The Pan Africanist Congre s s

C a t e g o r y G r a n t e d R e f u s e d

Violations in PAC camps 6 0 % 4 0 % Armed ro b b e r i e s 5 9 % 4 1 % Attacks on security forc e s 9 3 % 7 % Attacks on civilians 1 0 0 % 0 % Attacks on farmers 7 0 % 3 0 % S a b o t a g e 1 0 0 % 0 % Arms possession 1 0 0 % 0 %

PAC camps in exile

1. The Commission received evidence indicating that many gross violations of human rights occurred in the ranks of the PAC in exile, mainly in Ta n z a n i a . Despite this, only one application for amnesty was received. Amnesty was granted to Mr Mawethu Lubabalo Ntlabathi [AM5693/97] for assaults on Messrs Matsokoshe and Tebogo in a PAC camp in Tanzania in 1992 and 1993, with the a p p roval of its military attaché, Mr Bafana Yose.
2. The applicant told the Amnesty Committee that the assaults were a means of disciplining the two APLA cadres for their involvement in stealing APLA pro p e r t y, t h e reby undermining army discipline and the building of an effective army to attack and overthrow the government of South Africa.
3. The Amnesty Committee accepted that military forces have to maintain strict discipline in order to operate successfully and that offences associated with that objective fell within the definition of acts, omissions or offences associated with a political objective [AC/2000/247].

PAC ranks at home

1. The Amnesty Committee received four applications for the killing of three individuals suspected of collaborating with the security police.
2. PAC/APLA member, Mr Mduduzi Cyril Ngema [AM3681/96], was granted amnesty for the killing of Mr Christopher Nhlanhla Myeza on 1 October 1992. Ngema was instructed by a man called Thompson to kill Myeza, a fellow PA C and APLA member. Myeza had been seen in the company of police officer and had allegedly also been overheard promising a police officer that he would report on a PAC meeting. He was there f o re believed to be an informer. He was killed in a sugar cane plantation in Verulam outside Durban.
3. The Amnesty Committee accepted the evidence presented that the PAC, like other liberation movements, viewed individuals who worked as police informers as the enemy and thus as targets for elimination (killing). Mr Ngema was granted amnesty on the grounds that the act was committed with a political objective within a particular context and that he had made a full disclosure of all re l e v a n t facts [AC/1998/0116].
4. PAC/APLA member Shakespeare Buthelezi [AM1488/96], was granted amnesty for the robbery and attempted killing of Mr Basie Tladi at Twala Section, Katlehong, on 16 March 1993 [AC/1998/0051]. The incident occurred two weeks after an attack on the police in Katlehong in which a police off i c e r, Mr Fre d d y Mashamaite, had been killed. Buthelezi was implicated in the attack.
5. When Buthelezi heard that the police and Basie Tladi were looking for him, he decided to kill Tladi, whom he believed to be a police informer. Buthelezi testified that his decision to kill Tladi had been based on the ‘fifteen points of attention’ that constituted the APLA Code of Conduct. He made two attempts to kill Tladi at his house, both of which failed. In the second attempt, he shot Tladi as the latter left his house. When Tladi re t u rned with the police a short while later, t h e re was a shootout. Buthelezi was injured, arrested and eventually convicted of a number of off e n c e s .
6. H e re again, the Amnesty Committee accepted that the killing or attempted killing of an informer was an act associated with a political objective, taking into consideration the situation in the country at the time of the commission of the

o ffence. The Committee also accepted that Buthelezi was a member of a pub-licly-known political organisation and that his actions were undertaken on behalf of that organisation. The Committee also accepted that Buthelezi had acted within the scope of his authority or that he had a reasonable belief that he was acting within the scope of his org a n i s a t i o n ’s express or implied authority. F i n a l l y, the Committee accepted that Buthelezi had made full disclosure of events and had not acted out of malice or for personal gain.

Attack on Giovanni Francescato

30. Mr Giovanni Francescato, an elderly white male, was attacked at Fort Beaufort in the Eastern Cape on 6 September 1992 when three armed men burst into his

202 Armed robbery carried out by Pa t r i ck Thapelo Maseko [AM 5918/97] at the University of the Tr a n s kei (UNIT R A ) ,U m t a t a , on 18 February 1993.

V O L U M E 6 S E C T I O N 3 C H A P T E R 4 P A G E 3 8 0

home and assaulted him. Mr Francescato was forced to point out where he kept his firearms, his house was ransacked and he was then shot dead with a pistol.

1. PAC/APLA members Sipho Mabhuti Biko [AM 2916/96], Winile Veveza [AM 2918/96] and Mwamadoda Yengeni [AM 0334/96] applied for amnesty for the ro b b e r y. Because they had been acquitted by the court on the murd e r c h a rge, they did not seek amnesty for the killing.
2. The applicants told the Committee that they were carrying out the orders of their local commander, Mr Tamsanqa Duma. The attack was in line with APLA’s policy of attacking white homesteads to secure arms for the defence of PA C members. The arms seized were to be used in other APLA operations. Duma was not in direct communication with all the applicants but dealt only with Biko, who issued orders to Yengeni and Veveza.
3. Biko had identified the target before he applied to Duma for clearance, which he then obtained. He knew of the house because his mother, by then deceased, had previously worked as a domestic for Mr Francescato. He had also re c o n-n o i t red the house before the attack. Yengeni and Veveza knew of no plans to attack this particular house but knew generally that, in line with APLA policy, white homes were to be attacked to secure weapons. It was only when they w e re in front of the gate of Francescato’s house that Biko instructed them to b reak into the house and look for weapons. Biko admitted that it was he who had shot Francescato dead.
4. As the group re t reated from the scene, Biko searched his two accomplices to e n s u re that they had not removed anything else from the house against his instructions. He told the Committee:

As commander of that operation … I was supposed to search my sub-ordinates to ensure that they did not take anything like money. If the order was to take money and fire a rms, we are supposed to do exactly per order. We are not supposed to take anything. There f o re it was necessary to do that, to make sure that they did-n ’t take anything from the house. (Hearing at East London, 8 October 1998.)

1. After the attack, Biko handed the arms over to Duma. Duma confirmed to the Amnesty Committee that he received the arms that day and the money the following day. He also confirmed having given the order that Mr Francescato be robbed and killed to prevent him from identifying the applicants and testifying against them in
2. court. Asked why it was necessary to kill Mr Francescato after he had shown them w h e re the firearms were, Duma replied that it was the policy of APLA to attack and kill whites, who were seen at that time as ‘enemies of the African people’.
1. The Amnesty Committee took cognisance of the fact that Biko and Veveza had many previous convictions, mainly for housebreaking, theft of motor vehicles and robbery and, even though they were not seeking amnesty for any of these acts, they were both questioned at length about these. The Committee found their explanations ‘most unsatisfactory’ and described them as ‘a mixture of unmitigated lies and self-exoneration’. However, Duma and Mr Bulelani Xuma, former Deputy Director of Operations and Director of Special Operations in APLA, confirmed the versions relevant to their application in this matter.
2. The Amnesty Committee granted amnesty to Mr Sipho Biko, Mr Winile Veveza and Mr Mwamadoda Yengeni [AC/1999/0251], based on its conclusion that the operation was undertaken for political reasons and that the applicants had made the necessary disclosure.

Attack on a vegetable shop in Randfontein

1. On 16 April 1994, a three-person APLA unit attacked a vegetable shop at Station S t reet, Randfontein near Johannesburg. The object of the operation was to obtain funds for APLA, and the unit stole an amount of R3 000. While they were robbing the shop, they shot and killed the owner, Mr Joao Manuel Jard i m . Fleeing the scene afterwards, the attackers shot and injured a bystander, Mr David Oupa Motshaole, probably in an attempt to avoid identification.
2. Mr Jardim had been the victim of an earlier APLA armed ro b b e r y, at Elsburg Mine in Westonaria on 16 November 1990. In this earlier incident, three APLA operatives, led by Mr Thapelo Patrick Maseko [AM 5918/97], entered the store and removed a number of items, an unspecified sum of cash and a vehicle. When some of the people in the shop resisted, the unit opened fire, killing one person and injuring Mr Jardim. Mr Maseko was granted amnesty for this incident [AC/1998/0104].
3. The person who gave the order for the 1994 Randfontein attack and to whom the money was handed after the attack (described above) was the same Mr Maseko who had been involved in the earlier Westonaria attack.
4. Mr Maseko testified that he had given the instruction notwithstanding the fact that the first democratic elections were due to take place within a matter of days. He told the Amnesty Committee that the PAC had not yet suspended the armed struggle. On the contrary, he said, the President of the PAC had stated publicly that the PAC would not ‘abandon the bullet until the ballot is secure d ’ . He added that certain right-wing movements were still actively pursuing a policy of violence with the intention of disrupting the elections. He also confirmed that it was policy to raise funds for APLA by ‘repossessing’ money and other valuables from white people, and that no distinction was made between hard and soft targets in this re s p e c t .
5. PAC/APLA members Nkopane Diaho-Monaheng [AM3828/96] and Mangalisekile Bhani [AM5708/97] were granted amnesty for the 1994 robbery and killing in Randfontein on the basis that they had made full disclosure of the relevant facts and had acted within the ambit of PAC and APLA policy at that time [AC/1998/0119; AC/2000/065].

Attack on a PEP Store at Botshabelo

43. On 17 February 1992, a three-person APLA unit robbed a Pep Store in Botshabelo near Bloemfontein. Although one of the attackers was armed, no violence was used in the actual ro b b e r y. After the operation, the armed APLA member became involved in a shoot-out with the police in which two police

o fficers and the APLA operative died.

1. The Amnesty Committee agreed that the shoot-out should not affect the application, which related only to the ro b b e r y, for which the applicants, Mr Moshiuwa Isaiah Khotle [AM5619/97] and Mr Lerato Abel Khotle [AM3443/96], had been gaoled.
2. A significant feature of this case is the fact that the trial court had accepted the political motivation for the incident presented by the accused. This was one of very few cases that came before the Amnesty Committee where applicants had raised a political argument as part of their defence in the course of an earlier criminal trial. This was re g a rded as significant by the Amnesty Committee, which noted that:

[T ] h e re appears to be no doubt whatsoever that the act was committed during the course of the political struggle of the past, that the objective was to assist

the political organisation of which they were members, that there was no motive of private gain on their part. The money was to be used by the unit, it was to be held by the unit commander. [AC/1998/0046.]

46. A c c o rd i n g l y, Khotle and Khotle were granted amnesty [AC/1998/0046] for their role in the attack

Attack on the Sentra Hyperserve supermarket at We s s e l s b r o n

1. Five people were killed and four were wounded in an armed attack on the Sentra Hyperserve supermarket in Wesselsbron in the Orange Free State on 3 July 1993. Cash and cheques to the approximate value of R9 000 were stolen. The deceased victims were Messrs Michael Andries Sparkhams, George Christiaan F rederick Kleynhans, Herbert Jacobus van Niekerk and Johannes Arn o l d u s L o u rens, and Ms Maria Fatima de Castro. Three people were severely injured in the attack. They were Mr Joao Avelono de Castro, Ms Susana Catharina Vi l j o e n and Mr Hendrik Vi l j o e n .
2. Six members of the PAC, Mr Mangalisekele Bhani [AM5708/97], Mr Silimela Qukubona Ngesi [AM020/97], Mr Lerato Abel Khotle [AM5619/97], Mr Stanley Michael Tshoane [AM5901/97], Mr Moalusi Morrison [AM5953/97] and Mr Georg e Thabang Mazete [AM6630/97] were granted amnesty [AC/2000/250] for the attack. All the applicants were either APLA members or members of a PAC task forc e .
3. Mr Bhani, who commanded the attack, told the Amnesty Committee that he had received instructions from the APLA Director of Operations, Mr Letlapha Mphahlele, to go to Welkom where he would be received and deployed by the Orange Free State regional commander Lerato Abel Khotle. Khotle took Bhani to We s s e l s b ron where he was instructed to ‘identify a target’ for a robbery for the purposes of raising funds for APLA.
4. The We s s e l s b ron Supermarket was selected because the owner was thought to be a member of the Afrikaner Weerstandsbeweging (AWB), and members of the AWB and members of the South African Police (SAP) were amongst those who normally did their shopping there. Khotle secured approval for the target fro m the Director of Operations. At the hearing, Mr Bhani was asked how the shoppers w e re identified as members of the AWB. He re p l i e d :

I t ’s easy, because of their khaki uniform and their big hats like the cowboy hats

and they were armed. Some were armed with two fire a rms. So it was quite easy to identify them. (Hearing at Bloemfontein, 17 August 1988.)

