Amnesty Hearings — Cape Town — UNKNOWN

ADV BEMBRIDGE: You didn't see the person?

LORENZO VICTOR SMITH: I never saw him.

ADV BEMBRIDGE: What conclusion did you drawfrom the manner in which the attack was carried out, as you've just describedit?

LORENZO VICTOR SMITH: Man, to me it was a military organised attack, that is allthat I can say.

ADV BEMBRIDGE: What is your response to the suggestionthat it was only the

<UNKNOWN>: ommander who had any knowledge of the target or the natureof the attack, that the other people who were involved in this or was carryingout, had no such knowledge?

LORENZO VICTOR SMITH: I believe that we have a will anda right to refuse things when we come face to face with it and each and everyone out there that were involved in the incident, had at the given time a chanceto make that decision. Yes, or no, if they are going to go through with whatwas happening, what is going to take place.

ADV BEMBRIDGE: What then areyour feelings as to whether these applicants should be granted amnesty in thesecircumstances?

LORENZO VICTOR SMITH: I feel that if amnesty is granted, it must begranted on a truthful basis and that is it.

ADV BEMBRIDGE: Do you thinkit can in the circumstances be granted on a truthful basis?

LORENZO VICTOR SMITH: Well, what I've heard, I have mixed feelings, that is all.

ADV BEMBRIDGE: Do you think these applicants should be granted amnesty?

LORENZO VICTOR SMITH: Ifthey are telling the truth, yes, if they are not, then justice should take itscourse.

<UNKNOWN>: an you briefly just describe what the effectswere on the church community itself, effects of this attack?

LORENZO VICTOR SMITH: I can speak for myself. I am going through major, I wouldn't say myself, I haveremarried, I will be married in

<UNKNOWN>: ugust for two years. Just through the graceof God I met a beautiful woman, she is fantastic, I love her dearly. I haveput the past back about my wife, I accepted her death. She has gone home, shehas gone to a place that I look forward to in being. My children are sufferingtremendously. There are times when my wife too, she feels that she is inadequateto fill a gap of a mother, she is a parent, but of a mother. I have got a daughterof 18 years old, there are given times when I didn't know her. I said to her,this is going to be a lifetime for you to go through the situation that youare in. I have a son that is 23, he is doing his Master degree in Marine

<UNKNOWN>: iology,he doesn't speak. He doesn't speak about the incident. He has got a deep, deepsort of trauma about it. He says he is feeling okay, but I know he is not.

<UNKNOWN>: ndI feel that it is going to take them a lifetime to overcome. I have acceptedit, I have put my wife behind my back, and I accepted her death, but the wayshe died, I feel it is not right for any human being to take life in that manner.

<UNKNOWN>: DV

<UNKNOWN>: EM

<UNKNOWN>: RIDGE Have you observed any similar symptoms in any other members ofthe community?

LORENZO VICTOR SMITH: I have.

ADV BEMBRIDGE: Thank you Mr

<UNKNOWN>: hairman.

ADV BEMBRIDGE: Thank you.

<UNKNOWN>: re there any questions that counsel wishes to putto this witness, Mr

<UNKNOWN>: rendse?

NORMAN ARENDSE: Very reluctantly, yes Mr

<UNKNOWN>: hairman.Mr Smith, we coincidentally know each other.

<UNKNOWN>: an I just share with you the regretand sorrow of what happened on that day.

LORENZO VICTOR SMITH: Thank you.

NORMAN ARENDSE: I don't wish it on anybody and we have instructions also from the applicantsto convey their deep regret to you about the death of your wife and the deathof other people. Mr Smith, can I just read back to you what Mr Makoma said inhis statement about what actually happened in church? He says when we, becauseI am just reading it back to you because I think perhaps you either didn't hearproperly or it didn't come over to you correctly what he actually said. Whenwe entered the church, Nonxuba, who is also deceased, led the way and as weentered, we were in a passage which led to the main doors. People were walkingup and down the passage. We left off the passage for a few seconds and thenNonxuba said we will enter through the main doors. He told me to throw the handgrenadeand to shoot to kill. That was presumably now in the passage as they - Nonxubaled the way and we burst through the doors of the church. He first threw hishandgrenade, he was on my left, that is on this applicant, Makoma's left, andthen I threw mine.

<UNKNOWN>: s the handgrenades exploded, we took cover behind the doors,re-entered and while people were screaming, we started to shoot. We shot indiscriminatelyand finished the respective R4 magazines, collectively must have been about62 rounds of ammunition. That is what he says what happened. Doesn't that approximate...

LORENZO VICTOR SMITH: No, it doesn't. I would like to ask you if that is his truestatement that he made across?

NORMAN ARENDSE: It is, he said so under oath.

LORENZO VICTOR SMITH: Well, what I've seen and there is many in the church that can verifythe same thing, what I've seen on oath, he came in. The second person that camein, it was him, right, he first shot before he emptied out his rifle, walkeda couple of paces to the door, turned back again to the isle and lodged thehandgrenade. I was sitting at a place where I could see everything from thedistance where I was sitting. To me there is a miss, sort of evidence that heis giving.

NORMAN ARENDSE: Now, you are saying applicant Makoma did this?

LORENZO VICTOR SMITH: He came in the second time, that is what I am saying.

ADVARENDSE: Did you see him clearly?

LORENZO VICTOR SMITH: I can't see, I know itis a

<UNKNOWN>: lack person. I am short sighted, I know it is

<UNKNOWN>: lack person, he verifiedthat he came into the church, I have to take his word for it, but that is whatI've seen.

NORMAN ARENDSE: So you can't even say for sure whether he wasin the church? We know now that he was?

LORENZO VICTOR SMITH: What I can say, I definitelyknow at the given time, there was two different people who entered the church,and not at the same time.

NORMAN ARENDSE: Okay, firstly it is two peopleonly?

LORENZO VICTOR SMITH: It is two people only and the door was ajar, the doorswing closed when there is nothing keeping the door ajar.

NORMAN ARENDSE: So it is not three people who came into the church?

LORENZO VICTOR SMITH: Not threein the church, two entered at different times.

NORMAN ARENDSE: So when mycolleague Mr

<UNKNOWN>: embridge put it to one of the applicants that it was three people,he was - that was not your instructions?

LORENZO VICTOR SMITH: Man, to me - I saidthere must have been a third party because the door cannot be ajar at that forthem, for the door to be ajar, because the door is a swing door, it will closeby itself.

NORMAN ARENDSE: So you are prepared to accept that there wereonly two killers in the church?

LORENZO VICTOR SMITH: There were two that came inat different intervals into the church.

BERNARD MAKGABO NGOEPE: Just for the record,Mr

<UNKNOWN>: embridge said there were presumably three people.

NORMAN ARENDSE: I amprepared to accept that thank you, and I recall now actually that he said thatMr Smith, Mr Lorenzo Smith will say, that there were three or as the Judge correctedme, presumably three. You are now sure that there were two?

LORENZO VICTOR SMITH: There were two, but as I say a door cannot be ajar when it has a spring loadedonto it, it will close up by itself.

NORMAN ARENDSE: It is a swing door?

<UNKNOWN>: swing door.

NORMAN ARENDSE: Yes.

LORENZO VICTOR SMITH: So if the doorcloses by itself, you know, to me something definitely that is keeping the dooropen.

NORMAN ARENDSE: How quickly did this all happen, did it happen quicklyor did it take some time?

LORENZO VICTOR SMITH: This thing must have taken plus minus,over a minute to a minute and a half.