Amnesty Hearings — Durban — 1999-08-16

GRATINA NINELA: It seemed they had a wish of going through the house to find out whether he was hiding or not, but when I thought that they wanted to do that I told them, he is really not at home and no-one else was at home.  I found the doors locked and I opened the door because I had a key and then the person who was talking spoke to the two children.  "Hey you boys, where are the occupants of this house?"  They said they didn't know.  And I asked them, "What are your surnames?"  The way he laughed at me, the one who was talking, made me see that I was being fooled, though he gave me those surnames, but I realised that they were fooling me.

MS GABRIEL: What surnames did they give you, can you remember?

GRATINA NINELA: I don't quite remember.

MS GABRIEL: And after that the other, there were two men, one of them had very dark sunglasses and the other one, the one who had dark glasses, said, "How can a man do such a thing?  We had an appointment with him and he has broken it."  I couldn't say a thing about that or answer or anything and the other one said, "Will you please give us a paper and a pen?"  So I went to the house, I took a pen and a paper and he wrote the message and he said, "There's nothing to be hidden there, you can read the message.  Give that letter to him."

MS GABRIEL: To Blessing?

GRATINA NINELA: To Blessing.  Okay, when Blessing came late, I gave him the letter.  Of course, I had read it.  And I asked him ...(intervention)

MS GABRIEL: What was on that letter?

GRATINA NINELA: The letter had a message to Blessing, asking him to meet those people by the post office in Pinetown at 1 o'clock on a Monday.  That was on Saturday.

MS GABRIEL: Yes, and then you gave Blessing the note?

GRATINA NINELA: I gave Blessing the note, he read it and I asked him, "Who are those people and what were they after?"
He said, "Oh those people were investigators."  I can say investigators or detectives, one of those things, then wanted to know what was happening with the boy in the hospital, that was Senzo.  Well it stopped there.  On Sunday I had to go back to work, but the next weekend off when I got home, Blessing was not there.  His sister, who was staying at home, told me that when on Monday, when she was going to Pinetown he asked her to stop the taxi for him, he was also going, but before that he told his sister that sometimes people who are suspects of the Special Branch are taken to be killed somewhere and after they are killed there will be means of confusing the members of the family or convincing them that he is still alive.  There will be people with reports that he is somewhere, mentioning any place, knowing that they have killed him, he will never ever be seen.  That was before he parted.  They took the same taxi as far as Durban.  When they parted, he told his sister that he would be going as far as , I don't remember whether it's Swansbury or Swainsburg, but via Pinetown, as he was ordered to see those two men in Pinetown on Monday at 1 o'clock.  So that is the last time he was seen alive.

MS GABRIEL: Is that the last time you saw your son?

GRATINA NINELA: The last time I saw my son was the time when I left home to work.  My daughter who was staying at home, was the last person to see my son.

MS GABRIEL: When was the next time you heard about Blessing?

GRATINA NINELA: I heard that there is a young man who got home, who at the first asked where Blessing was, or whether he wanted to see Blessing, something of that sort.  At the same time, he had a so to say, Blessing was somewhere, I don't remember the place.  Blessing was somewhere.  When I heard this, this confused me.  How can a person first for Blessing and quickly he knows where Blessing is, but I couldn't ask anybody, I couldn't say anything about that, but that confused me and another one, a member of the community by the name of Mduduzi Ngedi, he was working at Checkers, Checkers that is in Game Centre, Game City I mean, he told me that Blessing came to the shop and they spoke with him and he said "what a handsome man" but he quickly went out and left.  This worried me.  One of the days I asked him, "By the way, you said you saw Blessing at Checkers", he said "yes".  "What did he say?  Where does he stay?"  He said, "He said he was around".

MS GABRIEL: And when did you discover the truth about what happened to Blessing?

GRATINA NINELA: Early in 1987.

CHAIRPERSON: 1997.

GRATINA NINELA: I mean 1997, sorry.  In 1997.

MS GABRIEL: Yes, tell us how you discovered this.

GRATINA NINELA: One of my daughters asked me to go with the other two daughters.  They were staying in one place.  Three of us were to go to Durban to meet somebody call Mr Mhlodi.  When we got to Durban, one of the daughters had a number, phone number, to phone Mr Mhlodi to tell him that we have arrived and she did it.  And when she had phoned she told us that he said, Mr Mhlodi said we must wait, he will be coming with a car.  He gave her a description of the car.  In a few minutes time that car drove near us and she said, my daughter said "That is the car".  So we went to that car.  Off we went.  We were on Smith Street.  We stopped by the ...(indistinct) Park, out of the car we went and we sat down.  It was the first time I heard the news that my son was no more alive.

MS GABRIEL: Who gave you this news?

GRATINA NINELA: Mr Mhlodi.  And he told us that people of the TRC are looking for Ninela's family, they can't find Ninela's family, but some people have come out, come forward asking for amnesty, but they didn't know where to find us.  They told us what happened and finally told us to go to TRC offices when they were still in Durban.  They said Blessing was taken to - I mean when the sister brought the news of what Blessing said the last time, he asked the sister, "Do your know where Swainsbury is?"  No, she didn't know.  And he said that place is round about Amanzimtoti, that is where he was killed and moved to Bulwer.  A bomb was placed on him to make anybody who hears the bomb exploding or anybody coming after that, seeing his body was exploded, the impression will be that he had a bomb to put on the railway.
	So after that we went straight to the TRC people where we got a piece of paper with the information which Andy Taylor gave to TRC people.

MS GABRIEL: Did you read this piece of paper?

GRATINA NINELA: Yes I did, though I cannot say all the details there, but there are two things that appear on the paper that confuse me, like the boy who came to my house and asked for Blessing and all of a sudden he knew where Blessing was.  There is a place on that paper which says there was no evidence to send him to court.

MS GABRIEL: So why does this confuse you, Mrs Ninela?

GRATINA NINELA: What confuses me is that after that there is a part where, though they say there was no evidence to send him to court, though he had himself admitted that he was on mission of the bombs.  What confuses me is that if at all there was no evidence to take him to court, why wasn't he released alive?  If at all he had admitted that he was on a bomb mission, why wasn't he taken to court?

MS GABRIEL: Mr Chair, it would appear that Mrs Ninela is referring to the first, well the only amnesty application of Mr Taylor and that's at page 4.  Yes, please continue, Mrs Ninela.