Amnesty Hearings — Pietermaritzburg — 1997-02-10

COMMENCEMENT OF TAPE 1B: ) ... sentence has now gone up.  Mine is now 12 years and Mr Harrington is 18, Erasmus is now 12.  That was the end.

MR BANADE: Mr Madlala, just one last question.  I would just like to hear from you if you knew Mr Jama in a personal capacity?

MR MADLALA: No.  I only met Mr Jama on that day when he told us that he was involved in the killings of Inkatha people.

MR BANADE: Mr Chairman, that is then the evidence in chief.
NO FURTHER QUESTIONS BY MR BANADE

MR BRINK: Mr Chairman, members of the Committee, this witness will be questioned by Ms Thabethe.
CROSS-EXAMINED BY MS THABETHE
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MS THABETHE: Mr Madlala, when you were told that you are supposed to go and safeguard the ANC meeting when you knew that you were IFP members, you didn't refuse to go there.

MR MADLALA: No, we didn't because our job was to safeguard, we were supposed to safeguard every area.

MS THABETHE: But you were told that if you see ANC people you must kill them or harass them.  So in other words, when you left for that meeting you knew that you were going to harass them.

MR MADLALA: There was no purpose at all.  But if we had a chance we were going to use that chance.   And also we were making sure that if we were doing all this harassment and killing we were not doing them in front of everyone.

MS THABETHE: How many were you in the van after the meeting when you left the meeting?

MR MADLALA: I think we were eight.

MS THABETHE: How many were sitting in front of the van?

MR MADLALA: When we left the meeting only three people were at the front, Frans Erasmus and Mr Harrington and another guy who was white, I don't remember his last name.   It was 1-ton van.

MS THABETHE: When you arrived there and saw this 15 group of boys and where Mr Jama was there, you stopped there and then you decided to search these people.  When they were searching Mr Jama, where were you?

MR MADLALA: I was busy searching the one that I mentioned that he said his name was Mkhize.  And then that's when I realised that there was one among them who was Mr Jama and who was very stubborn.

MS THABETHE: Are you saying you saw Mr Jama refusing to be
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be searched?

MR MADLALA: According to Mr Erasmus, when he refused to be searched they arrested him.

JUDGE WILSON: That's not quite correct, isn't it?  Wasn't the evidence that he refused to be searched, two constables held him so he could be searched and that he then was searched.

MR MADLALA: I can't say he didn't refuse because he was stubborn at that time.  Even when they arrested him he was really stubborn.  He didn't want to go.

MS THABETHE: When Mr Erasmus was searching Mr Jama you saw this.

MR MADLALA: As I told you before, I was busy searching Mr Mkhize, but I did see Mr Erasmus searching Mr Jama and I saw that nothing was received from Mr Jama.

MS THABETHE: When you were at the van, you said you saw a diary.

MR MADLALA: Yes, that's true.

MS THABETHE: Where was that diary from?  Because you saw them searching Mr Jama and they couldn't find a thing from Mr Jama.

MR MADLALA: I didn't see where it came from, but I saw the diary in Mr Harrington's hand and I saw a name belonging to an Inkatha member, Mr Vizi and he was an IFP and a very prominent leader.

MS THABETHE: You were inside the van but you didn't see where the diary came from.

MR MADLALA: We were many at the back of the van so I couldn't see where it came from.   Mr Harrington was busy choking Mr Jama.  That's when I started seeing the diary.  How he got hold of the diary I don't know, but what I heard
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is that Mr Dhlamini said there is a diary and it is from Mr Jama's pocket and inside the diary there are names belonging to IFP members.

MS THABETHE: In other words, you didn't see when they were actually searching him, but you just saw the diary.

MR MADLALA: Yes, I saw the diary being opened by Mr Dhlamini.

MS THABETHE: When you arrived at the bush you said Mr Harrington told Mr Erasmus that he mustn't shoot.

MR MADLALA: Yes, that's what I said.  Because they were scared that the ballistic tests will reveal that the gun belonged to them, yes.

MS THABETHE: Why did you shoot him?  Were you not scared of the ballistic test?

MR MADLALA: I knew that if you were using a "pump" gun it wasn't easy for anyone to discover whose gun it was.

MS THABETHE: In other words, you were not scared while Mr Harrington was scared?

JUDGE WILSON: ... that leaves marks on the bullet and a pump gun which uses shotgun cartridges which leaves no such marks.

MS THABETHE: You said when you shot Mr Jama he was already dead, or is this what you are thinking?

MR MADLALA: I thought even though I am not quite sure, I am not certain, but I thought he was dead.

MS THABETHE: Then why did you shoot him if you thought he was dead?

MR MADLALA: I just shot him because we already talked that it might happen he just lost concsciousness, he can regain consciousness.

MS THABETHE: In other words,you are telling us you also had
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it in your mind that he wasn't dead?

MR MADLALA: Yes.

MS THABETHE: Do you know that the doctor who gave the report of the post-mortem said Mr Jama was killed because of the bullet shot?

MR MADLALA: Yes, I heard that.

MS THABETHE: One doctor said he broke his Madula Bones.  It might happen that when he was shot he was already dead.  And then the second doctor said it wasn't true, because if he was killed from a gun why he was broken ...

ADV DE JAGER: ... you have been convicted of murder.  So the court found him guilty.  Whether he thought he was dead or not doesn't matter at this stage.  He has been convicted and we are dealing with the conviction and his sentence at this stage.
NO FURTHER QUESTIONS BY MS THABETHE

JUDGE WILSON: Mr Madlala, you've told us as I understand your evidence that you don't know what happened to this diary.

MR MADLALA: Yes, I don't know what happened to the diary.

JUDGE WILSON: ... sitting at the back of the van holding the door.

MR MADLALA: That's true.

JUDGE WILSON: Do you know that Mr Harrington said that you and he threw it out of the door, out of the van?

MR MADLALA: It is either that he doesn't remember properly, but it is not true.  It was himself and Mr Dhlamini who were together at the front.

JUDGE WILSON: ... in the front of the van was it?

MR MADLALA: If they threw it we were with them at the back.  Probably they threw it through the window and I did not see
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them because I was holding the door.

JUDGE WILSON: Was there only one vehicle involved, the van, there was never a car there?

MR MADLALA: Yes, it was only one van that we were travelling in at that time, because the other vans had driven off the scene of the meeting, ANC meeting.

JUDGE WILSON: You said also in your evidence that Mr Jama confessed that he was there when IFP members were killed.
You heard Mr Harrington giving evidence didn't you, and he made no mention of Mr Jama saying anything of that sort.

MR MADLALA: As I have come before Commission to ask for amnesty, I have come to say what happened and I don't even have to think about what happened because I know it for a fact.  I told Mr Harrington this is what Mr Jama said.

JUDGE WILSON: Were you interpreting?

MR MADLALA: I told Mr Harrington that Jama has just made this statement to the effect that they must kill us in the same manner that they killed the IFP people at KwaShange.  That's how I put it when I told Mr Harrington.

JUDGE WILSON: And you made a statement, you remember, to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.

MR MADLALA: Yes, I do remember.

JUDGE WILSON: You told us what happened when Mr Jama was killed.

MR MADLALA: Yes, I do remember.