Human Rights Violation Hearings — Pietermaritzburg — UNKNOWN

PROF AITCHISON: Later this convoy of lorries and trucks, followed by a large crowd on foot, travelled down the road towards Gezabuso, KwaShange, Vulisaka, KwaMnyandu and Edendale, and dropped armed men at various spots so that attacked communities could be encircled.  These attackers were joined by some Inkatha people from the local mustering point.  In all the force is estimated to have been about 12 000 strong.
 Attacks then took place.  With their superior fire power the Inkatha attackers routed the defenders, killing numbers of them.  Homesteads were destroyed and property looted and cattle driven off.  The attacks were observed by police, who had also watched the mustering of the morning.  During an aerial survey undertaken by the Democratic Party and the Natal Witness over the areas where the attacks were taking place at least 25 police vehicles were seen and no SADF vehicles.  Red Ford Huskys, presumably also police vehicles, were also present.  The police generally seemed to have ignored the Inkatha attackers when the youth in attacked communities tried to defend their homes.  There are statements that allege that police on some occasions actually participated in the attacks.  Certainly a number of people in "kits konstabel" uniforms did.  There are numerous reports of attacks and shootings taking place in the presence of the police, some of whom have been named in statements.  Sometimes at the end of the attacks police on the ground, or from the police helicopter circling overhead, fired tear gas.
 Three questions.  Why did the police not stop huge armed groups coming down the main road from Taylor's Halt?  Why did special constables and KwaZulu Police participate in the attacks, and on whose orders?  Why did the police not send substantial forces into the area once it was apparent to all that a major attack was in progress?
 During this period of mayhem observed by the police a totally under-employed SADF convoy of armoured vehicles was lethargically driving up and down the main road in Edendale.  Question:  why were SADF forces not asked by the police to enter the battle area, which clearly the police were not containing?
 At Gezabuso, early in the morning the Inkatha group had gathered, as I have already mentioned.  David Ntombela arrived with vehicles and collected people, and returned with them towards Taylor's Halt.  Minor damage was caused by this group.  Later, when the main attack started, the convoy of trucks, cars and lorries arrived, followed by a large crowd on foot.  Some of these moved on to attack KwaShange, and the remainder attacked Gezabuso.  Then the group, returning later in the day from KwaShange, attacked Gezabuso as well.  Most of the attacks seemed to have been taking place between in the morning and early afternoon.
 A first group ... (inaudible - end of Side A, Cassette 1) ... it was wet, and for which there was soon a shortage.  At KwaShange by early morning the attack - the people were expecting the attack as they had seen all the movement on the main road across the valley.  A group had mustered at Induna Gavaza Khanyile's place, and there were minor skirmishes between the KwaShange community and this group of Inkatha supporters.
 There appear to have been three main assaults on this particular community.  The first group of attackers came from Chief Shayabantu Zondi's place, and was led by Zazini Skiliki Zondi, the chief's brother.  It was small, about 200 strong, but well armed, and included a group of "kits konstabels," including Philelani Stuart Zuma and Jerome Indaba.  They came from Chief Shayabantu Zondi's place above Umvundleweni.
 The second group had assembled at Induna Gavaza Khanyile's homestead on the border with Ezibomvini.  Allegedly this group included Chief Shayabantu Zondi, Lololombo, Bhekamuzi Gcabashe, Ntonjani Gcabashe and Mtwasi Zondi.  The first and second groups combined and later went down towards Henley.  
 The third group came last from Taylor's Halt via Gezabuso, and comprised about 16 ZG trucks and smaller vehicles, as well as many people on foot.  This group was allegedly led by David Ntombela, or somebody driving his car.  The group may have been joined by other attackers who came over the hills from Sweetwaters, Umbubu and Impande.  Some of these trucks may also have continued to Ezibomvini, and after attacking there returned to KwaShange with other attackers on foot.  This group attacked KwaShange Number 2 and burnt houses at KwaShange.
 Both the first and the third group approached KwaShange via the main road, and had to cross over the only bridge over the flooded Umsunduzi River.  There was apparently some resistance by the KwaShange community, but according to a number of witnesses the police who accompanied the third group then went in front and helped the attackers cross this point.  Interestingly the SABC footage you saw has an aerial shot of the group going over that bridge, and in fact the car, David Ntombela's Sierra, is in fact in that footage.  The one place which could have been effectively used to block most of the attackers reaching KwaShange - an armoured vehicle on that bridge could have done wonders.  Why were no efforts made to stop attackers from leaving the main road and crossing the bridge over the flooded Umsunduzi to KwaShange?
 In KwaShange over 120 houses were burnt and property looted.  Cattle was driven off.  At least 11 men and women were murdered.  The people fled, tried to cross the flood Umsunduzi River.  At least one person drowned.  At about 3.00 pm a local policeman came with two white policemen and they told people that it was impossible to stop the attackers.  There were only three of them and they didn't have the manpower.  They told people hiding in shops to run away to places of safety.  Later there was one incident in which police in a Ford Husky shot at some of the looters.
 At Ezibomvini there were attacks.  At Vulisaka again attacks, people killed.  At KwaMnyandu there were further attacks where a group of returning people from KwaShange went through Umvundleweni and attacked KwaMnyandu from the south, while another group which had gone along the main road to cut off the people fleeing across the Umsunduzi from KwaShange, encircled KwaMnyandu and the place was attacked.  A police helicopter circled above KwaMnyandu while it was attacked.  Two attempts by youths to defend the community failed, and the youth fled towards Edendale.  Among the dead were elderly women in the community.
 Meanwhile back in Edendale, in Umphumuza/Xaluza sector again there were various forays by Inkatha forces into Simero, Siyamo, Esikodini and Ashdown.  Police were shot at by defenders on a number of occasions, and they in turn opened fire on defenders and a number of people were killed.  The situation calmed somewhat when army vehicles arrived. 
