Amnesty Hearings — Cape Town — 1999-10-20

CHAIRPERSON: Sorry, I am going to interrupt you again, I just want to check with the interpreters whether it is necessary to interpret, because if it is not necessary then you can keep up with that speed, but if it is necessary to interpret, then you might have to slow down a bit.  Not?  Very well, no then it is fine, then you can continue and perhaps you can just bring the microphone closer to yourself, then we can hear you more properly.  Thank you, please go ahead.
MR GROOTBOOM
"My family moved from Klipplaat during the late 1970's and settled because of my father's illness in the then newly developed town of Dysselsdorp, 20 kilometres from Oudtshoorn in the Southern Cape.  I spent most of my teenage years in this town, besides attending part of my primary schooling in Port Elizabeth, staying with my aunt on father's side in the suburb of Galvandale.  During 1985, while I was residing with my family in Dysselsdorp and attending high school in Oudtshoorn, I was arrested, convicted and sentenced to seven years imprisonment.  My family moved after my release from Dysselsdorp to Oudtshoorn where we reside today.
		My appearance before this Committee relates to my application for crimes committed against apartheid State.  These are;
(1)	 my conviction with one co-accused, Derek Basson, during February 1986 on a count of sabotage in the Knysna Regional Court,
	(2)	my conviction with 48 others Dysselsdorp ANC Youth League members during June 1991, on a count of illegally occupying and other charges relating hereto, the Dysselsdorp police station.  We all received suspended sentences.  I motivated to appear before this Committee as the relevant TRC structure with my application for the following reasons:   
	(1) 	because I recognise the TRC as the only legitimate body created through a democratic process for the purpose of revealing the truth in our endeavours to reconcile our nation and healing our damaged lives, 
	(2)	to motivate the political nature of the acts which I have committed and for which I wish to be pardoned in so far as my request is for it to be deleted from the official State record as crimes committed.  
		I will motivate the political nature of the listed acts hereunder by giving you an exposition of my political awareness and political activism, the first which precede the letter.  My political awareness as a young person came about through my family history as Africans who in search of employment changed their identity to become coloureds, ridiculed and the actions of white South Africans to me and my family and the black community as a whole as lesser beings.   For the record I wish to state from a young age my mother, uncles and aunts would make sure that we know that we were from proud Fengu descent who is sitting in the royal house of Dalingebu, that my family used to be a very affluent one with two farms in the Junctionville area and as a transport company, my grandfather used to transport goods with between the mining fields near Kimberley, that from my grandfather onwards, Afrikaans was enforced on my family's part of our earlier nation from who we are, by apartheid and its exponents, the Afrikaner. My father although he complained about treachery in black politics because of his own previous involvement, always inspired me with the dignity he carried himself with.  He lost his temper only once in my presence when an Afrikaner acted in a racist way towards us.   
		In brief, the above was my political awareness when I started high school in Oudtshoorn during 1983, when my actual political activism started.  My mother prompted me to become active in youth activities in Dysselsdorp, specifically at the Dysselsdorp library which was also the meeting place of the Youth Organisation, BABS, Build A Better Society.  I got involved in its activities, but because of its close links then to the local town council establishment, my attention was diverted to more politically orientated activities of the youth in Oudtshoorn, where I attended high school.  
		It was my attendance of Brichan Senior Secondary High in Oudtshoorn which gave the final spark to my political activism.  It was at this school that myself and fellow high school students from Dysselsdorp decided to launch our own political youth group in our home town.   Because informants were abundant in the government and the agents were constantly on the lookout for political groupings, our advice from comrades in Oudtshoorn was that we should not reflect any political affiliation in our youth organisation's constitution, but that such constitution states that we as the youth would look critically at our society.  
		Dysselsdorp Youth Organisation, DYO, on its founding day in the local civic hall proved to be the largest and the most popular youth organisation, starting out with approximately 100 members.  I was elected its first Chairperson. It was difficult politically because Dysselsdorp then was firmly in the grip of the establishment regime and its Forces.  Parents and the elderly was opposed to political involvement out of fear because of the brutal oppression of their revolt during the mid-1970's when the entire community was moved from the land under the Group Areas Act.  Many with their children openly became informants of the apartheid State and government.  Myself and my colleagues did not have much political education, but for our experience of racial discrimination, references to the community's forced removal, following the public campaigns of the United Democratic Front, literature on the American civil rights campaigns in identification of community issues, such as the eviction of families from their houses, by the town council.  	The then South African Police and Defence Force made their presence felt to our members, including myself being picked up, assaulted and some turned into informants.  The SADF went so far as to instigate members of the organisation to bring a proposal to the table that we attend the SADF so-called Leadership Camp with BABS and a Labour Party affiliated youth group, a proposal which threatened to split our organisation.   DYO attended this camp with two other youth groups, it was however clear to us from the beginning that the purpose of the camp was to interrogate our members on our political affiliation and to brainwash them with video's of cruelty depicting the ANC, SWAPO and Frelimo as evil terrorists.   This camp however did DYO good in that a stronger nucleus was formed who identified more closely with the struggle for liberation.   Those who instigated the camp soon split with the organisation to find their own which died soon thereafter.   