1. Mr Bhani led the attack into the shop and ord e red the customers present to raise their hands. He then told the other two operatives to shoot them. Mrs de C a s t ro, one of the owners, was then ord e red to open the tills. She opened the t h ree tills and the money was taken. She was then shot dead. The operatives then opened fire on the other customers. None of the victims had resisted the attack. They all obeyed the instruction to raise their arms in surrender but were executed extrajudicially.
2. The survivors of the attack opposed the applications on the grounds that nei ther the robbery nor the shooting was associated with a political objective.
3. Mr Pedro Ignatius de Castro lost his wife, Ms Maria Fatima de Castro, in the attack. He told the Committee that he believed the attackers had come to ro b him. He denied any AWB links and denied that he even supported any political p a r t y.
4. Despite various contradictions and inconsistencies in the evidence of the applicants, the Committee accepted that the incident occurred during the period re f e r red to as the ‘Year of the Great Storm’ and that such conduct was indeed party policy at that time. The applicants were granted amnesty.

R o b b e ry at UNITRA

1. Mr Patrick Thapelo Maseko [AM5918/97] and eight others carried out a robbery at the University of Transkei (UNITRA) in Umtata on 18 February 1993. At the time of the ro b b e r y, the university was busy with the registration of students. University staff members were counting money when the operatives entered the auditorium.
2. The assault group opened fire on the people in the hall, killing a security guard, Mr Mason Mlindeli Mankumba, and injuring two police officers, Mr Wilberforc e Sandla Mkhizwayo and Mr Elliot Michael Pama.
1. Maseko, who was standing outside the hall to prevent any interference with the operation, told the Amnesty Committee that, although he did not see what
2. happened, the commanders of the other two groups told him that the police had started the shooting. He testified that APLA had a standing rule that, if a targ e t d rew a firearm, operatives were to open fire immediately and not wait to be killed.
3. An amount of R500 000 was seized in the attack. Significantly, this huge amount – by far the largest acquired in Mr Maseko’s ‘repossession’ activities – was not delivered to Botswana. Instead, Mr Maseko alleged that he gave it to a Mr Mandla Lenin. However, he produced no evidence to support this assertion, nor were details given as to how the money was used.
4. Despite the fact that UNITRA was a historically-black institution, Mr Maseko explained that it was targeted as ‘an enemy institution because it was oppre s s i n g the African people’. He was granted amnesty for the operation [AC/2000/106].

The ‘Lichtenburg Battle’

1. In July 1988, Mr Louis Nkululeko Dlova [AM6596/97] injured a member of the SAP with a hand grenade in what became known as the ‘Lichtenburg Battle’ in the We s t e rn Transvaal.
2. Mr Dlova told the Committee that he and other APLA cadres had entered South Africa from Botswana under the command of the late Mr Sipho Mahlangu with a view to seeking, identifying and attacking ‘the enemy’. On their way to J o h a n n e s b u rg in a minibus taxi, they were confronted by the police. Dlova and Mahlangu threw hand grenades at the police. Dlova managed to escape in the ensuing confusion, but his commander and two other comrades died. The Committee was of the view that Dlova had acted with a political objective, and he was granted amnesty [AC/1999/0187].
3. All other applications for attacks on members of the security forces pertain to operations carried out in the early 1990s. They took the form of ambushes of police vehicles in Brakpan [AC/2001/067], Heilbron [AC/1999/002], Cro s s ro a d s [AC/1998/0103], Khayelitsha [AC/1998/0103], Pimville [AC/1998/0053] and Diepkloof [AC/1998/0050]; assaults on police stations in Batho [AC/1997/0064], Dimbaza [AC/1999/0333], Lady Grey [AC/2001/057] and Yeoville [AC/1998/0050]), and an attack on what was assumed to be a police contingent at the Khayelitsha railway station [AC/1998/0103], which turned out to be a group of private security guard s . The Committee granted amnesty to all applicants in each case.

Ambush on a police vehicle at Diepkloof

1. On 28 May 1993, APLA member Phila Martin Dolo [AM3485/96] commanded an APLA unit that attacked a police vehicle in Diepkloof near Johannesburg. One police off i c e r, Constable Jacob Hlomela Mabaso, was killed and Serg e a n t E d w a rd Nelushi was injured.
2. At the time of his application, Dolo was serving a life sentence on several con victions including murd e r, attempted murder and possession of arms, ammunitions and explosives relating to the attack.
3. Dolo testified before the Committee that the attack was in retaliation for an act of aggression on the part of the security forces who had ‘launched a national swoop on the offices of PAC’ and arrested various members, including those in national leadership positions. In his affidavit he noted that: ‘this act was seen as being provocative and a declaration of hostilities against the PAC … which action had to be responded to’.
1. Dolo testified that he had received an instruction from the Director of Special Operations, Mr Sipho Bulelani Xuma (code-named ‘Polite’), to launch operations
2. against the SAP in his area. He testified that he had been an APLA re g i o n a l commander with several units under his command and that he had been deployed in the Gauteng area (then Transvaal) in early 1993.
4. The ambush of a police vehicle was planned with Messrs Peter Muchindu, G o d f rey Mathebula, Musa (who later turned out to be an informer) and a fifth person. The group used a home-made bomb laced with nails and other explosives.
5. The Committee found that Dolo’s actions were all within the ambit of the policies of APLA and PAC and that they were associated with a political objective. He was accordingly granted amnesty [AC/1998/0050].

Yeoville police station attack

71. Mr Dolo [AM3485/96] was also granted amnesty for an attack he ord e red on the Yeoville police station on 30 May 1993, two days after the Diepkloof attack. Dolo gave Muchindu and Mathebula explosives and instructed them to carry out the attack. They travelled to Yeoville with fellow unit member Musa, but w e re intercepted by the police before they could reach their target. SAP member Ian Alexander was injured in an exchange of fire. Muchindu and Mathebula w e re arrested, convicted for the possession of explosives and sentenced to ten years’ imprisonment each. Dolo said he learnt later that Musa had tipped off the police about the intended attack.

Khayelitsha railway station attack

1. In the early hours of 5 December 1992, four APLA operatives, including Mr Andile Shiceka [AM5939/97] and Mr Walter Falibango Thanda [AM5784/97], attacked the Khayelitsha railway station, killing Mr Jan Mbambo and injuring Messrs Cosmos Bhekumuzi, Jackson Mjakiya, Sandisile Ntshica and Sihlanu Mtamzeli, all black employees of the Springbok Security company.
2. The APLA operatives had believed that police officers would be present at the station and that there would be no civilians on the scene at that hour. When the attack began, security company personnel ran into a small room to take cover. The operatives continued firing at them through the closed door.
1. Shiceka had received orders from an APLA commander codenamed ‘Power’ (aka Mzala or Mandla) ‘to carry out operations to attack members of then racist
2. South African Police, the South African Defence Force and other white people’. He was told that the purpose was ‘to take the war to white areas and to steal by force weapons from the police and members of the Defence Forc e ’ .
3. Despite the fact that this was a botched operation in that the victims turned out to be neither whites nor members of the police, Shiceka and Thanda were both granted amnesty [AC/1998/0103] for their roles in the attack. The Amnesty Committee accepted that the attack was politically motivated and consistent with the political objectives of the PAC and APLA.

The story of Andile Shiceka

1. B o rn in Guguletu in Cape Town in 1969, Andile Shiceka joined the PAC and went into exile in 1989. He underwent military training in Tanzania and Uganda and re t u rned to South Africa as an APLA combatant in 1992. He was then deployed to Cape Town by APLA commander ‘Power’ and given instructions to launch attacks on members of the security forces and white people congre g a t e d in ‘white’ areas. The Claremont restaurant attack (see below) was one such a t t a c k .
2. In addition to the Khayelitsha railway station attack, Shiceka was granted amnesty for attacks on the Claremont Steaks Restaurant in Cape Town and the Crazy Beat Disco in Newcastle in Natal. For this latter action, he had been c h a rged, convicted and sentenced to 25 years’ imprisonment in May 1994. With respect to the Khayelitsha railway station shooting, Shiceka had been charg e d with one count of murder and five counts of attempted murd e r. However, the matter never came to trial.

Attacks on the Cape Flats

1. To w a rds the end of 1992, three APLA operatives opened fire on a police vehicle travelling on Zola Budd Road in Khayelitsha near Cape Town, injuring one of its occupants. Mr Gcinikhaya Christopher Makoma [AM0164/96] and Mr Wa l t e r Falibango Thanda [AM5784/97] were granted amnesty [AC/1998/0103] for the a t t a c k .
1. On 8 September 1992, Mr Walter Thanda and two other operatives opened fire on a police officer (Mr Patrick Tutu) and a Spoornet employee (Mr Peter Dyani) who were on foot in the Cro s s roads area of Cape Town. Both were killed.
2. B e f o re the operatives could search their victims for firearms, the lights of an oncoming vehicle shone in their direction, causing them to re t reat hastily. Thanda only learnt that the victims had died when he re t u rned to the scene the following d a y. He told the Amnesty Committee that he had reported the attack to ‘Power’ the following day and ‘Power’ had said he would claim it as an APLA operation.
2. On 12 January 1993, Thanda, Shiceka and others opened fire on a police vehicle travelling along NY108 in Guguletu, killing one passenger, a Constable Mkwanazi, and injuring the driver, Sergeant Johannes Meyer. Thanda was a r rested and charged, but the case was eventually dropped for lack of evidence.

The story of Walter Falibango Thanda

81. B o rn at Molteno in the Eastern Cape on 29 November 1960, Thanda became a member of the PAC Youth League and APLA in 1990. He told the hearing on the Crazy Beat Disco attack that he was motivated to join APLA because of the conditions under which African people were living.

Nobody dragged me to join APLA. I saw how our brothers were killed by white people together with the police and the soldiers, defending the apartheid system. So there f o re nobody pushed me behind to go and join APLA, I personally joined APLA. (Hearing at Pietermaritzburg, 10 October 1998.)

1. Thanda came to Cape Town on the instruction of his commander, ‘Mandla’ (aka P o w e r, Mzala or Jones). He was instructed to start an APLA base in Cape To w n and launched a task force unit in 1991, the purpose of which was to pro v i d e military training to members and involve them in APLA operations there a f t e r.
2. Thanda applied for amnesty for the three above-mentioned attacks on members of the SAP and for the 1994 attack on the Crazy Beat Disco in Newcastle in Natal (see below). In the latter case, he was convicted and sentenced on 26 May 1994 to 25 years’ imprisonment. He was granted amnesty for all incidents [AC/1998/0103 and AC/1998/0016].
3. Thanda is currently serving with the South African National Defence Force (SANDF).

The story of Gcinikhaya Makoma

1. B o rn in Cape Town on 20 January 1976, Gcinikhaya Christopher Makoma was sixteen years-old at the time of his involvement in the Khayelitsha police vehicle
2. ambush and the St James’ Church attack in 1993 (see below). He was granted amnesty in both cases.
1. In December 1992, Mr Walter Thanda invited Makoma to a meeting with ‘Africans who were introduced to him as PAC members’. Without giving details, Thanda informed the meeting that they were going to carry out an operation. He distributed two AK47 rifles and two R4 rifles to members of the unit and

o rd e red them to inspect them to ensure that they were functioning pro p e r l y. Thanda then instructed those present to follow him, which they did. Makoma told the Amnesty Committee that, ‘because he (Thanda) was on the command s t r u c t u res of the PAC and a member of APLA, and I was his underling, it was not open to me to question his command.’ (Hearing at Cape Town, July 1997.)

87. In the attack on a police vehicle on Zola Budd Road, Khayelitsha, Makoma was

o rd e red to stand at one end of the road and to give a warning signal to the others when the police van appro a c h e d .

88. Makoma testified to the Amnesty Committee that the instruction he received and carried out in respect of the St James’ Church attack (see below) was to steal a motor vehicle for use in an undisclosed operation. On the way to St James’ Church, Makoma was handed an R4 rifle and a hand grenade and

o rd e red to accompany his commander, Mr Sichumiso Lester Nonxuba, into the c h u rch and to fire indiscriminately at the congregation. Makoma used his full R4 magazine of about thirty-one rounds of ammunition to shoot at the congre g ation. He testified that he had been trained not to question orders but to obey them at all times, and that the slogan ‘one settler, one bullet’ meant that ‘any white person in South Africa was re g a rded as a settler and if we came acro s s any settler during our operation, they had to be killed or injured’.

The King Wi l l i a m ’s Town Golf Club attack

94. APLA operatives armed with hand grenades and automatic rifles attacked the King William’s Town Golf Club on the night of 28 November 1992. At the time, the club was hosting an end-of-year dinner function. Four people – Mr Ian MacDonald and Ms Rhoda MacDonald, Ms Gillian Davies and Mr David Davies

– were killed in the attack and seventeen others were injure d .^{2 0 3}

95. Four PAC/APLA members, Mr Thembelani Thandekile Xundu [AM3840/96], Mr Malusi Morrison [AM5953/97], Mr Thobela Mlambisa [AM7596/97] and Mr Lungisa Ntintili [AM6539/97], were all granted amnesty for their roles in the attack. Mr Xundu, who is now serving in the SANDF, testified before the Amnesty Committee that Mr Letlapa Mphahlele had sanctioned the operation. The weapons used in the attack were supplied by the Regional Commander based in Umtata, the late Mr Sichumiso Nonxuba. Morrison was instructed to deliver them to Xundu, which he did. The club was targeted because it was believed that security forc e personnel would attend a function on the night planned for the attack.

