Amnesty Hearings — Potchefstroom — UNKNOWN

JUDGE WILSON: Mrs Dhlamini I asked you, you hadn't got your headphone on, whether any of these people who are now asking for amnesty ever came to you to tell you what had happened, to sympathise with you for what had happened to your son?

ELLEN DHLAMINI: Not even one of them Sir came to me.

MOKOTEDI MPSHE: Mr Chairman that is the evidence.

CHAIRPERSON: Are there any questions you want to put?

BERNARD MAKGABO NGOEPE: Only one Mr Chairman, thank you.  Mrs Dhlamini the pain that you are feeling we promise you it is the same feeling that we have.  The two men that have been referred to are today in prison.  Now the question is, if there is any other way to come and meet you to show how
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remorseful they are and ask for forgiveness for what they did to you will you ever forgive them?

ELLEN DHLAMINI: Yes I will.

BERNARD MAKGABO NGOEPE: What is the deceased's date of birth, the year, the month, the year, the month and the year?

ELLEN DHLAMINI: I forgot the year in which he was born.

UNKNOWN: Mrs Dhlamini how long have you been staying in Kgutsong?

ELLEN DHLAMINI: I am not staying in Kgutsong.

UNKNOWN: Sorry, how long have you been staying in Ganana?

ELLEN DHLAMINI: It's a long time ago.  I arrived there in 1981.

UNKNOWN: And when to your knowledge did Zinzile become a member of the ANC?

ELLEN DHLAMINI: I can't remember.

UNKNOWN: And when did you start noticing him moving with the group of ANC youths, what year was it?

ELLEN DHLAMINI: I think it was around 1978 because they were arrested as a group.

UNKNOWN: To your knowledge did he never resign from the ANC?

ELLEN DHLAMINI: No he never resigned.

UNKNOWN: Thank you.

JUDGE WILSON: Mrs Dhlamini was Zinzile going to school?

ELLEN DHLAMINI: Yes, he was schooling.

JUDGE WILSON: What school was he at?

ELLEN DHLAMINI: Bathabile school, B-A-T-H-A-B-I-L-E.

JUDGE WILSON: And where is that?

ELLEN DHLAMINI: At Ganana.

JUDGE WILSON: And can you remember what standard he was
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in?

ELLEN DHLAMINI: He was doing standard five.

JUDGE WILSON: How was he doing at school?  Did he get reports, did you see his reports?

ELLEN DHLAMINI: He was doing very well at school.

JUDGE WILSON: Have you got any of his school reports still?

ELLEN DHLAMINI: Yes they are at home.

JUDGE WILSON: So when you are taken home could you make them available to us?

ELLEN DHLAMINI: When we arrived at home I'll search for the reports and I'll give them to anybody who is taking me home.

JUDGE WILSON: I take it she is being taken home Mr Mpshe?

MOKOTEDI MPSHE: She is.

JUDGE WILSON: We will make sure that they are returned to you.

ELLEN DHLAMINI: Thank you Sir.

JUDGE WILSON: And the last thing I want to clear up with you, you say they were arrested as a group, was your son arrested in  1988?

ELLEN DHLAMINI: Yes they were in a group when they were arrested.

JUDGE WILSON: What happened to the group?

ELLEN DHLAMINI: They were released.

JUDGE WILSON: And this was 1988?

ELLEN DHLAMINI: Yes it was 1988.

JUDGE WILSON: Did he have any other troubles with the police?  Was he arrested or taken to the police station on any other occasion?

ELLEN DHLAMINI: Not at all.
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JUDGE WILSON: /...
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JUDGE WILSON: Thank you.

UNKNOWN: Mrs Dhlamini do you know of the group called Kofifi?  Of you aware of its existence in Ganana?

ELLEN DHLAMINI: I do not know.  I don't have any evidence with regard to the existence of such a group.

UNKNOWN: And you've never heard of that group at all, ever since you were there in 1981?

ELLEN DHLAMINI: I have never heard anything about this group.

BERNARD MAKGABO NGOEPE: Did the deceased already have an ID book when he died?

ELLEN DHLAMINI: No he didn't have an identity document.  We just took his register to the police station and he was never given an identity document.  No he didn't have an identity document.

BERNARD MAKGABO NGOEPE: Did you ever hear of an allegation that your son had raped and/or assaulted a woman and tied up her husband?  I am not saying whether that is true but I want to know from you whether you did ever hear of such an allegation against him?

ELLEN DHLAMINI: I have never heard such rumours Sir.

CHAIRPERSON: When you found your son lying dead did you make enquiries as to why he was killed?

ELLEN DHLAMINI: Yes I enquired who killed him and people said they do not know.

CHAIRPERSON: Nobody knew why?

ELLEN DHLAMINI: Nobody knew Sir.

CHAIRPERSON: Re-examination?

MOKOTEDI MPSHE: No re-examination Mr Chairman thank you.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very much.
WITNESS EXCUSED
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MOKOTEDI MPSHE: Mr Chairman that is the evidence in respect of the three applicants.
	Mr Chairman and the honourable members of the Committee will recall that yesterday I had made mention of a witness by the name of Charles Dhlamini whom I had intended calling yesterday but I do not intend calling him anymore for reasons that he advanced to me, and it was agreed between himself and the now witness that it is the witness who should testify.  Thank you.

ADV DE JAGER: Mr Mpshe I appreciate that you are not going to call him, but is there anything that could assist us which this person knows and which the Commission might be interested in so that we could decide whether we should call him or not?

MOKOTEDI MPSHE: Mr Chairman, members of the Committee, one of the reasons why it was decided between the two of them that the mother should testify is that the father did not stay at home.  He was coming home fortnightly.  He was working somewhere in Johannesburg.  So he never stayed with the deceased.  He knows nothing about the deceased's activities.
	Mr Chairman we now proceed into the other three applicants.  That will be volume E, F and G.  They are in one bundle.
(Tape 5B ends)
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217	A VAN STRAATEN

ADRIAAN VAN STRAATEN: (sworn states)

<UNKNOWN>: Mr Van Straaten, you were born on the 5th of March 1958 in Rustenburg?

MR VAN STRAATEN: That is correct.

<UNKNOWN>: Will you tell the commission about your childhood, where you grew up, also about your parents and your brothers?   You were nine children, tell us how you fit into this family situation, the whole, where you fit into the nine children?

MR VAN STRAATEN: I was born in Rustenburg, I am the third eldest son of seven brothers, and also the fourth oldest child of nine.   We lived in Rustenburg for about three years and then we moved to Vereeniging.   I lived there throughout my childhood and went to school there also.   I finished primary school there.   I grew up in a very conservative way, my father was, amongst others, a member of the Ossewa Brandwag.   I then went to secondary school.

<UNKNOWN>: May I interrupt you?   You say your father was a member of the Ossewa Brandwag.   What influence did this have on your education and your childhood, in what way did he communicate this to you?

MR VAN STRAATEN: My father taught us that things are right or wrong and that black people should be subjects and slaves, they should be used as labourers.   During that time, I saw many times how black people were attacked and beaten, I never knew why.   As I grew up in our area, there was also a nine o'clock curfew, after which black people were not allowed in the area.   There were patrol vehicles who took people away off the streets who did not obey the curfew, they simply took them away, beat them up, and this is the kind of context in which I grew up.   I then went to
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secondary school, and I continued in a similar vein.   Many of the places where I went, such as shops, shopping centres or malls, cafes, if there were black people, then we simply followed this tradition and also beat people up.   I never knew what the reasons for this was, this was simply the way things were, we grew up in this way and this is how things went.