Human Rights Violation Hearings — King William's Town — 1997-05-13

ADV SANDI: In 1992 you were arrested yet again?

WONKE WITHIEL MAQUBELA: Yes, I was.

ADV SANDI: Why?

WONKE WITHIEL MAQUBELA: In 1992 the one day I had gone home, I was a student at Fort Hare, doing my second year in BA Communications, I had financial problems, therefor I left Alice, I needed some books to ask my parents for the money.
 I got there it was pretty late, at about seven.  At twelve o'clock policemen came at home.  I did not hear them when they came because I was sleeping.  My room is right next to the road.
 I arose from slumber and my room was lit, there were search lights all over.  I saw a bar that was used to break down my door.  I tried to look at them carefully but I could not recognise most of them.

ADV SANDI: These police arrested you under Section 29?  You were detained, you were not allowed to have an Attorney and not charged?

WONKE WITHIEL MAQUBELA: Yes, because when they arrested me, but I would like to add this first, they searched the entire house looking for weapons.
 The ceiling was pulled down, even the cupboards were taken apart.  My parents were terrified, they had guns pointed at them.  The kists everything, they damaged their entire house.
 There was a  whole lot of damage, windows were broken down.  Most of the police were drunk.  They said that they wanted weapons.  They took my brother and I into the van.  I tried to tell them that my brother doesn't know anything about this matter.
 I then tried to stipulate that if they wanted me to cooperate, they must let my brother go back home and they must take me alone.  There was Sergeant Rossouw amongst these police.
 He kept on threatening me, my home was surrounded by police.  Somebody gave an order that if I tried to run away, I must be shot at the head.  
 Rossouw from the Security Branch had a hand grenade in his hand, he kept on putting this hand grenade on me.  I pretended as if I didn't know what he had in his hand.

ADV SANDI: Was he from Stutterheim?

WONKE WITHIEL MAQUBELA: It was the first time I saw him, but he identified himself as Sergeant Rossouw from the Security Branch.

ADV SANDI: How long were you detained under Section 29?

WONKE WITHIEL MAQUBELA: About two weeks.  There was a hunger strike and then they released us.  From Stutterheim I was taken to Berlin, from Berlin to the police station in King William's Town.  This is where they started beating us up, the three of us.

ADV SANDI: Who was beating you up?

WONKE WITHIEL MAQUBELA: There were a whole lot of policemen, Stander was one of them.

ADV SANDI: Where is Stander from, from King William's Town?

WONKE WITHIEL MAQUBELA: Yes.

ADV SANDI: Is he still there?

WONKE WITHIEL MAQUBELA: I don't know.  But I haven't seen him in a while.

ADV SANDI: When you were under the Section 29 detention, did you have an Attorney?  Were members of your family visiting you?

WONKE WITHIEL MAQUBELA: What happened is I asked my family to approach an Attorney so they went to Mr Van Heerden in King William's Town.
 But as they were endeavouring to get legal representation for us, we were under hunger strike, therefor we were released.

ADV SANDI: Who were you with?

WONKE WITHIEL MAQUBELA: I was with Mlungi Siqogela and Xolani Jacob, the three of us, but we were separated.  We saw each other when we went in and when we went out again.
 So what would happen in the mornings, there is a White man that would come in the mornings, he would check on us, asking us about MK.  A tall man, apparently from Pretoria, he had a (indistinct) in his one hand, one arm.  He would beat us up every morning.
 We requested that a Doctor come to see us.   This Doctor came, it was a female Doctor, a White woman.

ADV SANDI: Do you remember her name?

WONKE WITHIEL MAQUBELA: No.

ADV SANDI: From where was she?

WONKE WITHIEL MAQUBELA: We thought that she was from PE.

ADV SANDI: Mr Maqubela, let us conclude this matter.  What requests to you have before the Commission today?

WONKE WITHIEL MAQUBELA: My request is my education was disturbed.  If I could get some form of bursary so that I could go back to school, varsity, because my parents are on pension.

ADV SANDI: You say that you have a request about something that happens when you are sleeping?

WONKE WITHIEL MAQUBELA: What happens is when I am sleeping at home, I wake up in the middle of the night and it is like police have come.  I cannot sleep properly at night.

ADV SANDI: How is your memory?

WONKE WITHIEL MAQUBELA: I have a memory lapse since after I got out of jail.  I have been badly affected.

ADV SANDI: Your eyesight?

WONKE WITHIEL MAQUBELA: After I was teargassed, my eyes are damaged, this is why I am wearing glasses.

ADV SANDI: This female Doctor that you referred to, what did she say to you, what did she diagnose?

WONKE WITHIEL MAQUBELA: My one eye was badly damaged as I was beaten up.  This Doctor was writing in Afrikaans.  I would read what she wrote.  What she wrote was that we are not complaining and we had not been beaten up.
 I said that her report was deceptive.  She would write that we are in good health and that we are not complaining.  I would ask and try to dispute this, she said that she is a Doctor and she has got the authority to do so.

ADV SANDI: Do you think that she was a policeman?

WONKE WITHIEL MAQUBELA: Yes, I think she was a policeman.

ADV SANDI: Therefor to her it did not matter that you were in bad shape, she took it very lightly?  Therefor she supported everything that was happening to you?

WONKE WITHIEL MAQUBELA: Yes, I believe so.

ADV SANDI: Is that all the evidence that you have Mr Maqubela before we proceed to Mr Peter?

WONKE WITHIEL MAQUBELA: Yes.  I think that we should get some form of compensation because my home was damaged.  Because the police that were taken from East London that took photographs, they did nothing about this, my home was destroyed.

ADV SANDI: Thank you Mr Maqubela.  Mr Peter?
 Please come closer to the mike Mr Peter.  You were also arrested in February 1986 in Stutterheim?

WAYILESE PETER: Yes.

ADV SANDI: Were you a member of the Youth Congress in Stutterheim?

WAYILESE PETER: Yes.

ADV SANDI: Where were you arrested?

WAYILESE PETER: In Stutterheim I was not taken from home, but from another house.

ADV SANDI: Who arrested you?

WAYILESE PETER: Dion Oates, Sipho Ntebe and Swanepoel.

ADV SANDI: These are the men that have been mentioned here?

WAYILESE PETER: Yes.

ADV SANDI: Did you know them prior to your arrest?

WAYILESE PETER: I would see them around the township.

ADV SANDI: Please tell us what happened.