Special Hearings — Mental Health Workshop — UNKNOWN

MS MKHIZE: Okay I would like really now to say look, I would like to thank all of you.  I know you are all extremely busy people for making time to come and share with us in this difficult task.  Internally within the Commission Zina has worked very hard trying to bring all of you here.  Unfortunately she couldn't participate in this process because she's preparing briefers for the next hearings which are coming up on Monday; Winnie Madikizela hearing, so she's very busy but I would like to thank her in absentia.
 Sorry I didn't see her, I asked her why she was so quiet and then she said she'd be in and out and so I thought she was out.
(Indistinct comment from panel member)  Maybe that's another reason why she's hiding.  And having said that, also maybe if I can just respond to some of the concerns regarding the first hearings we had in May/June and these ones, I remember at one time I flew down to Durban. We went through a process of going around talking to grouping about what we are going to do and at the end we ended up with a few, the people who saw were really the people who responded; and as a Commission we have come to accept that, that not to say each time we like people to come and interact with us they will all be available.  We have come to accept that many people who have a willingness and a desire to make a contribution it's sometimes almost impossible especially at this point in time when people who are in positions of power are overstretched. I mean I will take a good example.  I don't want to mention anyone boldly but people who are really likely to take over some of the processes, they couldn't come. We heard that they are here, they are in Cape Town, they are in this meeting so it says a lot about where we are as a country and how stretched we are.  I'm not using that as a defence but that's a strong factor.  Just coming to organising this one I didn't know that Saths Cooper will come.  We insisted that we stick to the things which we have thought of.  We couldn't get somebody from the Department of Health, we couldn't get somebody from the Medical and Dental Council.  Initially we thought they would be represented by Saths but the answer was he might not be available.  We decided to have the topic in any way.  By chance he walked in when we started.  So that's, I'm referring to him because he made it, otherwise I wouldn't like the Media to say the TRC expected so and so and he didn't come.  
 So that was another factor that many people who had even agreed and made a commitment that they will come, they didn't come.
 Regarding communication within the TRC, some of you might have seen our booklet called The Truth Talk.  We came up with that booklet mainly because we felt we needed a simplest way of communicating with our staff and NGO's, you can pick it up anywhere but you heard that some people said that they don't know what the Committee is doing, and after each Commission meeting, whenever policies are approved by the Commission we come back and all the officers they are going through a same process, Committees Report to Staff from a housekeeper to a Commissioner in another committee. We report, we say look here are our policy proposals, they have been approved, workshops are put up, publicised internally and externally but it just happened that all the time people feel left out.  So that's not a justification but it's something which we have come to live with.
 Coming to this specific workshop, or maybe before coming to it, also something which I think is important to share with you, as a Commission I should think we have also realised that we symbolise a difficult part which people don't know how to interact with; people get angry at us, they get frustrated, it's a very frustrating structure.  People live with this love and hate sort of feeling.  Sometimes they are excited that the truth is coming to the fore but sometimes it's extremely frustrating in the sense that it forces them to visit the memory of the past.  Our Committee in particular has suffered mainly because of the things which were discussed here, the status of the profession per se and how our profession somehow colluded with the previous government in human rights violation.  As you heard how for instance our theories of racism informed the whole apartheid system and all those things, our Committee becomes a symbol of this bad past and time and again those reflections they end up stifling our work and compromise what the Committee's capable of doing, and I think it's something which we have realised that it's very very important to communicate with professional bodies because if we as a professional grouping don't act on those issues, in terms of making sure that there's an internal mechanism to deal with those colleagues who were part of the system, who colluded in human rights violations and making sure that also we have a strong culture of human rights within our profession, our profession is likely to suffer even more.
