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people's warExplanation The war in Tokoza started in 1990 but most of us were not yet involved in yet, we started taking heed of the violence in 1991. We then realized that people were dying where we stay. It was said that only Xhosa were being killed, but it was not the Xhosa only. People from our areas were also being ... It was a brutal and chaotic war that lasted for nearly five years and many of its battles were fought in and around the hostel compounds of the South African townships. Many people have told the Truth Commission about the terror associated with these fortresses and their inhabitants. ... section 29 to subpoena people but bring them to a public hearing. // You have worked well with the Attorneys-General in pushing people to come forward and apply for amnesty in the case of the police and you are also working with the Defence Force. You don’t get that idea, that there is a ... on SABC news that a group of about 30 black people clad in PAC T-shirts had attacked whites on the Durban beach front. Since we’d already declared war against the National Party and as a result of this attack I as cell leader felt that we should launch a counter attack to prove to the government ... ... limited to only 200. Only the reverend, we don’t want any freedom soldiers, no speeches. // Is it the police? // Yes, the police. It was like a war. There was a convoy with police and soldiers. ... I would like to express my unqualified regret towards any person and or organisation which was innocently disadvantaged or prejudiced by my actions. In the cruel struggle for survival it was often the case that there was no mercy shown and unacceptable things were done and mistakes made. I also ... ... in this country, because he’s talking peace. People wanted all the time the image of chief of staff to remain on him so that he must be a man of war, betrayed forever, but Chris died for peace. How shall we convince people about ... Here we found the war overnight or within a couple of months completely transformed. The protection was our responsibilities. We could not send our troops in uniform into the townships because if you send a man in uniform there they are immediately seen. So we had to find some other ways of ... ... in his evidence. He didn’t tell us about the train violence, the Boipatong massacre or his role in the Shell House killings. De Kock said his war never included women, children and innocent civilians. He did not talk about Jackie Quinn, a civilian with no links to any political parties, ... ... was almost inevitable. The word ‘amnesty’ is derived from the Greek word ‘amnesia’ which means to forget. Well, we cannot forget. A just war is understandable, but granting amnesty to people who killed indiscriminately will be condoning the actions of every single individual worldwide ... Shaun and John who fought this war were told they were protecting their country and their people against the threat of communism. The church and its chaplain said they were fighting for the Christian faith. The politicians said they were killing and dying on foreign soil because their country ... ... of about 20 policemen, people with counter insurgency training. // That’s correct. And I approached people who had fought in the Rhodesian bush war and perhaps also in Namibia and who had been in the task force; I didn’t go there with a group of administrative staff. I used people who had ... Shaun and John who fought this war were told they were protecting their country and their people against the threat of communism. The church and its chaplain said they were fighting for the Christian faith. The politicians said they were killing and dying on foreign soil because their country ... ... after the unbanning of the ANC, SACP, PAC and other organisations the AWB started flexing its military muscle and threatened the government with war if the ANC ever came to power. // ‘The intention of the ANC is to destroy my people, to destroy everything in sight. My message to the ANC ... I don”t want to be involved in a semantic level regarding the meaning of certain words in this document. I want to emphasise that words like ”eliminate” and ”take out” for the members on the ground, who were in a war situation, referred only to killing people. ... ‘Year of Great Storms.’ During the early nineties when most political players were sitting at the World Trade Centre negotiating their way towards change the Pan Africanist Congress was playing a different sort of game. While liberation armies like Umkhonto we Sizwe laid down arms, the PAC ... ... if one can learn from other countries, and certainly the Chilean Truth Commission, they took the position that the recommendations that went forward was that people should not hold public positions where they were involved in gross human rights violations. // Even if they were fighting a just ... 1990. Ezikhawini outside Empangeni, a war zone. // It was terrible. People were dying like flies. People were dying. It was terrible. We were just sleeping in the passages, not in our beds, not at all. There was the sound of bullets all over. From six o’clock you must close the gate, close the ... that many South Africans haven’t taken proper notice of, the tens of thousands of young white men who were forced by military conscription to wage war in neighbouring states and against their fellow citizens in the townships. Until then, good ... ... AK47, hand grenades, landmines, anti-personal mines, explosives, different explosives, TNT, plastic explosives? I’m mentioning now weapons of war, not police weapons. It was military training, that’s all I can say. If the Defence Force can say there was no secret, it was an open thing, no ... |