CHAIRPERSON: Good morning, Zandile, can you hear me properly?
MR MUSI: I have got a problem with my hearing.
CHAIRPERSON: Which language are you going to use, Tswana or Xhosa?
MR MUSI: Preferably Xhosa.
CHAIRPERSON: We know that you are with your brother who has accompanied you. We welcome both of you. Before you tell us your story we will hand over to Dr Randera.
DR RANDERA: Zandile, good morning. Please stand to take the oath.
ZANDILE J MUSI: (Duly sworn, states).
MS SEROKE: Zandile, as we have read in your statement, you have come to tell a very painful story. Something that happened to you in 1982 on the 15th of February. At that time you were 19 years old. Before you tell us your story please tell us briefly about yourself, what were you doing in 1982 and so forth. Please continue.
MR MUSI: I am just using this opportunity to ...
MS SEROKE: Please wait a while. I will request that if you are going to speak Xhosa, for you to remove your ear-phones because the interpretation will disturb you.
MR MUSI: I want to request today that we commemorate Fanjana Njingo and Bimbo. I want people to know that these
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people did not die because they were naughty, but because they were concerned about millions of South Africans. They were concerned about the millions of South Africans who have fought (indistinct).
Before I continue with my story, I want the Gagaza people to know that these three men that I am going to talk about, died for their country.
In 1981 I was 19 years of age, I was in junior secondary school. At that time the Gagaza residents organisation had just been formed. The Congress of South African Students also had just been formed. When Cosas was formed at Faith Mission I met Bimbo and Jingo. I already knew Fenjana and I was very close to him.
After meeting Bimbo and Jingo, we discussed a lot of things. After discussing these issues we came to the conclusion that we would like to join a liberation movement. We would meet now and again with Bimbo, Jingo and Fenjana. In January 1982 a chap called Ephraim Falapese - the comrades used to call him Francis. He went into exile with my elder brother. My eldest brother's friend used to stay at home. They all went together into exile.
In 1982 we met with Bimbo. We also discussed many issues. We told him that we wanted to join the liberation movement. He discouraged us about going into exile. He said it is not necessary for us to go into exile because there should be ANC structures back home. We would meet with him regularly when he came home.
We made an appointment with him for a Thursday. He said we should meet at an industrial station on a Saturday. We met on the Saturday. He told us that he had prepared everything for us for training. He would train us and we
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would carry out the operations. After that we could go int exile and then go to school.
MS SEROKE: What did he say he would train you in?
MR MUSI: He said he would train us in the use of weapons underground.
On the Saturday we met with him at the industrial station, together with Bimbo. At the time he had a Makarov. He showed both Bimbo and I how it works. Finally, we concluded that we would meet on the Monday. We told him that Fenjane and Bimbo were interested. Then we said we would meet on the Monday.
We were supposed to leave Lorato Hospital and go to our meeting place. They picked us up from Lorato. Then we went towards West Rand.
MS SEROKE: When they say they took you, who was it? Was it Ephraim?
MR MUSI: Ephraim was with Joe Mamasela. He was driving. They took us to West Rand mines. When we got to the West Rand mines we parked the car a few metres from where we were supposed to go. Joe Mamasela was driving. I recognised him because he had a scar. I remembered his scar. Even with the police, what I said to them is that the man who was driving the car had a scar on his face.
MS SEROKE: At the time you did not know his name.
MR MUSI: No, I did not know his name, I just recognised the scar. Then a SAP member told me who it was.
When we got the West Rand mines they put us in a shaft. Falapesa was walking ahead.
MS SEROKE: Which mine was this?
MR MUSI: It is a mine in West Rand, West Rand mines.
WE got there. Falapesa opened and we entered. It was
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at about half past eight, because we left Lorato at eight o'clock. We got into the shaft and he took out a grenade. He said it is an F1 grenade. Then he took out a Makorov as well. He said he would show and train us in these. He showed us how to operate the machinery. He said we must be careful because it is deadly. What happened is that there was a box in the corner of the room. That box looked very suspicious. When I looked at the box I just heard an explosion. I thought it was our mistake, because the last person with the grenade was Njinga. When I heard the explosion I cried out to Njinga because I thought he was the one who had made a mistake. We were injured. Even the building fell down. The people who died immediately are Bimbo and Njinga.
Fanela was next to me. We could not see each other, but we could speak to each other. He could not see or walk. I was bleeding. Fanela was lying down on my left side.
What is very painful to remember is that he had a hole in his body, because my hand went into his body as I was trying to communicate with him.
After a while I got up. As I got up I called Fanela and he responded. He was still alive at the time. I tried to scream, but nobody heard.