203 Volume Tw o, Chapter Sev e n , p. 6 8 8 ; Volume Th r e e, Chapter Tw o, p. 1 4 6 , and Volume Fi v e, Chapter Fo u r, p.

1 3 6 .

96. At about 21h50 on the night of the attack, Xundu and Nonxuba entered the dining hall of the club and threw hand grenades and opened fire with R4 and R5 assault rifles. Two other operatives, who had been posted outside the building, t h rew petrol bombs and opened fire on the building. Mlambisa, the driver, was armed with a 9mm pistol.

9 7 . The group split up the following day. A few days later, Xundu, Ntintili and another operative disposed of the stolen Jetta used in the attack along the Butterworth to Grahamstown road. The vehicle was pushed off the road and was found, b u rnt out, some time later.

98. The Amnesty Committee granted amnesty to the four operatives, accepting that the aim of attacks of this nature had been to impress on whites the need to abandon their support for the government of the day, and to make it clear that they would continue to be targets of such attacks unless there was political change in the country. Furthermore, the Committee was satisfied that the applicants had acted under the orders of Commander Mphahlele and that the act was committed in the course of the conflicts of the past.

Attack on the Steaks Restaurant in Claremont

1. An APLA unit opened fire on the Steaks Restaurant in Claremont, Cape Town, on 26 December 1992, injuring five people. Mr Malcolm Vi s s e r, the owner of the restaurant, was the only victim to be seriously wounded.
2. Amnesty applicant Mr Andile Shiceka [AM 5939/97] told the Committee that he and four others had stolen a Datsun bakkie and driven to the restaurant that night. After surveying the scene and deciding there would be few obstacles to an attack, he and an operative codenamed ‘Scorpion’ stood at the door of the restaurant and opened fire for about four to five seconds. They then ran back to the bakkie^{2 0 4} and drove to the home of one of the operatives in Khayelitsha w h e re they abandoned the vehicle. They heard the attack reported on the radio news the following morning. Shiceka testified that he then telephoned ‘Power’ to report the operation and said that ‘Power’ told him that he would claim it as an APLA attack under the code name ‘Bambata’.
3. Ms Amanda Wa rn e r, one of the victims and a waitress at the restaurant at the time of the attack, opposed the application in an affidavit. She stated that, since the attack, she had suff e red severe emotional trauma to the extent that she was no longer able to work as a waitress or even enjoy a meal at a re s t a u-rant for fear of being attacked. She also stated that she was unable to live alone for fear of being attacked and that she feared that her attackers would hunt her down and kill her. For all these reasons, she had decided to take up residence in the United Kingdom.
4. At the conclusion of the evidence Advocate Wa rn e r, appearing for Amanda Wa rn e r, addressed the Amnesty Committee. He conceded that the evidence disclosed that the offences committed by the applicants were associated with a political objective and were committed in the course of the conflicts of the past. He conceded too that the applicants held no personal malice or grudge against the victims of the attack and that they were engaged in the liberation of the African people from white oppre s s i o n .
5. Mr Andile Shiceka was granted amnesty for the attack [AM5939/97 and A C / 1 9 9 8 / 0 1 0 3 ] .

204 A light open truck .

Attack on Yellowwoods Hotel, Fort Beaufort

1. APLA members Nkopani Diaho-Monaheng [AM3828/96], Lungisa Mziwonke Ntintili [AM6539/97] and Vuyisile Brian Madasi [AM6077/97] were granted amnesty [AC/2000/225] for an attack on the Yellowwoods Hotel at Fort Beaufort in the Eastern Cape on 20 March 1993, in which Mr John Jerling was shot and died instantly.^{2 0 5}
2. Mr Madasi, who acted as commander of the operation, told the Amnesty Committee that he had received instructions from a member of the APLA High Command, the late Mr Sichumiso Nonxuba, to go to Fort Beaufort to carry out an attack at the Yellowwoods Hotel, which had been identified as a place fre q u e n t ed by members of the SADF, particularly on weekend evenings.
3. The following Friday, Madasi, one 'Nceba' (who was to drive the getaway vehicle for the attack and was not part of this amnesty application) and Diaho-Monaheng hijacked a red Langley vehicle from an unknown driver in Mdantsane.

205 Volume Tw o, Chapter Sev e n , p. 6 8 9 .

They drove to Alice where they collected weapons. (Ntintili confirmed to the Committee that he had supplied the other applicants with the arms in terms of

o rders from APLA.) They then drove to Fort Beaufort but found the hotel closed. They re t u rned to Mxhelo Village where they left the weapons and abandoned the hijacked vehicle near Alice.

1. A week later, on 20 March, they hijacked a Nissan Sentra vehicle belonging to Mr Kenneth Mashalaba. Promising not to damage the vehicle, the applicants released Mr Mashalaba and his passenger, Ms Vi rginia Khatshwa, between Alice and Fort Beaufort.
2. On their arrival at the hotel, Nceba parked the car and he and Madasi positioned themselves at the front door to prevent anybody from escaping. Diaho-Monaheng positioned himself at the window.
3. The applicants then opened fire on the patrons who were drinking and playing darts in the bar. The shooting lasted for about three minutes, after which the applicants re t reated. The following day they left for Transkei where Madasi reported to ‘ Power’ and Letlapa Mphahlele, members of the APLA High Command.
4. As it turned out, the hotel was not frequented by SADF members as the applicants had believed. The patrons were youthful civilians with no ties to the security forces. All except Mr Jerling escaped serious injury. At the hearing, the mother of the deceased, Ms Anna Jerling, testified that her son had no intere s t in politics and was still a student. He was eighteen and had friends across the racial spectrum. When he was killed, the family received condolences and messages of support from members of the local ANC Youth League.
5. Amnesty was granted as the Amnesty Committee was satisfied that the applicants were acting on the instructions of the PAC and APLA and that their actions were in line with the policies and activities of these organisations.

Attack on St James’ Church, Kenilworth

1. Eleven people were killed and fifty-eight wounded when APLA operatives opened fire with automatic rifles and threw hand grenades at worshippers in St James’ Church, Kenilworth in Cape Town, at approximately 019h30 on 25 July 1 9 9 3 .^{2 0 6}
2. Those killed were Mr Guy Javens [CT00620/SOU], Ms Denise Gordon [CT01124/SOU], Ms Marita Ackerman [CT02922/SOU], Mr Richard O’Kill [CT03029/SOU], Ms Myrtle Smith [CT03029/SOU], Mr Gerhard Harker, Mr Wesley Harker, Mr Oleg Karamjin, Mr Andrey Kayl, Mr Valuev Pavel and Mr Valentin Varaska. The last four were Russian sailors.
3. PAC/APLA members Mr Gcinikhaya Makoma [AM0164/96], Mr Bassie Mzukisi Mkhumbuzi [AM6140/97] and Mr Tobela Mlambisi [AM7596/97] applied for amnesty for the attack [AC/1998/018]. Mr Letlapa Mphahlele, who initially applied for amnesty for the same incident, failed to appear at the hearing. On the second day of the hearing, the Amnesty Committee heard via the press that his failure to appear at the hearing was in protest against the Commission’s lack of objectivity. Mr Mphahlele’s application was accordingly set aside.
4. At the hearing on 9 July 1997, Mr Mkhumbuzi testified that his unit leader, the late Mr Sichumiso Nonxuba, had selected the target because ‘whites were using churches to oppress blacks’ and whites ‘took our country using churc h e s and bibles. We know and we have read from books that they are the ones who have taken the land from us’. The applicants testified before the Amnesty Committee that killing white people would ‘put pre s s u re on the white government to re t u rn the land to the African people’.
5. The Amnesty Committee heard testimony that Makoma and Mlambisi stole a vehicle on Nonxuba’s orders on 25 July 1993. The applicants testified that they had no prior knowledge of the operation until they actually arrived at the c h u rch. Although the target was not disclosed, the unit pre p a red for the attack during the week before it took place. Mkhumbuzi was instructed to travel to the Transkei to pro c u re weapons and ammunition from members of the APLA High Command. He was given two R4 rifles, 365 rounds of R4 ammunition, thre e M26 hand grenades and R200. He took these in a bag to a house in Khayelitsha and reported this to Nonxuba. The day before the attack he was ord e red to p re p a re four petrol bombs for use in an operation that was to take place the following day. This he duly did.
6. At 18h00 the attackers convened at a taxi rank and drove to the church. Nonxuba still did not reveal any details about the target but simply told the others that Mkhumbuzi would be ‘security’, Mlambisa the driver, and that Nonxuba and Makoma would enter the target building. Makoma testified as follows:

206 Volume Tw o, Chapter Sev e n , p. 6 8 6 , and Volume Th r e e, Chapter Fi v e, p. 5 0 5 .

When we entered the church, Nonxuba led the way and as we entered we were in a passage which led to the main doors. People were walking up and down the passage. We left off the passage for a few seconds and then Nonxuba said we will enter through the main doors. Nonxuba then told me to throw the hand-g renade and to shoot to kill. Nonxuba led the way and we then burst through the doors of the church. Nonxuba first threw his hand grenade (he was on my left hand side) and then I threw mine. As the hand grenades exploded, we took cover behind the doors, re - e n t e red and, while the people inside were scre a m i n g , we started to shoot. We shot indiscriminately and I finished my full R4 magazine, some thirty-one rounds of ammunition. We had also heard a shot outside and a car screeching. We went back into the passage to re-load for our later protection. Inside the church one of the churchgoers had also fired at us… (Cape Town hearing, 9 July 1997.

118. When they came out of the building, Mkhumbuzi was supposed to throw the p e t rol bombs into the church. He did not do so because

I heard a grenade and gunshots and then saw a red car stopping in front of us, a p p a rently to block us. I got out of the car and threw a petrol bomb at the car and Mlambisa got out and shot at the car causing the car to speed away. Then Nonxuba and Makoma came out of the church, jumped into the car and we immediately sped away. (Cape Town hearing, 9 July 1997.)

1. After the attack, Mlambisi drove the operatives to a house in Ottery where he left Nonxuba and Makoma. He and Mkhumbusi then drove to a nearby scrap-y a rd, left the car there and re t u rned to the house on foot. Later that night, they saw a CNN television report about what had happened in the churc h .
2. Makoma was arrested on 5 August 1993. He was charged and convicted on eleven charges of murder and fifty-eight charges of attempted murder and sentenced to 237 years’ imprisonment. The trial court found that a palm print on the interior surface of the left rear window of the stolen car linked Makoma to the crime. Bloodstains on the print were of the same blood group as Makoma’s . DNA tests showed a very high degree of probability that the blood found in the Datsun was his.
3. Mlambisi re t u rned to the Transkei when he heard of Makoma’s arrest. He himself was arrested at Tempe, Bloemfontein, on 25 January 1996. Mkhumbuzi, who had also re t u rned to the Transkei, was arrested in February 1996 while alre a d y in custody in connection with a charge of armed ro b b e r y.

1. 1 2 2 . Mr Dawie Ackerman, whose wife was killed in the attack, opposed their amnesty applications. There was also opposition from Mr Lorenzo Smith and Mr Dimitri Makogon, who had lost an arm and both legs in the attack. Both Messrs Ackerman and Smith argued that the applicants had not fully disclosed the n a t u re of the facts of their participation in the attack and, further, that the
2. o ffences were disproportionate to the political objectives of the PA C .
1. 1 2 3 . They also contended that, because APLA’s Director of Information denied at the time that the attack was an APLA operation, it could not have accorded with the political objectives of the PAC. Furthermore, they pointed out that Mr Barn e y Desai of the PAC had accused the so-called ‘third force’ of mischievously connecting the attack with the PA C ’s military wing in order to derail negotiations which were then underway and in which the PAC was a participant.

124. The Amnesty Committee considered these arguments but concluded that many political parties or liberation movements could have decided to deny involvement in this incident because they might have considered it strategically and politically wise and expedient to do so, and that accordingly the statements distancing the organisation from the attack needed to be viewed within the political context that prevailed at the time.

In our view what is of cardinal importance is the fact that both the PAC and APLA have acknowledged in their submissions to the TRC in 1996 and 1997 respectively that the St James attack was one of the authorised operations carried out by APLA. [AC/1998/0018.]

1 2 5 . The victims also disputed the legitimacy of APLA’s claim that it had directed the attack against a white congregation in a white suburb of Cape Town. Accord i n g to Mr Ackerman, the congregation was about ‘35 to 40 per cent people of colour and the others so-called whites’ on the night of the attack. However, counsel for the applicants argued that the operatives had assumed that all the c h u rchgoers would be white because St James was in a white group area, but that they had obviously been wrong in their assumption. Mr Arendse, for the applicants, went on to say:

We will also submit that the acts were performed in the execution of an APLA High Command order; that having regard to the political context at the time, that the offences were directly proportionate to the political objectives sought to be achieved by APLA and lastly, Mr Chairman, that the offences were not committ e d for personal gain and were not done out of personal malice, ill-will or spite against any of the deceased or the victims concerned. (Cape Town hearing, 9 July 1997.)

