Human Rights Violation Hearings — Durban — 1996-08-29

WITNESS:   These people were working and colluding with the police, and the community named them the A-Team because the A-Team was a TV play.  Whenever there was a problem in a certain community this A-Team would be fetched to come and rescue the community and then disappear.  Now they were given this name by the community because they were colluding with the police at that time.  These killings went on.  The young men were being killed day in and day out.  At times others would receive telephone calls in the afternoon, or in the evening, and they would be threatened with death.  Immediately thereafter they would be killed.  I also received a similar telephone call at round about half past 11.  I was sitting in the living-room and reading a certain book.  Whoever was on the line said to me, "We are coming and we are going to kill Mduduzi because he does not want to join our group."  Now I didn't know who was talking to me because he never wanted to introduce himself to me, but what I noticed was that his voice was that of a very young person.  I told him that, "My son, what has happened between you and Mduduzi?  Is there any altercation that took place?"  He refuted that and he told me that as there two groups in Chesterville my son did not want to join our group, and he was probably joining the other group, and that is the reason why they wanted to kill him at that time.  I told the person over the line that so many young people had died, and they died after receiving telephone calls, and I told him that, "Whenever you come to kill Mduduzi he must be the very last one to die.  You must not continue this reign of terror."  He sounded a bit calm and convinced, and I sort of gave him as an advice as an old person, and I found myself to be wiser than him.  I told him that this group which was conducting a reign of terror was ripping the community of its right of living.  I told him not to involve himself in such killings.  Luckily, up until today these people have never come to kill Mduduzi.  He was at home at that time.  I never woke him up to tell him that I had received such a call.

DR MAGWAZA: I want to try to guide you so that you come back to your statement, so you mustn't be startled when I try to restrain you.  Now, you decided to form a prayer group.  Tell us more about that prayer group.

WITNESS:   Yes, just at the midst of that confusion on a particular morning I was preparing myself to go to work and I saw a group of women, and I asked myself as to what was happening.  They came to my place and I told myself that I would wait for this group of women, speak to them, and hear as to what their problem was.  They came to me crying, and their plight was also my plight, because they were also worried about the youths who were dying daily.  They said to me they had come so that we could devise a plan to save our children.  "We are being harassed at our homes.  We do not know who to turn to."  I felt powerless.  I did not have any ready-made plans, but I decided that I should pray to the Lord Almighty to give me strength and wisdom to be able to decide as to what we should do with the women.  We prayed, and I asked them to excuse me because I was going to work, and that I would come back to them.  When I came back home on that day I had got a plan.  Then I took my robe and I put a pillow inside my tummy and I pretended to be a pregnant woman.  I went around asking women that we should form a formal prayer group so that we pray to save our children.  They responded positively, and it was on the 15th of May we went around praying with the women together with the children.  We stood in the street underneath the street light and we prayed.  We prayed until dawn.  At about 1.00 am we stopped praying.  Somehow we had this fear, and we kept on asking ourselves as to who was next, who was going to be killed next amongst the youth?  As we were still praying we felt as if the earth was shaking.  When we looked up we noticed that there were cars, a lot of private cars, police cars, as well as police vans and Casspirs, which were heading to the police station, which was a little bit further up.  And we asked ourselves as women what was happening.  We thought maybe somebody had called the police because we had gathered, and probably they thought we were doing something out of line, but we were just praying on that particular day.  We went on praying.  As we were still praying under the street lights there came to Casspirs, being followed by one police van, and this police van came straight to us.  We were not even able to run.  We were arrested, and the soldiers also came and they cocked their guns.  They formed a circle around us.  We stopped praying and there was some quiet.  Nobody was speaking to anyone.  The police did not talk to us.  We also did not talk to them.  There is a certain policeman who was wearing a police uniform, and the others were wearing brown uniforms.  It was cold that day.  I took out my coat and I threw it right in front of the policeman, as well as my scarf and my hat.  I took out everything and I was left only in my dress, and I lifted my hands and I asked as to who the leader of the soldiers was.  The other one who was wearing the police uniform came forward and said he is the one.  I asked him what his name was.  He told me that his name was Bernard.  I asked him whether he was the leader.  He confirmed that.  I told him that as I have lifted my hands I am a woman, and we are all women.  We are not armed.  As I am indicating I do not have not even a fork.  I do not have any arms, so we want to talk with the police without them pointing their guns at us.  We want them to put their guns away so that we can talk freely.  We started talking with Bernard, and Bernard asked us as to what we were doing that time of the night.  I told him that we had come to pray, to pray to the Lord to save us as well as our sons and daughters, because there was a certain group called the A-Team which was notorious for conducting a reign of terror in that residential area.  So we were praying to the Lord to answer our prayers so that this particular group can put down the arms and stop killing the people.  He asked us as to whether we knew the members of this group.  They said they knew the members of the group, and they said we should choose three women who would come to the police station and make a formal statement and say who these people are.  I totally refused because I did not want anyone to be singled out to go and make a statement at the police station.  We wanted to do this collectively as a group.  We marched away as the women, following the very same police van, and we got to the police station.  And the very same gentleman who was speaking to us was no longer there, and at that point we were introduced to another person totally different from the one we spoke to.  We got into the police station and another policeman, a very young one, came to us, and I told him that I wanted to see Bernard.  He went away, but Bernard never came back to speak to us.  There was a very long chalk board.  It was long, but not wide.  It had a list of names, as well as their ranks and works.  That is the people who belonged to the A-Team.  And one of the women said, "We must not tell them anything because the names of the people were on the blackboard."  And at that time one policeman jumped over the counter to conceal the board.

DR MAGWAZA: Now, according to your statement you said you continued being harassed by the police up to such time that they killed your dogs because they said your dogs are giving them problems during the night.  Now, relate to us at the instance at the time where you had to run to Umlazi, and they harassed you even there.