Human Rights Violation Hearings — Tembisa — 1996-11-27

MS SEROKE: When they said, "What are you", what do you think they meant, what did they want to find out?

AGNES MANYISA: It means they wanted to know whether we TEMBISA  HEARING TRC/GAUTENG
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belonged to the ANC or to any other political party or are we comrades but they found out that we're just ordinary people.

CHAIRPERSON: We thank you, we'll ask you to remain seated whilst we proceed to the lady next to you, Antoinette Mundau who will be assisted by Joyce Seroke.

MS SEROKE: Good morning Agnes. Can you tell us what happened?

ANTOINETTE MUNDAU: We were asleep together with my husband.  He woke me up and told me that there was some gun shots outside and later we decided to continue sleeping. Later one lady came to our house, she woke us up and told us that there are some gunshots outside and people are running around.  We woke up and we started waking up the children.  After waking up the children some neighbours started arriving at our place.  When they arrived we didn't go into the garage, we went out and we started running away as all people were running. As we were trying to run away, we met some men, they told us that we have to turn back because the children might be shot. "We are not looking for you, we are looking for men".  And then we turned back and went back into the garage. We closed the door and sat inside.  And my cousin was sitting next to me said that my uncle must get out, meaning my husband because he was going to be killed. Then he got out.
 These men arrived and they started shooting.  I would say in the beginning they shot at a window because they said we didn't want to open the door and they said,"We're going to burn the house".  And I said to people inside the place, "Open the door because if they burn the house they will kill all of us, but if the door is open some of us might manage TEMBISA  HEARING TRC/GAUTENG
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to escape".  After the door was open I went out, I was carrying my child on my and also carrying another one on my arms. So two of my children were left inside the garage and I ran to the back of my neighbours house.  The shooting continued.
 After they finished shooting they towards my place and one of them said, "Here's a dog, kill it!", and the other one said, "No you mustn't kill her because she has children". The other one burned and picked up a stone and hit me on my knee and then they passed.  My sister called me to come back and told me that the child had been shot.
I turned and went back and I discovered that the sister who was sitting next to me, the lady who was sitting next to me was also lying on the ground. I took the child and picked her up because the child was still alive and went to hospital on foot.
 We arrived at a certain place and we met a man driving a van.  We asked him to take us to hospital. I'll when we say, to go to hospital we discovered a Caspar standing in the playing ground and it became clear to us that those people who were involved were police because the people didn't assist us and taken the people to hospital. They just looked at us as we were passing.    
 When we arrived at the hospital they started taking statements and immediately one of our neighbours arrived and my husband was in the car.  He was also shot, he couldn't even speak. His face and hand were swollen. I gave them a statement.  The whole of my body was covered in blood.  After giving them a statement, I left all the people in hospital and went back home.  When I arrived at home, it was about seven o'clock and the police were already in the home.  TEMBISA  HEARING TRC/GAUTENG
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The police, before they can ask me any question, they started collecting their bullet shells and they put them in their pockets. Ant thereafter they came to me and started to question me and I told them that I didn't know anything except that people came at night and they shot at us. 
 The police took me into their combi and they took me to Midrand and they asked me to give a statement. I gave them a statement at the police station and thereafter went back home.
 My child took about five days in hospital and after five days the child died.  The funeral was arranged and I had some problems because I wasn't working and my relatives had to help me in paying the funeral and my husband was in Kalafong hospital and that's where he was being treated. He was shot five times and they thought he was dead.  They also broke his neck and his jaw and it took about two months before he could start eating. One of the bullets broke his leg bone, however he survived and he's here.
 These are the things that I've seen and after all this I haven't had anything and even the statement that I've given to the police, there was no response.  Thank you.

MS SEROKE: Thank you Antoinette. I know this is very upsetting but we will just ask you a few questions.
 What was happening in Ivory Park when this happened, what was the mood in that neighbourhood?

ANTOINETTE MUNDAU: I don't know very well but we were living in peace because we could even hear the guns from a distance.  We never expected that such a thing could happen at our place.  We heard them from a distance as they started shooting but we couldn't run because we didn't suspect anything bad and they happened to catch us and shoot at us.
TEMBISA HEARING TRC/GAUTENG
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MS SEROKE: So the shooting that took place was not in response to protest marches or that kind of activity?

ANTOINETTE MUNDAU: We were not marching, we were not doing anything.

MS SEROKE: Did you see the people who shot at you?

ANTOINETTE MUNDAU: Yes I saw the people but I couldn't recognise who they were.

MS SEROKE: How were they dressed?  Could you describe their clothes?

ANTOINETTE MUNDAU: I can't explain how they were dressed because when I got out of the garage they were squatting outside and when I got out I was so afraid because there was shooting all over, so I just got out and ran away with my children.  But I saw them because they were shooting behind me from where I was coming from.  I was so frightened that I couldn't even see exactly as to what they were wearing.

MS SEROKE: Because Agnes said she saw that they were
wearing police uniforms and their faces were covered in balaclavas. I thought perhaps you could have also seen the same picture.

ANTOINETTE MUNDAU: I will say that since we were many, other people likely managed to see some of the things that we couldn't see, but what I saw and realised that these people were police is only when I passed the street and I saw a Casper standing by and they couldn't help us in any way.  We thought they were going to help us, so I started to think, "This might be the police who were shooting at us", and not even one of the people who were perpetrators were arrested.

MS SEROKE: Thanks.  Were you a member of any organisation, or your husband or any member of the family?

ANTOINETTE MUNDAU: I didn't belong to any political organisation. TEMBISA  HEARING TRC/GAUTENG
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My husband belonged to a committee.

MS SEROKE: What kind of committee, Antoinette?

ANTOINETTE MUNDAU: It was a community committee.

MS SEROKE: Your daughter was shot at, can you describe how many bullets were in her body or where she was shot?

ANTOINETTE MUNDAU: She had one bullet in her body, unfortunately she was shot in her thigh and it happened to penetrate into her intestines and they had to operate to find out exactly what happened.

MS SEROKE: Did you see the man who threw a stone at you when you were hiding?

ANTOINETTE MUNDAU: Yes I saw the person but I didn't know who it was.

MS SEROKE: Did you see the person who intervened on your behalf that you shouldn't be shot at?

ANTOINETTE MUNDAU: Yes I saw the person, I couldn't recognise
him too.

MS SEROKE: Were they both black or white people?

ANTOINETTE MUNDAU: They were black gentlemen.