126. Survivors of the attack gave vivid accounts of the sequence of events in the c h u rch that evening. They also described the effects of the attack on them as individuals, on their families and on their subsequent ability to function eff e ctively in their work environments and communities. The Amnesty Committee h e a rd of the extreme psychological and emotional consequences of the attack on individuals and on the congregation. Yet all the victims spoke of their ability, deriving from their strong Christian convictions, to forgive the attackers and to move on with their lives. Mr Dawie Ackerman told the Committee:

I went on record after the event to say that I hold no personal grudge: that I do

not hate them and I stand by that. I also held out reconciliation to them, and I

believe with all my heart because I’ve experienced reconciliation with God,

through Jesus Christ, that it is available to every b o d y, including to them. And I

held that out to them at the time and I still do so now. … It was a release to me

to go there and to be where she was killed. And as the time unfolded, and the

Truth Commission started up and I heard the testimonies of my fellow Black

South Africans, who had been subjected to the treatment that they had. And

p a rents and mothers, brothers asked, telling where is my son, where is my

f a t h e r, and we know now that some of them were buried in a farm somewhere in

the Free State, some were thrown in rivers in the Eastern Cape – because I

know the value of going back to the place where it happened, I appeal to the

agents of the government, whoever they might be, to come forward and to iden

tify what they had done, where they did it, at least give them also the opportuni

ty to grieve where it happened. (Cape Town hearing, 9 July 1997.)

127. Mr Ackerman requested that the Committee allow him to address the applicants d i rectly at the hearing:

May I ask the applicants to turn around and to face me? This is the first opportunity we’ve had to look each other in the eye and talk. I want to ask Mr Makoma who actually entered the church – my wife was sitting right at the door when we came in, where you came in, she was wearing a long, blue coat; can you remember if you shot her? MR MAKOMA: I do remember that I fired some shots, but I couldn’t identify, I d o n ’t know whom did I shoot or not, but my gun pointed at the people.

MR ACKERMAN: It is important for me to know if it is possible, as much as it is important for your people who suffered, to know who killed. I don’t know why it is so important for me, but it just is. If you don’t re m e m b e r, I will accept that. I have heard you through your attorney say and into the microphone, apologise and I have also heard your leadership extend an invitation to my church leadership which is still re q u i red, I think, to be considered, that they want to come to our church to offer condolences and they said that they would bring you along, whether or not you receive amnesty in a show of reconciliation. I would like to hear from each one of you, as you look me in the face, that you are sorry for what you have done, that you re g ret it and that you want to be personally re conciled. You can speak in your own language directly to me; you don’t have to w o r ry about the microphone. MR MAKOMA: We are sorry for what we have done. It was the situation in South Africa. Although people died during that struggle, we didn’t do that out of our own will. It is the situation that we were living under. We are asking from you, please do forgive us. All that we did, we can see the results today. MR MLAMBISA: I am also asking for an apology. As we were working under orders, we didn’t know that this will come to such a place. We wanted to be w h e re we are today. We were working under the orders. As the TRC is alive t o d a y, we hope that this will come to an end. I hope that you do forgive me, because I ask for forgiveness. Thank you. MR MKHUMBUZI: I also want to say I do apologise to those people who were in the church at that time, while there was that shooting. We also thought that we would meet with the church members, those who were there. Even if we can also go to the church to show that we want reconciliation with them under the circumstances that we were, I also say please forgive me to everybody who is White and Black, who are in this new South Africa. Thank you. MR ACKERMAN: I want you to know that I forgive you unconditionally. I do that because I am a Christian and I can forgive you for the hurt that you have caused me, but I cannot forgive you the sin that you have done. Only God can forgive you for that … (Cape Town hearing, 9 July 1997.)

128. The Amnesty Committee accepted that the applicants were APLA members. It found no evidence to suggest that Nonxuba did not command the operation; nor that the applicants had themselves selected St James’ Church as a targ e t . It accepted that the applicants had carried out the operation on orders fro m their commanders. The Committee was satisfied that the applicants had complied with all the re q u i rements of section 20(1) of the Promotion of National Unity and Reconciliation Act, Act 34 of 1995, (the Act), and amnesty was a c c o rdingly granted [AC/1998/0024].

Attack on Riverside Lodge, Ladybrand

1. On 16 September 1993, a unit of four APLA operatives threw hand grenades and Molotov cocktails at the Riverside Lodge, outside Ladybrand in the Orange Fre e State, near South Africa’s border with Lesotho. Nobody was injured in the attack.
2. APLA member Nkopane Diaho-Monaheng [AM3828/96] applied for amnesty for the attack. He testified before the Amnesty Committee that, as a regional comm a n d e r, he was under orders from the Deputy Director of Operations of APLA to ‘drive white people from the land because it did not belong to them’.
3. In line with this policy, Diaho-Monaheng identified two farms in Fouriesburg and the Riverside Lodge outside Ladybrand for attack. The Lodge was also chosen as a target because it was believed that it was frequented by members of the security forces on border duty. The applicant also had information that the AW B was having a meeting there. In the event, the meeting APLA believed was going to take place had either finished or did not take place at all.
4. Satisfied that full disclosure had been made and that the applicant had acted within the dictates of PAC and APLA policy at the time, the Amnesty Committee granted Mr Nkopane Diaho-Monaheng amnesty [AC/2001/0102] for the attack.

Heidelberg Tavern attack

1. T h ree women were killed and six people injured when two APLA operatives opened fire on patrons in the Heidelberg Ta v e rn in Observatory in Cape To w n on 31 December 1993. Another person was killed and one injured when the attackers fired on two people outside a neighbouring restaurant as they were making their escape.^{2 0 7}
2. The three people killed in the tavern were Ms Rolande Palm [CT00415], Ms Lindy-Anne Fourie [CT02703] and Ms Bernadette Langford [CT00415]. Mr Jose ‘Joe’ Cerqueira was also shot dead and Mr Benjamin Broude was shot and i n j u red when they ran out of a neighbouring restaurant into the stre e t .
3. APLA members Luyanda Gqomfa [AM0949/96], Zola Mabala [AM5931/97] and Vuyisile Madasi [AM6077/97] applied for amnesty for the attack. They had been found guilty in December 1993 on four counts of murder and five counts of attempted m u rder and sentenced to terms of imprisonment ranging from 24 to 27 years.
4. The applicants argued that they had acted on instructions from the APLA High Command in executing the killings at the Heidelberg Ta v e rn. Gqomfa testified b e f o re the Committee that he had received an order to launch the attack fro m Mr Sichumiso Nonxuba and Mr Letlapa Mphahlele on the grounds that the t a v e rn was frequented by members of the security forces.
5. At the amnesty hearing, Mr Bulelani Sipho Xuma also claimed to have been amongst those who gave the ord e r. He gave evidence before the Committee as f o l l o w s :

207 Volume Th r e e, Chapter Fi v e, p. 5 0 7 .

On behalf of the High Command of APLA, in my capacity as the member or members of High Command of APLA, the Deputy Director of Operation and Head of Special Operations, I have nothing to hide, affirm unashamedly with pride that Brian Vuyisile Madasi who happened to be Unit Commander, H u m p h rey Luyanda Gqomfa and Zola Mabala, in an order group attended by myself and the late comrade Sumiso Nonxuba, were given clear and loud orders to conduct attacks in Cape Town. Suffice to say that the Heidelberg Ta v e rn was attacked as a result of orders given by me in my capacity as APLA’s Head of Special Operations. According to intelligence reports prior to the attack, we l e a rnt that the Heidelberg Ta v e rn was a regular relax-in for South African police members. (Cape Town hearing, 28 October 1997.)

1. Gqomfa testified that Nonxuba brought Madasi and Mabala to his house on 13 November 1993. He said that he was the only person to be told what the targ e t s w e re and that he notified the other members of the unit only on the morning of the attack.
2. The Amnesty Committee described the attack on the Ta v e rn as particularly brutal.

It appears from the evidence and the other information available to us that the t a v e rn was a place largely used by students and other young people, and that those who made use of its facilities were not only members of the white comm u n i t y, that is the people frequently re f e r red to as ‘settlers’ by APLA members. Of the three young ladies killed, only one was White; the other was Coloure d and the third was an Indian. It is quite clear that they intended to kill as many people as possible. The evidence was that nails had been glued onto one of the g renades to increase the lethal effect of the explosion. After their arrival at the t a v e rn, shots were fired into the tavern using automatic weapons, and a rifle g renade was fired which did not explode. [AC/1998/026.]

140. In an interview with members of the Amnesty Committee, APLA’s Director of Operations Mr Letlapa Mphahlele said he accepted responsibility for the attack on the tavern. The fact that APLA took overall responsibility for operations was confirmed in its submission to the Commission:

It should, there f o re, not surprise anyone that targets like the St James Church, King Williams Town Golf Club, Heidelberg Ta v e rn etc. were selected. The leadership of the APLA takes full responsibility for all these operations. The APLA forces who carried out these operations followed the directives from their commanders and those directives were from the highest echelons of the military leadership. We do not there f o re re g ret that such operations took place and t h e re is there f o re nothing to apologise for.

141. Gqomfa said he did not carry out the operation for personal gain. The aim of the attack was to take back from whites land that had been taken from the African people through violent means. This would be achieved because the g o v e rnment would sit up and take notice of African people’s demands in the light of ongoing attacks on white people. He said he was aware that the PA C was involved in the negotiations process at the time; but was also aware that the PAC had resolved at its December 1993 Congress to intensify the armed struggle through APLA. He said that he did not see any contradiction in the PA C (as a political party) negotiating while its armed wing, APLA, was engaged in furthering the armed struggle. He testified under cro s s - e x a m i n a t i o n :

As APLA soldiers, we are members of PAC, which is the mother body. The political direction which was taken by the country, did not affect me. As soldiers we had to fight the war. Our political leadership did not say that we must stop fighting it; we could not stop fighting then. As soldiers, if an order had not come that we must stop fighting, we could not have stopped. PAC had not reached that decision at that time, that we must stop fighting. We were following orders a c c o r d i n g l y. (Hearing at Cape Town, 27 October 1997.)

142. Gqomfa conceded at the hearing that, during their political and military training, APLA soldiers were never briefed on the codes of guerrilla warfare or intern a t i o n a l humanitarian law insofar as they related to the killing of civilians. Indeed, former APLA member Brigadier Fischla told the Committee that:

The fact of the matter is that we did not consider any international humanitarian l a w. At no stage did we in our camps educate our forces about intern a t i o n a l humanitarian law. The first time I understood what international humanitarian law is, is when I integrated into the South African National Defence Force and that is when I got the meaning of what international humanitarian law is. And what I d i s c o v e red also when I integrated into the SANDF is that equally the form e r SADF did not even know what international humanitarian law was. (Cape To w n hearing, 27 October 1997.)

143. Gqomfa testified that it made no diff e rence if a given order involved killing soldiers, police or civilians. He said that APLA drew no distinction between so-called ‘soft’ and ‘hard’ targets. Asked if, as a commander, he had any discre t i o n to break off an attack once it was realised that the targets could not advance a political objective, Gqomfa testified that he was expected to comply with any

o rd e r. He was not expected to change orders or to defy them.

1. Relatives of the deceased and survivors of the attack expressed their opposit i o n to the applications for amnesty for reasons similar to those expressed by the victims of the St James’ Church attack. Many chose to address the applicants d i rectly at the hearing.
2. Mr Quentin Cornelius was severely injured in the attack, as a result of which he lost his right kidney and up to 60 per cent of his intestines. Today he is a paraplegic and in constant need of both physiotherapy and psychotherapy. He asked the applicants:

The question is – and I am looking at each one, every single one of you now, di rectly across this table – I want to know from each one of you and your leaders, to explain to us why this was done, if there was any logical reason for what you have done, to launch a senseless terrorist attack on a pub with young, cheerful, innocent students at a time in South Africa’s history when we were already on the road to democracy after you had all accepted and taken part in the accepting of an interim constitution on the 3rd of December? Is there any reason, sensible reason, why you had to still continue with something like that? Could you not think for yourself? (Cape Town hearing, 27 October 1997.)

146. Gqomfa replied that he thought that Cornelius had been indoctrinated in a way that led him to refer to them as ‘terrorists’. They were not terrorists but fre e d o m fighters. Gqomfa added:

[I]t is the person who is in a position of oppression that feels the oppression. He refers to this as having been senseless: it is because he did not feel the pain that we were under. If he was in my shoes, he would not speak the way he is speaking n o w. … We had to continue the war until the political leadership, our political leadership, PAC, gave a command that we must stop fighting. Our political leaders h i p had not given the command that we must stop fighting. I think that should be clear, this is why we acted the way we did. We were not subordinated to the ANC or the National Party; we were subordinated to the PAC. This is how I propose to answer the question. (Cape Town hearing, 27 October 1997.)

