Amnesty Hearings — Johannesburg — 1998-06-09

MR TLOUBATLA: I'm talking about your school at the time, not you personally.

SIMON MORRIS: Yes.

MR TLOUBATLA: Please refer to that.

CHAIRPERSON: Your answer is that when you say your school was not involved in politics, you are not lying, you are telling the truth?

SIMON MORRIS: Yes sir.

CHAIRPERSON: There's your answer.

MR TLOUBATLA: Thank you Mr Chairman.  Now let's move on to the assaults on you at the house of Jeff Lingani.  You told us in detail how you were assaulted but one specific assault that I want to refer to, you say you were hit with an iron bar.  Which part of the body were you hit with that iron bar and how severe was it?

SIMON MORRIS: When I was hit with the iron bar it was in the bedroom when I was blindfolded with the plastic.  I was then hit in the body with an iron bar.  When I came back from the kitchen again I was then tortured with a plier.

MR TLOUBATLA: So with the iron bar you were hit - which part of the body were you hit?

SIMON MORRIS: The iron bar was applied randomly, so if it hits the body, automatically the head will also be affected because they were just hitting like that, if you are using maybe a stick.

MR TLOUBATLA: Sorry, with this iron bar you were hit all over the body.  Is that how I understand it?

SIMON MORRIS: Yes.

MR TLOUBATLA: Was it hard?

SIMON MORRIS: How can I say it is soft Mr Tloubatla?

MR TLOUBATLA: No.

CHAIRPERSON: In all fairness to yourself Mr Morris the - when you speak of the iron bar is it the object which was used to hit you when you were blindfolded?

SIMON MORRIS: Yes sir.

CHAIRPERSON: You actually didn't see but you conclude that it must be the iron bar which you saw in the kitchen?

SIMON MORRIS: Yes, after being blindfolded I then bit the plastic, as I inhaled the plastic went to the face ... (intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: And you were later able to see that it was an iron bar.

SIMON MORRIS: It was taken out because I was suffocating and I saw it was an iron bar.

CHAIRPERSON: It was an iron bar.

MR TLOUBATLA: When I say hard I don't mean the iron bar, I mean was it applied hard on your body.  In other words - how do I put it to you?

SIMON MORRIS: Yes it was hard.

MR TLOUBATLA: Did you sustain any injuries as a result of that iron bar?

SIMON MORRIS: There'a a lot of injuries which I sustained because my legs cannot function correctly presently, my left arm is also weak because when I tried to block I sustained injuries.  My cheekbones where I have the lower gums are not strong enough.

MR TLOUBATLA: Right, why I'm specifically asking this particular question is that it's an iron bar, you say it was applied hard on various parts of your body including your head, but what surprised me is that you're not even sporting a scar on you face to show that you received this hard iron bar on the face?

SIMON MORRIS: Yes I don't have a scar because we don't heal the same.  Our antibodies are not working to heal wounds the same way.  You can be surprised now that I was shot in the head but you cannot point where I was shot.  So does it surprise you?

MR TLOUBATLA: Yes I'm surprised.   Alright.  In any event we are not for one moment saying that you were not assaulted but basically all what I want to - I'm putting this to you that do not try and exaggerate.  In other words you are exaggerating some of the assaults.

MR BRINK: Mr Chairman I'm not sure, with respect, this line of cross examination is getting anywhere.  It's common cause there were assaulted, it's common cause there were very seriously assaults.  Common cause that pliers were used to the man's testicles now to say that he's exaggerating a seriousness of assaults is really time consuming and not helping this committee with great respect.  He must stick to the point.  Whether this man is lying about torture, he can't be because it's common cause, whether he's lying about have survived a murder, he can't be.  Let's move on please.

MR TLOUBATLA: Thank you Mr Chairman, I'm thankful to Mr Brink for the - at least to bring me back to where we are.  As I said that the applicants are not suggesting that you were not assaulted, but let me move on to this other situation.  When you were apprehended by the applicants in Orlando East, did they mention any specific reason why they are apprehending your group?

SIMON MORRIS: The reason that they apprehended us, they said we burned a house in Orlando West.

MR TLOUBATLA: Alright.  During the course of your interrogation, during the course of your assault and humiliation were you ever asked about your political activities?

SIMON MORRIS: They said to us we were causing trouble in the location.  We said what kind of a trouble is that.  They then accused us of liking too much school.

MR TLOUBATLA: So what I want to - in fact my question is - let me be more specific, did they ask you about the UDF, whether you are members of the UDF, whether you are members of SOSCO, whether you are members of COSAS, whether you are members of political organisations that were operating in Soweto at the time?

SIMON MORRIS: We were told that we were members of the UDF, that is what we were told, we were not asked.

MR TLOUBATLA: Okay, that's how you understood it, it doesn't matter.  And now the next question that I want to ask you.  Did they ask you about whom you are receiving your instructions, that is on a local level within the UDF or whatever organisation they are accusing you of belonging to?

SIMON MORRIS: Sir I don't know what kind of and instruction are we talking about because we said to them at Orlando East that we never burned the house, we even said to them inside the house, in the kitchen that we never burned the house.  We even said to them in the bedroom that we have never burned the house, even in that place where they mentioned Glen's house, (indistinct) we have never burned a house.

MR TLOUBATLA: But from what transpired, my observation is that they didn't believe you at all, nothing whatever you said they didn't believe you that is why they proceeded with what they did.  Am I correct?

SIMON MORRIS: They might have proceeded with the beating or the torturing maybe because they enjoyed it.  We were just helpless as we are helpless now.

CHAIRPERSON: Really the question is, he's saying to you that it seems that despite what you said that you were not UDF, you did not burn the house, it would seem that they did not believe you, that is why they eventually shot you.

SIMON MORRIS: They went on torturing because we said no, all of us we were taken to two groups (indistinct).

CHAIRPERSON: But do you think they believe you when you told them look we didn't burn this house, we are not UDF, do you think they believe you?

SIMON MORRIS: I don't know sir.

MR TLOUBATLA: You also mentioned that - you know you mentioned specific people, particularly in the house that this one did this, this one did this.  Right, when you entered that place, how many people were there in that house?

SIMON MORRIS: As I've said earlier on that when we entered the house there were about nine to eleven men inside.

MR TLOUBATLA: Quite a number of faces?

SIMON MORRIS: Yes.

MR TLOUBATLA: Mr Morris don't you think it is possible to confuse faces in that situation under that type of pressure?

SIMON MORRIS: You can confuse a face but you cannot confuse a person who has shot you, you cannot you.  And the person who is now torturing you personally, you can not.

MR TLOUBATLA: Do you recall the face or the name of the person who personally shot you?

SIMON MORRIS: I was shot by Hlasa.

MR TLOUBATLA: Right.

SIMON MORRIS: One shot which went through my knee, he fired to shoot but as I said earlier on the bullets just went aside and Mphoreng also shot me because the gun was not working very well, it jammed.

MR TLOUBATLA: Okay.  In all you were fired, you mentioned about eight shots that were fired at you.

SIMON MORRIS: I was hit by three, missed by seven.