Human Rights Violation Hearings — Moutse — 1996-12-05

CHAIRPERSON: And perhaps if we could at a later stage, you mentioned that there were inaccuracies in what Captain Kokane had to say about the Fourie case, maybe we can get MOUTSE  HEARING TRC/MPUMALANGA
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that from you at a later stage, not now because that's one of the cases which we are investigating and we which we would like to clarify.  But thank you very much.  
 And I want to thank the audience, I want to thank especially the witnesses, those who have come to testify over the four days, we have come to the end of this event hearing.  Just to say that the reason that the Truth Commission has these kinds of hearings is part of this process of establishing as complete a picture as possible of the conflict of the past.  An event hearing does provide us with an opportunity to look at the conflict in all its different aspects and from all the different sides, the different protagonists, antagonists, the object always being, to gain a better understanding, to get the different perspective, to try and establish as much of the truth as possible, and this to be the basis on which some kind of ..... can take place.  I'm sure that people have very mixed feelings about this event hearing, some may feel disappointed that not all the answers to the questions which they have, were given.  To that I can only say that we will try and investigate and follow up on these matters, and when and if we do get answers, we will certainly inform those who are directly concerned.
 Some may feel that people were not completely honest and truthful in their responses, but as a Truth Commission we can only hope and expect that people will see that the 
objective is truth, it's not about retribution, it's not about taking revenge, and that hopefully people will want therefore to be honest and want the truth to come out.
 And there are some people who may have gained a different understanding of what happened here in Moutse, MOUTSE  HEARING TRC/MPUMALANGA
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Kwandebele over this very difficult and this very troubled period, 1986 to 1988. We hope that maybe new light has been shed that different perspectives have been heard, that people also who for so long have had fixed ideas about each other, perceptions about each other that maybe through this event hearing, some of that could have been changed, people could have had an opportunity to listen to the other side of the conflict, that hopefully people would have been brought closer together.  One of the things that we hope, which we were very concerned about and which we did not want to happen and we don't believe that it has happened, is that an event hearing like this will revive old antagonisms and revive the old conflicts of the past and the old antagonisms.  It was our concern that that should not happen and that is why before we had this event hearing, we actually met with people from Moutse, with people from Kwandebele and agreed on this venue and agreed on the format and agreed on the process.  
 And I think that people have demonstrated throughout these four days that they are prepared and willing to understand, and they're not out for vengeance, not out for getting their own back.  That from the side of the Commission, we want to say how grateful we are that people listened, even when they didn't agree, even when they felt that people were not being entirely honest, they actually 
listened, they didn't interject.  There were no catcalls from the audience.  And that we appreciate, because that assists us in our work.
 Next year the Truth Commission is going to have to look very carefully at public hearings.  There are difficulties with finance, there are difficulties also with time.  We did MOUTSE  HEARING TRC/MPUMALANGA
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hope that we will be able to come back to the Kwandebele area to Siyabuswa, to give people there an opportunity to speak about things which happened in Kwandebele itself.  That is still being considered but is not possible for us to make any promises.  What we do promise though is that the process of statement-taking will continue.  The Archbishop on Monday when the hearings began, emphasised that the work of the Commission is really based first an foremost on the statements which we get.  The public hearings are really an opportunity to try and get a picture, a window as people have said into the past, it is not to privilege one witness above another witness.  All statements are treated equally, all statements are treated with the same amount of importance, we try to follow up on every statement. So even if it is not possible for us, because of these financial and other constraints that I mentioned, to come back here in the new year to have a public hearing, we will certainly be coming back to come and take statements and I will encourage people to come forward and make their statements, because it's only on the basis of the statements that we can do our work, that we can make findings as to whether people are victims or not, and that we can make recommendations to the President and through him to Parliament about issues of rehabilitation and reparation.
 Just before we close, there are just a couple of people who I would like to thank.  I'd like to thank the staff of the Philadelphia Hospital for having provided us with this venue and for the assistance also throughout these four days, I would like to thank them for their assistance and 
for facilitating a lot of the statement taking, to thank the South Af.... (end of tape)