Human Rights Violation Hearings — Newcastle — 1996-09-10

MR LAX: You've said in your statement that after the unbanning of the ANC, and when the exiles came home, you were sort of expecting him to come.  Do we understand from that that you had thought that maybe he went into exile?

WITNESS:   I had that in mind.  I thought he had skipped the country.  I always entertained that idea and the hope, but I never ever got any information because he never came back up until now, and we never got any light as to where he was.

MR LAX: (Inaudible) ... follow up on that.  Have you made any inquiries with the ANC, who have quite good records of their people?

WITNESS:   No, there is no investigation whatsoever that I did.  I did not do any follow up.

MR LAX: (Inaudible) ... try and do that for you, speak to them and see whether we can go through their records and maybe find a trace of him.  Were there any nicknames that he might have used, names he would have been known to his friends by, or that you might have used in his family?

WITNESS:   He used to be called Mazambani.

MR LAX: /COMMISSIONER

COMMISSIONER: We have heard stories like the one that you have told us from so many other parents who have talked about the disappearance of their - mainly about their sons, and when we hear these stories we realise that we lived in a very unusual, abnormal society, where parents had no expectation that they would see their children grow up securely and safely in their own houses.  So many of these young people were forced into exile, into strange places.  Some of them returned after their training, and they were killed or they were arrested by the police.  A small number of them were imprisoned in camps run by the ANC in Zambia and Angola.  Many of them came back in 1990 and 1991, and some of them simply disappeared and have not been heard of.  It seems like your son was one of these, and it must have been very difficult to have spent this long time wondering about where he was, worrying about where he was.  In fact some parents have told us that they would even prefer to know that their son had died.  At least they would have some rest, rather than to go on worrying about him.
As Mr Lax has said, we will try to investigate what happened to your son.  It's a long time, it's 20 years, so we can't guarantee that we will be successful, but we've -in fact Mr Lax has already taken steps through our investigation unit to contact the ANC to see whether they have any information on their books as to where your son might be, and we will certainly pass that information on to you as soon as we get it.
So we thank you and your family very much for coming in her today, sharing your story with us, and we hope very much that we will be able to bring you some good news in the future.  Thank you very much indeed.

COMMISSIONER: Mrs Madela, we welcome you here today.  You have come from Mndeni village near Newcastle to tell us about the death of your husband, Thomas Mabhoyi Madela, who died in February 1992.  You have got somebody with you today.  Who is that person who is sitting with you on the stage?

DORIS MADELA: It's my sister.

COMMISSIONER: (Inaudible) ... today.  Can you stand up to take the oath now please.

DORIS MADELA: (Sworn, States)   (Through Interpreter)

COMMISSIONER: Mrs Madela, now your husband who died in 1992, did you have any children together with your husband?

WITNESS:   It was before we could have children.

COMMISSIONER: And how old was your husband at the time of his death?

WITNESS:   He was 38 years old.

COMMISSIONER: (Inaudible) ... employed?

WITNESS:   Yes, he was working.

COMMISSIONER: He was working at Rheingold Furnishers in Newcastle.  Okay, and where were you living at the time, Mrs Madela?  Where were you and your husband living?

WITNESS:   No 697, Section 1, in Madadeni township.

COMMISSIONER: Can you now tell us what happened on that day in February.  I think you said it was the 29th of February, when you received a phone call?  Can you tell us - take up the story from there and tell us what happened?