amntrans AMNESTY HEARING 1998-11-26 PRETORIA 4 SEMI BERNARD MAYISELA AM 7210/97 https://sabctrc.saha.org.za/hearing.php?id=53006&t=&tab=hearings https://sabctrc.saha.org.za/originals/amntrans/1998/9811231210_pr_981126th.htm ADV STEENKAMP Mr Chairman, the first applicant this morning will be Mr Semi Bernard Mayisela. His application appears on page 157 in the bundle, Lusaka-A. 157, Lusaka-A, Mr Chairman, thanks. CHAIRPERSON Can I ask you please to settle down, we want to start. For the record, today is Thursday the 26th of November 1998. It is the continued sitting of the Amnesty Committee in respect of the Thokoza SDU applications. The panel is constituted as previously indicated on the record. We are proceeding to hear the matter of Mr Mayisela. Mr Mayisela, can you please stand. Can you give your full names? SEMI BERNARD MAYISELA (sworn states) CHAIRPERSON Thank you, please sit down. Mr Sibeko? EXAMINATION BY MR SIBEKO Thank you, Mr Chairman. Mr Mayisela, you are an applicant applying for amnesty for the activities that occurred at Lusaka-A, Thokoza, is that correct? MR MAYISELA That is correct. MR SIBEKO Would you tell us exactly why you are applying for amnesty? MR MAYISELA The reason why I am applying for amnesty, the people who were part of the SDU where somehow connected with me. It also appears that I once transported them some point in time, and yet I was transporting them to a funeral. One other reason why I am ...(intervention) INTERPRETER The speaker is not quite audible. CHAIRPERSON Mr Mayisela, don't you just want to pull that microphone a bit closer to you? Pull it towards you, this thing. CHAIRPERSON EXPLAINS MICROPHONE TO APPLICANT CHAIRPERSON Okay. I think the interpreter had some difficulty in hearing you well so hopefully it will be better now. Will you just repeat what you had just said. MR MAYISELA I said the reason why I'm applying for amnesty is that the existence of SDU does implicate me. Why I say that, there were times, as people were dying continuously in our section, there were times that I would transport the comrades, the SDU members to go and monitor us in the cemetery or the graveyard to see how safe we will be and to sort of monitor those who were fully armed. And also go and check at Kweseni hostel. Since it was closer to the graveyard we would have to check to see that there was safety. Before the funeral procession could take off, headed to the graveyard, we would ensure that the route is clear. MR SIBEKO Please correct me if I'm wrong, you say you are applying for amnesty because firstly you were transporting SDU members to and from the cemetery in order to check whether there are police force members who were patrolling the area, so as to avoid a situation where your SDU members' firearms would be taken. Is that what you are saying? MR MAYISELA Yes, that's exactly what I'm saying. MR SIBEKO And you further say you also transported the SDU members to and from the cemetery in order to check whether the IFP members from the nearby hostel, that is Kweseni, were there to attack any of you who were involved in those burial ceremonies, is that what you are saying? MR MAYISELA Yes, that is what I am saying. MR SIBEKO Proceed. MR MAYISELA One other thing that I remember is that as it has already been heard from the previous applicants, it will so happen that they will come and request me to transport them maybe to Polla Park for example, and I would ask and find out what is it. I don't think I remember anything else but maybe with time I will remember. I have lost memory of so much that transpired. MR SIBEKO You were also involved in transporting bullets from Polla Park to Lusaka-A? MR MAYISELA Yes, I do agree that I was involved, but then carrying around firearms was so sensitive, you will not just do or administer that anyhow. You will be asked to carry some duty to do something ...(no English translation) MR SIBEKO Sir, what - if you can keep this short, what you're saying is even if you were not aware at the time that you were transporting bullets, you later discovered that what you were actually going to fetch from Polla Park to Lusaka-A were bullets and arms? MR MAYISELA Actually bullets. ADV GCABASHE Can we just get clarity. So it was just transporting people? Transporting people to go and collect things like bullets, it wasn't actually providing them with bullets? Because when I look at your application on page 158 of the application, 9.4, it talks of providing bullets to SDUs or is that a different matter, you also provided? Can you just clarify that? MR MAYISELA I would like to explain here. What happened is that I think I should explain how I got