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WILLIAMS, (first name not given)Age Description Williams says his experience in ANC camps has left him scarred. // I want to remember this, and it would be hazy and my head would feel like cracking, you understand? Sometimes it would be like I’m losing my mental capabilities. // This is probably why he struggled to relate his story to a ... I knew that it would be impossible to arrest armed men. I knew that these men were going to shoot, because the words that were used are that they should be ‘eliminated.’ // What other words were used? // To be ‘taken out.’ // What other words were used? // They had to be ‘swept.’ // ... today was arrested. I was still on the run, they couldn’t find me. And then what happened was some Boers told people in my organisation they’re not really looking for me, because I was the informer. // And then comrades dealt out their own rough justice. // The first thing that happened, my ... ... the 22 November 1990 attempted coup in the Transkei - supported by SA Military Intelligence - which left 19 people dead; testimony from Teddy Williams, a former MK soldier detained in the ANC?s Quatro detention camp in Angola and other incidents of human rights abuses within the ANC. From ... ... camp for taking part in a camp mutiny. // What traumatized me most is to see people being tortured. Lots of people … others beaten … There was another colleague of mine who was one of the mutinies. He had his scalp opened up with a bayonet during torture. I have concrete testimony about one ... trying to gun down each and every person. It was absolute horror. // Despite the unbelievably vicious nature of the attack the survivors preached forgiveness. // From my level as a human being, my personal level, I feel I have forgiven, and when I say I forgiven I bear no grudges against them. ... ... so. What do you say about that? // After we set up the original ambush for them we then withdrew from the operation. Thereafter they shot at us first, they attacked us and we must have been a lot more successful in actually countering this attack. That’s the way I see ... ... so. What do you say about that? // After we set up the original ambush for them, we then withdrew from the operation. Thereafter they shot at us first; they attacked us and we were simply a lot more successful in actually countering this attack. That’s the way I see it. // That’s one ... ... any certain cause because all they did … they even killed their own people who challenged them. So, I don’t think they advanced anything. I was not scared that I was becoming a bad cop. I was only scared that if I don’t do it, because there was too much shooting, I could have got shot ... ... punished by the government for taking that decision, who were detained, tortured and betrayed and who today carry their scars within. Moegamat Williams was a member of the Bonteheuwel Military Wing, (BMW) a grouping involved in semi-military operations on the Cape ... ... for everybody who cooperated with me: the askaris, Mbelo, and also the responsibility for those seniors who today are saying there was nothing wrong, they did not know me. Today I accept full responsibility for this whole ... So is it correct then that your mission clearly was that you should go out there and that you should kill the freedom fighters? // According to the situation, yes it was so. also that I can now carry on with my life. For the first time, yesterday after the meetings with them in the boardroom, I felt a release that I’ve not felt before. Something has lifted from my heart. // I thought about it last night, will I ever see them again, or will we be able to be friends? ... A man approached us raising his arms and he was talking in Xhosa saying that he’ll take us to where the rest of the group is. One sergeant from the riot unit, he was a white sergeant, said I should shoot this man. And before I shot this man, as he was raising his arms I saw his firearm, and ... ... me most is to see people being tortured. // ‘Torture, Quatro Camp’ // Lots of people, others beaten, their jaws broken and some… there’s another colleague of mine who was one of the mutinees. He had his skull opened up, with a bayonet during torture. // They used the ropes here on this ... ... How did you think the police were going to react? // I thought they were going to ambush the kombi; they were going to arrest these people, not to kill them. // For your own account you say that you realized that you were leading those men to their death on that morning. Am I correct? // ... In the past we used to say ‘Amandla Awethu!’ and we used to say ‘A Luta Continua,’ which means ‘power to the people’ and ‘the struggle continues.’ So for us, within ourselves those words are still there, ‘Amandla Awethu! A Luta Continua,’ because we are still fighting. He had two bullets in his forehead, holes, and about three down his face and … I want to put it to you Mr. Mbelo that you have tried to hide behind orders and circumstances to justify your conduct. // The main reason that I have come before the Commission is to tell this Committee as to what I know about the shooting and the part that I took, because the nation at large ... a grave, this time to lay to rest Robert Waterwitch and Coline Williams. But the victims of Bonteheuwel’s violent confrontation with apartheid are not only the ones lying in Cape Town’s graveyards. For every martyr there are many many more grappling with the destruction of their lives. ... |
