Human Rights Violation Hearings — Worcester — 1996-06-24

MR KARIEM: We schoolchildren then began to panic - we were all schoolchildren but the age of the other schoolchildren I couldn't tell you because only at a later stage I found that I was the youngest person among them.
While we were in the pass we began to kick and carry on in the back of the vehicle, we were trying to overturn the vehicle so that we could ask the police where they were taking us but we didn't manage anything and they just continued with us.  We eventually arrived  at a building in Paarl which was the Sasko Building.  There the police left the vehicle, entered the building, returned with papers and documents in files - then they got back into the vehicle and drove off.
We then went down a very quiet road and soon we were at a prison which we entered.  The police van turned so that it parked with the front of the vehicle to the gate and the back of the vehicle was drawn towards the entrance.  We walked down a corridor and here we found officers in brown clothes which made it clear to us that we were in a prison.
The police brought the files in with us, we were in a reception area.  One of the prison officials whose name I cannot remember at this moment,  a white officer, came out and asked us whether we were the rascals?  We weren't able to tell them we just told them to ask  the police what was going on.  They then took our particulars.
There were eleven of us from Worcester on that Friday.  There were other people also who at that moment came into the Victor Verster Prison but the eleven of us from Worcester were taken to a particular section where we were locked up in single cells.  We were in these cells for fourteen days in solitary confinement and then put in community cells after this span of time.
We were in the community cells with adults and there were both so-called Coloured and black people in these community cells.  After a week in the community cells Mr Symington and Mr Herbert came to the prison and called me.  A prison warden Sergeant Lottering, took us to a room where they interrogated me, trying to determine what happened on the schools politically speaking and what happened outside with the school organisation.  And I had told them that I simply did not know anything in this regard.
After fourteen days some of the school children were released.  Of those who were taken in with me on the Friday morning I was the only one who was retained in prison, there were four others from Breede River and some more from another school who were then released after fourteen days.
Eventually it was only myself and the students from Breede River who were taken in on that particular Friday who were retained in prison.  I was then told that the people who were locked up with gave them information that these people told the investigating officers, Mr Symington and Herbert that I had to tell them what happened since I knew more about the events.
And then I claimed that these were exactly the people who knew what had happened and that I was not the correct person to ask questions.  They then said that if I didn't want to say anything they would leave me in prison and  so I was left there in the cells.  While  in the  cells, there were also other comrades with us from Zwelethemba.  When I came out of the single cell I was crying a lot.  I would sit on my own and shiver and I would long home to my family - long for my family.  I wished that I could be outside amongst other people.
They asked me what was wrong and then I said to them I am not used to these circumstances. They then asked me my age and I explained everything to them.  And then they said I mustn't worry they would make a plan.  A day later they came back with Mr Dullah Omar who was still locked up with us at that time.  He was in the three person cells and they gained permission from Colonel Witbooi that Mr Omar could come around with them to the community cells.  So he came through to the community cells, they brought him to me, he then asked me what my situation was and I explained to him what the whole political school politics issue was in Rhoodewal - how the police were carrying on and then he said that I should not worry and that he would contact my parents through his various people and I left the matter in Mr Omar's hands. 
Another friend of  mine, not a personal friend, but someone I met in prison, Mr Anwar Ismail from Cape Town who lives in Wynberg, I met Mr Ismail him and he comforted me and told me not to worry and that when he was out of prison he would contact my family in Worcester and he would bring my mother to Cape Town and he would work with her to have me released from prison.
He was then released before I was and as I subsequently heard, he then came and fetched my mother in Worcester, he took my mother to attorneys in Cape Town and the attorneys told my mother to return to Worcester and to come and speak to Mr Niewoudt to find out exactly what the situation was.  My mother then approached the people from the Security Branch but they told my mother they didn't know anything about me, they didn't know who I was and they could explain nothing.  
My mother then decided that she would not leave the matter there and she returned to Cape Town.  Those people referred my mother to the media.  On the 10th December I was brought to Worcester Court under the charge of public violence.  The case was withdrawn against me on that day, the 10th December and I thought that I  might return home.
I was then told that I would be returned to the police cells and whilst there my mother came to me.  I was very happy to see her because I thought that I would be able to go home since they allowed her into the cells.  But my mother then told me that the police refused to release me, that they had told her that they didn't know where I was, that it would not take long before I would be back with her.
I then told my mother that I was glad what they were doing for me and she was then taken away again.  In the food that  was brought me I received a letter from my mother which comforted me and again said I should not worry and that she was working with attorneys from Cape Town to have me released.
I was then returned to Victor Verster.  Arriving at Victor Verster Prison I was shown a Cape Times by one of their comrades in which there was an article mentioning my detention with a photograph of my mother and Mr Ishmail.  After a further fourteen days - this is after the 10th of December - on the 24th December, my name was called along with two other black comrades.  We went to Colonel Witbooi who told us that there were people for us outside.  He did not tell us that we were being released by the prison he just said that there were people waiting outside.
Myself and the two youths were too scared to leave, so we told him that these people took us from our homes and they brought us there, and now you just telling us that people are waiting for us outside, people we don't know.  He then told us not to worry and that we just had to go outside.  There I found my mother and Mr Ismail and his wife.
They then asked me about these two black comrades where they come from and then I said they also live in Zwelethemba - we got into the car and whilst driving into Worcester we spoke about these matters - myself and these two others and along with my mother we found that they were also youths and that only the three of us had been locked up in Victor Verster until we were released.
When I came home the students who were still in school had already written exams - I was not able to write the exams - I was concerned about how I would go back to school, how I would be accepted since I didn't write the exams since there was only one exam in 1985.  I was then not able to go to school as it was the school holidays.  In January of 1986 when the schools reopened I went back to school.
And Mr Abrahams the principal then told me that I could do the re-write with the other children since there was a re-examination and I would be allowed to write that.  We then wrote all those exams in the church hall and I passed -  I was then able to enter std 7. 
 In 1986 roughly in June we had another school boycott in Worcester.  I was involved again in the school boycotts.  The principal of our school,  Mr Abrahams then told me I caused problems at school and that he would refer me to the school  committee.  I then had to drive with Mr Abrahams in his Mercedes which he still owned at that time.  He then drove with me and fought with me in the car - there were three of us in the car.
He said to me that I was the troublemaker at school.  I then asked him how he could say that since there senior school pupils also involved in the school boycotts but then he told me he had nothing to do with the senior pupils, that it was who had now entered school who were going on like this.  Mr Abrahams then took me to one of the school committee members  Mr Weir and when we came to Mr Weir's business he said that this was the person who was causing all the problems.   Mr Weir then spoke to me and said they did not want pupils like this in the school, that we would have to be thrown out of school.
We did not say anything ourselves but Mr Abrahams made us get back into his car which we did and we returned to the school.  We did not talk along the way but he then said that we had had a warning and that we would be thrown out of the school.  We then called other children of the school around and explained the situation to them and we all decided in the school that we would have another class boycott.  
That we would not continue with the normal classes and that we would involve the other schools and that we would explain to them what was going on in our school.