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

MR LAX: (Inaudible) ... understand we don't want the exact details of the whole meeting, and every time who spoke, and what you said, and what someone else said.  We want you to try and get to the point a bit more.  Now, you've told us in your statement that after this meeting there was trouble that started.  Am I right that this was in about September 1993, these meetings that you're telling us about?

WITNESS:   That is correct.

MR LAX: You've said that because of these different meetings friction developed between yourself and Mr Siwela, is that right?

WITNESS:   I am sorry, I think I wanted to start somewhere because I wanted to connect this.  I have got a very long talk, because there are certain people who are implicated, and I wanted to start from scratch, and I wanted to explain to the Commission as to how they get involved.

MR LAX: (Inaudible) ... understand there are many people after you, and you are eating their time as well, and that's why I want you to be fair to them.  Now, tell us about how you've suffered, and what has happened to you as a consequence of that.  Okay?  We do understand the context that there was trouble in your community.  We do understand that, and you've given us a picture of that, how it started.  In your statement you tell us that at that time you were IFP, and there was friction between you and other people in the IFP, and these developed around various community meetings.  Am I right?  Do you agree with that?

WITNESS:   Yes.

MR LAX: (Inaudible) ... the time when, arising out of that friction, you were subsequently attacked in your home, and how that attack happened.

WITNESS:   Before I got attacked I just wanted to explain that when the violence started.  This violence started because the council took Mr Siwela to section 7 and said he must give people sites, and when he gave those sites to the people he is the first person who formed Inkatha in that place at that time.  And Inkatha was running around day in and day out calling their war cries, and they were also carrying Inkatha flags, especially the Inkatha youth.  They were always having this flag in the mornings.  Then I approached Siwela and asked him as to why he was using the youth to run his mile.  He said he wanted to be protected.  Then on that same day when we were in the meeting Themba Nkabinde, who was in the meeting, came to me and said, "Mr Dlamini, do you know that I can quell the violence that was at section 7?"  He said he could quell the violence which was prevailing in section 7.  Then on the following week when I met him Themba came to me and said he had already devised a plan, and there was a group called Savuka which was harassing people at section 1, and he said he wanted to take these youths from the Savuka group and recruit them to be Inkatha members.  And he said if he could recruit these people and make them Inkatha members they will stop being this group of vagabonds.  He wanted to make them Inkatha members, and this group was a group of criminals and they ... (inaudible - end of side A) ... this was a group of rapists.  They were raping all the females in the community.  Whenever they raped women they wanted their men to watch whilst they were raping the women.  They were so brutal in the manner that they were conducting their rapes.  That was happening every day.  Now I'll come back to the point, because I seem to be having a very long story.  People were dying in large numbers and nobody knew who had killed them, but the police would come in their vans and take the people to the mortuary, the corpses to the mortuary.  And whenever you went to the police to report a certain crime or offence they never paid any attention.  And we had no recourse at law, because whenever we went to report, even before the murders took place, the police never paid any attention.  Then on the 3rd of September 1993 the community at section 7 was attacked by the very same Inkatha criminal groups.  These criminals came at about half past six.  It was in summer and it was just slightly dark.  And they would get into houses.  They started looting houses.  They would take TV sets as well as radios.  At my neighbour's place they took the radio as well as the TV.  If you were selling they would take anything that you were selling, and that was in 1993 on a Friday, on the 3rd.  The following day, on the 4th of September, we convened a meeting to try and get a solution to the violence that was quelling the community.  As we were discussing the issues we decided to postpone the meeting to the 5th, that is on Sunday, and there's a certain place called The Block where they were trying to build a school, but now the school was not built at the end.  We got to The Block on a Sunday at about quarter to seven.  It was myself as well as other members of the community.  As we were still talking the criminals approached.  They were a large group.  When they got to us I said we should choose one person who was going to talk to them because we were not supposed to talk all of us.  They said I am the one who was supposed to talk, and I approached this big group and asked them as to whether we could help them.  They said they had come to the meeting, and we told them that this meeting was for specific people, and it was not meant for them because it was a meeting for people who were sent letters to attend the meeting.  And I told them they should go back to their places and tell their parents that there was a meeting and it was not a meeting for the youths.  They went back.  And the people were angry at that time.  They were asking as to why we had left these youths to come and control us, we should have dealt with them accordingly.  And from there people decided that they wanted to fight.  They went to fetch their weapons and they started assaulting the youths.  They chased the youths up to Iscor, and on that day - it was on a Sunday - these criminals were assaulted.  Thereafter there was an investigating policeman called Malinga.  He said he was sent by Major Mthethwa, because Major Mthethwa had heard that there were certain people who were dissatisfied, and these people should stay in that meeting, they should not leave, they should wait for him.  He ultimately came, and he said that he wants these people to be told.  He said these people should elect a leader who was going to be a spokesperson for them, because he could not speak to all of them, and he did not want them to speak so they must elect a leader.  They chose a leader, because he said he didn't want to speak to everybody, he wanted to speak to one responsible person.  And the major came.  He asked as to whether Malinga had told us.  Malinga said yes, and he asked as to who the leader was.  They said they had chosen Dlamini.  He said they had chosen Dlamini.  He said they had chosen a person who fits the position.

MR LAX: (Inaudible) ... let's not listen about you being chosen.  Please come to the point.  As I've spoken to you now it's over 45 minutes you've been talking.  Please, I don't want to be rude to you, but let's get to the point.