Human Rights Violation Hearings — Pretoria — 1996-08-15

CHAIRPERSON: I will ask Mrs Selina Baloyi to come to the witness stand.  We welcome you Mrs Baloyi.  Are you relaxed where you are?  Who is in your company?

SELINA MAKAO BALOYI: She is my niece.

CHAIRPERSON: We would like you to relax and if, at any stage, you feel depressed or a bit tired, take your time and drink some water to help you.  I would now like to ask Professor Piet Meiring to administer an oath to you.

PROF MEIRING: Mrs Baloyi will you please stand and will you please put your right hand in the air.

SELINA MAKAO BALOYI: (Duly sworn in, states).

PROF MEIRING: Thank you.

CHAIRPERSON: I will now pass you to Mr Hugh Lewin to help you in your testimony.

MR LEWIN: Thank you Mr Chair.  Morning Mrs Baloyi, we would like to welcome you to this hearing and to thank you for coming.  Can you hear the translation clearly?

SELINA MAKAO BALOYI: Yes, I can hear them

MR LEWIN: Yes.  We are very pleased that you have been able to come.  You are going to tell us about an incident again in 1986, ten years ago, which resulted in you losing, well resulted in the bombing of your house and we would like to ask you to tell us in your own words and your own time, tell us that story.  Thank you.
PRETORIA HEARING TRC/GAUTENG
2 S M BALOYI

SELINA MAKAO BALOYI: In 1986 on the 11th it was at about one o' clock when I came back from work I sat in the house.  Whilst there it was time to go to sleep.  Whilst I was sleeping my husband came in and said to me it seems as if the police are bombing are houses nowadays ... I saw some fire and the house was burning and I was also burning at that time.  The people, my neighbours came to keep out of the fire and they took me to the hospital.  When I asked who had burned my house they said it was the police because everytime we were at home they would ask me where my son is and I would say to them he is around and they said they wanted him.  When I asked them why they said we know, you do not know why we want him.  Then I went to sleep at the hospital.
 Whilst there I was discharged.  On the day I was discharged they came again, that is the police, and they said they were looking for Stanley and I said he is not here.  They said the saw him, he is in the house.  I was by that time still ill and this white man said to me, we saw him, you have given him a hiding place.  I said to them, no, I have not, you can see I am from the hospital.  They looked into the house because they said he was hiding in the house and they found him and they asked him, are you Stanley and he said, yes, I am Stanley.  They asked him why are you telling the newspapers that we are the ones who bombed your house.  I was still ill by that time.  
 We received a letter from the hospital and it informed me that I have to pay R900,00 and I could not do that because I am not the one who has burnt myself.  I do not know who burnt me and we left with my husband for the hospital and when we arrived there I asked the Superintendent and I said to him, I am not able to pay this 
PRETORIA HEARING TRC/GAUTENG
3 S M BALOYI
R900,00 because God did not cause this illness of me.  I was injured by the police.  That is where the Superintendent wrote me a letter and I went to the police station with my husband and we gave the police this letter from the hospital.  They wrote another letter after reading the one we gave them and they asked me to send it to the Superintendent at the hospital.  When I got there the Superintendent said to me you can go away and not pay anymore and that is when I went home.

MR LEWIN: Thank you Mrs Baloyi.  If I could just ask one or two questions to give us a clearer idea of what, a clearer idea of what happened.  This was in April 1986.

SELINA MAKAO BALOYI: Yes.

MR LEWIN: April, yes.  Could you tell us a bit more about Stanley?  How old was he at the time, your son?

SELINA MAKAO BALOYI: I cannot remember how old he was by then, but he was already a grown-up, that is a man.

MR LEWIN: And you have told us about how the police use to come to your house and harass you because of his activities.  Could you tell us more about his activities?

SELINA MAKAO BALOYI: Stanley was not a thief, he was a Comrade and they did arrest him at once and send him to jail.  Whilst we were still wondering why he told us that he was bailed out by the Comrades and he had been discharged.  He did not tell us anything about his whereabouts.

MR LEWIN: And being a Comrade he was then a member of the ANC?

SELINA MAKAO BALOYI: Yes, he use to be in the company of the ANC.

MR LEWIN: Did he discuss this with you at all because in 1986 the ANC would still have been banned, would it not?

SELINA MAKAO BALOYI: When they had meetings we use to see through
PRETORIA HEARING TRC/GAUTENG
4 S M BALOYI
the clothes he wear when he went to these meetings that he was an ANC member.

MR LEWIN: Then if I could come back to the night that this horrible incident happened to you.  Was he in the house at the time?  Was he staying with you then or had he gone away?

SELINA MAKAO BALOYI: He was still staying with us.  That is on the day they came to bomb our house.  He did not tell us, but in our street he caught some boys and said they must look out for the police because they were coming to bomb our house and they did guard, but when the bomb was thrown at our house, when they came out of house number three, the police cars had already driven away.

MR LEWIN: Your house is number seven.  Is that right?

SELINA MAKAO BALOYI: No, my house number is number nine.

MR LEWIN: But Stanley was at a different house that night?

SELINA MAKAO BALOYI: Yes, they were in house number 13.  That is where they were on the lookout for the police.

MR LEWIN: So he felt that there was going to be an attack.  Did he say anything to you or your husband about the possibility of the attack?  Do you think that is why your husband ...

SELINA MAKAO BALOYI: No, he did not tell us anything.  He only told the neighbours.

MR LEWIN: But do you think that is why, perhaps, your husband put up, ask to put up the blankets?

SELINA MAKAO BALOYI: No, he was from he use to hang out with his friends.  They use to say that where a Comrade resided the police will visit.  That is what the people use to say at that time.

MR LEWIN: Can you also tell us, this might be difficult because you were asleep and you woke up in flames, but you
PRETORIA HEARING TRC/GAUTENG
5 S M BALOYI
can tell us what the bomb was?  What do you think it was?  Was it, what did it look like?

SELINA MAKAO BALOYI: When I came from the hospital I saw a bottle at home.  It had a petrol bomb inside and sand inside in and a  little bit of powder.

MR LEWIN: And what I am asking is do you think it looked, was it professional?  Who had made it, do you think?

SELINA MAKAO BALOYI: I do not know because I carry no knowledge of these explosives.

MR LEWIN: And could I ask what this did for you?  You were very badly burnt which is why you were taken to hospital.  If you could describe your injuries and your husband's injuries.

SELINA MAKAO BALOYI: Our beds were destroyed, our windows were destroyed on our clothes and I suffered burnings and my husband also suffered burnings.  The smell of the petrol bomb took about four months in my nose.

MR LEWIN: And then what was the effect on your husband because he died subsequently, did he not?

SELINA MAKAO BALOYI: No, he did not die immediately, but after we were bombed he started being ill.  We do not know whether the bombing was the cause or not.

MR LEWIN: Can you describe the illness to us please?

SELINA MAKAO BALOYI: His illness was only to cough from time to time, but it was not TB.  They said that he had a problem of diabetes at the hospital, but after we suffered this ordeal it became worse.