Human Rights Violation Hearings — Newcastle — 1996-09-12

COMMISSIONER: (Inaudible) ... primary theme over the last three days has been very serious allegations made against the police.  We heard from five civic leaders from Sibongile township in Dundee, people who had very reasonable and legitimate civic demands about the quality of life in their township, who were treated like dangerous terrorists.  They were thrown into gaol, they were detained for up to two years - over two years, they were assaulted, they were tortured, and this was a virtual reign of terror by the Security Branch which seemed to centre here in Newcastle in the mid eighties, and the lives of thousands of people were affected, many of whom are still experiencing the effects of that even today, as we saw on stage.  Many of the people we heard from this morning are still traumatised by what happened to them.  And, as we heard from the second-last witness, Mr Veenendal, this sort if grossly unlawful activity was persisting even up until 1993, and the fact that he represents a white right-wing organisation indicates a subculture of unlawful behaviour by the police, particularly the Security Branch, irrespective of the political orientation of the victims.
We also heard allegations of widespread bias, political bias, by the KwaZulu Police in their support for certain members of Inkatha and, as I said a few minutes ago to Mr Veenendal, whether the issue is torture by the Security Branch, or whether it is bias and violence by the KwaZulu Police, neither of these things can be described as proper policing.  They destroy the credibility of the police and they destroy any proper notion that we, as citizens, should have of law and order, and it is very, very important that we strive to have a police force that we can trust and that we can work with, and we hope very much that we are moving towards that stage.
We also heard terrible stories of murder and arson arising out of political intolerance between the IFP and the ANC, and we saw people from both parties here today, sitting together, listening to each other's suffering.  And we hope that those people, having listened to how each other's families suffered, we hope that it helps to bring realisation to people of the uselessness of violence.
Finally, we heard evidence yesterday from two people from Hlobane, from the Iscor mine in Hlobane, where there was a terrible massacre last year.  We heard from Mr Ephraim Ngcobo and Mr Clifford Siyolo, both of whom are city councillors here in Newcastle.  And the mine management and the police tried to describe that violence on the mine as Zulus fighting Xhosas, and the members of the trade union, of the National Union of Mineworkers, persistently denied that it was a case of Zulus against Xhosas.  Mr Ngcobo himself is a Zulu-speaking person, Mr Siyolo is a Xhosa-speaking person, and they came up onto the stage here and they very eloquently said that there was never conflict between Zulu and Xhosa mineworkers.  They said that they were friends, they had always been friends, and they would always be friends.  And, as I said to them yesterday, they represented the best hope that we have in a new South Africa, because they are living proof that people of different languages and different cultures can live and work together.
We may - depending on the number of people from Newcastle who wish us to come back to Newcastle we may come back next year, or later this year if you request us to.  We know that we have only heard a fraction of the human rights abuses in this town, Madadeni, Osizweni and other places, and if there is a demand for the Truth Commission to come back to Newcastle we will certainly do so.
So, finally, I want to thank all the witnesses who gave evidence here today.  Thank you for having the courage to have come forward to tell us your stories.  We want to also thank the people provided support, voluntary support to the witnesses.  We know that they need that support very much after they have gone through the quite traumatic event of reliving the stories that they have told.  We want to thank the TRC staff, who also made this a very successful hearing, and others such as the police, who provided security for us, the interpreters, and the press.  
And we also thank you very much for the very respectful and controlled way that the audience has - controlled behaviour by the audience over the last few days.  It's the first time of any of the hearings we've been to where the audience has spontaneously stood up as the witnesses come onto the stage and depart from the stage, and that is a real indication to us of the respect that people have in this area for others who have suffered.  
We also thank those members of the City Council of Newcastle who have found the time to come and be with us today and over the last couple of days.
Before you go can I please just ask you not to remove these items from the hall.  They're expensive and they don't work outside the hall, so please leave them on your seats or at the back of the hall.  
And, if there are people who wish to make statements, there have been statement-takers here for the last three days, who will be leaving this afternoon, but if there people who want to make statements statement-takers can easily come up from Durban and spend a couple of days here in Newcastle taking more statements.
So I hope I haven't left anybody out.  The volunteers, I think I have thanked the volunteer counsellors.  If I haven't, again thank you very much to them for making themselves available to us and to the witnesses.  
Finally we're going to ask Father Shange to close with a few words of a prayer.