Human Rights Violation Hearings — Venda — 1996-10-04

MR LYSTER: Thank you very much.  We extend our sympathies to you and your family, it is a terrible thing to lose a child and it is particularly sad when it is your only child.  Did you ever find out from your son's friends what happened on that day?  Why they were on top of that military vehicle, had they been arrested, were they being taken to the Venda Defence Force head quarters, what was the situation?
VENDA HEARING TRC/NORTH WEST
8 N MUKOSI

MS MUKOSI: Thank you.  I will give you an explanation.  I requested the young men to give me an explanation because the hippo left in my absence.  You know that year was a very violent year and no meetings were allowed at all, especially the political meetings.
 But the youth was just going to give a feedback to the community and rumour had it that the soldiers arrived and they said it would be better if we take some of you to our head office so that you can get clarity as to the permission of the meeting and when they arrived at their head office, the meeting was legal.
 And when the soldiers realised that it was a legal meeting, they said we are sorry, your meeting is legal, we can now take you back.  Now on their way back, they say a hippo was driving in a very high speed, I don't know are they trying to cover the time or what were they doing.
 But we were told that the boys asked the soldiers, why are you driving this way and one of the soldiers said, this is our style of driving.  And when they approached the Venda sign robots, it went off the brakes and it went through a red robot and at the robots at the shopping centre, it couldn't stop and cars were just travelling, it couldn't stop and it just got in this accident.
 My son fell from the hippo onto the tarred road and that was it.

MR LYSTER: Mrs Mukosi, I just want to take you back a bit before we come back to that incident.  In your statement you refer to something which happened in February 1990.  Sipho had been to a gathering or a party at someone's house to celebrate the release of President Mandela from jail.
 Could you tell us about that incident?
VENDA HEARING TRC/NORTH WEST
9 N MUKOSI

MS MUKOSI: My son never stood up and tell me that he was a member of the ANC.  The second point I know the reason why he didn't tell me, I was so scared and I knew for a fact that you say anything about the ANC, you are going to be arrested and maybe that's the reason he didn't want to tell me anything.
 After the release of President Mandela, Sipho arrived at home, he was injured.  You could see that he was assaulted with sjamboks.  And I asked him Sipho how did you sustain these injuries?
 Every time he left in the evenings, he would tell me that he is going to gym and I said, Sipho you went to the gym and you come back injured, what happened?  And he said, mom, we were busy exercising and the soldiers got hold of us, they assaulted us, telling us that we were holding a secret meeting.
 The second time he came back home and I could feel his arm was broken and I said to him, listen here, take this money, go to Chilizeni, because every time you go to the gym you come back injured.  He went to the hospital and they plastered his hand.
 The other time he said they were going for a meeting at Sqwibelo.  I think Sqwibelo was one of their members, they were going to celebrate the release of President Mandela.
 Sipho, you come back this way, what happened?  He said to me mom, we were in the middle of the barbecue enjoying and the soldiers arrived, they didn't say anything, they just took out their sjamboks and they were on us.

MR LYSTER: Now just going back to the incidents in which your son died.  Was there an inquest that was held, was there any sort of case that was held relating to his death
VENDA HEARING TRC/NORTH WEST
10 N MUKOSI
or was the driver of the vehicle charged with anything?

MRS MUKOSI: I do not know anything.  I don't even know anything about the court case.  I was mourning and I even took a lawyer, but he didn't do anything and we realised that there was an oppression of some kind and then we were told that Sipho's court hearings will begin, but as his parents, we were never called.
 I was so harassed.  Men and women, young men and women were pushing me and I couldn't gain entrance.  I don't know what the proceedings of the court were.  I don't even, that's why I say to you I don't remember as to whether there was a court case or not.

MR LYSTER: And you said Sipho was working at the time.  Where was he working?

MRS MUKOSI: He was working with another woman, they were drawing plans on weekends.

MR LYSTER: Did your son or his wife receive any sort of payout or compensation from the motor vehicle accident fund as a result of this, or any compensation from the Venda Defence Force arising out of his death?

MRS MUKOSI: How would I get compensation because I never went to court.  Even today, we didn't get anything.

MR LYSTER: Thank you Mrs Mukosi.  I'll ask my colleagues if they have any questions to ask.

THOMAS MANTHATA: Mrs Mukosi.  You wouldn't see this as an ordinary accident.  What would you say such a case could be described as?  What I want to say is would you say the soldiers decided to kill the youth in the car without themselves going to be killed too?

MRS MUKOSI: If a person came to me to tell me that it was an accident, I would take it that way, but this Muntso came
VENDA HEARING TRC/NORTH WEST
11 N MUKOSI
to my house and told me that my son would be killed.
 And I believe it was a plan.

THOMAS MANTHATA: ; And the military office of Venda land did not come to your house to explain what the youth said was the typical way of driving some of these cars by the officers of the department?

MRS MUKOSI: Nobody came to me, but on the 29th of June as I was reading a newspaper, I came across an article saying Ramoswana came to me to give condolences.  I've never talked to him, I do not know him.

THOMAS MANTHATA: Because you said he issued a car that took you to Garankua.  Was this just an order or did he come, or did he send for you to find out what the position is and therefor offer a car to transport you to Garankua?

MRS MUKOSI: He didn't bring a car, but the youth left, they went to his office to tell him what was happening and a car was taken out.  I think he did this because of the pressures from the youth.  He didn't do it out of his own will.
 He didn't come to me, he didn't come to my house.  There was this car written VDF and I was told that Ramoswana gave permission for us to get the car.

THOMAS MANTHATA: The youth couldn't pressurise him further to account for the accident if we have to call it that or the manner in which the drivers, behaved themselves?

MRS MUKOSI: I won't have more information.  But I think there is something they said to him because he ended up releasing a car and a helicopter was also sent to take my child to the hospital.  Maybe there was pressure of some kind.

THOMAS MANTHATA: ; At that time what was Sipho's wife doing, was
VENDA HEARING TRC/NORTH WEST
12 N MUKOSI
she at school, was she working?

MRS MUKOSI: Sipho's wife was schooling, but at the time of his death, she was not schooling because she was pregnant.  The child was born after the death of Sipho and she went back to school thereafter.

THOMAS MANTHATA: Okay, no further questions.