147. The mother of one of the deceased victims, Mrs Langford, wanted to know if the applicants could remember how they felt about attacking appare n t l y unarmed young people who appeared to be enjoying themselves:

I’m going to ask you another question Mr Madasi. I need to know, I really need

to know how you felt when you saw what you had done to human life. I re a l l y,

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, when that happened; because I ask you

this for the simple reason because, when you got away, you showed much more

feeling for the vehicle – that the vehicle shouldn’t be damaged – yet you’d just

come away from showing no feeling towards life. I need to know how can one go

from one kind of a feeling to another in the same instance, the same happening.

I need to know how you can cope with that: how did you feel and how do you

feel now? (Cape Town hearing, 28 October 1997.)

1. Madasi said that, while he knew that nobody had the right to take another’s life, the conditions under which people were living at the time were such that many members of the oppressed had shed their blood. Oppressed people felt the pain of losing a loved one equally.
2. Mrs Clarissa January, the mother of Mr Michael January, who survived the attack, asked why the applicants appeared to show no remorse whatsoever – which would have given the victims some sort of comfort.

You have only spoken of the orders and the killings that you have done. I understand a great deal of your suffering – we have also suffered; but I think it’s about time that you must face us and ask us directly for forgiveness. That’s all I want to say to you or ask you – if there is an answer. (Cape Town hearing, 28 October 1997.)

150. Mr Madasi re p l i e d :

I greet you Madam. I’m glad for this opportunity to meet you and the people that l o s t so much from this matter. The fact of what you’re saying – that we’re not showing remorse or empathy – we are human beings, we are also sons to our fathers given birth to by our mothers. I know that a person survives in this world or makes it because of the support of other people. You perhaps look at me and think that I’m not showing remorse. However, our families know us well – I know that people who ...[indistinct] closely with us in connection with this matter. They would tell you how much remorse we are experiencing. If we did not, we would not be h e re even at this moment. This would show that we do not care about you, you can feel however you feel. To show and to demonstrate that, as the people we a re, we feel remorse, we are here to ask for forgiveness. I know that forgiveness is not a small matter, no matter how small the offence. However, if somebody’s asking for forgiveness, forgiveness is forgiveness – you must know that if the person is asking you for forgiveness they mean it. If we did not want to show remorse, we would not be here. I don’t know whether we’ve answered – I’ve a n s w e red the question. (Hearing at Cape Town, 28 October 1997.)

151. Mr Roland Lewis Palm lost his twenty-two year old daughter, Ms Rolande Lucielle Palm, in the attack. He told the applicants that the irony of his daughter’s death was that she was not a white person:

I say to the PAC and APLA and to the applicants, you killed the wrong person. Rolande was also joined in the struggle against the injustice for the apartheid system particularly in education. You simply ended her life as if she was a worthless piece of rubbish. You say you did so to liberate Azania. I say you did so for your own selfish and criminal purposes. You prevented Rolande from helping rebuild our broken nation which, if you had simply waited another few months, in fact came to pass when we had free elections.

Your commander Brigadier Nene stated that it was difficult to control the forces on the ground due to lack of proper communication and proper political training. These are simply empty excuses that in fact expose APLA for what it was: an unguided missile, out of the control of the PAC, at loggerheads with each other and unable to accept the political decisions of their political masters.

If proper planning and surveillance had been done, APLA would have discovere d the following: (1) the tavern catered for a multiracial clientele; (2) the pre d o m i n a n t patrons were young students from the UCT; (3) the Tavern did not cater exclusively for military personnel, nor could be described by any intelligent person as a m i l i t a ry target where arms could be obtained; (4) its resident musician was Josh Sithole, a black man who was loved and respected throughout the country by multiracial audiences countrywide and who was entertaining the patrons at the time of the attack; (5) a better ‘military target’ which fulfilled their criteria was the Woodstock Police station a short distance away.

APLA, as well as the applicants, cannot be truthful when they state that by murdering patrons at the Heidelberg Ta v e rn was a bona fide act associated with a political objective. (Cape Town hearing, 31 October 1997.)

1. Mr Francisco Cerqueira, brother of the deceased re s t a u r a t e u r, Mr José Cerq u e i r a, a p p e a red before the Committee to register his opposition to the amnesty applications on the grounds that he believed the applicants had falsely implicated his brother when they testified that he had opened fire on the getaway vehicle outside his restaurant.
2. The Amnesty Committee viewed the two incidents as part and parcel of the same attack. There was some doubt as to whether Mr Cequeira had fired shots at the attackers as no traces of powder were subsequently found on his hand. The Committee accepted, however, that the applicants were under the impre ssion that they were being attacked when they shot in his dire c t i o n .
3. The Committee also heard argument from and evidence led by counsel for Commissioner Dumisa Ntsebeza, head of the Truth and Reconciliation C o m m i s s i o n ’s Investigation Unit. Mr Ntsebeza was implicated in the attack when a Mr Bern a rd Sibaya claimed that the Commissioner’s car had been used by APLA members. Sibaya later confessed that he had been blackmailed by the police into naming Ntsebeza.^{2 0 8}
4. The Amnesty Committee concluded that the three applicants in this matter had complied with the re q u i rements of the Act and demonstrated that they were

208 Volume Th r e e, Chapter Fi v e, p. 5 0 8 .

quite clearly acting on behalf of APLA, which was engaged in political struggle against the state at that time. The Committee found that the applicants had not acted for personal gain or out of personal malice, ill will or spite dire c t e d against the deceased and the victims. They had no knowledge of the victims and had merely been sent by their organisation to act on its behalf.

156. Mr Luyanda Gqomfa, Mr Zola Mabala and Mr Vuyisile Madasi were granted amnesty for the Heidelberg Ta v e rn attack [AC/1998/026].

The Crazy Beat Disco attack

1. Ms Gerbrecht van Wyk was shot dead and at least two other people were i n j u red when APLA operatives fired shots through an iron grid at the entrance to the Crazy Beat Disco club in Newcastle, Natal, on 14 February 1994.
2. APLA members Walter Falibango Thanda [AM5784/97] and Andile Shiceka [AM5939/97], and PAC member Bongani Golden Malevu [AM0293/97] applied for amnesty for the attack. All three had been convicted on 26 May 1994 on c h a rges arising from their roles in the attack. Thanda and Shiceka had been sentenced to 25 years and Malevu to ten years; both were serving prison terms at the time of their amnesty hearing.
3. In their evidence to the Amnesty Committee, the applicants testified that they had been sent by their commanders in the Transkei to Newcastle to ‘identify areas where whites gather’. They said they targeted the disco because it was frequented by white patrons. They had initially targeted a restaurant in the area. However, when they arrived at the restaurant on the night of the attack, they saw a number of black people in the vicinity and decided to attack the discotheque instead.
4. Thanda was the commander of the small unit that planned and carried out the attack. He testified that he reported to his commander ‘Power’ from time to time in order to keep him up to date with the developments. Asked why he did not question the ord e r, he responded, ‘it was not for one to do so; if one had any question to ask, it would only be after the execution of instructions’.
1. In May or June 1993, Mr Malevu received information from a member of the High Command in Transkei that APLA would be taking its struggle to Natal. He was given arms to transport to the Newcastle area. He also helped transport
2. the other applicants to a point where a vehicle was forcibly taken from its owner for use in the attack. Like his comrades, Malevu testified that white people were t a rgeted because they were re g a rded as political oppressors. If they attacked white people, the government would take them seriously; white people were the ones who could persuade the government to change.
5. The Amnesty Committee challenged the applicants on the issue of whether race was a factor in the selection of the targ e t :

ADV PRIOR: I must put to you the question … that the reason for not attacking

the restaurant and attacking the disco instead seemed to be a decision which

smacked at racism. You were n ’t pre p a red to injure anyone other than white

people. Could you comment on that? Was that part of your motivation in

attacking the discotheque?

MR SHICEKA: Mr Chairman, APLA is not a racist organisation. I think you are

a w a re that whites were oppressing us; that was the race that was oppre s s i n g

us. We didn’t attack white people because we hated white people; we don’t

hate white people. Even the documents of the PAC clearly state that those who

a re accepting a democratic goal in Africa should be recognised as Africans. We

d i d n ’t attack the Crazy Disco because we are racist. Right from the foundation

of the organisation we are not a racist organisation. However, the situation in

which we had to live created a conflict between a white person and a black per

son: it’s not that we are racist. (Pietermaritzburg hearing, 9–11 February 1998.)

1. In his defence, Mr Shiceka argued that, although he re g retted the attack, he did not re g a rd the operation as a success, as only one person was killed. He said that whites were the only oppressors and that this is why they were targ e t e d . For this reason, he denied that his action smacked of racism.
2. In argument, counsel for the applicants off e red three reasons why the Committee should not find that the attack had been a purely racist act:

MR ARENDSE: F i r s t l y, the applicants, on the uncontested evidence were foot soldiers carrying out orders; that is not disputed. They were not part of the APLA hierarchy or High Command which, it is well established, made the policy decisions and decided on matters of strategy. For the same reason that Brian Mitchell or Coetzee or any other ex-South African Defence Force soldier wasn’t part of the inner ...[indistinct] of Botha’s cabinet making decisions to pursue cross-border raids, etc.

S e c o n d l y, the struggle for liberation in this country inevitably had to have a racial dimension and the reason for that is quite simple and very glaring; and we d o n ’t need evidence for that because the applicants lived through it. Black people in this country lived through it who were born here. They were g o v e rned by whites; they were controlled by whites;, they were suppressed by whites, and the overwhelming majority of the white electorate voted in the same g o v e rnment repeatedly by, in fact, increased majorities as we moved towards the April 1994 election.

So that was an inevitable part of the history of this country. Now it’s very important that our Parliament, a democratic elected Parliament, recognised this by making the cut-off date the 10th of May 1997. It recognised, the law makers recognised, that we were engaged in a racial struggle up to that point. And the 14th of February falls within that cut-off date.

Then just thirdly, again on a parity of – because this is what this Committee must do, this is what the Commission as a whole must do is to be even-handed and to treat people in the same fashion. The apartheid government targeted overwhelmingly black people. Coetzee was told to get rid of Griffiths Mxenge and he did so very effectively. Griffiths Mxenge was a well-known human rights activist but he was a black civilian. Brian Mitchell committed the Trust Feeds murder where he killed innocent black young men, woman and children; he s l a u g h t e red them. Those were civilians and both of them got amnesty. (Hearing at Pietermaritzburg, 9–11 February 1998.)

1. The applicants expressed their remorse at the hearing and their desire to meet the family of the victim and ask for their forgiveness. They said that they wished to explain to the family that the act was carried out on instructions and that, as soldiers, they had no option but to obey them. The victim’s mother declined to attend the proceedings, preferring instead to leave the decision in the hands of the Amnesty Committee.
1. The Amnesty Committee deliberated about whether or not this was an APLA operation. It noted that two of the applicants did not live in Natal and that they had not known one another at all until they met for the purpose of carrying out the operation. This gave credence to their story that they were brought together by their military commander ‘Power’, who was known to all of them. The victims of the attack were also not known to them and they derived no personal benefit from the attack. In considering why strangers should come together and trust each other in order to plan such an operation, the Committee reached the inescapable
2. conclusion that the operation must have been ord e red and co-ordinated by APLA. The Amnesty Committee also noted that, at a meeting in Umtata before the incident (the meeting at which Malevu was given the weapons used), the PAC had passed a resolution not to suspend the armed struggle. Despite this, it accepted that APLA was autonomous in military matters.
2. Mr Walter Falibango Thanda, Mr Bongani Golden Malevu and Mr Andile Shiceka [AM5939/97] were granted amnesty for the attack [AC/1998/0016].

The killing of Amy Biehl

168. In April 1994, PASO members Mongezi Christopher Manqina [AM0669/96], Vusumzi Samuel Ntamo [AM4734/97] and Mzikhona Easy Nofemela [AM5282/97] were convicted of killing American Fulbright scholar Amy Elizabeth Biehl in Guguletu, Cape Town, on 25 August 1993. They were each sentenced to 18 years’ imprisonment. Subsequently, in June 1995, Mr Ntobeko Ambro s e Peni [AM5188/97] was also convicted of the offence and sentenced to 18 years’ i m p r i s o n m e n t .^{2 0 9}

1 6 9 . The four applied for amnesty. The Amnesty Committee heard that, on the aftern o o n of her death, Amy Biehl was giving three colleagues a lift in her car with a view to dropping some of them off in Guguletu, when her vehicle came under attack by people running towards it and throwing stones. The stones smashed the w i n d s c reen and windows of the car. One of the stones hit Ms Biehl on her head, causing her to bleed pro f u s e l y. She could not continue driving and climbed out of her car and ran towards a garage across the road. Her attackers did not relent, but pursued her, still throwing stones. Manqina tripped her, causing her to fall. By now she was surrounded by between seven and ten people who stoned and stabbed her. She died as a result of her injuries.