involved and then it will emerge as to how it came about that people are saying I brought ammunition. I was a shop steward for NUMSA and when the civics were set up, I indicated that I am involved in the struggle, I don't mind. And I don't know what was happening in the township where I resided, I was very sceptical about partaking. When this violence started we were a little mobilised. We knew that - seeing that we were going to the elections, there might be a conflict. So that we were the people who were taking the front seats at meetings. Whatever was discussed at the civic meetings would be referred to the elders in the community, who would then make a decision. Myself and Dan, the late Dan and some few others were involved in reporting to the community what transpired in the meetings that we had in the civic. That is why my name is implicated in the supply of ammunition. There is - one other person had an access to the people in Polla Park. Even though a decision was taken, they would come to me and request that I transport them and indicate what they wanted to do. That is why it emerges that I was supplying them. I was not directly involved in supplying them. MR SIBEKO And if ...(indistinct) you're saying is, what appears here in your form doesn't necessarily reflect what you actually did. That is, you were fetching, in fact you were transporting those bullets, that is together with whoever would come and ask you but not necessarily supplying bullets to the members of the SDU. Your duty was to transport? MR MAYISELA My duties were such that I had to be flexible if they requested me to do whatever. We were the ones who were promoting the civic. We had to be present, we could not leave our section because it was target number one. One other thing that I also was involved in was to recruit after Dan was killed. I had to recruit membership for the ANC for the election. That is why I got so involved. MR SIBEKO Sir, with ...(intervention) ADV SANDI Sorry, Mr Sibeko, can I just come in here? This is all very vague for me. Mr Mayisela, did you recruit people for SDUs? MR MAYISELA I am confused. The volume is disturbing me, I don't understand what the speaker was saying. PROBLEMS WITH MICROPHONES ADV SANDI Yes, let us start again. Did you, Mr Mayisela, recruit membership for SDUs? MR MAYISELA No, I was recruiting membership for the ANC, at work and elsewhere. ADV SANDI Did people come to you and suggest that you take them to a place where they could fetch ammunition? MR MAYISELA Yes. ADV SANDI Were you at any stage near a place where people were being attacked? MR MAYISELA Insofar as attacks were concerned I was not involved but we experienced a lot of problems at the cemetery because these comrades, the SDUs that is, used to shout slogans and a funeral would proceed and after that the Stability Unit would start shooting, starting with the teargas and the shootings would continue thereafter, and we would be burying another person before the following week, a person who had been present at the previous funeral. For example, on Vusi's funeral or in Vusi's funeral if I'm not mistaken, teargas canisters were fired, people were injured. These are incidents that I can refer to. ADV SANDI I will just make a request, Mr Mayisela, that you try and make your answers as short as you can. Did you take SDU members to places where they were going to attack IFP people? MR MAYISELA No, I don't remember anything to that effect. ADV SANDI Thank you. MR SIBEKO Thank you, Mr Chairman, I've got no further questions. CHAIRPERSON Any cross-examination? CROSS-EXAMINATION BY ADV STEENKAMP Mr Chairman, just one question. Sir, if you look at your application at page 160, I just want to ask you two questions. The first being, Mr Chairman, basically the second paragraph. "I was a member of the Committee of Seven of Lusaka, elected by the community." Is this correct, were you a member of the Committee of Seven? MR MAYISELA Yes, that is correct, but I was not doing what the committee was doing, I was mostly involved in the civic. Mr Tshabalala was the only person remaining in the civic, so he had to be assisted and therefore I had to work with them taking minutes at their meetings. ADV STEENKAMP Thank you, Mr Chairman. NO FURTHER QUESTIONS BY ADV STEENKAMP ADV SANDI At those meetings of the Committee of Seven, did any discussions take place pertaining to attacking members of the IFP? MR MAYISELA Yes. ADV SANDI So you were taking minutes, did you take part in the discussions or were you just taking minutes? MR MAYISELA I just want to correct this. In the Committee of Seven there were no minutes, the minutes that I'm talking