Amnesty Hearings — Sebokeng — 1998-07-13

MR BERGER: I'll give you an example, at 805 Bafokeng Street, there was a family who lived there, Victor Mkwana and his family.   When the attackers came, they ran into a back room and they barricaded the door and the windows with all the furniture that was in the room, and fortunately they survived, and after the attackers had left, they came out of the room, they found the sitting room had been smashed completely, the front door had been broken down, the chairs had been slashed with pangas, wall unit broken, from the wall unit the attackers had taken a portable television set, a large colour television set, a video cassette recorder, dinner service and so on, ornaments, and food from a locked cupboard which had been forced open.   There were bullet holes inside the house, a grandfather clock was stolen, the Disa telephone was stolen, more food in the sideboard was stolen, the dining room door was smashed, all the food in the fridge was stolen, in the main bedroom, blankets, duvets, pillows, linen, shirts, shoes, an overcoat and numerous other items of clothing were stolen.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Berger, perhaps you should give us a list of all the items that were stolen.   Seek an agreement from your colleagues to find out whether they are taking issue with whether or not food and all the other items that you are enumerating were stolen.

MR BERGER: What we'll do, Chairperson, is we will put together a list of not only things that were stolen, but people who were killed and how they were killed and all of that, we will put it to our learned friends, ask for their agreement and then hand in a memorandum to the Committee.

CHAIRPERSON: It will be very helpful, rather than going through the list of - and putting it to the witness, who apparently says he doesn't know why they were stolen.

MR BERGER: You do know, Mr Mthembu, do you not, that a vast amount of loot, by that I mean blankets, television sets and so on, all the kinds of things that I have described, were stolen from Boipatong by the attackers that night, you know that, am I right?

MR BERGER: Mr Berger, as you've just explained, I don't know why they were stealing these things, if they indeed stole these things.

CHAIRPERSON: I think what, as I understand the question, what is being put to you is this, do you accept that in the course of the attack at Boipatong certain items were stolen by the attackers, such as food, television sets and a whole variety of other goods, a list of which will be handed to us in due course?

VICTOR MTHANDENI MTHEMBU: Yes sir.

MR BERGER: And you don't know why?

VICTOR MTHANDENI MTHEMBU: No.

MR BERGER: Is your explanation about King Shaka then just something that you surmise, or is that an explanation which was given to you by somebody?

VICTOR MTHANDENI MTHEMBU: As I am explaining that I am giving you an example about what I learnt in the history of Amazulu.  Yourself as a white person would not understand this thing.  For example, women would also be abducted to become Shaka's subjects after the conquest, he would confiscate the livestock so that he could feed his people.

MR BERGER: Mr Mthembu, was the attack on Boipatong an IFP attack, or was the attack a Zulu attack?

VICTOR MTHANDENI MTHEMBU: Mr Berger, the attack on Boipatong was about these two organisations, the IFP and the ANC.

MR BERGER: After the attack, you went back to the stadium, where you all gathered, am I right?

VICTOR MTHANDENI MTHEMBU: No, no, I don't remember something like that happening.

MR BERGER: If the Committee will just bear with me please.  Mr Mthembu, I can't find it now, but I'll find the reference later and come back to it.

CHAIRPERSON: Well perhaps you should try and find it now, so that we can, because we, you know, we've been going on with this witness for a long time, I think at some point we, you know, we have to come to the end of the cross-examination, so we'll give you time to look - to find the passage and go on with your cross-examination.

MR BERGER: After the attackers came back from Boipatong, they went back to the stadium.   Mr Mthembu says they did not go back to the stadium.

CHAIRPERSON: Well is that where they're supposed to have gone back and when they're supposed to have burnt down the property?

MR BERGER: No, no, that wasn't that night.

MS PRETORIUS: Is that, sorry, is that when they had to hand over their weapons back... (intervention).

MR BERGER: Yes.

MS PRETORIUS: ...then the (indistinct) is on page 16, paragraph 33.

MR BERGER: No, no, this doesn't refer to that night, but thank you.   Mr Mthembu, your evidence is that you never went, the attackers never went back to the stadium after the attack?

VICTOR MTHANDENI MTHEMBU: Mr Berger, I think you are asking me, I came back and I just went away, I didn't go to the stadium, I don't know what happened there.

MS CLOETE: May I assist, where on page 39, paragraph 10 deals when they went back to the stadium - when they went back to Kwamadala Hostel, and he says
"By that time, I heard the sound of ambulances.  I knew they were then taking all the people who were injured to hospital.   I was so tired, because it was the first time that I had done such things.   I went to sleep because I was doing day shift."
That's the only reference I can get.

MR BERGER: All right.   Mr Mthembu, subsequent to the attack, there were meetings in the hostel, in particular there was a meeting on the Friday, the 19th of June, am I correct?

VICTOR MTHANDENI MTHEMBU: Yes sir.

MR BERGER: Did you discuss with any of your fellow attackers or was it ever discussed in your present what had happened at Boipatong on the night of the 17th of June?

VICTOR MTHANDENI MTHEMBU: Mr Berger, what I know was discussed there was that it was no longer possible for hostel residents to go to the shops in the township.   There were many police blockading the streets and people could no longer go to work.   That was what was discussed.

MR BERGER: How did you know that people had stolen blankets and television sets and two plate stoves from Boipatong, how did you know that?

VICTOR MTHANDENI MTHEMBU: I knew about this.   When we arrived back, for example, it was indicated that if there was something that was looted at Boipatong, these things should be burned.

MR BERGER: That was on the Friday?

VICTOR MTHANDENI MTHEMBU: Yes.

MR BERGER: But how did you know what had been looted from Boipatong, that's what I'm asking?   Surely you must have discussed it with your fellow attackers?

VICTOR MTHANDENI MTHEMBU: These things were brought in front of people, they were burnt in my presence.

MR BERGER: You also knew that young children and old people had been killed in the attack, am I correct?

VICTOR MTHANDENI MTHEMBU: Mr Berger, I did not have knowledge about that, I only knew about this during our criminal trial.

MR BERGER: You never discussed it with any of your fellow comrades prior to the criminal trial?

VICTOR MTHANDENI MTHEMBU: No sir, I don't remember discussing it with anyone.

MR BERGER: How many, when you came back from Boipatong, you then didn't even know if anyone had been killed, am I right?

VICTOR MTHANDENI MTHEMBU: Yes sir, I didn't know.

MR BERGER: When did you discover for the first time that people had actually been killed in Boipatong?

VICTOR MTHANDENI MTHEMBU: I heard when I arrived at work on a Thursday morning.

MR BERGER: Who told you?

VICTOR MTHANDENI MTHEMBU: My colleagues at work.

MR BERGER: And they told you that children had been killed and old people had been killed?

VICTOR MTHANDENI MTHEMBU: They told me that people had been killed at Boipatong, killed by Inkatha.