At the morning about six o'clock I fainted. In the morning it was very cold when I woke up. I called out to Fanela, Fanele did not respond. I realised that he had passed away.
At about nine o'clock in the morning the police came. Mr Nkosi was one of the policemen. They asked for my identity. They asked what I was doing there. I told them we had gone to see a Milly Jackson show and some people
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picked us up. They then said I was being deceptive. They took me to Lorato Hospital. They put plasters on my leg and they treated me. Then they took me to prison. Before they took me to jail I could not see. They took me to a field, I could sense that I was walking on grass. There was one man who took out a gun and put it into my mouth. He said I must tell them who I was with and what we were doing. I told them that two men took us, a black man and a white man, they said they are taking us to a stadium.
The reason why I said there was a white man, I thought that they would assume that this white man wanted to kill us. They put me in jail. They tortured me, kicking me in jail. They wanted to know who I was with. I tried to deny everything. I told them that we were going to the Colloseum. Slowly I recovered, my eyes opened, I went back to hospital. After four weeks I got a visitor. My grandmother who passed away in 1985.
I was charged in the sixth week of my detention. I appeared in court. They said I was in possession of explosives. I got R500,00 bail. I came back to Lorato Hospital because my leg was still injured. I was admitted to hospital. They put a plaster of paris on my leg and on my right arm. I regularly went to court and I was acquitted. Because a major from Krugersdorp prison testified that the police were torturing me. He would hear me when I screamed. He helped me. That is why I was acquitted. That was that.
In 1985 I was arrested once more, under the state of emergency. I was sentenced in 1987, October, under the Explosives Act. I went to Robben Island and I was released on the 15th of December 1990.
MS SEROKE: Is that all you have to say? Please give him a
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glass of water. We have listened to your story. We are going to ask you a few questions, because we have heard that Bimbo and Fanjana and Jingo's parents are here today. They too are going to tell their stories. You have given us your story. We are not going to ask whether they are, because we have heard that they are here. Zandile, when you were arrested in 1985, what did they accused you of exactly?
MR MUSI: I was involved in local political structures, residents' organisations, youth congress, I was involved in all those. That's why they arrested me.
MS SEROKE: After you had recovered from the explosion, and you had gone back home, how did your friends' parents respond and react towards you?
MR MUSI: I did not come across them that often. I only saw them, because I felt guilty. I also perceived that things are not going too well between the families.
MS SEROKE: Were they blaming you for having taken their children or were they suspecting that you were part of the plot?
MR MUSI: I fetched Fanjana from home, I am the one who fetched him. That's what they said as well. That I took Fanjana from home and the next thing he is dead.
MS SEROKE: You said that you never explained to them, because you had been avoiding them. So therefore at the time you were aware that the man that was with Emphraim was Mamasela. Or at what stage did you find out that the man who was driving the Kombi was Mamasela?
MR MUSI: I don't understand your question too well.
MS SEROKE: What I am saying is, after you had been injured when did you find out that the Kombi driver that picked you up from Laratong was Mamasela? When did you receive that
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information?
MR MUSI: I heard from Reggie Moraba this year.
MS SEROKE: So what happened to Ephraim who was your contact?
MR MUSI: He is a priest in Rustenburg. I met him coming from Ledach. We met him at Jorda next to (indistinct). I saw him and I recognised him. Reggie Moraba tried to trace him as I had informed him. They found him there. He is a priest in Rustenburg. They talked to him and he told them that before he talks to them, he wants a human rights lawyer. They tried to organise the lawyer, they found the lawyer. I told the lawyer what happened.
MS SEROKE: So how was he involved, what did he say, what is his explanation?
MR MUSI: They did not inform me, well, even Reggie himself.
MS SEROKE: In essence did he admit that he tricked you?
Did he admit that he trapped you, saying that he wanted to train you and demonstrate to you how the arms worked?
MR MUSI: Yes, he did admit that.
MS SEROKE: Could we perhaps get his address, maybe from the lawyers or the people you are with, so that we too can get a statement from him?
MR MUSI: I would be glad if you could contact Reggie Moraba and they will be able to help you.
MS SEROKE: For now, I am going to hand you over to my colleagues to give them a chance to ask you questions, if they so wish. Dr Randera?
DR RANDERA: I want to come back to your meeting with these three individuals, who you now say is Joe Mamasela, Scarface and Ephraim. At the time, how did they introduce themselves to you?
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MR MUSI: The one that I knew, Ephraim, I knew Ephraim, but Joe Mamasela was a driver, I had never met him before. It is only Ephraim that I had known prior to the incident. Nobody made any introductions.
DR RANDERA: But when they said that they were going to train you, on whose behalf were they going to be training you?
