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people's warExplanation 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. one we need to learn a lot about in our country because the parallels are very dramatic. Some things do seem to make it worse, being in an unpopular war, an unpopular conflict is a problem. Our men had a problem even worse in some ways than Vietnam in that I’ve seen a number of people who talk ... 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 ... ... thousands of people in the street in a matter of minutes. They took seven hours in what could only be described as declaring a residential area a war zone. I am convinced that if the will was there Anton could have been gassed out, starved out if it took seven days. The impressions created by ... …because people wanted to make war, they’re fighting us. We were only SRC students, students speaking out, and now they were fighting us. So we had to retaliate. BMW was the Youth League of MK; we were the ones who did the fighting in Bonteheuwel. ... with. It was a very messy situation and we had to, as we saw it, apply messy legislation without any particular crusading zeal to fight a just war or anything like that. It was a very unfortunate situation we landed ourselves in. ... Some people lost their lives in the process; some were injured, some were jailed and some had to run for their lives out of the country. But the march drew the attention of the world and South Africa was never the same again. ‘On 2 December 1988, New Hanover police Captain Brian Mitchell ordered the elimination of a group of UDF members. The operation went wrong. Eleven people attending a night vigil were killed.’ // It was just I think the driving force behind it, behind the motives of the security establishment ... Early this morning Dirk Coetzee was fetched by the witness protection team to be taken to his amnesty hearing. He’s one of about a 100 people who have been protected since the Commission started. Another was Phumzile Priscilla Ntimbane. // As the Truth Commission have started in Tembisa I got a ... It’s a breakthrough. It’s a breakthrough in the sense that mentally, emotionally, things will be normalized now. It’s very great. Look, it worked inside us. People don’t see it. I’m happy to see these bones here; I have picked up the bones myself, I lend a hand there. So, we are taking ... Some crucial moments have passed. In the beginning of last year when you got to know the legislation you realized that it was unfairly weighed towards the perpetrators. No one did anything. You didn’t request to ask that the legislation be changed. After the first six weeks of hearings people ... Let’s move to Cape Town for the last evidence by the five policemen whose amnesty applications have served before the Truth Commission’s Amnesty Committee the last few weeks. Together, they killed at least 65 people in the name of the apartheid state. We’ll tell you about 21 of these murders ... I really need to know how you felt when you saw what you had done to human life. I really really need to know that, because can you remember their faces maybe? Can you remember how shocked they looked? Can you remember when they fell? Can you remember anything about that? // Mam, I don’t want it ... In May this year the many months of hearings and committee meetings finally took their toll. // I remember after the political party hearings, we worked in Cape Town for the whole week, sort of day and night almost. Sitting overnight looking at what people are saying. With each statement you’ll ... Pedro had a letter with the names of his contacts in Lesotho. Benzien wanted those names, badly. // I was given instructions to carry a letter which I should not open until such time as I’d cross the Lesotho border and then I would find out who these people were and where I was supposed to meet ... One of the concrete examples of the new plan Gen Joubert was talking about was the brutal murder of Dr Fabian Ribeiro and his wife Florence in their house in Mamelodi in 1986. Fingers were immediately pointed at the state, but the exact identity of the killers has remained largely a mystery. This ... I wish to comment on crimes committed by security forces. Up to 1994 when I was given the job by the then state president in the TEC, of going into the recommendations and findings of the Goldstone Commission, I never realized what was happening in this country in reality. I had a good idea, but ... have to come, but you have three days to decide. So here I am. I came and it started in a sense one of the most difficult but also one of the most rewarding experiences of my life. The most important part of the work of a Reparation and Rehabilitation Committee is to draft policy for reparation ... Falati also claimed that she was told where the bodies are of some of the other children who disappeared. // Is it correct that you accompanied John Morgan to a certain place where certain pointings out were made? // And he told me that there’s a plantation and there was this mineshaft and Lolo ... In 1968 with the launch of the Black Consciousness movement I ventured into newspaper’s news rooms. What did I find at the Rand Daily Mail? I found black people sitting in a corner designated for black journalists. Mayakiso, Mojapelo these people were put in a corner; they ate in a separate ... |