 Thursday, the 29th of March.  A second attack on KwaMnyandu in midmorning led by Inkatha forces from Chief Shayabantu Zondi's place.  Police and "kits konstabels" and possibly KwaZulu Police again involved.  A number of people were killed and wounded, and more houses burned and looted and people driven off.  More police finally arrived and the attackers withdrew.  Question:  why on the Thursday was there again no effective police presence to stop the attack on KwaMnyandu?  
 However, the police were active in Edendale, where they stopped a march by 500 unarmed women protesting against police partisanship and inaction against the attackers, and told them to disperse or force, including tear gas and birdshot, would be used.  11 women were  arrested by Lieutenant O'Connell.  This hard line on peaceful women demonstrators was in stark contrast to their soft line on armed impis wreaking mayhem in the region.
 That evening Inkatha forces were seen returning to Ntombela's place at Nqane.  Ntombela had been interviewed during the day by the Natal Witness reporters.  He denied that anybody from his area had been involved in any violence.  He said he was in contact with other Inkatha leaders in the region, and that he had no knowledge of punitive raids being launched in retaliation for the stoning on buses on Sunday and Monday.  He said he knew of only one Inkatha person killed during the week.  
 That night four people in KwaNqane were murdered.  Again further skirmishes in Xaluza, Simero and Ashdown.  Police were active searching and disarming youths going to defend their borders.  Several clashes in Ashdown, and again the Inkatha attackers on Xaluza returned that night to Chief Nsikayezwa's homestead and encamped.  There were several buses at this base.
 That day as well Mpophomeni was attacked by a 500 strong force of Inkatha from KwaShisho.  There finally withdrew.  And that evening again there was an attack and the Catholic church was slightly damaged by the attackers.   In that evening there was almost continuous shooting in Imbali, and a number of houses came under attack from Inkatha groups who roamed around the township on foot and in vehicles.  Calls to the Riot Unit to respond to pleas for help were not acted upon.  The Imbali support group, three members of whom were staying in a house, saw their vehicle shot up by a group, including two white men, and  it was later in the night petrol bombed.  Repeated
attempts to get the SADF to deploy were frustrated by the police.  A 10 platoon convoy waited fruitlessly outside Huletts Aluminium for the police to call them in at the height of the Imbali shooting.  When calls requesting SADF back up were made they were told by the police that the army was just off duty and tired.  Eventually, apparently at SADF insistence, as they were being deluged by calls for help, they were told to meet the SAP at Huletts Aluminium at 10 to seven in the evening.  10 platoons were there at the height of the shooting fruitlessly awaiting the police.  The police never came and they returned to their base and played volleyball.  A number of African callers to the emergency service 10111 claim that they were told to ring F W de Klerk and Mandela.  Police consistently refused to call in the SADF, who were under-used.
 Saturday, 31st of March.  Another attack on Mpophomeni.  At Vulindlela a number of meetings at Ntombela's place and Chief Ngcobo's place.  A fair amount of hysteria as the community, it suddenly dawned on them, were now cut off from food resources in Pietermaritzburg.  An eminent person group visited Edendale and Vulindlela during the day.  The met a heavily armed David Ntombela near Taylor's Halt.  He now blamed the stoning of buses by youths for the current strife, and that Inkatha people were only defending themselves.
 In Imbali sporadic shooting continued.  A number of people were killed and wounded and homes burnt.  Virtually every street in Imbali was barricaded with burning tyres, cars and rubble.  There are many eye witness accounts of  Inkatha vehicles, including a six-ton truck manned by
about 15 people with rifles and shotguns, driving through the area firing at random at residents.  There are also reports of police providing weapons and ammunition to Inkatha people, notable at Manyoni's house.  Late in that evening some army vehicles entered the area and it became quieter. 
 And that is the end of my account of that week.  Very briefly, to conclude, the aftermath.  There were 20 000 refugees in Edendale and Pietermaritzburg, most of whom had lost everything.  The so-called civil defence of this municipality refused to help the refugees for fear of being partisan.  The Government did not offer much help.  Deputy Minister Tertius Delport, in a statement of breathtaking inhumanity, said that not a cent would be spent in the region until violence ended, and so the refugees were punished further.  The area was not declared a disaster area, and why was it not?  The army was called in eventually to stabilise the situation, which it did after a fashion, and the death toll dropped to a regular 35 or so a month in the Midlands for the rest of the year.
 Police investigations into the nearly 100 murders in the seven-day week can at best be described as derisory.  Unpublicised so-called informal inquests did not suggest that anybody in particular should be prosecuted.  Again, why were full inquests not held?
 In the middle of the year violence erupted in the Witwatersrand.  International journalists returned to Johannesburg and the Natal Midlands was forgotten, although what had happened in this region offered many clues to the origins of the violence in the Transvaal.   Some people did care.  The Midlands Crisis Relief
Committee did great work.  The South African Council of Churches, the international church community, other religious groups, foreign governments, alongside organisations such as the International Committee of the Red Cross, and a variety of human rights organisations who documented what had happened.
 Six years after the Seven Days War the murderers of men, women and children remain seemingly immune from justice.  Those who planned the attacks and those who allowed them to happen unhindered have for the time being escaped earthly justice.  The people of this region know who they are and will not forget.  Neither will they forget those who died and suffered in this first false dawn of the new South Africa.  And I leave two final questions.  Why were key leaders such as Chief Zondi, Philip Zondi, David Ntombela, Lololombo and Gavaza Khanyile not formally questioned about or prosecuted for their obvious role in the attacks?  And lastly, why was no apparent action taken to make senior policemen, including General Buchner, account for their actions and inactions in relation to the ... (incomplete)