MR MUSI: Mfalapesa, I know him as a comrade, an MK comrade. I thought that he had come to train us so that we could join MK.
DR RANDERA: Where is he now, do you know where he is?
MR MUSI: He is in Rustenburg.
DR RANDERA: You say you knew him. How long did you know him for, as an MK comrade?
MR MUSI: He left with my brother in 1976. They went to join MK in 1976. They then came back in 1982, sorry, 1981.
DR RANDERA: I know that that period that we are talking about was a very difficult period. Now you earlier on spoke about the Kagiso residents association and Cosas. Were there structures in the community where you could actually go and ask other people and say listen, is this person a trustworthy person or not? Or did you just accept because he left with your brother, he was okay?
MR MUSI: I think when it comes to the issue of structures, Mfalapesa, I thought he was an MK member working underground. Therefore, he could not expose himself. I trusted him. He also stipulated that we must not expose him because he worked underground.
DR RANDERA: To come back to your arrest in 1985. In-between, between 1982 when you yourself were injured and these other young people were killed, did you leave the
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country to go for training?
MR MUSI: I thought about it, but I did not leave.
DR RANDERA: Because you were charged with handling explosives again and sent to Robben Island. Where did you get training on the use of explosives?
MR MUSI: Here, back home.
DR RANDERA: When did you find out that these people were not ANC operatives?
MR MUSI: When I was released from jail in 1982, I phoned my brother in Zambia. I told him what happened. He then told me that Weston was in cahoots with the boers, he was working with the boers.
DR RANDERA: Who is Weston?
MR MUSI: Mfalapesa.
DR RANDERA: Mamasela.
MR MUSI: I didn't know Mamasela at all.
DR RANDERA: I want to ask one last question. In the amnesty hearings two or three weeks ago in Johannesburg, the five people who applied for amnesty talked about many of the killings that they were involved in. Of course, one of the killings was related to these young people from outside Pretoria, who were also killed, almost in a similar incident to yours. There was also the incident of the young people, I think in the East Rand, who were given the grenade by Joe Mamasela and these were dud grenades and of course, they blew themselves up and many of them were killed and some of them were severely injured. The article in the newspaper a day after this, raised the question - and I want to actually just, so that you can actually give us your point of view. An article in a newspaper a day later asked the question: what were these young people going to do with the grenades
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themselves. So my question to you is: what were you going to do with the training that you were going to receive, that you were going to be receiving in using these explosives?
MR MUSI: We were going to fight the apartheid system.
MS SEROKE: What is your answer?
MR MUSI: Should I repeat it? We were going to fight the apartheid system.
DR RANDERA: If necessary, killing people?
MR MUSI: Not necessarily the people. But I was going to abide by any MK policy.
DR RANDERA: Thank you very much.
MS SEROKE: Mr Manthata?
MR MANTHATA: You and your honourable late friends, where were you in the habit of meeting?
MR MUSI: At that time we were going to meet at Loratong.
MR MANTHATA: Even before you got this kind of promise for training, were you in the habit of meeting anywhere with other youths?
MR MUSI: Yes, we would meet regularly.
MR MANTHATA: Where would you meet?
MR MUSI: In the township.
MR MANTHATA: I ask these questions because you referred to the Faith Mission Church.
MR MUSI: We would have meetings regularly there. The meetings would be at the Faith Mission.
MR MANTHATA: At that time who was the Minister of the Faith Mission?
MR MUSI: It was Frank Chikane.
MR MANTHATA: What were you doing as youths, besides this that came into your mind later?
MR MUSI: We would have church meetings. We would meet for
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religious meetings.
MR MANTHATA: At that time, which I think even now, you were religiously inclined.
MR MUSI: Yes, I was a church-going person.
MR MANTHATA: At the time you met this Ephraim, had you told about your brother, and where he had left him?
MR MUSI: Yes, he did say.
MR MANTHATA: What information did he give about your brother?
MR MUSI: He said that my one brother is back in Germany and the other one in Zambia.
MR MANTHATA: So those were the reasons why you trusted and believed in him. But as you say, when he brought these new men with his car, did he introduce himself to you?
MR MUSI: No, he did not introduce them.
MR MANTHATA: The time after this explosion, did the families of the comrades ever visit you?
MR MUSI: I was not admitted, I was just treated, I did not sleep at the hospital, I was treated and taken to prison.
MR MANTHATA: Did they attend your trial?
MR MUSI: Yes, they did attend.
MR MANTHATA: ... support. When do you think they lost faith in you, that they began to doubt you?
MR MUSI: I just thought that they were doubting me.
MR MANTHATA: Of course, this was compounded by the feeling of guilt on your side, that you had organised the youth yourself.