1. The Amnesty Committee heard that the four applicants were amongst those involved in the attack. Peni admitted to having thrown stones at Ms Biehl fro m about three to four metres away. Manqina stabbed her with a knife and thre w stones at her. Nofemela threw stones at her and stabbed her three or four times. Ntamo threw many stones at her head from a distance of only a metre a w a y. They stopped attacking her only when the police arrived at the scene.
2. The attack on the car driven by Amy Biehl was one of many incidents in the a rea that afternoon. Bands of t o y i - t o y i n g^{2 1 0} youths had been throwing stones at delivery vehicles and cars driven by white people. A delivery vehicle had been pushed over and set alight. Only the arrival of the police prevented further damage.
3. The applicants explained their behaviour in the following way. They testified that earlier that day they had attended a meeting at the Langa High School, where a PASO unit had been re-launched. Peni had been elected chairperson at the meeting. Manqina was vice-chairperson of the PASO unit at the Gugulethu C o m p rehensive School and Nofemela was a PASO organiser at the Joe Slovo High School. The meeting was addressed by Mr Simpiwe Mfengu, the Regional S e c retary of PASO; Mr Wanda Madubula, the Regional Chairperson of PA S O , and many other speakers. The applicants told the Committee that speakers dealt with various issues: the strike by teachers in the We s t e rn Cape who were demanding recognition for the South African Democratic Teachers Union (SADTU); the struggles of APLA for the re t u rn of the land to the African people, and the fact that APLA had declared 1993 as the ‘Year of the Great Storm’. R e f e rence was also made to the launching of ‘Operation Barcelona’, aimed at stopping all deliveries into the townships.
4. The speakers urged PASO members to take an active part in the struggle of APLA by assisting APLA operators on the ground to make the country u n g o v e rnable. The speeches were militant and punctuated by frequent chanting of the slogan ‘one settler, one bullet’.
5. The applicants testified that they were so inspired by the speakers that they left the meeting in a militant mood. They marched through the township toyi-toying and chanting slogans, determined to put into effect what they had been urged to do. This, they testified, is how they became involved in the killing of Amy Biehl.
6. Referring to this incident in its testimony to the Amnesty Committee, the PAC s t a t e d :

209 Volume Th r e e, Chapter Fi v e, p. 5 0 9 .

On the Amy Biehl issue, we wish to state that PASO was not a part of APLA. They are a component part of the PAC not involved in armed struggle. This act

o c c u r red in the context of a strike for recognition by South African Democratic Teachers Union (SADTU) in the We s t e rn Cape. To support the strike, ‘Operation Barcelona’ was launched to stop deliveries from towns into the townships.

210 The toyi-toyi is a revolutionary dance.

Although the PAC was not involved, PASO acted in solidarity with their teachers and with COSAS. They wrongly targeted and killed Amy Biehl. We expre s s e d our re g ret and condolences to Amy Biehl’s family in a letter to the United States A m b a s s a d o r. We restate this position yet again through the TRC. But misguided as the deed was, we support the amnesty applications of all those convicted and sentenced for the offence.

1. The applicants testified that, although they did not act on the orders or instructions of APLA or the PAC that day, they believed they owed loyalty to the same cause. Nofemela and Peni had attended lectures by APLA operators on political matters and had received elementary lessons on the handling of arms and ammunition. As members of PASO, they were active supporters of the PA C and subscribed to its political philosophy and policies. By stoning company delivery vehicles and making it difficult for them to make deliveries in the townships, they were taking part in a political disturbance and contributing toward s making their area ungovernable. Thus their activities were aimed at supporting the liberation struggle against the state.
2. The Amnesty Committee carefully considered why it was that Ms Amy Biehl, a private civilian, was killed during this disturbance. It concluded that part of the answer could be found in the fact that her attackers were so aroused and incited that they lost control of themselves and became caught up in a frenzy of violence. While giving his evidence, one of the applicants said that they all subscribed to the slogan ‘one settler, one bullet’. This meant that they believed that every white person was an enemy of the black people, and saw Amy Biehl as a re p re s e n t a t i v e of the white community. They believed that by killing civilian whites, APLA was sending a serious political message to the government of the day. By intensifying their activities, they believed that they would eventually increase political pre s s u re on the government to such an extent that it would be compelled to hand over political power to the majority of the people of South Africa.
3. Viewing the conduct of the applicants in this light, the Amnesty Committee accepted that the crime committed by Amy Biehl’s killers was related to a political objective. The Committee accepted that the applicants had made full d i s c l o s u re of all the relevant facts as re q u i red by section 20(1) of the Act. Amnesty was there f o re granted to the four applicants.
4. The Amy Biehl incident provided the Commission with an extraordinary example of reconciliation. Members of the Biehl family who attended the hearing did not oppose the application.
5. The applicants expressed re g ret for their actions. In his application for amnesty, Peni said:

I feel sorry and very downhearted especially today, realising the contribution Amy Biehl played in the struggle ... I took part in killing someone that we could have used to achieve our own aims. Amy was one of the people who could have, in an international sense, worked for our country so that the world knows w h a t ’s going on in South Africa, so that the government of the day would get support. I ask Amy’s parents, Amy’s friends and relatives, I ask them to forgive me. (Hearing at Cape Town, 8 July 1997.)

181. At the conclusion of the evidence, Mr Peter Biehl addressed the Amnesty Committee. A part of his statement follows:

We have the highest respect for your Truth and Reconciliation Commission and process. We recognise that, if this process had not been a pre-negotiated condition, your democratic free elections could not possibly have occurred. There f o re, and believing as Amy did in the absolute importance of those democratic elections occurring, we unabashedly support the process which we recognise to be u n p recedented in contemporary human history.

At the same time we say to you, it’s your process, not ours. We cannot, there-

f o re, oppose amnesty if it is granted on the merits. In the truest sense it is for the

community of South Africa to forgive its own and this has its basis in traditions

of ubuntu and other principles of human dignity. Amnesty is not clearly for Linda

and Peter Biehl to grant.

You face a challenging and extraordinarily difficult decision. How do you value a

committed life? What value do you place on Amy and her legacy in South Africa?

How do you exercise responsibility to the community in granting forgiveness, in

the granting of amnesty? How are we preparing prisoners, such as these young men

before us, to re-enter the community as a benefit to the community, acknowledging

that the vast majority of South Africa’s prisoners are under 30 years of age –

acknowledging as we do that there ’s massive unemployment in the marginalised

community; acknowledging that the recidivism rate is roughly 95 per cent? So how

do we, as friends, link arms and do something? There are clear needs for prisoner

rehabilitation in our country as well as here. There are clear needs for literacy

training and education, and there are clear needs for the development of targeted

job skill training. We, as the Amy Biehl Foundation, are willing to do our part as

catalysts for social progress. All anyone need do is ask.

A re you, the community of South Africa, pre p a red to do your part? (Cape To w n hearing, 9 July 1997.)

Attack on a Translux bus, Beaufort We s t

1. APLA member Mr Thembinkosi Henge [AM6137/97] applied for amnesty for an armed attack on a Translux bus at or near the Gamka River Bridge in Beaufort West on 27 August 1993. Eight people were injured in the attack.
2. Mr Henge testified that he received orders from his commander, the late Mr Sichumiso Nonxuba, to attack a Translux bus that passed through Beaufort West on its way to Johannesburg. Two buses apparently travelled that ro u t e , and the applicant had to decide which of them to attack. He eventually chose the midnight bus as it entailed a lower probability of detection and off e red a better opportunity for re t re a t .
3. The applicant was ord e red to collect firearms and ammunition from the Ngangelizwe location in Umtata. He collected two R4 rifles and five loaded magazines and re t u rned to Beaufort West. After approximately two weeks, he was informed that a certain ‘Mandla’ (an alias) would be sent from Umtata to assist in the operation. When Mandla arrived, Henge showed him the layout of the area and briefed him about the plan for the attack.
4. The next day, 27 August 1993, Mandla and Henge fired a magazine at the bus. In total, approximately fifty shots were fired. Although they had intended shooting the driver so that the bus would crash off the bridge and into the river b e l o w, they missed him altogether, even though they fired at the front of the bus. Eight people were injured in the attack and all the occupants of the bus w e re traumatised and shocked by the incident.
1. Under cross-examination, the applicant conceded that he had previously been a supporter of the ANC, having become politicised at the age of ten. He said he had decided to join the PAC because he pre f e r red its policies and was not
2. happy with the pro g ress of national negotiations. He expressed his re g ret at what had happened.
5. In reaching its decision, the Amnesty Committee noted that the attack took place when most political parties were engaged in negotiations, but that the PAC had not yet abandoned the armed struggle. The applicant was a member of APLA and had received an order to attack the bus. The arms and ammunition used in the attack were supplied by APLA and the orders came from Mr Nonxuba, who was at that time a member of APLA’s High Command.
6. The applicant felt obliged to carry out the ord e r, which he believed would speed up the negotiation process and make whites understand that the PAC was serious about its position. His actions were, there f o re, found to be associated with a political objective as defined by the Act, and the application was granted [ A C / 2 0 0 0 / 1 6 7 ] .

Ambush of a vehicle near Zastron

1. Mr Luyanda Humphrey Gqomfa [AM0949/96] applied for amnesty for the ambush of a vehicle travelling from Zastron to Sterkspruit in the Orange Fre e State on 18 March 1992.
2. The victims lived in Zastron and travelled daily to Sterkspruit, where they were running a furn i t u re business. Mr Fanie Smith was shot dead in the attack while he lay injured next to the car. Mr Deon Martins was seriously injured in the left hand and his finger was subsequently amputated. Mr Ben Maliehe and Mr A n d rew Lategan Franzsen escaped the ambush unhurt and were able to flee f rom the scene.
3. Though APLA commander Mr Letlapa Mphahlele was listed as a co-applicant, it became clear during the hearing that he had no intention of participating in the p roceedings. His counsel Mr Lungelo Mbandazayo made a number of attempts to secure his co-operation and attendance, but to no avail. As a result, his application lapsed.

1 9 3 . Mr Gqomfa testified that, as a member of APLA, he had received military training in exile and then re t u rned to the country, where he carried out various operations on behalf of the organisation. He received orders in respect of all these operat i o n s

f rom the High Command of APLA, most often from Mr Mphahlele, who was

A P L A’s Director of Operations at the time.

1. At the time of the incident, Gqomfa was being harboured at a house in Sterkspruit, secured for him by Mphahlele. Whilst he was there, Mphahlele and another APLA member, Ben Wakumzi (an alias), took him to a meeting with a g roup of APLA operatives.
2. Mphahlele ord e red them to attack white travellers along the Mayaputhi road near the Sterkspruit bridge. In order to acquire a vehicle, Gqomfa and two other operatives went to Ndofela Village where they robbed Mr Nkopane Johannes Lesia of his Isuzu 2200 Diesel Bakkie.
3. Lesia reported the incident to the police and later received a report that his vehicle had been found. He told the police that, on the afternoon of 18 Marc h 1992, he was on his way from Palmietfontein (where he lived) to Ditapoleng village. As he drove past Ndofela village, he saw three black men standing next to a small bridge. They were all armed and fired shots to force him stop. They told him that they were freedom fighters and needed his car ‘for the struggle’ and gave him R20 so he could travel to work.
4. After robbing Lesia of his vehicle, Gqomfa and his comrades proceeded to the Mayaputhi road near Sterkspruit bridge. Here they found that Mphahlele was in c h a rge of the operation. When Smith and the other victims appro a c h e d , Mphahlele opened fire. The others followed suit. The vehicle stopped immediately and Martins, Maliehe and Franzsen alighted and fled the scene. Smith was i n j u red and fell to the ground next to the vehicle, unable to flee. Mphahlele

o rd e red Gqomfa to shoot Smith, which he did.

1. At the hearing, Gqomfa expressed his re g rets at the shooting but said that he had had no choice as he was carrying out ord e r s .
2. The Amnesty Committee found that Gqomfa was a member of the PAC and APLA and that he had acted in terms of these organisations’ policies and objectives. The Committee accepted that APLA was still engaged in the armed struggle at the time and that it re g a rded all whites as supporters of the government. The Committee found that Gqomfa had acted under the orders of Mphahlele, that the offences and acts applied for were acts associated with a political objective and that the applicant had made full disclosure of all relevant facts. He was granted amnesty [AM0949/96].

Eikenhof attack

1. Mr Phila Martin Dolo [AM3485/97] applied for amnesty for the killing of Ms Zandra Mitchley, her son Shaun and Claire Silberbauer, as well as the attempted killing of Mr Norman Mitchley and Craig Lamprecht. The victims were shot while driving in their vehicle in the Eikenhof area of Johannesburg on 19 March 1993. T h ree ANC members were arrested and later convicted of the attack, for which two w e re sentenced to death and the third was given a long term of imprisonment.
2. H o w e v e r, in 1997, Mr Dolo asserted in his amnesty application that the attack had been an APLA operation, conducted by four APLA operatives known only by their codenames. Mr Dolo had given the orders for the attack, originally aimed at a school bus carrying what he termed ‘settler school children’. The four attackers were unable to carry out the attack and instead opened fire on the Mitchley’s vehicle. The sentenced ANC members were released from prison in November 1999. Mr Dolo was granted amnesty [AC/2000/147].