		The launch of the UDF and subsequent attendance of its meetings in Cape Town or in Oudtshoorn by myself and other members of the organisation, propelled us into the option of violent attacks in Dysselsdorp on government buildings and or associated entities.  Similar attacks in Oudtshoorn lent support to our campaign.  Our first target which was identified by myself was the Rent Office which administered the evictions of poor and helpless families.   We attacked this office on the 30th of October 1985 with a petrol bomb.  This attack resulted in our conviction on a count of sabotage in the Knysna Regional Court, on 05 February 1986.  
		My father died soon after my conviction, having suffered a stroke.  He tried to visit me while I was awaiting trial, but the police and prison warders deliberately would give false and or wrong information to him and my mother, which made it impossible for him to ever see me again.  My mother who was the sole breadwinner of the family of five with an income of R190-00 per month, suffered starvation for the sake of myself and my siblings as well as physical harassment by the police throughout my prison term.  During one such incident, the police set the dogs on my mother while she was unsuspectingly carrying her groceries to a taxi.  News like this would usually reach me in prison.  	Besides Robben Island Maximum Prison where I joined the ANC, at all the other prisons I was held in the Western Cape, warders tried their utmost best to turn us into gangsters and or to have gangsters to sodomise us.  Approximately four of the five years I have been in jail, was with common law or criminal prisoners.  It was difficult but still we survived against the police and warders' wishes.   Others did not.  My prison experienced convinced me much more than before, that apartheid must be destroyed and that ultimately the struggle for liberation will be victorious.   
		The first sign of victory dawned upon me with my release from prison on 11 April 1991 after having served five and a half years of the seven years.  The struggle however continued and as a dedicated member of the ANC I heeded the call to return to Dysselsdorp to build the ANC and to mobilise the people behind the popular demand for the establishment of a constituent assembly.  In Dysselsdorp we focused again our attention on the youth who was inspired by our return.  One of the issues around which we mobilised was the accessibility of the local civic centre to the youth and the abuse of power by the local police as well as their political affiliation to the local apartheid structures.  
		The ANC Youth League, Dysselsdorp Branch, previously DYO, who was then involved in a dispute with the local town and divisional council on the usage of the civic hall for a fundraising event, found itself at loggerheads with the local police who interfered in what we believed was a political issue.   A decision was then taken by the Youth League to occupy the police station and to submit a memorandum to the relevant councils and the police about our grievances and demands.   As a group we entered the police station late in the afternoon and took control of it for approximately six hours.   
		After submitting our memorandum, we decided to leave the station peacefully.  We were then arrested and assaulted by the police, we were later charged and convicted in the George Regional Court.  Two police officers were injured during our action, namely Sgt Murray and Cons Tarentaal.  Tarentaal was notorious in the local community for assaulting members of the community  as was most of his colleagues who operated with impunity.   Many of these police persons are still in the service today in Dysselsdorp and Oudtshoorn.  Not much changed for them.  
		In concluding, I wish to state the following 
(1)	apartheid and its exponents viciously and deliberately without any feeling or regard, transformed my family from a proud, independent and prosperous family, into a poor, humiliated and desperate existence,
	(2)	my involvement in the struggle for liberation although taken very personal, was never for any personal gain, 
	(3)	I am not sorry and do not regret anything I have done in my small contribution to the struggle for liberation, but because I have compassion for humanity, I do regret any pain and or suffering I may have caused the two police officers and or their families who sustained injuries during the relevant incidents.   I say this with a deep sense of conviction despite being aware of the fact that those who terrorised my family and assaulted me, many of them still in the police and prison services, never extended a hand to me.  I forgive them because I believe in forgiveness rather than hate and in reconciliation which must transform our country into one nation at peace with itself and positive about its future.  It was signed by me on the 18th of October 1999 in Cape Town."