 Well when we started yesterday, I will remind you of what we said; we said we have had quite a number of people coming before us who had made statements but who had expressed difficult emotions like anger, depression, suffering, complicated grief and all those difficult emotions which go with the past, and we said it's difficult for us to name what we are dealing with; we are not too keen to diagnose those people because we know those are people who are people who were functioning at a high level, they were leaders.  If I might steal some of the words which have emerged from this workshop that those people need to be affirmed, that was our feeling as well, that those were not just people who were mental ill but strong leaders who for some reason where their bones were broken by the previous government because of the positions they held and their beliefs.  So I should think also we're concerned about a body which will look after them and I'm just picking up those tow because those were two pressing points in our own minds but reflecting on what has emerged here, especially just taking from the reports that we have had from working groups, it's like out of this workshop there is an awareness that the whole question of mental health needs to be looked at very carefully in the sense that it's not mental health in a traditional sense of the word where people are thinking about pathology, but it's a search for an environment which is conducive to peoples' well-being.  Of course people here who have looked at survivors of human rights violation as we have them today and also people who will suffer because of the legacies of the past, people like the question of people who's rights will be violated or who will be abused by let's say perpetrators. So that also has been very very helpful for us to broaden a scope of understanding what is in our data base.
 And reflecting on what was said I should think that we accept a challenge that as a Commission we have a very limited capacity, especially to investigate allegations that there are documents out there which were written up by experts in our field which are likely to perpetuate discrimination, racism and beliefs about other people that they are less human and they can be treated anyhow.  I mean as we have said, if we can be given specific names of those documents, we'll be keen to have a look at them.  
 The question of professionals who in the past used their expertise in oppressing detainees, it's also a very difficult one especially in instances where it is said they are still in positions of, some of them in positions of power and influence within a new dispensation.  Again because of our limited capacity to investigate, it's a question of really appealing to people that look, if you have names that will make the lives of the investigative unit much much easier. And also the question of the body which will take over; already we have recommended that the body which follow up all the recommendations of the TRC should be the President's office.  The reason why I mean a comment was that body should have a similar clout so to say, political clout; I should think the President's office, we thought is a critical body because it has the highest authority and a level of accountability in terms of what is done for survivors of human rights violations and also what he matched that there should be a special consideration of people like in other countries.  I should think that office is in the best position to really push and make sure that in a work place, in public life in general for a limited period of time, people who are survivors of human rights violations  are given special treatment.  I know of course some people will question that but given the motivation which we had, it makes a lot of sense to us, especially the fact that that can go on for a limited period of time.
 Regarding the question of the body, although there have been different proposals, in some instances it was like people were opposed to each other.  I should think basically we appreciate the view that there should be an interministerial or interdepartmental cooperation in addressing these issues and I agree with you that maybe a proposal that we need a human service department might be too radical, given the fact that already government ministries have initiated new plans in this era.  
 So from our point of view a lot of suggestions which have been generated here we will take forward and incorporate them with our thinking and limit ourselves to our mandate and we are hoping that representatives of professional bodies here will make sure that the debate continues because after we have made our recommendations the very professional bodies which are in existence today, will have a responsibility to monitor and to take forward some of the suggestions.
 I've left out an important question of the kind of research which will enable as many people as possible to generate questions around this process after the life of the Commission and what has been suggested especially around the good example which was raised now of a video-dialogue project.  I should think it adds to what was said earlier on using poems and all other moods, story-telling of communication that we need to be creative and make sure that as many people as possible are part of the process of telling their stories and revisiting their past.  And also an important suggestion which we hope it won't be lost and we have noted that it is the idea of having something similar to a holocaust museum.  We have noted that and fortunately the Ministry of Arts and Culture, they seem to be positive to the idea and are wanting to start from the past and link it up with the rainbow nation, what is happening today during this era.  
 So I will really like to thank you very much, especially people who came from KwaZulu Natal and the Western Cape, Lion and Nicholas and A...(indistinct) Bhana, we thank you very much for coming, not to say we don't value the Gautengers but we really appreciate, especially I know at this point in time universities are very busy preparing marks for students but we thought this is important enough, so thank you.