Attack on Mr RJ Fourie on the farm ‘Stormberg’

1. PAC/APLA members Hendrik Leeuw, Daniel Magoda, Meshack May and Sebolai Petrus Nkgwedi applied for amnesty for the robbery and killing of Mr Roelof Johannes Fourie on the farm ‘Stormberg’ in the district of Ve r k e e rdevlei, Orange F ree State, on 12 February 1992.^{2 1 1}
2. The Committee heard testimony that, during 1991, the PAC and APLA launched their ‘Operation Great Storm’, in terms of which APLA operatives were instructed to attack and to instil fear in farmers. The applicants testified that the purpose was to drive the white farming community from their farms in order ‘to get the land back’. During November 1991, APLA Commander Jan Shoba (now

211 Volume Th r e e, Chapter Fo u r, p. 3 8 0 .

deceased) instructed the applicants to carry out attacks on farmers in the vicinity of Botshabelo, Tweespruit and Ve r k e e rdevlei. He supplied them with a .38 special revolver for this purpose.

1. The farm of Mr RJJ Fourie was identified as a target by Mr Leeuw and Mr Nkgwedi: Mr Nkgwedi had grown up on the farm. The four applicants went onto the farm property and observed Mr Fourie and his companion leaving, appare n t l y on their way to town. They also noticed that Mr Fourie had left the gate open. The applicants closed the gate so that, on his re t u rn, Mr Fourie would be obliged to stop and open it. They then positioned themselves in the bushes adjacent to the gate and waited for the couple to re t u rn. When Mr Fourie stopped to open the gate as anticipated, one of the applicants shot him in the back of his head. His companion, Mrs May, remained in the car, which the attackers then drove to the farmhouse.
2. The applicants searched the house and stole two firearms, money, watches, a camera and numerous personal belongings. After tying up Mrs May and disconnecting the telephone and radio, they drove off in the deceased’s car.
3. The Amnesty Committee received a submission from Mrs Margot Penstone, who stated that the deceased was not involved in party politics and was a pro-g ressive farmer who had assisted his farm workers to improve their stock, housed them in brick houses with running hot and cold water, built a school for their children on the farm and provided them with a soccer field. She added that she believed the murder to have been a purely criminal act. In this, she was supported by Mrs May, who stated in an affidavit that the applicants had repeatedly asked her where the money was kept and said that they were only i n t e rested in valuable articles. Mrs May and Mrs Penstone did not give evidence b e f o re the Committee, so the applicants’ counsel did not have the opportunity to cross-examine them on these claims.
4. The applicants testified that they were instructed to take the property and hand it over to their commander, Mr Jan Shoba, who would sell it in order to obtain money for their struggle. They had also intended to hand the vehicle to him. H o w e v e r, they testified that they were arrested two days after the robbery and b e f o re they had had the opportunity to hand the property over. The applicants w e re all convicted and sentenced to terms of between nine and fifteen years’ imprisonment.
5. In making its decision, the Amnesty Committee first considered Mr Nkgwedi’s involvement in the attack and whether, having grown up on the farm, he might have been motivated by ill-will or personal malice. In reaching a decision on this issue, the Committee concluded that an act that was, or may have been, motivated by a personal grievance could, nonetheless, qualify for amnesty where t h e re was also a strong political motive. There f o re, although there was some evidence of a personal motive in Nkgwedi’s case, the fact that the applicant would have killed any white person in furtherance of official APLA policy meant that the political motive for the attack outweighed the personal.
6. The Amnesty Committee further accepted that, in both their submissions and oral evidence to the Commission, the PAC and APLA had stated that ‘Operation G reat Storm’ involved the killing of farmers and the stealing of weapons. It also noted that, while the PAC had stated that it was opposed to armed ro b b e r y, it had also re f e r red to ‘repossession’ and to the existence of ‘repossession units’. The Committee felt that it was by no means clear about the distinction between ‘ robbery’ and ‘repossession’, save that in the case of repossession the proceeds would be handed over to the Commander to be used to further APLA’s g o a l s .

No distinction was drawn between what might have been property for military use and property taken for personal gain. The Committee is there f o re faced with the dilemma that the act does not authorise us to grant amnesty in respect of a portion of a sentence. Having found that the murder of Mr Fourie and the robbery of the fire a rms were offences associated with a political objective, the Committee is obliged to grant amnesty in respect thereof. No provision is made in the Act for dealing with offences which have elements of criminality as well as political motivation in it. [AC/1999/297.]

211. Amnesty was granted to Messrs Hendrik Leeuw, Daniel Magoda, Meshack May and Sebolai Petrus Nkgwedi [AC/1999/0297].

The killing of Mr John Bernard Smith

1. Mr Jacob T Mabitsa [AM5178/97], Mr Petrus T Mohapi [AM1167/97], Mr Thabo Paulus Mtjikelo [AM1249/96], Mr Simon T Olifant [AM5177/97], Mr John Wa -Nthoba [AM2997/96] and Mr John Xhiba [AM1215/96] applied for amnesty for the killing of Mr John Bern a rd Smith on 25 July 1993 on his farm at We s s e l s d a l in the district of Vanstadensrus in the Eastern Cape.
2. The applicants also stole a motor vehicle, three firearms, various pieces of equipment and clothing, two bottles of liquor and a sum of cash. Mohapi, Oliphant and Mtjikelo were convicted of murder and robbery and sentenced to an effective 25 years’ imprisonment. The other applicants were convicted only on the charge of robbery with aggravating circumstances and were each sentenced to 12 years’ imprisonment.

2 1 4 . The applicants testified that they left Botshabelo for Wesselsdal on the 23 July 1993 with the intention of carrying out the attack. They called this off because of the presence of visitors on the farm. On 25 July, Mjikelo, Mohapi, Oliphant and Xhiba went back to the farm and approached Mrs Smith with a request for p e t rol, saying that their car had run out of fuel. Mrs Smith called her husband who said he would help them to syphon some petrol from his car. Mr Smith gave Xhiba his store room key and asked him to fetch a container and a pipe.

1. The other three applicants accompanied Smith to the garage and, while he was syphoning petrol from the car, Mohapi stabbed him in the back. Mr Smith fell to the ground and Oliphant stabbed him in the chest and other parts of his body, ultimately inflicting approximately nine wounds. The attackers then searched the house, seizing three guns and a small amount of cash. They tied Mrs Smith up and locked her in a ward robe. They then took possession of the Smiths’ M e rcedes Benz for use in future operations.
2. Oliphant confirmed the evidence and testified that it was the objective of the PAC to wage the struggle for the re t u rn of land to the African people, which was why he was involved in that operation. When it was pointed out to Oliphant that the attack took place while negotiations were underway at Codesa (Convention for a Democratic South Africa) in which the PAC was a participant, Oliphant stated that the PAC had not suspended the armed struggle and that, while the negotiations continued, operations were conducted in order to put pre s s u re on the government to give in to the demands of the liberation movements.
3. The applicants called Mr Lerato Abel Kotle, the regional commander of APLA in Bloemfontein, to give evidence about ‘Operation Great Storm’. Khotle explained that ‘Operation Storm’ was intended as a means of intensifying the armed struggle and was decided upon by APLA’s military commission, which included the political leadership of the PAC and the military leadership of APLA. He described the attacks on farmers as one of the phases of the campaign. The PAC believed that the farming community had participated in the dispossession of the African people and that farmers were beneficiaries of the land taken away f rom the Africans.
4. The Amnesty Committee accepted the contention that the applicants had committed the offences believing they were advancing the struggle being waged by their political organisation with the aim of re t u rning the land to the African people. The offences committed were, there f o re, acts associated with a political objective. The possession of the pistol and knives used for carrying out the operation was also associated with a political objective. Amnesty was granted to the applicants [AC/1998/0020].

Various attacks in Ficksburg

1. Mr Phila Martin Dolo [AM3485/96], Mr Lerato Abel Khotle [AM5619/97] and Mr Luvuyo Kenneth Kulman [AM1638/96] applied for amnesty for several attacks on homes in Ficksburg in the Orange Free State on 10 December 1992. The acts were committed with other persons, known only by their code-names: ‘Roger’, ‘Scorpion’, ‘Jabu’, ‘Nduna’ and ‘Kenny’.
2. The Committee heard that Phila Dolo was in charge of the APLA base in Lesotho, that Lerato Khotle was in charge of the APLA base at Sterkspruit, and that the two liaised closely to plan attacks in the area between.
3. Dolo testified that certain houses in Ficksburg on the Lesotho border were re g a rded as belonging to members of the security forces. These he described as ‘in the first line of defence’ and ‘acting as the garrisons of the then apartheid state’. They there f o re qualified as suitable targets for attack. Khotle told the Committee that he attempted to confirm this information:

I … re c o n n o i t red the place and I also interacted with the people who were working there, domestic workers, and I engaged with them in discussions to get i n f o rmation from them as to whether those places were occupied by the members

of the regime. That is how I ended up making a decision that we have to attack

this place, because they were occupied by the security personnel. Those were

the reasons why I needed his [Dolo’s] help and he agreed and he came to my

side to give us help. (Hearing at Bloemfontein, August 1998.)

222. The operatives travelled on foot from Lesotho, Dolo carrying a bag of rifle g renades, M26 grenades and Molotovs. At Ficksburg they divided into two units. The first, commanded by Dolo, attacked a house at No. 143 Veld Stre e t , F i c k s b u rg. The second, commanded by Khotle, targeted an old age home but was foiled in the attack. They then conducted random attacks on various homes in Ficksburg .

2 2 3 . The house of Mrs Cornelia Gertruda Pienaar (then Roos) was severely damaged in the Veld Street attack. Mrs Pienaar was at home with her two daughters, aged five and twelve years, when the attack occurred. She testified that her house was not owned by the police but belonged to her and her husband who had died only a week earlier. Before his death, he had performed light duties in the police mortuary. He had at one time been a member of the South African Police and had become unfit for ordinary police duties as a result of an accident.

1. The attack began after she and the children had gone to bed. The attackers t h rew a grenade into the childre n ’s bedroom and started shooting at the house. Mrs Pienaar and her children managed to escape through the back door and c rept through the fence into the neighbour’s yard .
2. Dolo told the Committee that the attack had been motivated by a recent statement by the Minister of Defence that there would be no more farm attacks in the area. The applicants had carried out the operation ‘to show the enemy what we can do. We can continue with the armed struggle; nothing will stop us.’ He said it was ‘unfortunate’ that they had ended up attacking a house that was not occupied by the police. All whites, however, were re g a rded as supporters of the government, with whom APLA was still locked in armed struggle because the oppression of blacks had not yet stopped.

Our interest was not on Mr Pienaar or Mrs Pienaar or Van der Merwe, all the

White people were oppressing the Black people. If it happened that at the end a

house that was attacked did not belong to a policeman or a soldier, still that house

falls under our programme because, when we participated in our struggle, we never heard who was smiling with us or who loved us [and] we all treated white people as participants in oppression. (Bloemfontein hearing, August 1998.)

226. When asked why they had targeted an old age home, Khotle said it was unacceptable for Africans to be killed in the way they were. The purpose of targeting an old age home was to:

make whites feel the pain the same as Africans who felt the pain ... Why I’m

saying age was not an issue is that, firstly, the oppressors themselves, when

they see me, they saw me as a boy. My father was regarded as a boy; my

grandfather was regarded as a boy; my sister was regarded as a girl; my mother

was a girl – so they did not differentiate between the various age groups or they

d i d n ’t see a difference between me and my father or my grandfather. We were

all boys so there f o re we did not have a problem to respond to that oppre s s i o n

knowing that there was no young persons and old persons, all of them were

o p p ressors. (Bloemfontein hearing, August 1998.)

1. The Committee accepted that the applicants had acted on behalf of APLA and in accordance with what was then the policy of the PAC. It was satisfied that they had made a full disclosure of their respective roles and participation in the attacks. Accord i n g l y, Mr Lerato Abel Khotle, Mr Luvuyo Kulman and Mr Phila Martin Dolo were granted amnesty for the attacks in Ficksburg .
2. They were also granted amnesty for a shoot-out on the Ficksburg bypass in which two people were injured. This incident had occurred as Dolo and his unit w e re withdrawing from the town. They fired shots at a police vehicle in the vicinity of the Ficksburg bypass, injuring Sergeant Otto Coetzee (who was in the police vehicle) and Ms Mathapelo Lethena who was travelling in a passing taxi.
3. Mr Dolo also gave evidence of his involvement in a further attack in which he and two others threw a hand grenade and opened fire on a farmstead in the Danside area on 19 December 1992. One person, Mrs Leone Pretorius, died in the attack. Once again, the farm was attacked because it was believed that white farmers belonged to the commando structures. APLA cadres wanted to drive them out of the area in order to create a wider operational platform for themselves. Dolo was granted amnesty for this incident [AC/1999/0182].

