Human Rights Violation Hearings — East London — 1996-04-17

MR SMITH: Are you saying that just coming forward and applying for amnesty would not be sufficient, that you would also maybe require a person to show remorse for what they have done.

NYAMEKA GONIWE: Yes.  They have to show us remorse, that they're sorry for what they did.  I don't say that, I mean it would immediatly make us happy, it's a challenge, we're going to be challenged in that kind of way, and grapple with that, inside and it will take a long time.  Healing takes a long time.

MR SMITH: Nyame, you were also involved in the last suit which were mentioned by the other three yesterday.  Now I dealt with that matter when I was questioning them, and maybe the Commission would then formally inform you if they have done anything about it, so I'm not going to ask you
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anything about that.

NYAMEKA GONIWE: I appreciate that.

MR SMITH: Thank you very much for giving evidence.  Mr Chairman that concludes my questioning of this witness.

CHAIRPERSON: Are there other candidates? Yes?

PANEL MEMBER: Mrs Goniwe, I have been listening to your horrifying story, and yesterday when I left this place, I was asking myself the question, what kind of a human being can do such horrible things?  What kind of hatred is this? I'm going to ask a question about this child.  You said you had gone out to Port Elizabeth and when you came back the police had left a message to say that the car was found somewhere.  How old was the child to whom the message was given?

NYAMEKA GONIWE: He was then 14 or 15, I mean, we were furious, this was a serious matter, a matter of death and the police treated it, you know, casually, and I think we confronted them.  Matthew protested a number of times in the media about that, that what kind of system would give a child such a message.  I mean they are supposed to summon their police officers to come and address the family.  But this is what happened, or we suspect this is what has happened. And treat the family with dignity and respect.

PANEL MEMBER: Your message about this was left with a 14 year old child?

NYAMEKA GONIWE: Yes.

PANEL MEMBER: Thank you.

DR BORAINE: I just want to persue a little bit the question that was asked by John Smith.  You have said publicly that you hesitated to come to the Commission because it was now the turn of the people who were not so
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well known and perhaps whose stories have not been heard, and we honoured that, but we still felt it was very very important that your story should be heard by this Commission and by the Nation.  I'm wondering, part of your reluctance to come to the Commission, did it stem from almost cynicism that you had spent so many weeks and months attending an inquest and the final result left you really no further than where you had started, was that part of your reason?

NYAMEKA GONIWE: Very much part of that. I guess I was protecting myself.  We had two inputs, the one was such a circus.  It ended after a very very short while.  You know after the family was engaged in trying to get the first inquest to be opened up, you know they wanted to have just a closed matter and deal with it as quickly as possible, we fought over that, using our lawyers and then it was opened up a little bit.  But as you know, nothing came out of that, the first one.
 And then we had to go through a long inquest, and we were bruised by it, emotionally and physically, and I guess we had high hopes as well.  I remember when the finding was announced, we were so disappointed.  I don't know what we were expecting at the end, so I suppose we are approaching the Commission in the same sort of light.  That is me.
 The second reluctance was over not knowing what it is, that's going to happen here, I had little information. But now that I am here I'm sort of humbled by the experiences of the others.  I'm happy to say, I'm happy that I came.

DR BORAINE: Thank you very much, I'm very grateful to you for that.  I want to ask you a very direct question, and then ask a further question.  Who do you think killed Matthew Goniwe?
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NYAMEKA GONIWE: Who, the person, are you saying who are the persons?

MR SMITH: You tell me what you think.

NYAMEKA GONIWE: I could write a book about that, but I mean. if you know what has happened in the Eastern Cape during that time, the state security councils, the army working together with the police, it's a sort of combined thing.  Maybe each force giving backing to the other force, but I think the whole thing started at home.  I would start at home because I've traced Major Venter, from the time, how he came to Cradock.  Obviously maybe the then government was quite frustrated with the former head of the security branch in Cradock because he was so very casual and very unsophisticated in a way.  He lost all the cases against the community, so they were angry, the State was angry and they couldn't pin down Matthew in a way and they felt that this person was advising the community and they had to bring a better man, and I think the heart of the matter started with the security networks, I mean Venter really monitoring Matthew's movements.  Not him alone but also all the Eastern Cape, you know the Eastern Cape Security, the head of the then security branch would know who was then based in Port Elizabeth and of course, what I think and we have a picture of what happened, though we cannot prove it to the courts what actually happened, and I think that they might have used the death squad.  That's why we are hopeful that the Commission, whatever comes out from the De Kock Trial could shed light or what came out from the police bombing in Port Elizabeth, that case would shed light on what happened in the Eastern Cape during those days.  Because the fate of the PEPCO Three, the same tactics, the same strategies, were
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used to kill.  The PEPCO Three vanished in May, on the 8th of May I think, and just shortly they were targeting the activists, the main activists in the Eastern Cape.

DR BORAINE: Thank you you're being very patient with me and I'm nearly finished.  There are two possible ways in which the truth can be made known about who killed Matthew Goniwe.  One is to persue the investigations which you have referred to and obviously the Commission has the opportunity, has the resources to continue that.  The other way is through someone who was involved, who witnessed it or took part in it, who knows something about it, finally cannot contain it, coming to the Commission in another way, in another place and telling the truth.  how would you feel about that?

NYAMEKA GONIWE: WE have two inquests running and it didn't come nearer to who was the killer, maybe, you know that it is with those people within the security forces but who they were, we don't know, I think we need to crack that, we need an inside person, we need a witness and i would appeal to those people who are still out there and still concealing the truth, to come forward.  Thank you.

PANEL MEMBER: Mr Chairman, I would like to follow up on Advocate Nzebesa's question from yesterday.  We referred to the three ladies yesterday, but today I would like to refer to the four of you, and follow up on the question, I don't know if you've had the opportunity to confer over it.  He asked the question, how you would like to have your husbands remembered, and perhaps that might even include the three PEPCO victims, we don't have to have the answer today, if you haven't discussed it, but I thought I'd follow on.