Human Rights Violation Hearings — Durban — 1996-08-29

WITNESS:   It was a funeral of Mrs Shabalala.  We were at a meeting just before the funeral.  We were at a meeting of the Clermont community at night.  Just when the meeting was going on Shabalala's boy came and said, "Rush, Dad, my mum has been shot already."  We left the meeting immediately.  We rushed to the scene and we found her.  Truly she was shot, and she was lying there in the river of blood.  It looked like they had slaughtered three sheep, but she was already taken to the hospital.  We went to Mariannhill and we got there.  We found out that she was not inside, but still in the van outside.  The doctor saw that she had already died.  But what was the most painful thing to see is the way she died.  She died brutally.  I was one of the speakers at her funeral, representing the businessmen of Clermont.  My speech was not so long, it was brief, because there wasn't much to say.  But what I think brought enmity for me are the things that I said.  I remember one time when we heard ... (inaudible) ... on an Indian in Durban who had already finished people.  Many people will remember this.  I think one day - what I am telling you is that one day he was arrested.  I remembered Mavini, who finished the whole world killing people, but he was finally arrested.  And I said this person who committed this crime - because we knew, we suspected someone, and there was one we suspected so strongly that he had committed this crime, and I said, "God will disclose the person who has done this.  We will get to know about the person who did this."  And when I got outside after my speech I met Mr Makhatini outside, who was Jamile's friend.  And I said, "Mr Makhatini" - he is my cousin by the way, I said, "You go and tell your friend, because you know each other and you know very well that he did this, but finally he will get arrested.  He must know that."  And after that my cousin dismissed all what I said and went on.  Then after a few days, because the funeral day was Tuesday - Wednesday, Thursday, Friday - Saturday morning, it was just during the day Saturday, I visited one of my friends, who was a businessman in Pinetown.  We were just chatting.  I told him the danger of what transpired, and also I went on to say that, "I am sure those people will get so agitated and so annoyed and so angry from what I have said in my speech.  I know they will be after me."  Now, one time we were sleeping at night, as I have already said that all my children have left home because they are older.  We were there with the helper, with my wife and myself and the helper at night.  I heard my wife waking me up, saying, "Obed, wake up.  There are people talking outside, making noise."  When I tried to open my eyes I stood up.  It was around half past 12 on the 21st of February 1988.  When I woke up, went to the passage in the house, I just saw this rainbow.  It was green-red in the house already, and I got back.  I said, "Wake up, wake up, we are being bombed here."  My wife woke up and I approached the door, the kitchen door.  When I was opening the door I saw people standing out there in their uniforms, police uniforms, and their caps.  One other was so fat and the other was so tiny.  When I tried to do this he shot me just once, and it just got into my thigh.  It grazed my thigh.  They were shaking, and you could tell that the things that they were doing were evil.  And he shot me once again, and that hit me.  That one was scaring.  I could see smoke, and I got shot.  And I tried to hold onto the door, and I could feel that I have some kind of fracture on my foot.  And I said to my wife, "Let's call the police quickly."  I tried to hold onto my wife, walk slowly towards the phone, and I picked up the receiver.  As I was trying to dial I saw my wife dropping something, and I saw her running out.  When she was trying to run out there those people came.  This other one looked at me.  My wife managed to escape, to run away from the situation.  Right at that time when that guy was trying to hit me, beat me, I held him tight.  When I was trying to even hold even stronger, trying to get his cap off so I could see him who he was, he refused and he shot me again.  And I said to myself, "He got me this time."  I said, "Yes, he got me."  The house was in flames.  You see, before I came home, before I went back inside - maybe let me say this.  Before all this transpired we used to rehearse and say, "When people come to shoot us what will we do?"  We had a basement.  Now, my friend's child fell there on that basement, and that's just how my wife fell, just like that child, to the basement.  Well, as I was there shattered, in pain still, it was dark at home, but you could see one another because of the flames, fire.  They ran away, the fled.  When I heard from people they were 19.  19 people were outside and two inside.  In all they were 21.  