MR MUSI: Yes, that is the reason.
MR MANTHATA: Musi, don't regret it. Then for the second arrest they said you were found in possession of firearms, is that what they said? That is the 1985 arrest.
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MR MUSI: It was explosives, I did not have firearms, just explosives.
MR MANTHATA: Where did you get that from? Were you already, even at that time, organised into another cadre of comrades?
MR MUSI: I was a comrade, but not a cadre as such, but I was a comrade.
MR MANTHATA: My last question would be, even at this time in 1985, in your operation as a comrade, did you kill anybody?
MR MUSI: No, I have never killed anyone.
MS SEROKE: Prof Piet Meiring.
PROF MEIRING: I only have a few things I would like to ask. There are a number of things I would like to ask just to complete the picture.
The first thing I want to ask, is you said, I think it was in 1985, when you were in prison, you were being tortured and then there was a major who intervened on your behalf. After his intervention things improved and you were released. Is that so?
MR MUSI: It was in 1982.
PROF MEIRING: Do you know the name of that major who came to your assistance?
MR MUSI: Yes, I do remember him - no, I do not remember him.
PROF MEIRING: A white man or a black man?
MR MUSI: It was a white man. He helped me in the sense that he testified in court that I was being beaten up and assaulted.
PROF MEIRING: Another question about your own personal circumstances. In your written report you say that you had
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two ear operations, but you can't hear properly and you also had an operation on your right leg. Is that so?
MR MUSI: Yes, that is so. My hands are all right, but I have a problem with my ears.
PROF MEIRING: Are you working at the moment, are you employed or are you without work?
MR MUSI: No, I am not working, I am unemployed.
PROF MEIRING: What education do you have?
MR MUSI: I am supposed to write Std 10 examinations. I have got a problem with my memory and concentration.
PROF MEIRING: Musi, are you married, do you have a family, any children?
MR MUSI: I am not married but I have children.
PROF MEIRING: How old are your children?
MR MUSI: My eldest is 11 years old and the other two months old.
PROF MEIRING: A boy and a girl?
MR MUSI: They are both boths.
PROF MEIRING: The last question I wish to ask is - oh, yes, I want to ask. You are not able to work. Who are helping you financially? Do you have a pension or are you dependent upon your parents, who helps you with money?
MR MUSI: I depend on my mother. She helps me. She is an assistant nurse at the hospital.
PROF MEIRING: Then the very last question is: you said in the course of your testimony that the feelings between the families are sometimes not too good. Do you think that today in coming to the Truth Commission will help to heal the relationship between the families?
MR MUSI: Yes, I would really appreciate it if the Truth Commission would help in the reconciliation of these
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families.
MS SEROKE: Zandile, according to your statement here, you say that you and your late friends were affiliated to Cosas and also active in the Kagiso residents organisation. You then continued to say that Cosas dealt with political and educational issues and Kagiso residents organisation dealt with community issues. You were involved in all those issues. At what stage then did you deviate from this way of reparation?
MR MUSI: I did not deviate. But I realised that the best way to help the community would be if we joined the MK. We were not deviating as such, we were just in the struggle.
MS SEROKE: Thank you for coming here today to tell us what happened in 1982. I am sure that you feel that at least there is less magnitude and gravity now that you have spoken. What we realise is that you were a victim because Emphraim took advantage of the fact that he knew your brother and you trusted him. Because you must have thought that somebody who knows my brother is like a brother to me too. We realise that all these years you were stigmatised, people were suspicious. I don't know, but I should think so, that your friends in the township, even the parents of the deceased, probably suspected that you were involved in their children's murders. It is terrible to be suspected of something you are innocent of. We understand that you must have felt guilty for having fetched these children at home, from home, to put them in such danger. Besides the fact that you were on Robben Island for three years, psychologically you must really have been badly affected, especially your youth, because you are quite young, you are still growing up. What I really want to say is that before
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you step down, is that I can imagine how much you were traumatised. We have heard your request, because you do not hear well and the lapse of your memory. Before you leave I would like to give you an opportunity, maybe there is something you would like to say to the audience. Maybe you would like to address the parents of the deceased now that the truth is out. Maybe you can also address your request to the parents.
MR MUSI: My request is that Fanjane and Jingo have contributed to the freedom we have to this day. They died being aware that there will be a qualitative change in our country. They have died as heroes of South Africa. Could their families perhaps get some form of compensation? Perhaps the Truth Commission could help me with my life as well, so that I can continue with my life and live like a normal person. That is my request.
MS SEROKE: Thank you very much. We have heard your requests. We will put forward a recommendation to the President and we will see what we can do.
It has been a very tough decision to speak today, but we are glad that you have let all this out. Thank you.
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