about are minutes with reference to the civic which met every Wednesday. And on Sundays there would be this other meeting where minutes were not taken, we would just discuss. If there were people who were taking minutes they would just be doing it on their own. ADV SANDI What was supposed to be your role in those discussions, in the meetings of the Committee of Seven? MR MAYISELA Insofar as the Committee of Seven is concerned my role pertained to the fact that I had to make sure that the comrades - I had to monitor. Let me say, reporters would come. Every weekend we had to meet and we would report back as to what had transpired in the township during the course of the week, indicating each problem per street. And ourselves as the Committee of Seven were supposed to go back to the community and verify the information gathered so that we could come up with guidelines. Sometimes there would be minor conflicts between comrades, something very trivial, and we had to intervene and indicate or show them that the situation as it were was not as a result of ethnicity between the IFP or amaXhosa and amaZulu. Instead they had to be conscientised about having to be prepared for the votes that were forthcoming or the election that was forthcoming. ADV SANDI Thank you. Thank you, Chair. ADV GCABASHE Thank you, Chair. If you have a look at page 160 of your application, Mr Mayisela, the very last few lines you talk about having assisted SDUs attend flashpoints and you assisted when the SDU community members were injured, by taking them to hospital. Two points, flashpoints and hospital. Now I understood you say that you didn't take any SDUs to flashpoints, can you clarify that first one, flashpoints? MR MAYISELA The flashpoint issue was such that after every Sunday meeting we would go back home to relax, but I had a transport and therefore I had to be the one who would drive around and identify flashpoints where necessary. Insofar as taking the comrades to hospitals, I'm trying to think about that. I cannot remember, honestly speaking. ADV GCABASHE Tell us just a little more about identifying flashpoints, what do you mean by that? Just explain that to us. What would you do and who would you be travelling with? MR MAYISELA In most instances I would be alone. I would drive around moving from a direction that comes from Khatlehong towards the township, and I would proceed towards the Vereeniging circle. I didn't have to ask what was happening, I just had to look around and if people were walking around freely I would then conclude that things were still fine. That is how I operated. ADV GCABASHE Did you have a walkie-talkie that you then used to communicate any problem areas to the SDU commanders? MR MAYISELA No, I did not have a walkie-talkie. ADV GCABASHE If you came across a problem area, who would you communicate that to, the Committee of Seven or the commander, Mosa or what would you do? What was your duty? MR MAYISELA In these areas where there were commanders we no longer patrolled there. I used to communicate with comrade Dan and indicate to him that we have heard gunshots etc., and they would take the necessary steps. ADV GCABASHE Thank you, Mr Mayisela. Thank you, Chair. ADV SANDI Mr Mayisela, this is still very vague to me. It's not clear to me at all what role you played in all this but I'll try and ask you one or two questions, maybe it will help. Did you attend any meeting where it was decided that members of the IFP should be attacked? MR MAYISELA What I can still remember is that the meetings used to be at Kethegelo. The meeting used to be held often in public, so that decisions such as those had to be taken by commanders. But yes, we knew the IFP was our enemy. ADV SANDI In short, what is your answer? I'm not sure. Did you attend such meetings, did you not attend? Can you say that again very briefly, Mr Mayisela. MR MAYISELA May answer is that I don't remember being present when such a decision was taken. ADV SANDI Did you personally have any discussion with any person regarding attacking members of the IFP? Did you ever come across a situation where members of the IFP were attacking people? MR MAYISELA Yes. ADV SANDI Did you report that to members of the SDU, to come and attack those members of the IFP? MR MAYISELA No. That happened before. Some of the things happened before, before the SDUs had commanders. That is the attacks that I can still remember, that is the IFP attack. ADV SANDI Thank you. Thank you, Mr Chairman. CHAIRPERSON Re-examination? MR SIBEKO None, Mr Chairman, thank you. NO RE-EXAMINATION BY MR SIBEKO CHAIRPERSON Thank you. Mr Mayisela, you are excused. WITNESS EXCUSED