Amnesty Hearings — Middelburg — 2000-05-11

MR RICHARD: With the political motive of the context and the time.

CHAIRPERSON: And I am a supporter of the ANC so I fall into category A and my association makes it a common purpose, it is a crime that I have committed and there it seems to me that the matter rests.

MR RICHARD: My second two points were the political nature of the offence, the evidence is overwhelming.  It certainly cannot be said to be far fetched.  Taking the various reports that we have available, plus the evidence of these applicants, taken in conjunction and the context of evidence in other matters, I don't see any reason to doubt or be suspicious or impute fabrication to these applicants that there was a political motive.
	Witches as I have already argued, were perceived to be the opponents, and that was the subjective and bona fide belief.  I don't want to re-argue other matters, so I am going to leave it there.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes, the point that Ms Mtanga quite rightly makes is that that is not really where the matter ends, because we must also be satisfied that the conduct is bona fide.  So assume for example that the victim was a five year old girl, really totally harmless, then of course the objective looking at the facts in order to determine bona fides, of course will weigh more heavily against the applicant.
	I think that is what she is referring to, that you have to actually go that second step as well, and you must look objectively and be satisfied that there were bona fides in these circumstances.

MR RICHARD: In this case we are not looking at a five year old girl.

CHAIRPERSON: Of course, of course.

MR RICHARD: We are looking at the age group of the typical witch.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes, I thought I will just illustrate the argument that Ms Mtanga raises, which to my mind is a proper approach to the exercise that we must engage in.

MR RICHARD: My answer is that on the test of bona fides, there was nothing to repugnant to logic and reason in this matter, so as to come to the conclusion that it is not bona fide, it is male fide.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes.  Ms Mtanga argues that we are under duty  not to uncritically just accept everything at face value, that we have to actually apply our minds.

MR RICHARD: That is a valid point.

CHAIRPERSON: I don't think there is a difference between you ...

MR RICHARD: No, that is a valid point.  And I believe on a critical examination of this evidence, in as much as there is an onus on an applicant in an amnesty application, the evidence is before the Commission to satisfy itself quite properly and critically that there was bona fides in the act.
	Again we are dealing with witchcraft, witchcraft is a subjective perception.  I believe the evidence is overwhelming that the perception of these applicants was that a witch was an enemy of the liberation struggle and hard as it might be, ten years after the event in a different context in time, to believe what happened then, at that time in the context of the struggle, a belief was both honest and bona fide and that is what the perception that the applicants acted with.  I rest.  To take it further means re-arguing this in other cases.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes, we appreciate you not doing that Mr Richard. There are some other matters that we must still attend to.

MR RICHARD: That is why I tried to curtail.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes, thank you very much.  That concludes the application.  As you have gathered from the discussion here at the end, that it is a matter that will have to be considered, it is a matter in which a decision cannot be given immediately, but the Panel will still even given the constraints that we operate under normally, logistically, we will endeavour to formulate a decision as quickly as the circumstances permit and we will then notify the parties once that decision is available.

MR RICHARD: As the Committee pleases.

CHAIRPERSON: The decision is reserved.  Thank you very much.  These applicants can stand down at this stage, they would be excused.  There is one more applicant, Mr Tladi, who is accommodated in Pretoria and we would like to finalise that matter so that the Correctional Services who have gone to great difficulty to get to the venue here, are able to be released finally, because they wouldn't have any other person to actually deal with, once Mr Tladi's case is finalised, so we would like to really deal with that one and hopefully complete it as well.

MR RICHARD: I believe we can deal with it and complete with it tonight, it is not a long matter, Chairperson.  May I request the indulgence of a five minute adjournment?

CHAIRPERSON: Very well, we will stand down just briefly, just a few minutes, just to re-arrange.  We will reconvene and deal with Mr Tladi's matter.

MR RICHARD: Thank you Chairperson.
COMMITTEE ADJOURNS