PAC/ANC conflict

1. The Amnesty Committee received applications from four PAC members relating to offences committed in the course of localised conflict between members of the PAC and the ANC.
2. PAC member Sonnyboy Johannes Sibiya [AM3381/96] applied for amnesty for the killing of Mr Vusumuzi Ephraim Dhludhlu at eMzinoni, Bethel in the Tr a n s v a a l on 17 October 1992. He was convicted and sentenced to 15 years’ imprisonment.
3. Sibiya testified that he joined the PAC task force in 1991. He described his duties as the protection of PAC members and their homes. Soon after this, he was sent to the then Transkei for basic training under the auspices of APLA. After a short stay at Folweni near Durban, he was deployed to eMzinoni.
4. Sibiya described a situation of ongoing political conflict between PAC and ANC members in the area. He related a number of incidents in which people were killed, homes burnt and people forced to leave the township. He said that he took steps to try to report the problems caused by this conflict to APLA’s D i rector of Operations, but was unable to contact him. He managed to get in touch with ‘Mandla’, APLA’s regional commander for the Highveld area. He met with him in Embalenhle and, after explaining the situation to him, re c e i v e d

o rders to identify the ANC ringleaders and attack them in order to prevent further attacks on PAC people.

1. By the night of 15 October 1992, Sibiya had gathered sufficient information and went out in search of the ANC ringleaders. However, it was not until 17 October 1992 that he located Dhludhlu and another person in a shop. Both, he claimed, had been identified as ANC culprits. He testified that he called Dhludhlu over to him and, after trying to negotiate and reason with him, shot him dead.
2. Some years before, Dhludhlu had been a suspect in an attack on Sibiya’s u n c l e ’s home, which resulted in the death of three members of his family. Sibiya, h o w e v e r, denied any suggestion that he had been motivated by feelings of revenge against Dhludhlu. Further to this, a member of the National Executive Committee (NEC) of the PAC, Mr Jabulani Khumalo, testified that there had been conflict between the PAC and ANC in the area from 1990 until 1992/93. He said that this conflict affected a number of areas, including eMzinoni. He was aware that APLA cadres were deployed in those areas where attempts at negotiation had failed to prevent further conflict. He said he had knowledge of these matters because he had been a PAC leader in the East Rand at the time.
3. The Committee accepted that Sibiya had acted on behalf of and in support of the PAC in the context of the conflict with the ANC and his conduct was held to be an act associated with a political objective. Satisfied that he had made full d i s c l o s u re of all material facts and did not appear to have acted for personal gain, personal malice, ill-will or spite, The Committee granted Mr Sonnyboy Johannes Sibiya amnesty [AC/1998/0052].

Attack on Sophia and Gabriel Rossouw

1. Although APLA policy authorised robbery as a means of raising money, amnesty was denied to Mr Sithembiso Vanana [AM6540/97] for a robbery in which money was used for the personal benefit of the applicants and not the org a n i s a t i o n .
2. Mr Vanana applied for amnesty for the killing of Mrs Jane Sophia Rossouw, aged 72 years, the attempted killing of Mr Casper Gabriel Rossouw, aged 81 years, ro b b e r y, housebreaking with the intent to steal, and theft of a motor vehicle. These offences were committed on the farm ‘Sarahsdale’ in the district of D o rd recht on 1 August 1993.
3. A c c o rding to the applicant, the operation was planned in order to ‘raise funds’ to enable him to travel to the Transkei where he would receive basic APLA military training. He spoke to a Mr Nelson Gebe, an APLA cadre, about joining APLA. Gebe informed him that he would have to undergo military training in Tr a n s k e i and that he (Gebe) knew a person in Butterworth who would be able to make the necessary arrangements.
4. Vanana, Gebe and one other person participated in the attack on the Rossouws. They were unsuccessful in finding either money or arms in the house and instead stole the Rossouws’ motor vehicle and drove to the Tr a n s k e i , w h e re they stayed for at least six weeks. The applicant testified that he was unsuccessful in reaching the contact Gebe had told him would arrange for his training. Nor did they make any attempt to get in touch with any other members of the PAC or APLA in Tr a n s k e i .
5. They sold the Rossouw’s vehicle for R5 000 and used the money for their own benefit. They also robbed a bottle store and hijacked a motor vehicle. Soon after this, they were chased by the police, who shot at them. The applicant was hit and in j u red. He was arrested and detained in hospital where he received tre a t m e n t .

2 7 3 . The applicant escaped from hospital and went to Cape Town. Here, he and some others killed a Mr van Niekerk on a smallholding. The applicant was eventually arrested in the Cape Town area while robbing a shop.

274. The Amnesty Committee noted that there was:

no corroboration that the applicant was ever a member of the PAC. He states

that he lost his membership card when being chased by the police in Tr a n s k e i

and there is no evidence before us, other than his assertion, that he is or was a

member of the PAC. We are also of the view that the applicant’s evidence that Gebe

was an APLA cadre is both untruthful and improbable. Gebe has a criminal

record which reflects that he has, from June 1973 to March 1988, had twenty-

nine previous convictions and that he has on four occasions been declared an

habitual criminal … It is also apparent from applicant’s own version, untrustworthy

as it is, that the proceeds from the sale of the Rossouws’ vehicle was used for the

perpetrators own benefits and not for the benefit of any political organisation.

We are of the conclusion that the crimes committed by the applicant were committed for personal gain. [AC/2000/072.]

1960s: PAC National Working Committee/Task Force/Poqo

1. The PAC explained in its submission that the response of the government to the anti-pass campaign (the Sharpeville massacre) led to the ‘formation of rudimentary units comprising mainly task force members. Armed operations were carried out at Bashee, Paarl, Ntlonze and Queenstown between 1960 and 1962’. Poqo was formed in September 1961, following the formation of underg round cells and the decision to embark on armed struggle and target police stations, post off i c e s , power installations, fuel depots and various government buildings. In addition, white suburbs were selected as targets. Branches, theoretically consisting of no m o re than fifteen members, were set up. In larger branches, smaller cells were set up – with their own small committees and ‘task force’ leaders. The task forc e was made up of foot soldiers to be in a state of readiness at all times. Foot soldiers also served as the org a n i s a t i o n ’s police who stood guard during meetings.
2. While the PAC Disciplinary Code encouraged members to air their views ‘and to a g ree or disagree with all or any member of the movement, including the leader …’, there were incidents where action was taken against those who disagre e d openly with the leadership. No political education programme was provided for members. Such a programme would have helped members define who the enemy was, rather than inciting the membership to kill whites and their informers in a m o re general way. Where the enemy was not clearly defined, gross abuses of human rights were inevitable. Some of the violations committed by PAC or Poqo members took place during this period.

212 See Chapter Two of this section.

1962: Revolutionary Council

1. Mr Potlako Leballo (founding PAC national secretary and acting president in exile) set up the Revolutionary Council in Lesotho, which was to plan and execute the next phase of the PAC struggle to overthrow white domination and establish ‘an Africanist socialist democracy’ via Poqo cells.
2. In the late 1960s, the PAC established a base in exile, headquartered first in Lusaka, Zambia and later in Dar-es-Salaam in Tanzania. It established missions in eighteen countries and began a programme of military instruction for PA C members: first in the Congo alongside the FNLA^{2 1 3} and later in Ghana and Algeria.

1968: Formation of APLA/PAC High Command and Military Commission

283. APLA was founded in exile in 1968 and the PAC planned for the infiltration of trained guerrillas into South Africa. After 1975, members of the APLA High Command were despatched to the frontline states to prepare an underground trail.

Late 1980s

1. F rom 1989, APLA cadres were infiltrated into the country and established as s e l f - reliant, easily-manageable and controllable task force units of no more than t h ree guerrillas. They consisted of a political commissar, whose brief was to make s u re that all operations enhanced the PA C ’s political positions and ideology; a c a d re in charge of securing logistics whenever needed, and a commander who was in charge of the military aspects of operations.
2. The political commissars were the first to be infiltrated to occupy certain positions inside the country, followed by the logistic personnel and then the commanders, who were ‘the actual fighters’.
3. APLA based reconnaissance units all over the frontline states. Inside the c o u n t r y, however, the political commissars, whose task was generally to pave the way for the entry of the fighters, also had to do the major re c o n n a i s s a n c e work. As part of APLA’s all-round training, cadres were equipped to perform any tasks at any given time and situation. It was the commissars who had to answer to the Military Commission in the event of mishaps arising in the course of operations.
4. A c c o rding to the testimony of Mr Vuma Ntikinca, an APLA operative in the Transkei at the time, this modus operandi made the APLA units:

213 National Front for the Liberation of A n go l a

m o re slippery, more mobile and more efficient in an encounter with a big arm y. These units were independent of each other. They selected their own targets and they did not face any dangers of their operations and movements being known by the enemy as a result of the capture of one cadre or the whole unit, or as a result of enemy infiltration at headquarters. These tiny units also had the advantage of depriving the enemy of the opportunity of using heavy weaponry. It was easier for us acquiring small and light weapons that suited the size of the units, which could not be easily detected. In the latter part of the operations, though, APLA forces had expanded into much bigger units which were now using rocket launchers such as RPG7s and other weaponry. (Interview with the C o m m i s s i o n . )

1. The units were deployed in a manner that ensured that they had no contact with one another. They reported directly to APLA’s headquarters in Tanzania after an operation had been carried out. If serious political re p e rcussions arose from any one military operation, it was the political commissars who answered to the Military Commission, explaining any deviation from PAC ideology, strategy and pro g r a m m e .
2. Local commanders in small units were given a fair degree of autonomy in selecting targets, undertaking reconnaissance, procuring arms and establishing tactics for APLA operations. Once a target had been selected, however, a local commander would have to seek authorisation from a regional commander or some superior official. According to the evidence presented in amnesty hearings, this was generally done.

2 9 0 . The operational planning of an attack was the task of the commander of the unit assigned to it. As will be clear from the operations described earlier in this c h a p t e r, a feature common to most was the fact that the foot soldiers were briefed on the details only moments before they were launched. They were deliberately kept in the dark and prevented by APLA’s operational code fro m asking questions about the proposed attack. Nor were they at liberty to question the instructions they received. The Amnesty Committee repeatedly heard applicants say that it was not their place to question the instructions or the legitimacy of

o p e r a t i o n s .

291. Applicant Andile Shiceka told the Committee that APLA soldiers on the ground had no capacity either to determine or influence policy. They were mere l y expected to obey orders. They did not participate in making or changing policy in respect of target selection, but simply followed instructions. Many applicants told the Committee that they would never have questioned the orders given to them. They had been trained never to question an order or instruction. A disciplined member of the army would simply carry out the ord e r. Defying an ord e r would be tantamount to ‘mutiny’ within the army ranks.

Early 1990s: APLA repossession units

292. Mr Patrick Thapelo Maseko [AM5918/97] told the Committee that, after receiving PAC training outside the country between 1983 and 1989, he re - e n t e red the country as a member of APLA and was deployed to a repossession unit code-named ‘Beauty Salon’:

I was deployed inside the country with specific instructions to advance the struggle for the liberation of African people in all fronts. We were told that the PAC and APLA have no funds and there f o re the cadres should be self-re l i a n t . We were told that the targets will be chosen by us. This unit there f o re was called ‘Repossession Unit’. This was the first unit to be sent in the country for this purpose, though we were to conduct other operations. (Statement to the C o m m i s s i o n . )

293. Maseko was involved in commanding at least twenty-eight operations. Initially, he reported to a man called Msiki in Botswana via a courier code-named ‘General’. Later he reported to Mr Letlapa Mphahlele who had re t u rned to South Africa as part of the APLA High Command after the unbanning of org a n i s a t i o n s in February 1990. He was expected to hand over to Msiki whatever had been repossessed by the unit, with the exception of arms and ammunition, which he retained for further use by operatives. If the money obtained was less than R3 000, the unit used it to conduct further operations. According to the evidence before the Amnesty Committee, the ‘Beauty Salon’ unit was responsible for the theft of over R40 550. In 1991, over R532 000 was stolen.

Transkei operational bases

2 9 4 . F rom operational bases secured in the Transkei, APLA conducted a series of attacks on civilian targets in the early 1990s. Operations in the We s t e rn Cape had particularly strong links to APLA structures in the Transkei. Weaponry was also sourced from the Transkei security forces. For example, the Amnesty Committee heard that the hand grenades used in the St James’ and Heidelberg attacks originated from a batch of grenades supplied to the Transkei Defence F o rce. Transkei also provided refuge for APLA operatives after operations. In most attacks, APLA personnel from the Transkei were deployed in conjunction with locally-trained operatives, while local PAC structures provided logistical support to such operatives.

MOTIVES AND PERSPECTIVES