Amnesty Hearings — Pinetown — 1999-03-08

MR STEWART: Thank you, thank you Mr Chairperson.
That then takes me to the role of each of the individual applicants in broad terms.  The Committee of course is well familiar with these as well, so I won't traverse it in detail.  
	The important point insofar as Luthuli is concerned, is the way in which he, on being released from prison having been there on charges related to ANC activities, then wore two hats for a period, ANC and IFP.  And that was a period in history where that, the relationship between the two organisations allowed that, and indeed encouraged it.  And then shifted his allegiances over a period of time to the IFP and became involved intensively in IFP activity.  Initially in organising  the formation of the trade union Uwusa and then on being recruited into this role as political commissar in the Caprivi, and subsequently to being the commander, or what he described as the overall commander of the Caprivi trainees on their return and their deployment in KwaZulu Natal.
	Now at this point it's worth digressing slightly to try and develop something of an analysis as to what happened in that time period.  It was clear, in my submission, that on the Caprivi trainees returning to KwaZulu Natal there were structures in place, there was quite a sophisticated idea at least as to how those structures should work.  The Caprivi trainees were split up into different groups, as the Committee is well aware, the offensive group, defensive group, contra mobilisation, and so on.  And they were each supposed to have their own roles, and they were commanded, below Luthuli, by particular people, and there was the planning committee with the ongoing liaison between the IFP people responsible on the one hand, being chiefly NZ Khumalo and Mr Luthuli, and on the other hand the SADF and the SAP.  And Luthuli speaks about the first meeting of the planning committee, which he attended.
And at that time it seems that there was an attempt to implement those structures, and ensure that those groupings worked in the way in which it had been planned that they would work.  
	And the kwaMakutha massacre which took place relatively shortly after the return of the Caprivi trainees, and which was perpetrated in, initially at least, a model way inasmuch as it, there was prior surveillance, there was a reporting back, there was proper planning, there was a proper liaison between the military and military intelligence and SAP security branch on the one hand, and the Caprivi trainees on the other, and then the move in to hit the house.  It turned out that it may have been the wrong house, but certainly it turned out that it may not have been planned that so many uninvolved people were murdered.  But prior to that it seemed that it was implemented in the fashion that had been intended.
	But we also know that, from what Luthuli has told the Committee, that he became, on returning from Caprivi and attending the first planning committee, and seeing the involvement of the SADF through military intelligence, and the SAP through the security branch, he became concerned about the extent to which, as he put it, the boers were directing things, and the extent to which Inkatha was dependent on the boers.  And he then didn't attend planning committee meetings thereafter, save for one which he was called to, to attend to explain a certain incident. 
	And so right from then the channels of command started to disintegrate, and although we have statements in the affidavits and on record about how things were intended to happen, and how things were intended, and how orders were intended to be relayed, that as time goes on we see that those structures were operating in the initial planned fashion less and less.  There was a level of disintegration, there was a level of informality, whereas at the beginning, for example, reports to NZ Khumalo were done only through Luthuli.  It happened fairly soon after the kwaMakutha massacre, for example, that some of the Caprivi trainees were reporting directly to NZ Khumalo themselves.  They were going direct to NZ Khumalo themselves to get weapons.  And that sketch of an analysis as to how things became less formal, and the lines of command became less formal, explains, in my submission, how it is that in certain circumstances there were attacks where there hadn't been specific instructions.  There were general instructions, about fighting the ANC, about clearing ANC people out of certain areas, and so on, but no necessarily a specific instruction from the highest command.  
	And we saw also then an attempt to integrate the Caprivi trainees into first, well at one time into, well let me not use the word integrate.  There was an attempt to offer the Caprivi trainees some sort of cover under the auspices of the KwaZulu police by the issue of appointment certificates, and even by the stationing of certain of the Caprivi trainees at KZP police stations.  Mr Mkhize, my learned friend Mr Wills' client, being stationed at the police station in Izingolweni for example.  And then, we saw an attempt, and now I use the word integrate, to integrate the Caprivi trainees into the special constable forces of the South African Police, and we have that particularly from Mr Khumalo and Mr Dlamini.  Mr Khumalo explains how they were trained at Koeberg, they returned to Pietermaritzburg, they had certain duties there, but in respect of themselves and some of those that were with them, that only lasted a month or two and then they became disgruntled and they left.  But all of that is an indication, in my submission, of this lack of formality in the lines of command, and the cross over in areas of responsibility between the formations of the South African Government on the one hand and the formations of the KwaZulu Government and the IFP on the other.  And as I've suggested it explains that in certain circumstances the strict lines of command, or channels of command, weren't necessarily followed.
