Human Rights Violation Hearings — Pietersburg — 1996-07-19

MR MOGANEDI: I will start by what happened to me in Mutatema when I was injured.  We left Jane Furse going to Mutatema to a funeral.  We also wanted to go and look for a combi which was stolen.  When we arrived in Tafelkop where our comrades were killed we found the combi and it was driven by those people who stole it. After the funeral we got the combi and we wanted to go home.  When we arrived at Rhatchevo, we gave other guys money for them to get cigarettes in a shop and while we were waiting for them, Mutatema policemen came, Mr Ngadema came to us and we were inside the brown combi.  When we wanted to leave we just heard gunshots. Alex Ngwan was shot on his thigh and on his hand, I wanted to run away and I heard another gunshot and I went back into the combi.  This policeman came and took us into the police van.  They took us to Mutatema Police station.
 Mutatema police told the other police that they found me in the shop and they thought we went into the shop to go and put a bomb there.  We tried to explain that we went to the filling station to fuel up, so they continued to say that they had heard about Steve, the other Rasta guy, and they were looking for him.
 When we were sitting in the charge office, de Kock and Geld came and one of them came to me and he started kicking us.  I was wearing a hat and I didn't want to show my dreadlocks, so this guy called Gert came and took off my hat and they saw that I had dreadlocks.  The started realising that the rasta guy they were looking for was me, so they took us outside and they said we should lie down, whereupon they started beating us with sjamboks.  They beat us until they got tired.  They put all of us in separate cells.  I was severely tortured there by de Kock, Gert and other soldiers.  They took off my trousers and started beating me and tied me with cloths and I tried to ask why they were beating and torturing me.  And they told me that they heard that I was Bob Marley from America.  I told them that I was a South African and that the main thing that they arrested me for was for politics.  I told them that I didn't  understand why they were torturing and assaulting me.  They asked me if I knew Mandela and I said even if I do not know him personally I want him to be released so that we could be freed.  I was then kicked and de Kock said I should lie down and he kicked at me.
 They started kicking me on my thighs and they twisted my testicles and they hit me with a fist and they used their boots to assault me and I started crying and they demanded that I should tell them the truth. I asked them what truth they want, I am litter because you said you wanted litter, here am I.  De Kock said you should know today that we've arrested Ncbabakeleng, he's at Skoornot and he is dyeing and because you are his fried we are going to kill you as well.  I replied that if they kill me for the freedom of the nation it's not a problem, kill me then.  My kidneys were then severely beaten and they left me for dead.
 I request the Truth Commission, that I cannot produce children with the woman that I stay with.  I've been married to her for twelve years and I don't have a child.  Even today when I sleep with her, there is nothing I can do. No this really affects me and my testicles were twisted and then this really hurts me.  I think this is the reason why I cannot produce children.  I request the Truth Commission to investigate this with a very sharp eye because the woman that I'm staying with now wants to hear everything and she wants to understand what's really happening with me.  Now I'm not living happily with my family because of the child that I cannot produce.
 All these things happened at Mutatema.  Let me pass the issue of Mutatema, I want to tell you about Wilson Mashego.  He was a detective at that time, he assaulted me from 1984.  e used to come to my home with the police and soldiers wearing camouflage.  He assaulted me from 1985 until 1988.  He picked me up and then he would continually harass me.  They took me from my home, but before they got into my home they shot.  I have the cartridges here.  Before they picked me up they shot my home with their guns and they told me to take out the AK 47's that I have and I said to them that I've never seen an AK 47 since the day I was born.  They then, Mashego de Kock and them, took me, blind folded me and then took me to Mpuduli where there was soldiers' camps and when I arrived there, it was Soroloss, they tied me behind a hippo, the hippo that they used to sprinkle water with, I was naked and as was blindfolded behind the hippo there were stones that were uncomfortable and sharp.  They said, "Yes you think you are a bull in the Sekukuneland, you think that you can see far, far away.  Know that today you are going to tell us the truth, you are going to tell us everything that you have been doing!" I said, "No ways, you'd better kill me!"  They said, "No we aren't going to kill you, we're going to assault you and hurt you until you die".
 They harassed and assaulted me until they put me into an office and they started hitting me and twisting my testicles again as well as hitting me with fists.  They kicked me continually until I was unconscious.  They took me to Marble Hall just before the sunrise, and continually assaulted me there, de Kock and them together with the boers at Marble Hall.  They took me now into the cell with the bandits, and said that these bandits were going to strangle me.  A policeman came to me while I was in the cell and he said, "Steven, this is a wrong place, I want to take you to the other cell".  From Marble Hall they took me and released me so that I could go home.  While sleeping at home the soldiers came back a 12 o'clock, they took me and repeated the same story, twisting my testicles, an assaulting me with sjamboks.  It was at a camp at Gamasemula. Now in this camp I was also assaulted, they used sjamboks and I kept on asking them why they assaulted me.  They replied that I was  a leader in Sekukuneland, and I asked what a leader was as I was not a leader but a comrade. 
 Now the same soldiers then, that is de Kock and company, they tortured me again.  They took a choke which they put in my nose and then as I was shaking, they laughed.  When they saw that this thing was really killing me, they switched it off and said, "Tell us the truth!" I asked what truth do they want as there is no truth other than what I had told them, they must rather kill me.  But they said that they were not going to kill me but were showing me that I was stubborn and what they can do to stubborn people. WE spent the day in Masemula camp and then they released me and I went back home.  
 When I arrived home, and while I was still in pain, they came back.  From 1986 until 1988 I've been in and out of the cells.  The person who witnessed all these assaults is my mother who is here with me.  I'm requesting the Truth Commission to listen to my mother if it is possible, as to the assaults that I received from the police.  I've got two friends of mine who are also at Mutetema and I will request the TRC to also give them a few minutes to give evidence because they were together with me and witnessed the assaults.
 When the soldiers came to pick me up for the last time in 1988 they turned everything at my home upside down, they searched for AK 47's and took money to the value of R2 000, my mother's money, they took it for themselves.  We went to claim the money at Pokwane Police station, but were never given any response.  I want to stress this because she was there and she witnessed the whole incident.  Now at Pokwane there was a policeman called Lekutha, one of the CID, he came home together with the police from Mankweng,to pick me up and took us to Pokwane, we arrived there at the police station where they started interrogating us and twisted our testicles and using their fists again. Now I asked this Lekutha, what he was doing, why doesn't he kill me, why does he have to hurt me, but he said that they are not going to kill me, they just wanted me to feel the pain.