Amnesty Hearings — Cape Town — 1999-10-18

UNKNOWN: Mr Chairman, on behalf of my client, I will speak in Afrikaans.
	This is a reasonably unique situation that in a certain sense, there is only one person who can testify about what had happened regarding the specific death of William Dyasi, and that is the applicant appearing before the Committee.  
	Regarding the merits of the case, it is my respectful submission that his version as provided to the Committee, is the true and correct version of what had happened.   This is corroborated by the only real evidence which is available, in this case as my client testified and also said, you have a certain acceptance of a father and mother being here today, and the father acknowledged that that was a very tumultuous evening, he was very shocked and his part of the testimony which may be relevant, can be regarded or should be regarded in that light.   
	It is my submission that my client, Mr Luff, was specifically allocated to combat riots.  Riots which in 1985 consisted of political groupings who was in insurrection against the system of apartheid and what had happened on the 3rd of November was a direct consequence of that.  The only reason why Mr Luff became involved was because of these Riot Unit or combating these riots which the police had to do on a large scale.  This was the reason why they were at that community hall on that specific evening.   	Their activities there was once again only based on Mr Luff's evidence and he said that they were attacked by a group of people, that he and his colleague fired some shots in the direction of this group and according to them, it seemed or it appeared that somebody had been hit.   
	Mr Chairman, I wish to present to the Committee the fact that this was a deed committed in a political context and this falls within the context of Subsection (3) of the relevant Act.  Mr Luff acted in the course and scope of his duty.  This is Section 20, subsection (b).  
	After this incident, and I request the Committee that you must please accept Mr Luff's version as the truth, and when they found the deceased later on in the house, they took the deceased outside, the deceased started to run, Mr Luff followed him and when - Mr Luff fell and when he got up, he shot the fatal shot.  	The reason why he is appearing here is because he did not act correctly.  We can accept that and you can expect that he should have had better judgement under those circumstances.  It could have been an offence.  He is asking for forgiveness, he is applying for amnesty and I ask the Commission to accept his version as the true version and that he has made a full disclosure of all the relevant facts.   
	And furthermore that the firing of the second shot, just as the action at the hall was the result of a political situation which existed during 1985, and that he acted as an employee of the South African Police Service.   
	Mr Chairman, without repeating myself I want to emphasise that only Mr Luff or Mr Luff's evidence regarding the first incident and the second incident, has been given under oath, because he is the only person who can testify and I request the Committee to accept that as the true version.  I don't know whether there are any other issues you want to address me on.