Human Rights Violation Hearings — Grahamstown — 1997-04-07

VUKELE MABOLE: On that day, it was on the 28th of August 1987, if I am not mistaken.  Simphiwe was my neighbour, we use to go together all the time.  On the day of this incident we were in one of our neighbours house.  There is an old township and a new township.  We were staying in the new township.  We were separated by a river, these two townships.  When we were in this new township we heard a toy-toy from the old township.  When we heard this toy-toy we decided to go and join the toy-toy, because we knew that we had to be there at that time.  When we arrived there we joined the toy-toy, from the new location to the old location.  People were singing freedom songs, we joined the Comrades.  We sang around the old location chanting freedom songs.
 There was a police van patrolling.  It was not doing anything at that time, it was just patrolling.  At about eight, if I remember clearly, one, we decided to go to our homes before anyone can be injured.  When that decision was reached we went to, back to the new location together with Simphiwe.  It was dark at that time.  In front of us there was a group of people, although I did not know who they were.  We went back to the new location and this group of people was leading us.  When we were near the bridge a blue Sprinter, a police Sprinter with four police, four white police came to us.  This car had to pass the people in front of us.  When the group of people saw this car they ran away, they ran to the river, crossed the river.  When we saw this we did not know, but we saw the police.  We also ran away, crossing a river following these people.  
 When we were on the other side of the river we looked back.  We saw this car, the police opened the door, the car stopped and they were looking in our direction.  We were on the other side of the river.  They went into this car and they went back to the old location.  We carried on walking.  When we arrived in our new location we went through First Street, Jonas Street.  At that time even those who were in front of us were going back to their homes.  We went through the Jonas Street, through the Makhonxa Street.  We were going up the street because we were staying in the other street.  When we were going through the Makhonxa Street a group of people appeared.  If am not mistaken, there were three or four people.  They had torches with them.  They were carrying torches.  They made noise and they were swearing at us telling us to stop, not to run away.  We managed to see that these people were police.  One of them 
was Mfunquli Nomala, Mxolisi Sijila, the other one, he is a policeman.  The other one was not a policeman, Khonzekile Mkhetshana, he was not a policeman. 
 When we heard them we ran away, we ran through Makhonxa Street.  After a while, while we were running, they were chasing us.  I looked back, I saw that Nomala, Mfunquli Nomala, was the one chasing us.  The others I did not see them.  We went through houses in that street, through the back yards trying to hide ourselves.  We reached a back street, we stopped running in front of one house.  After a few minutes, Mfunquli Nomala came.  When he came he faced us with the gun in his hand.  He was pointing us with the gun.  Simphiwe got scared, as I was also scared.  He tried to talk to him as he knew him.  He tried to tell him that he was Simphiwe, but at that time Mfunquli did not want to listen although Simphiwe was pleading for his life, Mfunquli told him to shut up, not to say anything.

JUNE CRICHTON: Are you saying then that he was shot without any questions being asked?  He was just shot simply because he was running away?  Is that what you are telling me?

VUKELE MABOLE: Can you please repeat.

JUNE CRICHTON: I am just saying they asked no questions, they simply shot Simphiwe?

VUKELE MABOLE: Yes, no questions were asked.

JUNE CRICHTON: Right.  Thank you very much, Vukele, for filling us in with all of that.  We have the information about the court case.  At that point, I presume, that you must have escaped yourself, obviously.

VUKELE MABOLE: Yes.

JUNE CRICHTON: Thank you very much for your testimony and for filling us in, in for us so that we have a very clear piccture of everything.  Thank you.  Is there anything else that needs to be said about the court case that Mrs May left out?

VUKELE MABOLE: No, there is nothing, because his mother is here.  What I can say is that this was a pain to me, because as I was a student at that time, I was doing standard six, this affected me in my school work, because I use to have a picture of this all the time.  As a result, at the end of the year my studies were affected, my results were affected.

JUNE CRICHTON: Just one last question.  I presume that both of you were involved in student organisations.  Were you, in the political organisations?

VUKELE MABOLE: Simphiwe was not at school at the time.  As his mother has already said that he was working with her.  I was the one who was still at school.

JUNE CRICHTON: Thank you very much, indeed.  Thank you, Mr Chairperson.

CHAIRPERSON: Reverend Xundu.

REV XUNDU: Thank you, Mr Chairperson.  I want to summarise the testimony or the evidence that has been given to us.  This shows us what the police, this shows us what the police did.  The parents were suffering.  Mothers lost their sons, their young sons.  It is true that the police were supposed to be maintaining law, but they were not doing that, they were killing people.  You, Vukele, you have already, you supported what Simphiwe's mother has said, but you have managed to come here to give us your story so that the people of this country can hear what happened.  The Government will not allow such an incident to happen again.  Your testimony will help us a lot.  We thank you very much for coming here and for sharing your story with us, because
you showed us your pain and we can learn from this story.  Thank you very much, both of you.

CHAIRPERSON: We thank Reverend Xundu.  We have two cases left.