Human Rights Violation Hearings — Pietersburg — 1996-07-19

MR MASHABELA: I don't know really what to say because we went to the chief who sent us this man and we wanted to enquire from him why he was doing that, we wanted him to give us a letter, and then we told him about all the damages, and they said to us, they would this matter.  He himself called the police at Skoornot and the police came on the same day.  When they arrived they went to the chief's place, they never came to us.  This man burned our houses, the police were there and there was no interference at all and we were shocked, we said we want to see the end of this whole story, but up to this day we are here, we don't want know what's taking place.  I want to tell you, just like a lizard that you kill and throw it away, nobody would come and claim the lizard.  We are really puzzled as we are.

THOMAS MANTHATA: Have you remained a community of people driven from where you are or are you just scattered around and you cannot even make a claim or a request for all of you as a community that stayed there before?

MR MASHABELA: My Lord, we never thought of that thing because we were left in the wilderness and then we thought that our chiefs would investigate this matter and take us and bring us together with this man so that we can solve the conflict but we've been waiting until this day, we've never met this man, we've never said anything to him.  Now according to our knowledge, we think that these are the collaborators, they support each other, because they said to us they would investigate this matter, but to this day they are still investigating.  We were so glad to hear that there would be a Commission in town, that is why we are here before you, saying please, isn't there anything that you can do.  We don't know what, but just to help us, maybe to investigate, we cannot even think anymore.  Even when we are driving we'd just end up bumping other cars because we are not concentrating on the driving, our hearts are still thinking of many issues.  He is still around, he's free, he just walks past us but nothing has been done to him.  I thank Christianity, it's controlling my life, I want to thank Christianity, it's a very good thing, I am a Christian as you see me.  When I'm asleep I say to myself, "God thank you!" And before,  I told myself at night that I would go to their houses without being seen and burn them, but now God spoke to my heart, I'm a Christian, I didn't do that.
 Up to this day I'm helpless.  I'm saying I request compensation so that I can replace my property and the property of my children which was lost.

THOMAS MANTHATA: My last question is, have you heard about the Land Claims Court?

MR MASHABELA: We haven't heard of that in this area.

THOMAS MANTHATA: No further questions.

MR MASHABELA: I thank you.

RUSSELL ALLY: Mr Mashabela, it seems as if this incident of your house-burning took place at more or less the same time as an incident which we heard about yesterday from Mrs Maditsi whose son Solomon was shot and hacked to death.  Do you know mrs Maditsi?

MR MASHABELA: Yes I know the woman, we were staying together in that village.  Her son was killed during that time because we really wanted to understand what really Masha was doing to our nation, Maditsi's son was killed in that incident.  He was just an innocent person, they were in a group, they wanted to actually get a clear message as to what was happening, and then he was killed.

RUSSELL ALLY: Now the burning of your house, did it take place before this incident with Solomon or after?

MR MASHABELA: The burning of my house took place the very same day.  I have to say when they burned these houses, there was a man chosen by the nation, he was Johannes Leshabane, he was a school committee member, and they came and said they don't want this man because this land belongs to us, it was given to us by the government and we want to inaugurate our own school committee.  And we said no, you are not supposed to do that because this man is a committee member and then they lost temper and they burned his house and then all our houses were burned.  This happened a long time after he had taken the fields for himself.
 I think this man who was a committee member, Mr Leshabane will come before you, he will appear at some stage before the Commission.  He was the person whom we wanted because this field belonged to us.

RUSSELL ALLY: Thank you.

MR MALAN: Mr Mashabela, thank you very much for coming to us and talking to us. I want from a personal note to say to you that it's really been a privilege to listen to the wisdom and to the calmness that came from you.  The wisdom to find out that a person who would not ask for forgiveness for his wrongs would be a person that could kill an animal, a lizard.  Also your statement that God had been good to you in terms of helping you not to retaliate.  We've heard this, the public has heard this, we will look at this case, we will also look at the case of Maditsi which Dr Ally referred to and the number of others where we have evidence from.  We will put everything together, we will see what we can make from it, and we hope that especially on this case, that we can come back and may be of some assistance to you. Thank you very much for coming to us again, we appreciate that.

MR MASHABELA: I also thank you people of God.