Amnesty Hearings — Pinetown — 1999-03-08

MR WILLS: Not to my knowledge, and I submit to be corrected because there is a voluminous, there's literally tens of incidents, but I've divided the issue up in my Heads to specific incidents of orders, where like Mr Stewart I've referred those to, as you'll see in page 9 of my Heads, identification and elimination of specific targets relating to the Izingolweni matters, and there I've detailed where they got the orders from and what's that about.
	But then the issue, the second issue that I deal with, and I'll get to, and I think I need to elaborate slightly on what Mr Stewart has said, relates to the, what I term the so called indiscriminate attacks, and I think in that category there are certain cases where it may be submitted, in my submission without merit, that they were acting outside the mandate of their superiors.  	But if I could just, with respect Mr Chairperson, just focus for a short while on the importance of the membership of this military machine and its implications on the applicants.  Because it's my submission that it's this very membership, without, if they didn't have this membership they wouldn't have been in the position they were, and obviously also the dehumanising effect of that, on each of the applicants, I think must be taken into consideration.  Particularly in relation to applicant seven, Hlongwane, who was involved in horrendous direct conflicts from a very young age.  And it could be argued with merit that somebody who finds himself in that position would not be able to be discerning in his later life, and that I think is borne out with his subsequent history.
	There's also the division, as I see it, in the IFP military structures.  On the one hand you've got people like Mkhize and Luthuli and Dlamini, who got involved, and Mbambo, who got involved in formal hit squad structures, and later on Hlongwane joined, but I think there's also an important aspect of just youth getting involved through informal structures and being controlled specifically by local people on the ground, particularly the people in Hammarsdale, Mr Mkehle was a dominant influence in regard to Hlongwane, and because the relationship was quite a loose military relationship, there were just broad instructions given to attack the ANC and the UDF, and obviously if that is the case, there would be a wide range of activities which possibly might not be sanctioned other than by a broad instruction.
	Another aspect which Mr Stewart has referred to briefly, which I concentrate on and I think is important, is at page 5 of my Heads, and it's what I've titled the territorial dynamics of the conflict.  It's a unique feature of the Natal violence, in my submission, that the conflict relates so directly to territory, and the whole of the conflict was about dominance of particular geographical areas, to the extent, as I say in my heads, that one could more or less rely on the fact of if one lived in a particular area than one would be a member of the political party that was dominant in that area.  This aspect of the conflict I submit is important particularly when one looks at what might, had it not been for that characteristic, be considered indiscriminate attacks.
I think the evidence of Hlongwane in the Hammarsdale record, is pertinent in this regard.  He, as a young man, was under the impression that it was his, it was for him to fulfil the objectives of his organisation, that the UDF should not exist and not be able to govern Mpumalanga.  
"...We were supposed to eliminate the UDF, everybody, everybody belonging to the UDF was supposed to be eliminated at the time."
Luthuli also comments on this, that it would be assumed that because in an area there are certain people who belong to a certain political organisation, which is controlled by a certain organisation, those people would have to be killed.  And I think this relationship which the foot soldiers had with  their superiors who had this attitude, clearly gave them the distinct impression that it was their party's policy to adopt this approach, and it was part of the policy of the IFP military to take, to attack anybody in an ANC area.

SISI KHAMPEPE: Is it policy Mr Wills, or practice?