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people's war

Explanation
a popular national rebellion of both trained soldiers and ordinary civilians during the mid- to late 80s. The strategy, promoted by the ANC, involved integrating armed MK combatants with mass organisations inside South African townships, and rendering the townships ungovernable through attacks on the security forces and other representatives of the state.

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This is very important as a symbol, because symbols are very important in our lives. This is a very simple but meaningful and effective symbol in the sense that people have forgotten over the last two years what the Commission is about, the Commission is actually a people’s commission. Everybody ...
In November 1989 a man called Dirk Coetzee gave the first documented and detailed account of the South African Police death squad at Vlakplaas. He also told of his share in the murder of activist and lawyer, Griffiths Mxenge. One of his Vlakplaas colleagues, Almond Nofemela confirmed his ...
Early one morning, on the 4th of August 1983 Ciskei forces opened fire on commuters on their way to work, the reason being they had opted for trains and not use the government owned buses at the time. At the last human rights violations hearing in Mdansane, Eastern Cape the Commission heard how ...
Their pain and anger has been witnessed by the nation. But the viciousness of apartheid and its violence is not only the pain and suffering they caused to people they targeted as enemies. It was also the way that they did undermine what was most important about South African communities, African ...
The people were given coffee; there was a sleeping drug in it which was provided by Capt van Zyl or Lt Niewoudt. It was put in their coffee and given to them. Shortly thereafter they fell asleep and then the people were taken out of the garage one by one and they were eliminated. // Who did the ...
38 men and women died that night. Mandla Nangalembe insists the police were involved in the massacre, but his allegations have never been thoroughly been investigated and no one has been convicted for the slaughter.
Gentlemen what do you say to the proposition that your statement that you issued on the 16th of February 1989 is part of a STRATCOM operation? // All I can say, for me, that’s a ridiculous proposition. I’ve made the point here that arising out of the events in Soweto I was part of the drafting ...
We searched all over for Nokuthula and we never found Nokuthula, even at the border we went to inquire if she’s crossed and to no avail. Some in Swaziland said the ANC people sent her to the republic and we went to the ANC people and they denied any knowledge of Nokuthula. In 1985 we decided to ...
Mister Mitchell, are you now desirous of making amends? // Yes I am. Although it may be impossible to do it, but I am desirous of that. // You’ve become a Christian and understand the value of forgiveness. Will you let us have your thoughts on that? // Yes I understand that forgiveness does not ...
We were over 60 in number I don’t remember exactly however, we grouped into two. The others had to attack one of the homesteads nearby. // We started… we hit the door, there was a hew in the door and we used it to hack the door. The door opened and we shot at the people and we also stabbed them ...
Clive Derby-Lewis calls himself an English speaking Afrikaner. He says he bought the gun for the killing and gave the address. Today he is simply a murderer imprisoned for his crime, but once he moved in high political circles holding court in public and in the media. // Stop interrupting now Mr. ...
Du Plessis and Van Rensburg presented a plan to General Erasmus to have the two activists eliminated. // And what is the ultimate conclusion which the three of you reached? // Our final conclusion was that there was no other way, detention or any other thing than to eliminate this people. // And ...
With the birth of the Truth Commission last year a voice was finally given to the thousands of South Africans who’d been brutalized during the conflict of the apartheid years. For months people from every part of the country poured their hearts out before the TRC’s Human Rights Violations ...
... him from near and he fell down. What precisely happened there I can’t remember. At that stage I thought my life was in danger. // It’s a bit awkward but just give us the details. When you shot this man, what did you see, where did you shoot him? // I shot him on the side of his head; that is ...
... explained to them what the problem was that we were faced with. I can just mention that Mr. Niewoudt and Mr. Van Zyl at that stage were completely aware of the activities of Pebco. // Is it your evidence that these three people, the so-called Pebco Three, that they were extremely dangerous? // ...
Initially I felt a bit sorry for him, on the first day when I saw him because I thought that he had a lot on his shoulders. Ja, he went through a lot himself and he had a lot of things to speak about and he seemed such a lonely figure because there wasn’t anybody with him. He didn’t have any ...
There were the cynics of course, some called it the crying commission, but often they were white or old allies of apartheid and scared of the guilt that came with hearing the truth, but then there were those who became part of the telling and through that some sort of reconciliation. // ‘You have ...
I see my case as a political one. It is because of the meetings we were attending and the decisions taken there. Yes, I played a role because we were told that we should defend ourselves should we be attacked. // The instructions he gave you, as I understand them and as you wrote out in your ...
I want the truth from Mamasela, because he is the one that performed. They all say they had not instructed him, so he is the person who is to say what actually happened. I really want him to tell us the truth and that is the truth for us. Yes he must come and tell us, what they told us I didn’t ...
The Commission has documented volumes on the activities of white policemen who were hated and feared in the townships, but this week in Grahamstown it was the actions of the black municipal policemen known as kitskonstabels that came under the spotlight. // These municipal police, we know who they ...
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