	I've dealt briefly with the position of Luthuli, but to add to that, and it fits into the picture I've tried to portray, whereas Luthuli was initially regarded as being the overall commander, really responsible for the deployment of all these people around KwaZulu Natal, and telling them what to do, not long after he returned from Caprivi he was sent by NZ Khumalo to Hammarsdale Mpumalanga specifically to take care of problems there himself, and he resided there, and he was involved in attacks on people's houses and so on, as it is documented.  And that's not consistent with a continuing role of an overall commander.  Or it's not entirely consistent.  He continued to play something of an overall commanding role, but as I've suggested NZ Khumalo was playing more of a hands on role, and indeed many other people he mentioned.  Captain  Langeni, and others.  And once again that explains in at least part why certain lines or channels of command may not have been followed.  Perhaps it can be, perhaps also it can explain why, in my submission, it's inappropriate to try and place each incident into a model framework, a model framework which had been intended to operate at the beginning, but which clearly didn't operate for very long.
	In respect of Khumalo, his history is set out, how he became involved in the IFP, thought he was going to be a policeman, he got taken off to the Caprivi, he was trained along with Dlamini in this very intensive counter-revolutionary or guerrilla warfare, urban guerrilla warfare, with explosives, high powered armaments, and so on and so forth.  And then coupled with that was the political indoctrination and training about who is the enemy, who are we going out to kill, what our job is on returning to KwaZulu Natal.  And that sets up a background for him, which indicates that unless there's some clear indication to the contrary, the various hits that he was involved in, the various incidents that he was involved in, were in pursuance of that overall political objective which he had been instructed to pursue when he came back to KwaZulu Natal.  	We know as well that he was one of the witnesses in the case of the State v Msani, which was the so called Malan trial, and indeed has given in other cases, and on Luthuli's encouragement, he told his story to the ITU and he was then placed in witness protection, and has given statements explaining various incidents.  
It's not a case, and by this I don't mean to detract from the validity of the applications of Mr Wills' clients at all, but this is not a case of someone who's in prison, whose been convicted of something, and who's now seeking to get out and this is the one hope there is, is amnesty.  
	The Committee, Members of this Committee and indeed Members of other Amnesty Committees that have sat, have on  occasion refused amnesty where clearly those were cases where someone's been convicted of something, they try and dress it up in political clothes in order to try and get out of prison.  These in respect of those applicants that I represent, that doesn't apply.  And in respect of most of the incidents, or certainly many of the incidents that they've been involved, they have been the only sources of information in the hands of the State, broadly speaking about these incidents.  It's not as 'though they faced imminent prosecution.  They've come in a genuine effort to tell their whole story.  Khumalo was also issued with a KZP appointment certificate and, as I've indicated, he did spend some time as a special constable.
	By way of cross-reference, as it were, the Committee will be well aware of the amnesty application of Brian Mitchell, in which Brian Mitchell was granted amnesty, were some detail is given as to the purpose of the training of special constables, and the incorporation of Caprivi trainees within the special constable force of the SAP and the deployment of them to various areas, and the involvement in fighting the ANC, taking that fight to the streets of township and rural areas.
	Insofar as Dlamini is concerned I must, at the outset, make the apology that I've made the error of putting an H in Mr Dlamini's name when it shouldn't be there.  His name is D L A M I N I, not D H L, so I apologise to Members of the Committee for that.  
At the time that Mr Dlamini was sent to the Caprivi for training, he was only 16, and in the years before that he had already been involved in violent conflicts between Inkatha and ANC or UDF supporting youths, and he had come from that politicised background at the hands of Zakele Mkehle in the Hammarsdale area, and also on the understanding that he was now being trained to be a policeman he was sent to Caprivi, and received the same intensive military or para-military training that the others received.  And really, that's all he's known from that age until now.  And all that he's been involved in, as documented in these papers, stems from that background.  He also was issued a KZP appointment certificate at one stage, and was trained as a special constable.  And once again, on the encouragement of Luthuli, he left where he was at the time, which was essentially gun running for Themba Khoza in Johannesburg, and he left on Luthuli's encouragement to come clean, as it were, and to tell his story.
	That takes me then to, I'm on page 15 of my Heads of Argument, it takes me then to the specific requirements of the Act insofar as amnesty is concerned, and the first one which I seek to deal with is the one of full disclosure.  Now it's not uncommon in amnesty applications for applicants to apply for amnesty but to seek to limit their culpability in certain respects, in particular to limit it to what information might be otherwise available to the Members of the Committee or available to the Prosecution Services.  And one's seen, in my submission, in certain case, attempts by amnesty applicants in that way really to say I'm applying for amnesty for a incident that I was involved in, but I was not involved in anything else, where we know that it's simply not credible for that claim about non-involvement in anything else to be, simply not credible to make that claim.  But because there's only public information about their involvement in incident A that's the only one that's applied for.  Now these applications, those of my clients and those of my learned friend Mr Wills, really are in an entirely different camp, in my submission.  One has a situation here where they may indeed be criticised, and I think Mr Hewitt may have criticised them for this, for saying too much rather than too little.  They've, in my submission, really made an attempt to say, look, these are the terrible things that we've been involved in, and they stretch over a long period of time, and we're now ashamed of them and we seek forgiveness for them from the communities concerned, and we seek amnesty for them from the Committee. ...(intervention)