Human Rights Violation Hearings — Soweto — 1996-07-25

GLENDA WILDSCHUT: Mr Lollan, no doubt you have given us a very eloquent account of yourself and your brother and your family's life in the past.  But may I just ask a few questions for clarity.
 Maybe I will start with your account of your sister who died, as you said of a brain haemorrhage.  Can I ask, was that her death as a result of the interrogations and questioning and the torture that she had undergone?  Was that as a result of the torture?

ARTHUR LOLLAN: She would always confide in me and tell me that she suffers from headaches, through the beatings she got from the police.

GLENDA WILDSCHUT: Yes.

ARTHUR LOLLAN: The day she haemorrhaged, I thought it was a result of all those beatings that she got.

GLENDA WILDSCHUT: Had she been seen by doctors, had she been examined post, after the interrogations, so that this could be verified?

MR LOLLA: She was a very private person, she would not talk t my mother or anybody else, she used to confide in me and never even broke the news to anybody. She always kept to herself.

GLENDA WILDSCHUT: So in a sense the torture and the interrogations that she had gone through, was a very private affair and she had not shared that with anybody.

ARTHUR LOLLAN: Not shared with anybody.
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GLENDA WILDSCHUT: Except with you.  Thanks. I just need to ask questions around sequence, with regard to your brother, Stanley.  You were taken to Civitas Building, as you described.  Was that before Stanley came back to South Africa or was it just after he was acquitted from the treason trial and the police were trying to get information from you about his whereabouts?

ARTHUR LOLLAN: Yes, it was after the treason trial.

GLENDA WILDSCHUT: So it was soon after the treason trial?

ARTHUR LOLLAN: Yes.

GLENDA WILDSCHUT: Where you and your sister were taken - you and your mother were taken to Civitas Building?

ARTHUR LOLLAN: That's right.

GLENDA WILDSCHUT: Can you just take us through that interrogation that happened at Civitas Building, just very briefly. Could you tell us how you were interrogated, what was the nature of the questioning that you were undergoing and whether you were assaulted at all at that point.

ARTHUR LOLLAN: All they wanted to know from me was whether my brother was in Eldorado Park or somewhere in Johannesburg. They told me that they had information that he was somewhere in Botswana or in Swaziland. They took me to another room where they kept on beating me until I was almost, until I fainted.

GLENDA WILDSCHUT: So you had lost consciousness during that interrogation.

ARTHUR LOLLAN: Yes.

GLENDA WILDSCHUT: Was that the time when you were also injured, I would imagine on your back, because you were saying that your urine was red.

ARTHUR LOLLAN: I think my kidneys were damaged.   I had
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terrible pains in my kidneys, because they kicked me more than 10, 20 times.

GLENDA WILDSCHUT: Right. During that interrogation you were separated from your mother. Do you know whether your mother took was beaten and interrogated at that point?

ARTHUR LOLLAN: No, they treated her very nicely.

GLENDA WILDSCHUT: I guess your mother must have gone through quite a bit of anguish, because she was aware that you were being interrogated and tortured as well.

ARTHUR LOLLAN: She almost died when she saw me coming out of the next room.

GLENDA WILDSCHUT: So in a sense that could also be regarded as a form of torture?

ARTHUR LOLLAN: That's right.

GLENDA WILDSCHUT: For your mother, to watch you and to see you being hurt and interrogated.

ARTHUR LOLLAN: Precisely.

GLENDA WILDSCHUT: What in your mind was the cause of, the actual cause of your brother's death?  Because the way in which you describe it was that after he had been arrested or beaten up at Hyde Park Corner, his health deteriorated. So can you give us an idea what, in your opinion, was the cause of his death?

ARTHUR LOLLAN: It definitely was the beatings he got over the years.  He was arrested on several occasions and beaten up so many times, I can't remember.  And he became, I think there was a word they used, he was suffering from a mental disorder because of all the beatings. I went to a clinic, to a hospital in Arnolds Grove, Frian Barnard Hospital and I spoke there to a male nurse, Mr Sullivan, and he told me that all the knocks and bruises on Stanley's head and body,
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was the cause of his illness. I even visited several police stations in London, one of which was Holloway Prison and one in Islington, to find out exactly why on a few occasions Stanley was arrested. Then I found out from an Indian friend of Stanley's, that the agents would beat him up before he entered his flat every night.  They would wait for him outside and give him a beating and then drag him to the police station and accuse him of being drunk.

GLENDA WILDSCHUT: So in a sense the harassment that he had experienced in South Africa, followed him even into London in exile?

ARTHUR LOLLAN: In London, even worse in London.

GLENDA WILDSCHUT: I see. I do not have any more questions, except to find out from your, as a representative of your family, what are the kinds of responses that you would like to have from the Commission with regard to the statement that you have made to us today.  What are the kinds of things that you would like us to do, and also, if you have given any thought to what kind of recommendations the Commission should make to the President at the end of the mandate of this Commission, in respect of human rights abuses?

ARTHUR LOLLAN: It is very difficult to say.  But the treason trial and the Rivonia trials were not just something easily forgotten.  It was an act of God, these things had to happen, and because of that those heroes shaped the future of this country.  Their families and loved ones must be compensated and cared for in a way which would satisfy them, not that we are asking for hand-outs or charities, but because of all the things we lost during the years.  When I left England with my brother, I left a flat full of
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furniture, house full of things, and even in Swaziland, when the flat from Swaziland, he left many things behind.  That is a material loss. I am not speaking about physical losses or spiritual loss, it is hard to calculate the amount of compensation that can be given to these heroes.

GLENDA WILDSCHUT: Thank you very much, Mr Lollan.  I will ask the other Commissioners if they have any questions or comments that they would like to direct to you.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you.  Tom Manthata?

THOMAS MANTHATA: Thank you.  Did you feel that Stanley was left unprotected and insecure, by the British Police and perhaps even our ANC staff in London, at the time of his sufferings in Britain?