Human Rights Violation Hearings — Welkom — 1996-10-08

WITNESS:   I'll just give you an explanation as to how this happened and what happened.  During the year 1991 I was working at a firm called Reebeck and I was a driver there.  As I was still working as a driver in that particular firm that was the time when the President, Nelson Mandela, was going to be released from Robben Island and that was the time that the exiles were supposed to be coming back into the country.  And as we were seeing most of the exiles coming back into the country we also had expectations that our son would also be amongst the ones who were coming into the country.  Unbeknown to us it wasn't going to be like that.  Our son had died a long time ago and nobody notified us as to his death.  And the first time we heard about this we were traumatised emotionally together with my family to such an extent that as I was employed as a driver I was involved in an accident where I hit a pole at work because I was not concentrating and that's how I lost my job.  Up till today I'm not working.  After I had lost my job, just a few days thereafter, after we had heard about my son's death, we took further steps to try and establish cause of death.  Up till we got to Bloemfontein, I went together with other members of the  ANC and I believe that was in March 1991 when we went to Bloemfontein with the ANC members.  When we got to Bloemfontein it was myself as well as the other members of the ANC but my wife was not there because she was working at that time.  They told us that there's a certain man by the name of Jani Mohabi who had just returned from exile.  He was actually from Robben Island.  And he is the one who had come with this message that Ndoyisile had died and he had died in 1987.  During all this time we were not notified.  We did not know anything about my son's death.  We got to know about my son's death from Jani Mohabi in 1991.  And I wanted him to explain to me as to how my son was buried.  He told us that we should go to the funeral undertakers that is Goodwill Funeral Undertakers.  We got to Goodwill Funeral Undertakers and the gentlemen we got there told us that it was true that my son had died and was buried in 1991.  His corpse was given to him by the State so that he would be buried as an unknown body.  He continued to bury my son.  He also gave me the grave number as well as his name, Ndoyisile Xhamfu.  I further asked this gentleman as to why they had given the body to him because it was an unknown body but he also told me his name, that his name was Ndoyisile Xhamfu.  How did it come about that he knew his name whereas he was initially labelled as an unknown body.  He explained to me that he only got to know my son's name later on and that he was from Welkom.  He asked me as to whether I was his father.  I said yes, I was Ndoyisile's father.  He asked me as to what I wanted him to do.  I said I wanted my son's remains and I want to take them with to  Welkom so that I can give him a decent burial.  He said we should go to the police station because it had some to the surface that this was not an unknown body.  His name was known.  His parents had come and they wanted the remains.  So he was not refusing.  He said we should go to the police station to have the remains exhumed.  We proceeded to the police station which was situated there within that residential area and we spoke to a certain Sergeant Ntamo.  Sergeant Ntamo took me to certain places where I was filling certain forms and I was told I should submit my name and I should sign certain forms.  We went to a police station which was situated in town.  I think it's the very last Bloemfontein police station which is at the south of Bloemfontein.  He retrieved a certain file.  It was a big brown envelope which had my son's photos in it.  And I was listening to him when he was calling this file number.  He said this number is 77/87 and they looked for the file.  They retrieved it and they have it to him.  He opened up the envelope and he took out my son's photos and he allowed me to have a look at them and I saw that this was my son.  I identified him from the photos.  He was naked.  I could see his face and I could see his forehead which had a bullet-hole in it.  And I looked at his whole body.  It had so many bullet-holes and it was apparent that he had been shot more than 200 times in the body.  I asked as to how it happened that he was shot so many times because it was sufficient for him to be shot only once in the head and this sergeant said to me, "These were not the bullets but it was a hand-grenade that he was having with him."  I told them  that I did not know how a hand-grenade works but I believed that I could not recognise him if he was blown up by a hand-grenade and I did not want to believe that he had been blown up by a hand-grenade.  And I asked as to who had shot my son and how many people had shot my son but he could not give me an explanation and he said, "You have seen your son's photos.  Now you should go."  And we moved out of the police station.  I asked them to give me one of these photos so that when I buy my son I should be able to make an obituary which has a photo of him and they told me that the law did not permit them to give me any of his photos and I left without anything in my hands and we came back to Welkom.  We decided that this Goodwill Moshai was going to tell us after the remains had been exhumed and we would take the bones to Welkom for the burial.  I was notified later on and I went to fetch my son's remains from the mortuary.  I looked at the bones.  The first one that I took was the skull.  I took the skull and I had a thorough look at it and I saw that these were my son's remains because this skull had this bullet-hole in it.  And I knew his dental formula and I looked at his mouth and I saw that these were his teeth and that's how I could identify my sons remains.  And I took these bones and brought them with to Welkom with the help of the ANC.  That is about all I can say.  That is all I know about my son's death.  Now I would request this honourable Commission to try and find out - I want to know as to who was there in the house - that is the house in which he was attacked or shot dead.  Who were the killers or who was the killer.  I would like this Commission to try and find out this  information because I am desperate.  I want to know more about my son's death.

PROF MAGWAZA: Thank you very much, Baba Xhamfu.  This is a very painful story and I think for you to be able to relate such finer details, it indicates that you are one of those people that were very strong.  Quite as strong as your son.  Your son died as being a hero.  And also I think because of your strength you and your wife being so supportive to each other you managed and you put every effort to re-bury your son.  At least today you know your son had a dignified burial.  Many of the parents still don't know where there children are but nevertheless it should not ease your pain because there's still lots of unanswered questions.  We hope we are going to try as much as we can to help people to provide answers for those questions.  I will just ask a few last questions.  Your family, you told us that there were two sons.  Do you only have one son now?

WITNESS:   That is correct.

PROF MAGWAZA: Or you had five sons.  What happened to them?

WITNESS:  The eldest is 28 years old.  It's a boy.  The second one is 26 years old.  She's a girl and she's married.  And the third one is 22 years old.  And the fourth one is 20 years old and the last one is 18 years.  There were six including the deceased.

PROF MAGWAZA: Are they all working?

WITNESS:   No, the eldest is not working.  The three are still at school.

PROF MAGWAZA: Only one is working?

WITNESS:   Yes, this other one is married.

PROF MAGWAZA: Aletta, are you working?

WITNESS:   Yes, I am working.