Human Rights Violation Hearings — Alexandra — 1996-10-29

MR LEWIN: Mama, thanks very much.  (Witness upset).

MRS MATLANA: While I was then after my child's death this white policemen came and they came to one house where there was a tent and they were running after some children.   The children ran towards the house and got into the house.  When they arrived and entered the house I asked them, I didn't know that they understood Zulu and I asked in Zulu what are they looking for because they have already killed my son and one of the white men answered me and he said to me we are looking for (indistinct) this is the young kids.  There were so many people in my house and they said they are going to take me and kill me in the house.  However, the people tried to ask them not to kill me.  I don't remember - I would like to apologise before God, I don't think of anything if ever I was to be employed I was going to poison the white man's children.  The way they killed my son hitting him against a rock and we found him with a swollen head, they killed him in a tragic manner and I don't think I will ever forgive in this case, especially to these police who were involved and who were there.  What worries me the most is that the Alexandra policemen were the people who were running around, they were called (indistinct) those were the people who
ALEXANDRA HEARING TRC/GAUTENG
7 MADLANA
started all the altercations between them and the children because on the 1st January until new year they were guarding one women's hostel where this incidents where there was this first child to be buried.  He was standing in front of  his gate and he was shot by police from the (indistinct) police station.  This boy was playing for a soccer club called Mighty Quin.  They came with their guns and they shot us, we were cooking, they poured some tear-gas in the pots in which we were cooking and from there up to the time where there was this six days war.  Thereafter they continued in February and came to kill one child at 3rd Avenue. I would say that children got angry because they could see that the police were finishing us.  The very same police that were staying with us.  The (indistinct) police from Alexandra, this it the people who were doing that.  Those are the people who started the violence and killing our children and they started the whole violence because children got angry, there was no need for them to go and guard the hostel and kill the child from the apartheid family.  Why did they kill him.  They killed him because they knew he was a leader of the youth.  I would say that they are the ones who started the violence within the community.  If they don't come Mtebi and Sindani, these two people one of them, Sam who have already died, he has followed the children that he killed.  However Sindani is still alive.  We are very much angry about this because one child from Tembisa was also a leader.  He is the one who was calling people around the children, organising them to go and burn his house because he was  angry because his mother had left him behind.  This Sindani came to me to tell me that he has not finished the killings, they are still going to kill and Mtebi himself came to say
ALEXANDRA HEARING TRC/GAUTENG
8 MADLANA
the very same words.  They said they are coming to kill all the young kids and the dogs and they are also coming to kill the leaders.  Therefore I don't think there will be any reconciliation or forgiveness because today the police in Alexandra, they promote crime because they eat together with these criminals.  They are crooks, they are still doing the very same things that they used to do and therefore I don't think I will ever forgive police.  (Witness upset).

MR LEWIN: Mrs Madlana we hear you.

MRS MATLANA: What will make me to forgive is if Sindani and Mtebi, these two policemen come and tell us why he killed these sons of the wars and also ask for forgiveness before the mothers of these children.  It is then that I can forgive him.  I am so surprised to find out that today that Mtebi is today a reverend and which children is he preaching to and which parents is he preaching to if he killed the children of the wars.  I would like Sindani and Mtebi to come and ask for forgiveness.  Thereafter I might consider forgiving them, together with his fellow white people who came to kill our children.  They just killed these defenceless children with their machine guns.  They brought their dogs and hoses running after young children with machine guns with the aim of killing the black nation, the black race underneath the sun.  I will say that I will never forgive because this was my last born.  Maybe if he was still alive he was going to be married by now have some children and a wife but because they have killed him I will never rest because I used to go out and go and sleep on top of his grave because even today I still go there and pray in his grave.  I will never forgive them if they don't come before the Commission.
ALEXANDRA HEARING TRC/GAUTENG
9 MADLANA

MR LEWIN: I would like to thank you for telling us this story.  We hear what you are saying and I think that we can all understand the pain and the grief that you have and the anger that you have.  What we as the Commission are trying to do is to uncover this type of story in this sort of detail so that we are then able to find the people who did this and what you have told us will never be forgotten. You have now told people in public, you have shared your grief and this is something that is actually very important that you do that.  We will through our investigative unit follow up as closely as possible and when we find these people yes we will bring them to you, bring you together with them so that they too can feel what you feel.  My only other question is because you have given such a graphic description of what happened at that time and shown us your anger, which I think we all appreciate.  My only other question is just about Bongani.  I mean you say he was 12 or 13 at the time.

MRS MATLANA: He was 12 years old, he was about to turn 13.  He was not yet 13.

MR LEWIN: What about your other children?  You have your one daughter with you.  Do you have other children as well?

MRS MATLANA: The others are all grown up.  He was my last boy.  The one before him is Woesi is also married now.  Bongani was my last boy.  The others were daughters.  I would like to say that for me to forgive, and I don't see the opportunity of me forgiving anyone, I suffered a lot because of this because I didn't understand why the children were killed but there is just one important thing I would like to say before the Commission, before our children and the whole country.  At the beginning of the struggle the
ALEXANDRA HEARING TRC/GAUTENG
10 MADLANA
struggle started at Wits University within the white community where white students threw away their books not even a single of them was tear-gassed or killed.  However, when black children started fighting for their liberation they were shot by guns.  We had to bury a lot of people killed by these guns and I would like to say I have buried a lot, I am only left with four children. However, when their children started to fight for their rights they were not killed.  However, our children when they started the very same thing they were killed since from 1976 up to 1986.  They never buried any one or where we find them coming to a mass funeral saying that these white people were on strike and we shot them or killed them.  Even today they still do that, they fight for their rights but they are not tear-gassed or killed.  Things like that we can find out that there was this apartheid system working within the black community, we were taken as dogs, baboons and all such things.  These dogs and baboons which work for them, which bath their children, cook for their children however they are still content to kill them.