I just heard that from people.  I just heard that figure from people.  The house was burning, the curtains in fire, the headboards in flames, smoky all over.  I said to myself, "You know, I once said when I die I should be cremated, but I never thought I will die alive like this in this way."  But suddenly I recalled and my memory got back, and I went to the dressing table and I tried to open the window, and the air got in now and I could breathe properly after that.  You see I could feel that I have lost my arm and my foot as well.  I cannot even walk or do anything.  I tried to walk and I did.  When I was trying to shake I could feel the bone.  I held onto the bone so strongly and struggled with my other left foot to walk.  And in the passage it was wet because my wife was trying to extinguish the fire using water.  I crawled, crawled up to the kitchen, and there was a steps towards the basement from the kitchen side.  When I got to the steps I said, "Now I am outside even when the house is burning and in flames, but I am outside and safe."  But after some time the geyser exploded, and hot water was all over, splashing all over, and I was burned from the geyser water.  And I wasn't dressed, properly dressed, I just had a pyjama top, because I had already taken out my trouser, my pyjama bottom, because it was soaked in blood.  I tried to go out.  There was a tap down there, and I am burning, and the house also is falling apart now.  The ceiling was beginning to fall.  I was burning on the other side.  Now I said to myself, "No, let me just get down."  And also I said, "How will I get down to the steps.  Maybe I should devise a plan to get down the steps," and I held onto my thighs so tight and I went down slowly.  When I got down there there was a pipe, but fortunately I did not disconnect the hose pipe from the tap, so the hose pipe was connected to the tap.  I moved slowly towards the hose pipe to get hold of it so I could open the tap, and I sprinkled my body all over with water.  That's how I survived that fire, the burning.  And one gentleman came and said, "What's happening?"  I said, "Don't ask me questions, just try to get me out of this place."  He looked at me, and I think he just said to himself, "Things are bad here."  And I tried to move, but I could not, but the neighbours came suddenly.  My neighbours were standing watching this, so that when I was outside they quickly rushed to me.  I don't know when they came, but they were there suddenly.  The car almost caught fire, but it did not get burnt.  And the neighbours tried to help us and see how they could get us save from the situation, and they took me.  Now, when I were outside now by the street, and waiting for the ambulance, I remembered where's my wife.  I did not know where my wife is, and I went back to the house and there was no way to see where my wife was at the time.  The house was in flames, burning.  Suddenly a boy came and said - told me that my wife was out there.  She survived.  She was shot four times.  The other one grazed on the head, the other here.  Her ear is not functioning properly.  The other one the shoulder, the other one on the thigh.  Fortunately, by God's grace, I don't know how she survived this.  And after that they took us into the ambulance, we were taken to the hospital.  Most fortunately when we got to the hospital I called one doctor who was a friend of mine, and they told me he was not on duty, but he was called.  He came.  I won't mention his name because I know they'll be after him.  He contacted other doctors and they helped us, they attended us.  My wife could not even talk.  You see I talk a lot.  I have a verbal diarrhoea.  I talk a lot.  Well, the weekend passed.  On Friday - because they left me before they could do anything to my leg, to my thigh and to my foot until a certain time.  They said they will just hold on before they could do anything further or complicated on my thigh.  But they put a pin in my thigh, and it's still there even now.  During the day around 12 - I was not eating yet.  They used to bring me food at the hospital.  I will take food and try to eat, and I could not eat it.  You know, I could not even get the taste.  I will try an apple, I will try a banana, especially that I like bananas, and I will manage to eat banana and take the second banana, but I don't remember if I finished the second banana.  But at around one I felt powerless.  Because I was right next - my ward was right next to the duty room I went to the window to knock at the window, and when the nurse came she asked me, "What's happening, Mr Mthembu?  What's wrong?  Oh, please call the doctor.  I think he is dying."  I touched my tongue.  I could not feel.  I felt numb.  And the doctor marched in suddenly and asked what was happening.  You know, what completely finished me, the doctors were working 24 hours.  They did help me a lot.  After that I was discharged.