Human Rights Violation Hearings — Pretoria — 1996-08-12

MR MASUKU: Yes, on condition that you will make copies and give me the other copies.

YASMINE SOOKA: I am sure we can do that.  Thank you very much.

CHAIRPERSON: Dr Ally.

RUSSELL ALLY: Just three very brief questions.  The first is the video tape which was made.  Is that still in existence and
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could we also perhaps have a copy of that, when the police actually came during the ...

MR MASUKU: ... cemetery to bury my mother and also when the police were hitting people, beating them up, he managed to do that because at the end they wanted to come for me and if it was not him they could have actually slaughtered me.

RUSSELL ALLY: But that video is available and there is a copy somewhere which we could.

MR MASUKU: I am actually trying to get hold of the Japanese Embassy to get it, you know, to get Dr Horie.  He was here for five years and then he had to change.  He had been deployed somewhere and I met somebody in Tekkie, I told him that I will be actually appearing before the Truth Commission, can the try to contact me and so forth.  So that he must make the video available.

RUSSELL ALLY: After 1986 did the, did you continue to be harassed by the police?

MR MASUKU: These guys actually they were coming to my place, you know.  I remember the two security guys called van der Westhuizen and Fouche and then the other one I do not remember him.  They were from Compol Building.  They were coming to my place and actually I threatened them by actually intimidating and saying that I will lay a charge.  What do they want?  I am not under house arrest.  Then they said it is their general routine.  They just come to our houses and check and show their new members, new employees that this is a victim and so forth.  This is a culprit actually.

RUSSELL ALLY: And how long did that go on for?  When did it actually stop?

MR MASUKU: This actually went until 1989, yes, roughly
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1989.

RUSSELL ALLY: Just one last question.  I see from your statement that you have actually been a political activist for a very long time.  So could you just give us some sense of what was happening in Atteridgeville round about 1986.  What type of battles were being waged to get this kind of violent reaction from, you allege, the police?  You know, something of the conflict in Atteridgeville round about that time.

MR MASUKU: Yes, I may say that from 1976 about the students, during the student uprisings there was a lot of activities around the issue of the student education.  I mean the education generally and then people actually started being aware about what is happening.  You know politicising people and so forth and then the people started forming organisations.  The Civics, but the Civic was formed in 1983.  A few months before the formation of the UDF and there were also other political organisations like AZAPO and, well, PAC and ANC were not visible, but AZAPO was there, UDF and then COSAS, you know.  There were also a lot of crisis about education whereby high, I mean, high profile people were called also to come and try to solve the political crisis or education crisis in our community like Archbishop Desmond Tutu.  He attended that in Atteridgeville to come and meet the student's leaders, civic leaders to address this issue and other educationalist like Professor Marie Watiemeila and therefore the others in the community including Dr Ngoma and so forth.  They were trying to come up with a solution to the political or education crisis in our community.

RUSSELL ALLY: And the Town Councillors how did they fit in to this dispute?  Did they ever get, were they directly
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implicated?

MR MASUKU: Sorry.

RUSSELL ALLY: Councillors, what, how did they fit into this conflict?

MR MASUKU: Well the then Councillors as everyone knows that they were serving the interests of the past regime, the apartheid regime were actually asked to step down.  Those who refused, they were forced to step down by other means.  People were marching, stoning their houses and so forth.

RUSSELL ALLY: Were any Councillors killed during that period?

MR MASUKU: No Councillor was killed in our community.

RUSSELL ALLY: Thank you.

MR MASUKU: Okay.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Manthata.

THOMAS MANTHATA: Oupa, here it seems like you are talking about the police whom you know.  How do the Atteridgeville people view these police when they see them on duty nowadays?

MR MASUKU: Well the people in Atteridgeville and Saulsville community about, firstly, David Modau.  They do not like him, you know.  Mostly when we move around they are saying this guy must actually be out of a job because is harassing people, he had harassed people actually during those era of the struggle and Lesley Mogotsi he was the worst, you know.  He was the worst of, he was actually intimidatory, you know.  When he sees you he tell that, no, you cannot get reparation, all those things.  He was harassing the activists and also ordinary people saying that you cannot do anything, we are in power, we are the police and so forth.  Unfortunately about his activities he had been suspended from the police force because of his unlawful activities and he is the guy who knows also what happened to my place and
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so forth.

THOMAS MANTHATA: If I understand you well you are still speaking about the struggles you went through.  What I am asking you is what are the people saying about those police who are still on duty?

MR MASUKU: What I mean is the people do not like them.  They want them to be released from duty.  Lesley is no more a policemen.  He is only involved in criminal activities.

THOMAS MANTHATA: Instead of the police saying that they are the ones who killed the people they say to the people that point out the people that killed you.  What do you say about that?

MR MASUKU: Yes, it is true, because what actually amazed me is when we got to the court, the inquest here in Pretoria, they want you to identify the people who have done that and which is very, very bad.  How can you identify those people who arrest you whereas you are asleep when they were doing all this activities and I may say that during those times even if you go to Atteridgeville Police Station and report any matter.  Either if somebody has assaulted you or stabbed you they are saying bring that person here.  How can you bring a person whereas you know that that person is going to finish you up, you know.  Then I may say that is, they need restructuring and re-education and including the courts.

THOMAS MANTHATA: In short, Oupa, how do you expect the Commission to help you?

MR MASUKU: I would say you are asking me a difficult question because I have lost my mother who was our breadwinner, who was educating us and I am not the only child.  We are four and I do not how reparation works and so forth or the Commission as a whole, but I am saying that no one can bring my mother's life back and no one actually can
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replace those past activities that she was doing for us, meaning supporting us, educating us.  It is very difficult to say and even if the Commission wants to help us that will be between the family members to sit down, discuss this and come to an agreement because the Commission is not only going to help me, but I as an individual, the other thing that I like to ask the Commission to do is to try to get a better medication for my hand.  I mean to get maybe a better hospital institute that can actually take out this shrapnel from my body because those doctors told me that my hand cannot work properly because my main nerve, actually, is being suppressed by that particular shrapnel which is lodged on my body.

THOMAS MANTHATA: What is your younger brother doing now who did not finish at university?