Amnesty Hearings — Bloemfontein — 1997-03-25

MR MTHEMBU: As I see in paragraph 9.4 of your application, with due respect Mr Chair I am not that fluent in Xhosa but I can make out here that the applicant said that he hated White people, you say because that you have worked for Whites before and they played around with you and everybody.  Now do you still share the same sentiments today?

DANIEL MAGODA: No I do not feel the same way because it seems that there is a bit of compensation.  I used to hate them before.  There is a bit of reconciliation, and even when I attacked them it was not out of hatred, it was just to show them what we wanted as African people.

ADV DE JAGER: But if I understand the translation correctly we did this because we were oppressed and we hated White people, and also because they messed all Black people around.  So here you said in your application in fact you did this because you hated White people and because they messed Black people around.

DANIEL MAGODA: It must have been a slip of the tongue while I was writing the statement because I did it in a hurry.  It is not that I attacked them because I hated them, it's that I hated what they did, because I worked for them for a long time, which reference to Whites.  It was not that I hated Mr Fourie specifically or I hated Whites specifically, I hated what they did to Africans and to me as an African.

JUDGE WILSON: You said earlier in your application, paragraph 9(A),
"Due to circumstances I was living under, together
		with my children under the apartheid regime I was full of hatred".
do you remember saying that?

DANIEL MAGODA: Yes.

JUDGE WILSON: Furthermore in your application form where you answered the question as to what order or approval was given for you to commit this act, do you remember there was a question like that in the application form, who gave - that the order was given, do you remember that, that there was?

DANIEL MAGODA: I do not understand the question very well, could you please repeat it?

JUDGE WILSON: In the application form there is a section ll(b) which says if the act was committed as a result of an order you should state, give particulars of the order that was given to you, do you remember that?

DANIEL MAGODA: Yes I remember the - I was trying to explain the command which was issued by Comrade Jan Showa.

JUDGE WILSON: What you said was,
"The person issuing the instruction that we should go and attack the White person because he was treating Blacks badly and the plan had to be made with regard to him".
do you understand what I have just read to you?  You said this person was to be attacked because he was treating Blacks badly, and a plan had to be made with regard to him.  It would seem that you were talking here of a plan to attack a particular White person because he treated Blacks badly.

DANIEL MAGODA: That was probably a mistake in what I was writing because no one was mentioned, it was not said go and attack Mr Fourie.  The instruction which we received was
that White farmers should be attacked and Fourie was one of them.

JUDGE WILSON: Carry on.

MR MTHEMBU: Sir to take this issue further which was raised by Mr Chair, in paragraph 11(b) in brackets you said this person who gave that order that you should attack this particular farm was Jan Showa of the PAC, did in fact Mr Showa tell you or instruct you to attack this particular farm or not?

DANIEL MAGODA: He did not specify which farmers.  We received instruction from Mr Leeuw as our commander that we should go to this farm.  He did not explain why we had to go there since the instruction that was issued was that we should attack farms and that was all.  We could have chosen any farm but because I found that Mr Leeuw knew what we could find there and they referred to the fact that this man was a reservist and he was a commander and that we would be able to find things on his farm.

MR MTHEMBU: But did he believe that he would attain any political objective?

DANIEL MAGODA: I do not know what he thought.  We don't all think the same things.

ADV DE JAGER: This form was completed in Xhosa, is that correct?

DANIEL MAGODA: That is correct.

ADV DE JAGER: Whose handwriting is on the form?

DANIEL MAGODA: I am the person that wrote that.
 And if you've written, as was put to you, 
"The person issuing the instruction that we should go and attack the White person because hewas
		treating Blacks badly and the plan had to be made 
		with regards to him, the person who gave that instruction was Jan Showa of the PAC".
You've written that in your own language, in your own handwriting?

DANIEL MAGODA: Yes I wrote that.  I am explaining that when I filled this form we were under pressure because it was near the closing date and I was unable to construct this in an appropriate manner.

ADV DE JAGER: But this isn't an ordinary mistake.  It's a sentence and it makes sense.  How could you make such a mistake?

DANIEL MAGODA: It happens to me often similar to when I am writing a letter and somebody is talking nearby.  I become distracted and end up writing what the speaker is saying.

JUDGE WILSON: Are you now suggesting that you wrote that down on the form because somebody near you may have been saying it?

DANIEL MAGODA: There were many of us there at Goedemoed and we were all working in the same room at the same place.

JUDGE WILSON: You see earlier you had written, when you were asked about your justification for regarding it as political, the following
"The Whites took our land and our possessions from us as Blacks. We are not educated because of them, that is why we are taking revenge.  I was fighting against the oppression of Blacks and taking back what is rightfully ours and was fighting for our country".
There you state political reasons with clarity.  How is it that a matter of a few lines later you suddenly could write something that you are now saying had no connection with 
what you did at all, can you explain?

DANIEL MAGODA: (No reply)?

JUDGE WILSON: Very well.

JUDGE MGOEPE: Did you attend school?

DANIEL MAGODA: Yes I am still busy with my education.

JUDGE MGOEPE: Up to what standard did you attend formal schooling?

DANIEL MAGODA: I passed standard three on the outside and I am registered for standard four in prison.

JUDGE MGOEPE: Now at the time when you attended school, while you were still a young person up to what standard did you got to school, or does that embarrass you?

DANIEL MAGODA: I got as far as standard three, I passed standard three when I was still young, but I did not reach standard four.  I am currently busy with standard four now that I am in prison.

ADV DE JAGER: But at the trial the trial Judge found that you in fact at that stage was 40 years of age and that you have passed standard five, didn't you give him that information?

DANIEL MAGODA: Yes it was a mistake on the part of the person that was writing the statement, because I passed standard three and that person wrote that I had passed standard five.  It was not my mistake.  I told that person which standard I had obtained at school.

MR MTHEMBU: Can I proceed.  Mr Magoda paragraph 11(b) of your application form, when you wrote out what's contained therein, did you really mean this or you were just negligent in the manner in which you completed this application form?

DANIEL MAGODA: It is a mistake because looking at it now that is not what I was supposed to have written.  That was a
mistake on my part.  Because it was done in a hurry, I wrote it in a hurry.

MR MTHEMBU: Are you fluent in - or can you read Xhosa well, if at all?

DANIEL MAGODA: I would say that I can read it, but I am - I can't read that well.  Something else that affects me is stress and it causes me not to be able to concentrate very well.  When reading a book I sometimes sit and read the same paragraph over and over without comprehending what it says.