Amnesty Hearings — Bloemfontein — 2000-11-15

MR VISSER: Chairperson, I must object to this blatant hearsay.  Why can't the wife and the sister be called to come and tell you?  No foundation has been laid to show that this is the best evidence available to the victims.  If it's important evidence to them and they want to give hearsay evidence, they've got to lay a foundation and the foundation can only be that this is the best evidence they've got. Now we know that the sister and the wife are the people who can come and say this.  We don't know whether they're alive or dead, but if they're dead, well that's a different matter, but surely some foundation has to be laid.

CHAIRPERSON: What's your response to that, Mr Malindi?

MR MALINDI: Chairperson, I will ask one question which will determine the status of at least one of the two women.
Since the unbanning of the ANC, have you been able to meet Tax's wife?

MARIA DIJENG SEJANAMANE: I have never met her.

MR MALINDI: Do you know if she ever came back from Lesotho or not, Tax's wife?

MARIA DIJENG SEJANAMANE: Her family told me that they were still looking for Dimakatzo, that is my son's wife and they don't know where she was.  Then I also told them that I'm also looking for my son.

MR MALINDI: Ms Sejanamane you say Tax was being harassed, if I remember well, before he went into exile, by the police?

MARIA DIJENG SEJANAMANE: That is correct, that is so, they used to harass him.

MR MALINDI: Do you have anything that you can give to the Committee to show that indeed he was harassed by the police before he went into exile?

MARIA DIJENG SEJANAMANE: I do have some papers with me, even the day they detained him from his room at my place.

MR MALINDI: Chairperson at a stage I beg leave to hand up some newspaper cuttings which I have not had an opportunity to go through except to peruse them quickly.  I think one of them does not have a date, because the family cut the clipping without putting a date or pulling out the whole page.  Chairperson, I don't know how you would like me to do it.  I could either quickly go through the relevant portions and put them on record or I could hand them up to the Committee to put them on record.

CHAIRPERSON: Has your opponent seen them?

MR VISSER: Chairperson, I would also like to say something.  I don't want to interrupt you but I'd also like to say something about this at a convenient time.  I don't know whether now is a convenient time.  The question is simply, how is this relevant, Chairperson?  How is this relevant to this application whether he was arrested or harassed as the witness says or not.  I don't see the relevance.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Malindi, are you wanting to say that he went into exile through the harassment, the continuous harassment, the detention, because the tenor of the evidence we heard from the applicants is that he was an MK member away from home, that's basically what it is, so that he was detained, the newspapers might say that, it's neither here nor there, because he was actually away from home.

MR MALINDI: Indeed Chairperson, except that we may submit at the end of the hearing that Sejanamane was not the kind of person who would have sold out so easily after having borne harassment, gone into exile, maybe he could have sold out before even going into the ...(indistinct) of going into exile.  That is the only basis upon which we will submit that reports are relevant at a stage, Chairperson.

CHAIRPERSON: I think there should be foundation as well before I accept that.

MR VISSER: Chairperson, can I try to make it easy for my Learned Friend here?  If my Learned Friend assures you that the newspaper reports show harassment other than just a normal arrest and detention, then I believe that he should then have the right to hand it up to you.

CHAIRPERSON: Or wouldn't you want to see them first, or they can come directly, ...

MR VISSER: Perhaps we should just look at them first, Chairperson, but I'm just concerned about the relevance.  We've heard so much irrelevance in this hearing and we know we're short of time, as I'm told, so I don't want to prolong the matter, I'd rather prefer to shorten it and if its going to be irrelevant, well the obviously it shouldn't be allowed.

CHAIRPERSON: You may hand them up to us Mr Malindi.  How many are they?

MR MALINDI: Chairperson, may I establish that from Mr Koopedi?

CHAIRPERSON: I have copies in my possession which have been handed up.  The Newspaper is the Friend, Bloemfontein Tuesday January 13 1981 and the headlines are, there is a picture of a man, written Mr Thebogo Sejanamane and the head lines that:  "Azapo man flees" and written by Seroto Seroto. I will mark that A and the second one is in Afrikaans, I don't know form which newspaper, is that:   "A funeral..." and the third paragraph of this paper cutting says
"Three members of the Bloemfontein branch of AZAPO, Tax Sejanamane, Matata Lesapo and A.  Sekware  were taken into custody before the funeral"
That would be marked B.

MR VISSER: Chairperson, may I remind you that we've already got an A and a B, so this would have to be C and D respectively.

CHAIRPERSON: Oh yes and the small one would be D and the last one would be E.  It's also from the Friend, Bloemfontein, Wednesday 14 May 1980. The headlines:  "Manaung teacher is detained" it says
"The Treasurer of the Bloemfontein branch of the Azanian People's Organisation, (AZAPO) and a teacher at ...(indistinct) Higher Primary School, Mr Thebogo Godfrey Sejanamane, was detained by the Security Police last weekend."
I would force Mr Joe Jafta to just make copies, if we have such facility here, that everybody would be in possession of these three and for the interim, could you give the list to Mrs Sejanamane, whilst you get Joe Jafta?  You may proceed Mr Malindi.

MR MALINDI: Thank you Chairperson.  Ms Sejanamane, it has already been read onto the record that your son was a teacher, do you confirm that?

MARIA DIJENG SEJANAMANE: That is true.

MR MALINDI: Besides the incidents of harassment that are contained in the newspaper clipping that have been handed up as exhibits, were there other incidents that you know of?

MARIA DIJENG SEJANAMANE: I do not understand.

MR MALINDI: You have just given the Committee some newspapers that show that your son was an activist and was harassed by the police.

MR VISSER: With great respect Chairperson, my Learned Friend keeps on saying harassed, harassed.  What the news clippings show, that you have read to us, show that he was arrested.  Now unless my Learned Friend wants to argue that arrest is the same as harassed, I would ask him not to use the word harassed, because at that stage, those arrests may have been lawful, I don't know whether they were or weren't, but he can't just assume that they were harassment.

INTERPRETER: The speaker's mike.

CHAIRPERSON: ...continual arrest does not suggest harassment, it might be lawful or unlawful, so we don't know the circumstances, unless you lay a basis for that.

MR MALINDI: Chairperson, I'll refrain from using the word harass or harassment.  Mrs Sejanamane, except the incidents in the newspaper clippings involving your son and the police, were there other incidents that you know of?

MARIA DIJENG SEJANAMANE: Yes.

MR MALINDI: Were they also carried in the local newspapers or not?

MARIA DIJENG SEJANAMANE: No they did not appear in the newspapers, that is when he came back from a detention, at my home.

MR MALINDI: Thank you Chairperson, no further questions.
NO FURTHER QUESTIONS BY MR MALINDI

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you Mr Malindi.  Mr Visser, any questions?

MR VISSER: Thank you Chairperson.

MR VISSER: Mrs Sejanamane, I'm not sure I understood what you said.  You were asked by your counsel whether you had contact with Tax Sejanamane when he was in Lesotho.  Can you just tell us again what your answer was to that?