him.  I saw that the head was very swollen.
 They said let's go and we went.  We then decided that we were going to see him in East London.  They left with 
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Vuyo and we prepared ourselves to go to East London.

REV XUNDU: Please give us some water.  Take your time, take your time, please Ma'am.

UNKNOWN: It became apparent that I wasn't going to get the right thing from them and we kept going.  I cried when they told us that our child had passed away and said that we must go to the police station.

REV XUNDU: Please take your time Ma'am.  Don't rush.  When we stopped outside the police station, his father said let's go to Dr Nhlaban.  We got to Dr Nhlaban's place and he gave me tablets and even an injection.
 And we got back into the car - I cried.  This needle made me drowsy and I woke up at home at  Ezibeleni.  At home I found that Nonqobele had called people and when I saw people I cried again and realised that Vuyo wasn't there any longer.

REV XUNDU: Did you get the report at the hospital that he had passed away?

UNKNOWN: I had heard through the prayer meeting because the people had been informed before me.  And since they was saying that Monde was an informer, he started as a comrade in 1976.
 And I didn't realise then that he was a comrade.  People just kept on coming to report to me about the activities that he was participating in at the school while he was doing standard 8.
 He then applied at Hilltown and his teachers would not give him testimonials.  We met with Mr Yaqa and Monde went there because of Mr Yaqa.
 He assured us that when we got there, he would have fixed everything because the children that were staying in 
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Mr Yaqa's street, he was helping them with their education.
 Monde got into this other school because of Mr Yaqa and once again the uprising started.
 I eventually got a telephone and I got a message and I went to his father at work and his father said that he is going to come with me, and we went but we didn't find Monde.
 We heard that the others were arrested.  And we were told that he had been seen here and there, but he was attempting ways in which he could hide and go home.
 We came and found him at home.  He stayed and then considered once again trying to get into a school at Butterworth on his own.
 He eventually got into a school there but there too I got a phone call during the course of time, saying that children and teachers were being detained.

REV XUNDU: Let's just go back Ma'am to where you said that he passed away.  Where he was, he passed away and then he was buried.

UNKNOWN: Vuyo was buried at Ezibeleni at a place where I was staying.  There weren't any people because the comrades couldn't attend.

REV XUNDU: Was anyone arrested in connection with this?

UNKNOWN: Yes.

REV XUNDU: How did the trial go?

UNKNOWN: There were those that were found guilty and others were charged with arson on the house.  Maningi, Gerald and Thoza were found guilty.  The others were acquitted because they had an attorney.
 Samson pleaded guilty and said, you see he had a scar, a wound on his hip and said that there was a child that had stabbed him, that he hadn't assaulted.
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 I don't know what happened to him, but all the others were acquitted.
 There was another one that he had said that this child stabbed him, but he hadn't stabbed this child, but this child ended up serving a prison sentence.

REV XUNDU: So were the people that did this arrested and some of them were found guilty and the others were acquitted?

UNKNOWN: Yes, but they were not, they did not serve long prison sentences, because they were eventually released.

REV XUNDU: Did this happened when the political organisations were unbanned?

UNKNOWN: Yes.

REV XUNDU: Was there anything, anyone in your family who was severely affected by this?