Special Hearings — Mandela United Football Club Hearings — 1997-11-26

PAUL VERRYN: His eye was bloodied, and by that I mean, it wasn't - it was like a black eye repairing from being beaten, and he had marks on his back, you know, obviously where the skin had been broken, the kind of marks that would come from being beaten with a sjambok or something.

MR TRENGROVE: And he told you that he'd been beaten up?

PAUL VERRYN: He did.

MR TRENGROVE: You took him to Doctor Kennel for a medical examination?

PAUL VERRYN: I did that in the evening of that day.

MR TRENGROVE: We know today that on the 16th of January, Thabiso Mono and Pelo Mekgwe  were released from abduction.

PAUL VERRYN: That is correct.

MR TRENGROVE: We also know that that evening a community meeting was called at which they gave an account of the events since their abduction.

PAUL VERRYN: That is correct.

MR TRENGROVE: At that meeting they told the meeting how they'd been forced to implicate you in sexual activity with them, but at the meeting retracted those allegations and made it clear that they were false.

PAUL VERRYN: That is correct.

MR TRENGROVE: Had you had any contact with those two people, Thabiso Mono and Pelo Mekgwe,  since their abduction and before they made this report to the community meeting?

PAUL VERRYN: No.

MR TRENGROVE: Who took them to the meeting?

PAUL VERRYN: Peter Storey.

MR TRENGROVE: Was it on his advice that you refrained from having any contact with them?

PAUL VERRYN: It was on his insistence.

MR TRENGROVE: After the community meeting on - I think it was the 18th of January, you also took those two for a medical examination by Doctor Kennel.

PAUL VERRYN: I did.

MR TRENGROVE: You asked me to ask the Commission to allow you to express your feelings about two people. The first of them is Stompie Sepei and the fate that he suffered. Would you like to do that now?

PAUL VERRYN: I see that Mrs Sepei is in the audience here today, and the thing that has been most difficult for me is that, having heard the allegations, I did not remove him from the mission house and get him to a place where he could be safe, and I think that if I had acted in another way he could be alive today.  And so I want to apologise to Mrs Sepei for my part in that.

MR TRENGROVE: The other person about whom you requested an opportunity to express your feelings is Mrs Madikizela-Mandela.

PAUL VERRYN: My - I don't know Mrs Mandela really, we've met face to face briefly in my mission house once, and my feelings about you have taken me in many directions, as you can imagine.  I long for our reconciliation. I have been profoundly, profoundly, affected by some of the things that you have said about me, that have hurt me and cut me to the quick.
 I have had to struggle to come to some place of learning to forgive even if you do not want forgivenness or even think that I deserve to offer that to you.  I struggle to find a way in which we can be reconciled for the sake of this nation and for the people that I believe God loves so deeply.  And so I sit before you and want to say that to you.  Thank you.

MR TRENGROVE: Thank you, Chair.

CHAIRPERSON: Hanif?

MR VALLY: Mr Pigou will be asking a few questions.

MR PIGOU: Good morning, Bishop Verryn.  Bishop Verryn, before this incident in December 1988, could you tell us, from your perspective as a churchman in that area of Soweto, whether you were receiving reports of tensions within the community around the Mandela United Football Club?

PAUL VERRYN: There were rumours, I think, there were rumours relating to behaviour that was unacceptable to the community.

MR PIGOU: Could you perhaps indicate what the nature of these rumours were, what sort of incidents were being brought to your attention?

PAUL VERRYN: I need to just deal with a part of that question - "were being brought to my attention" is not in the sense that I was regarded in any sense as a community leader, a political community leader particularly.   I was being told that the soccer club was fairly highhanded in some of their activities, that some people were suffering abuse from them - that was physical abuse, that was the gist of it.

MR PIGOU: Thank you. Did you have any contact with the so-called Mandela Crisis Committee before the kidnapping of Stompie and the other boys?

PAUL VERRYN: I had a very brief encounter, I was called into the Reverend Frank Chikane's office and asked to be part of a very small group - three of us, who would try, as  I understood it, reintegrate the soccer club into the community.  There was concern that the club needed to be disbanded, the soccer club needed to be disbanded, and it was important that was done responsibly.  That those who needed further education could be got into schools, and those that needed jobs or whatever else - further education, that that would be properly ... [inaudible]
 The person who was supposed to do that work with me that I met was Sister Bernard Ncube and the other person was the Reverend Gideon Makaya, the three of us were supposed to do that work.  We were taken briefly to a house in Diepkloof which was Mrs Mandela's - supposed to be Mrs Mandela's house, and met briefly there with Zinzi.  Mrs Mandela was not present at the time and I think it was only Sister Bernard and myself that went, we were taken there by Frank and Aubrey Mokoena.
 We were introduced to the group and, if I remember, we had a cup of tea, and we left.  We then made an arrangement to meet briefly after that at - it was supposed to be a Saturday morning at 7 o'clock. I went and waited outside the house, nobody turned up, and that was the end of that.

MR PIGOU: Thank you.  I'd like to - perhaps my colleague could pass this document to you, this is a memorandum provided to us by Bishop Storey - an account of the events related to the abduction of youths from Orlando West Mission house on 29 December 1988. This has been made available to the legal teams and to yourselves on the panel.
 I'd like you to turn to page 4 and on Friday, the 13th of January, the 5th paragraph starting: 
"At 9 a.m., Fink Haysom agrees to act for us"
Do you recall having a meeting with Fink Haysom where you discussed the preparation of papers for some form of interdict or habeas corpus action in connection with the boys who were being held at Mrs Mandela's house.

PAUL VERRYN: I do remember that.

MR PIGOU: And do you recall - and I'd like you to go down to the next paragraph after the one line where it says
"PJS and Verryn met with crisis team again at 3 p.m."
Do you recall - 
"and asked whether they would give evidence in this regard"
Do you recall the Mandela Crisis Committee saying that they would not co-operate with such a legal undertaking?

PAUL VERRYN: I do.

MR PIGOU: Thank you.  I'd like you now to turn to page 6 of that document, 2nd paragraph. It says
"John Reece conveys a message from Albertina Sisulu,  who he saw the previous evening, to Verryn saying that he must stay out of Soweto because his life is definitely in danger."
Do you recall being informed by Mr Reece about that message from Albertina Sisulu ?

PAUL VERRYN: I do clearly remember being told that I needed to stay out of Soweto.

MR PIGOU: Thank you.  Were you also told by Bishop Storey that Frank Chikane had passed a similar message prior to that?

PAUL VERRYN: Yes.