Amnesty Hearings — Welkom — 1998-11-16

STEPHEN DONALD MAKHURA: Yes, Sir, he is Mr Collie.  Well I need to go a little bit, Sir.
"The operation to go and defend the people in Natal was not an MK operation, it was an operation of the Self Defence Units.  Even though I am a member of Umkhonto weSizwe it was not an MK operation because MK suspended armed operations long ago, on the 6th of August 1990."

CHAIRPERSON: Whereabout were you headed to in Natal?

STEPHEN DONALD MAKHURA: I cannot tell you, Sir, I really don't know.  In fact there was this so-called chain of command, there was some of the things which I was not supposed to know.

CHAIRPERSON: So was Ndabeni, the deceased Ndabeni, was he the leader of that operation?

STEPHEN DONALD MAKHURA: Yes, I will say two of them, Nozulu and Sebenzile were the commanders and they knew each and everything about the trip.

DR TSOTSI: Where is Nozulu?

STEPHEN DONALD MAKHURA: I don't know, Sir, we tried to establish his whereabouts for a long time, probably for about two years, we couldn't get hold of him.

DR TSOTSI: When ...(indistinct)

STEPHEN DONALD MAKHURA: Pardon?

DR TSOTSI: When last did you see him?

STEPHEN DONALD MAKHURA: That was when he escaped on the very same day, the 2nd of April 1992.  As for Joe, he was shot dead in Germiston and his body was flown to, was taken to Mozambique to go and be buried there.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Mhlaba?

MR MHLABA: Mr Makhura, do you know anything concerning the shooting of Cornelius Oosthuizen and Hermanus Johannes Joubert?

STEPHEN DONALD MAKHURA: Well Sir, that incident happened when I was a little bit far away from the actual spot.  I don't know what transpired there, I only heard the shots of, the sound of AK47s Sir.  I was not near that spot.

MR MHLABA: Is this all you can tell the Committee about your involvement in this incident?

STEPHEN DONALD MAKHURA: Well there are other points which I believe are going to be very important to the  Committee.
"Sir, I want to go back to Polla Park.  The people of Polla Park lived under painful situations, Sir. Sometimes it happened - I'm even going to involve the involvement of the police in that violence, Sir.  Sometimes the Security Forces would come during the night to attack people, to kill people and leaving behind red bands, now red bands were normally worn by Inkatha people from the hostels, to create a picture that it was the IFP which came to attack people at Polla Park.
	Now in turn we will collect our arms and go and attack them ..."

CHAIRPERSON: You mean IFP?

STEPHEN DONALD MAKHURA: Yes, Sir.
"It later emerged, after some of the policemen were gunned down there in Polla Park, that they were doing and they were engaged in this type of action."

MR MHLABA: Do you know anything, Mr Makhura, about the incident involving the attempted murder of Bruce Rutherford Collie and the attempted murder Christoffel Coetzee and Henry Sidney Chris Nortje?

STEPHEN DONALD MAKHURA: No, Sir, I was not near that shooting, I was not near it, Sir.

CHAIRPERSON: What happened to Mr Collie who you shot?

STEPHEN DONALD MAKHURA: He was injured, he's testified against me in the Court, Sir.

CHAIRPERSON: Whereabout did you strike him?

STEPHEN DONALD MAKHURA: From the medical files I seem to have shot him on his stomach.

MR MHLABA: Is it your case, Mr Makhura, that in shooting the victim you were furthering the aims of the political organisation?  That is you were trying to secure a safe passage to, or rather safe transit to your destination where you were supposed to execute your mandate?

STEPHEN DONALD MAKHURA: That's correct, Sir.

MR MHLABA: Do you have any other thing to add in support of your application, other than what you have already told the Committee?

STEPHEN DONALD MAKHURA: I don't understand Sir, do you mean anything I want to tell the Committee, apart from what I've been saying?

MR MHLABA: If you have told the Committee everything insofar as it relates to the incident which you are applying for amnesty for, I would want to find out from you if there is anything which you feel may have been left out which may be persuasive towards the Committee deciding in your favour?

STEPHEN DONALD MAKHURA: Thank you, Sir.  I want to bring to the attention of this Committee the following points
"Two of my comrades were shot and killed on that day.  One of them, Mac Gregor, was buried by the police without the consent of his family.  We don't know where my comrade has been buried.  The family of Mac Gregor came to claim the body at Bethlehem. His brother was detained and subsequently referred to come to Welkom to come and look for the body in Welkom."

CHAIRPERSON: In Welkom where we are?

STEPHEN DONALD MAKHURA: Yes, Sir.

CHAIRPERSON: But Welkom is very far from Bethlehem.

STEPHEN DONALD MAKHURA: That is why we are so surprised, because the body was probably in Bethlehem.

CHAIRPERSON: Do you know, well you wouldn't know of firsthand knowledge from what you've told us but do you know whether MacGregor died on the scene of the shooting or whether he died later in a hospital or whatever?

STEPHEN DONALD MAKHURA: He died on the scene, Sir, but immediately after the shooting of the police where I was not involved, the people I was travelling with then ran with that car, they drove that car towards Ficksburg, then they were pursued by the police.  That is where a shootout ensued, Sir, between the police and the people I was travelling with.  Mac Gregor and Sebenzile were shot and killed somewhere there.
	I managed to go to the mortuary to go and identify the bodies Sir.  All of them were riddled with bullet holes.  In the Court during my trial there was an album, a photo album of the deceased, they were lying in the fields near their rifles. 
	So at the end of the day I will personally request the Committee to please help in finding the deceased who was buried at a place we don't know.
	Secondly, Sir, one of my co-accused, Thozamile Clement Ndabeni had to undergo a surgical operation of nine stitches immediately after being arrested on that day.  Now the police said in the Court that the man drank poison where he was hiding.  It was not true, Sir.  It later emerged that he was assaulted with a rifle, with a barrel of a rifle and he had to undergo nine surgical operations.

DR TSOTSI: Mr Makhura, can I take you back to - I just want to clarify something, can I take you back to the moment where you disembarked from this van.  Did I hear you correctly that after you and Fokazi disembarked from this van you never met your colleagues thereafter until you were arrested?

STEPHEN DONALD MAKHURA: That's correct, Sir.

DR TSOTSI: And do you know whether this van left the place where it stopped after you disembarked or whether it remained there?  Did you leave it there when you walked back to the township?

STEPHEN DONALD MAKHURA: Are you referring to the police van or the van which was driven by the farmer, Sir?

DR TSOTSI: I'm referring to the van in which you were being conveyed with your colleagues, with the other applicant and the people you've mentioned, Nozulu, Wellington and Sebenzile.

STEPHEN DONALD MAKHURA: Immediately after we disembarked from that car, that's the car we travelled by from Polla Park to Natal, immediately after we left that car ...(end of tape) ... in fact it seemed as if Sebenzile was worried that we were not coming back, we were taking our time.  He seemed to have come to look for us.  That's where the shooting took place, Sir.

MR MHLABA: Thank you, Chair, I don't have any other questions.
NO FURTHER QUESTIONS BY MR MHLABA

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you, Mr Mhlaba.  Mr Mapoma, do you have any questions to ask the witness?

MR MAPOMA: Mr Makhura, in your amnesty application you apply for amnesty for murder amongst other things, for whose murder to you apply for amnesty?