Amnesty Hearings — East London — 1998-04-07

ELIZABETH ANNE SAVAGE: There's just one more thing and I ...[inaudible] it's too philosophic but I really, the thing that has hurt me the most about this whole hearing is that somehow there's a feeling that all white people are bad and what I want to say to you is that night at the Golf Club the majority of people, my best friend in fact, spoke to one of you gentlemen right in the front there and compared the evening.  That lady spent her life going around various settlements organising pre-school equipment for children. I myself come from a family that was severely discriminated against during the National Regime.   My father had his telephone tapped, we were actually hounded out of a very strong Nationalist stronghold.  I can remember my mother walking the streets at night, looking for my father wanting to see if he had disappeared so it's a wheel that just goes round and round, healing comes in time but please not all white people are bad and boogymans, really, believe me.  A lot of us were actively involved in the struggle.  So that's all I would like to say thank you very much.

MR MBANDAZAYO: Mr Chairman, it's not a question, it's just that I want just to ask Mrs Savage just one question.  It's a question that - now that you have heard the applicants and explained why they did what they did, how do you feel about it?

ELIZABETH ANNE SAVAGE: As I said to you it's between him and his Maker.  I do what I have to do and he did what he felt he had to do, so you know, it's not for me to comment, I don't have a problem with amnesty.

MR MBANDAZAYO: What I was trying to get at, I'm not saying maybe you agree with them with what they did, what I wanted to get at is that now that have come forward and told what went
through them when they did what they did.  All of us we don't know whether is what happened is only them and the Maker truly who knows what actually happened but what I'm saying, now that you have heard and they have said what they have to say here, how do you feel that they have also poured out what was inside them?

ELIZABETH ANNE SAVAGE: I think it's very brave and I do believe that if I had been born black I would feel exactly as they have felt and I would probably have been the most, the worst rebel you could wish to find.

MR MBANDAZAYO: Thank you Mrs Savage.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you for coming to us and telling us what you've done and felt and I'm sure I speak for everybody here that you have our highest regard and best wishes for the future.
WITNESS EXCUSED

MR PRIOR: ...[inaudible] call Mr Davis.

MARK DAVIS: (sworn states)

MR PRIOR: Thank you Mr Davis.  Is it correct that your parents were both attending the function at the Golf Club on the evening of the 28th November 1992 during the APLA attack and both were fatally injured, both died, is that correct?

MARK DAVIS: Yes.

MR PRIOR: You wish to address the committee on this matter and could you please proceed with what you wanted to say?
Could you tell us a bit about your parents?

MARK DAVIS: I was not present on that night as I cannot lead evidence directly but I would like to record some of my thoughts and feelings about this process.
	I think that by and large we have heard a lot of the truth from the applicants and their version of the events that happened.  There may be some disputes here and there but I feel that by large they have revealed their experiences.  I think it's clear that their actions were politically motivated whether or not their actions satisfy the proportionality requirement is something I don't feel qualified to judge.  I think that I'm personally too affected to make that judgement but I trust the Commission will make that judgement.  I think that at one level my parents died as a result of a horrible accident that seeking to hit a target of military and political personnel, APLA hit a Christmas party for the Wine Circle.  But at another level, my parents died because they were symbols and I think this is how the applicants see it.  They died, as white people they were symbols of an oppressive system of government and I think that for me, part of my understanding and as part of my healing process, is to see them again not as symbols and not as victims but as people -  see my parents again as mother and father.  My parents had a life which had it's share of losses and pain.  Three months before they died my eldest brother died, took his own life.  It was a tragedy which had hit them extremely hard and I think at the time that they died, they were just beginning - just beginning to grapple with that.  I think people who knew my parents will testify that they were loyal friends, extremely loyal to the people they knew and they were also very close and intimate married couple.  They were a loving husband and wife and a model which I have found inspiring in my own marriage and I think lastly they were extremely caring parents.  Caring to me and my younger sister and my elder brother who died. 
	So I think that for me one of the primary objectives of this reconciliation process is for me to see my parents not as the symbols for which they died but as the human beings in the role the played in my life.  
	Over the past two days I have heard the anger expressed by the applicants, the anger at what they saw and suffered under the Apartheid System.  Well I hear that anger and I sympathise with it and as far as I possibly can I empathise with it but I would also like them to hear my anger, an anger at my sense of loss of having lost my parents and the loss that my sister and I have had to bear.  Within a week or two of my parents' death my sister developed her first symptoms of Multiple Sclerosis which the doctors confirmed came on as a result of the trauma.  Multiple Sclerosis is a nervous system disorder.  She is now largely confined to a wheel chair and is partially blind.  So part of my anger is about having to have to bear these things - my sister too, having to have to bear these things.  
	But I think that part of my path of reconciliation is having to find a way to lay that anger down, to put it to rest and I would hope too that the applicants would feel that they have the opportunity to lay their anger down too.  Which makes me think about another kind of reconciliation - the kind which I think most people think of when they think of the TRC and that is whether there can be any reconciliation between the perpetrators and people such as myself.  It's difficult for me to think about, having been here for the last few days I'm not even sure the applicants wish that or perhaps this isn't the right occasion.
	I'm not even sure under what pre-conditions or under what conditions any kind of reconciliation can occur but I would like to state that I am willing to engage in a process which might lead to that so I would like to say that I am open to that and if people here are willing to engage me in that they can do so through the TRC.  That's all I'd like to say.

MR PRIOR: Thank you, Mr Chairman.

MR MBANDAZAYO: Mr Chairman, it's just a comment just directed to Mr Davis to say that I'm sorry of the tragedy that befell your family before and during the event and after the event and I think also I'm expressing the views of the applicants on that
score.

MARK DAVIS: Thank you.

CHAIRPERSON: What is your sister's name?

MARK DAVIS: Sarah Davis.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Davis, once again, I know I speak on behalf of the Committee and I'm sure I speak on behalf of all who have heard you.  We extend to you our deepest sympathy and our love and understanding to both you and Sarah and we hope that in days to come you can think back of the sympathy we all have for you.

MARK DAVIS: Thank you.
WITNESS EXCUSED

MR PRIOR: Mr Chairman, I finally call Mr Craig MacDonald.
	Mr MacDonald lost both his parents, Mr and Mrs MacDonald.

CRAIG MACDONALD: (sworn states)