Human Rights Violation Hearings — Queenstown — 1996-07-22

UNKNOWN: Yes, in fact I didn't go there as an informer.  I just gave my testimony, then I was taken back to the cell.  The comrades who were accused, came to talk to me encouraging me and showing me that I was on the right track.
 And I would help them to go through and thereafter I never said a thing.  I was then released on a particular day.  
 Like all others, I just went out, like any person released from jail.  I didn't even feel that I had done anything wrong, then I went home.
 Days went on by and by.  One Saturday I heard by one person a boy called Duaqu that I was known as an informer and from that day I got this disturbed.
 I then went to Butterworth to go to school there.  Then in June of the same year, people heard of it that I was an informer, then one day Siphoma (indistinct) were with me there, there was a - Butterworth Youth Cultural Club, because I was a student at Xampla ... (tape ends) (tape starts) ... to defend myself, so I went on until one day, though I used to have some minor clashes with the comrades of the Butterworth Youth, even here at school in Xampla, I used to have some clashes with the teachers, until one day I clashed with one teacher named Skombuza Majike and even my friends were also harassed, they couldn't even attend shows.
 So I clashed with this teacher and I gave him a telling QUEENSTOWN HEARING TRC/EASTERN CAPE
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and he in turn gave me, then he went the organisation and told them what I had said.
 They had a plan of whatever.  I was living in a place called Mission in Butterworth.  There was a knock at the door one day and I was sitting with a certain lady when there was knock and I asked the person to come in.
 When the door opened, a lot of people came in and mind you, this was just a small room.  Then they asked me that, they told me that they wanted to see me as the Butterworth Youth.  I knew that they had come for something, so I was taking them out with the intention to close the gate.
 Then it is then that they told me that they were going to take me because they wanted me to go to the organisation.

REV XUNDU: Now, could we come closer now to this period here in Quamani.  Now tell me, which organisation were you involved in at the time Vuyo died?

UNKNOWN: When Vuyo died I was a member of the Youth Organisation, I was a member of the fund organisation with other comrades like Ququloleko, Mongezi Noholoza and someone from the Nxulu family.  We were in this fund raising group, going round collecting money and even painting people's houses and not asking for any charges.

REV XUNDU: ; According to what you know, what is it that made the people so angry?

UNKNOWN: What happened is that in Butterworth Nquks and  Vusuma Mlangweni gave information that when I was in detention, they received a letter from Mobele Mpenjana that I was the cause of their arrest.
 Stembi Lasokwe was there cross-questioning me only to find that they didn't actually know the procedures of the court and most of the information was not true and then 
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Stembi dismissed them and asked them to go back to go and investigate in Queenstown how it so happened that I was known as an informer.

REV XUNDU: Then at the time your brother died, where were you?

UNKNOWN: At the time my brother died, I was in jail.

REV XUNDU: So you were there with other comrades?

UNKNOWN: Yes, I was there.  So we used to talk and shout at each other in the cells then I noticed that Notandu was no longer talking to me.
 And even the way we were served with food made me feel suspicious, then we played sick together with  Sisho Balinqa because we wanted to get information from outside, then we were sent to Frontier Hospital and we met the people who could give us information.
 And one person told me that people who were looking for me to burn me and he told me about what had happened at home.  I wasn't so surprised, I just listened to everything they were saying, then we went back to jail.

REV XUNDU: Let me say, this story of yours can be understood even the way you were harassed. I understand it, now I want to know after hearing these details that - what do you now say could be done by this Commission?  What do you want this Commission to do for you?

UNKNOWN: This story I'm saying I am very grateful to be given this opportunity because comrades failed to bring light, true reflection to the people.
 In stead they spread false information and they received, I received cheques, that's what they said, which was  a lie.  For instance, I was known to be having a watch that was a recording, even my sister too was known to be 
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having some earrings that were recording and yet she was detained. 
 And yet people were saying she was not actually detained, in stead she was put there as a monitor and as an informer to an extend that whilst I was in jail, a certain boy living just below Mr Mashoba's home by the name of Dondoy came dressed in the attire of the marshals.
 So as you know, we who are in jail always want information from outside, so every time there is someone coming from the others, we always ask for information.  So this boy joined us and we listened to what he had to say.
 So he told us that he had been arrested because he had burnt a certain house, which he did not even know which it was.  Then as he was saying it, I kept on thinking that it was my home and ultimately he said, yes, it is the Batyi home.
 Then he said we know that Monde and Notandu is in the Hexigon hotel, they are not detained.  And he was saying this directly to me.

REV XUNDU: Did this boy not know you?

UNKNOWN: Yes, he didn't.  So what is most important for me, would be that the Commission should consider that I have suffered a lot.  There isn't a single year that I have spent at school.
 I lost friends, even my brother because of some petty matters, because the comrades failed to tell the people the truth.
 In the AGM of the Youth Organisation, I had to give an account and tell them why I was labelled as an informer.  Then the people present there were told by Glen Thomas that I made a statement in the Supreme Court and to the police on QUEENSTOWN HEARING TRC/EASTERN CAPE
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my own accord, without being forced, and I really don't know where he got that information from, because I really know nothing about him.
 It is therefor my wish that the Commission should ask him where he got all this information from, because he said there at the Centre I gave the information on my own.
 He also thought that I should not be included in the structures of the community and so they were going to investigate.
 And once more, this was brought to the attention of the AGM in Moreva and then the decision was taken that they are not going to drive me away, I should go on until I cannot do it any longer.
 Then I kept on working until in 1985.

REV XUNDU: Now, do you want that there should be an investigation done with Glen Thomas?