Human Rights Violation Hearings — Welkom — 1996-10-09

WITNESS:   There was this other woman who stayed in the street in 1987 and she went to the outside countries to look for her son and receiving the information that she was out of the country to search I got interested and I went to her and I enquired as to the trip.  And she said to me, "I do not know, " and there after I left her.  My grandmother and other  women came home and as they were chatting they said, "That woman that your daughter visited was so scared to come to you to tell you that your grandson has died."  And I was crying then after receiving the news and the preparations were made for me to come to Welkom to report this matter.  But Andeli Lobese's family received a telephone call and one of the children came home and said Andile wants to speak to you and I gave them my telephone numbers and Andile gave me a call and he said to me, "Know that your brother has died."  I said to him, "What is the cause of the death?"  And he said, "No, I won't tell you but I will tell you some other day when I'm available."  And I had to come to Welkom to report the matter.  I didn't tell my mother straight that my brother was killed.  I went to a relative of ours called Denja and Denja said we should go to Matsipe who was a lawyer at Odendaalsrus and I went to this attorney.  I explained to him everything.  I said, "I am scared of telling my mum this bad news.  I don't want to break this news to her.  Will you please go and tell her?"  Really the next day Mr Matsipe came home and he broke the news and he said to her, "Your daughter came to me to seek my assistance.  I'm here to tell you that your son has died."  And we then told my father.  He was working in the industrial area.  And we went back to Matsipe to enquire as to the cause of his death but Mr Matsipe said he didn't get enough information.  It would be much better if we go to those countries and get a full picture of what happened.  And I said, "Mr Matsipe, how would I go to those countries because we don't have funds and we've heard that it's so  expensive and how would we get there?"  He said, "I do not know really."  I said to him, "Don't you think it would be a wise thing to contact the people of the ANC?" and he said, "No, we can't do it now."  And I went back home.  I was together - oh, we had our brother Peter Mohati who was staying in Gauteng and I gave him a call and he said to me, "Please come down."  My mother tried to get money.  She was doing temporary jobs at OK and I went to Johannesburg.  It was on a Saturday.  On Monday we went to the ANC offices.  When we arrived at the offices we were sitting there.  Nobody attended to us.  And we went back home.  The next day on Tuesday we went back and we were told that Chris Hani was not available.  He was outside the country and I requested them to give us anybody who would assist us and they gave us someone to assist us but unfortunately I can't remember his name and I enquired from this man about Kenneth and his whereabouts and where he died.  This man opened some files and he checked from 1976 until 1990 and he discovered that his name didn't appear in all the books and he said to me, "Please come the next day because I will check in the next file that is coming in from Angola.  There are people who died in Angola."  And on Friday I went back and he told me that our brother died - I can't remember was it in Tanzania or in Angola.  Yes, it was in Tanzania.  When I wanted him to tell me the reason for his death he said, no, he didn't have any reason.  I was doing my part-time jobs at OK and I received a telephone call as I was working.  It was on a Saturday.  And I was told to rush to Johannesburg.  I went to Johannesburg and I met Peter.  He took me to a  certain gentleman who was a Comrade.  You know, I don't know Gauteng as a whole but he was somewhere in Gauteng. But this brother said, "Yes, we learnt that your brother had died but there will be people coming to your family to bring condolences."  I went back home, from home I went back to Port Elizabeth.

CHAIRPERSON: Did they tell you how your brother died?

WITNESS:   No, Sir, we don't have the core of this story.  There were so many stories coming up.  Up to this day we haven't had the right story.  We are here.  We want to know.  We need an explanation because some people say he committed suicide.  They say he went outside and he wanted to guard and they only heard a gunshot and he shot himself.  They say he pointed his gun on his throat and he released a bullet and he died instantly.  And some of them some with a new story.  They say there was a fight.  They were fighting for a girl and some tell us that he was told to come to South Africa for a certain mission.  Now we don't know what is the truth.  I went to Port Elizabeth last year in February.  I think is was last year in February.  I'm not mistaken it was - I'm sorry, it was this year in February I went to Port Elizabeth to visit my uncle and I tried to go to Andile Lobese's family and I requested to see him and they told me that he was working at King Williams Town but he was going to visit them that weekend.  And it's true, he came during the weekend and he came to see me and I said to him, "I've been communicating with you only through the telephone but tell me the real story."  He said, "No, I'm sorry, I don't have any information.  Moyani, you brother was staying at Makeni and I was a distance  from Makeni.  I only heard later that he was shot dead and when I discovered he was a known person to me."

CHAIRPERSON: When did Andile come back from exile?

WITNESS:   He came back from exile when I returned from Port Elizabeth.  I was now residing in Welkom.

CHAIRPERSON: You say that when you went to the ANC offices at Shell House to find out about your son through your daughter - I believe that the daughter is the one Puleng Gwende - the ANC people said that they had no records relating to him but later you say that the Tabong ANC branch gave you R1 000,00 towards the upkeep of your home.  Is that true?

WITNESS:   This amount was given to all the women who belonged to the organisation and they were given R700,00 all of them as they were an organised women.  When I went to Gauteng this money was not yet issued out.  We were still investigating as to what happened because I spent the whole week in Gauteng and that is when I was told that he appeared in their papers.  His pseudonym was Ray and the surname was Sudomi and up this day we do not know the cause of the death.  That is why we request - we need an explanation from the ANC as to how he died because we were told another story that he was driving these cars - I do not know what kind of cars are those - but we were told he was a driver.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very much.  Where was your brother buried?

WITNESS:   He was buried in that country because the call that they gave us was done after his burial.  When I asked him why they didn't phone us before, he said, no, they could only phone us after the release of Mr Mandela. Do you know who buried him?   ---   No, we do not know who buried him.  That is why we are here.  We want to know who buried him, why was he buried by them and what is the cause of the death.  Because the ANC didn't take any initiative to come and tell us what happened because my mother said they came afterwards but I had already left for Port Elizabeth, but they came home to tell my mother the story.

CHAIRPERSON: Now, how the family been affected by this, all what happened?  How are you affected as a family from the mother to children?  How has it affected you?