TRUTH AND RECONCILIATION COMMISSION 

HUMAN RIGHTS VIOLATIONS

SUBMISSIONS - QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS

DATE: 21.05.97

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CHAIRPERSON: Can I just say that there's a slight change to the persons who are coming. We were going to have Toliwe Zwane who was going to talk about Nomsa Mabaso. Now Toliwe has not come but we have got Mr Andries Ndebele who's son also got killed on that day in the same incident. So I'm going to ask him to come to the stage and tell the story about his son.

Mr Ndebele good afternoon.

MR NDEBELE: Good afternoon.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you for coming. Mr Ndebela you are going to take us back to 1993 back to Thandukukanya township. We heard many stories this morning already about what happened in that township in that period that you lost your son. Dr Russel Ally is going to help you as you tell your story but before he does that can you please stand to take the oath. Mr Lewin will you please help.

ANDRIES NDEBELE: (sworn states)

DR ALLY: Good afternoon Mr Ndebele.

MR NDEBELE: I also greet you.

DR ALLY: You're going to tell us about your son. What happened to him. This incident took place on the 3rd of June 1993. There were also other people who were injured and who were also killed on that day. So we would really appreciate it if you could tell us as much as you know and as much as you can recall about the events of the 3rd of June 1993.

MR NDEBELE: What happened is that I was at work on that particular night and the children had told me that they would go to Situhle Shleze's(?) memorial or night vigil. Then the following morning at about 10 in the early morning, mid morning, my friends came to my work place and they told me that my son Sifundo had disappeared. Because they were driving in a car and I tried to find out as to which direction he had followed but they said they didn't know because some were shot during the night and they were at the hospital. I rushed for the hospital to go and look for my son because they said he had disappeared that night and when I got to the hospital I looked in each and every ward but I couldn't get him, and I was later told that some of the youth had been arrested. I should go and look at the police station. I further asked the people who had come to report to me to take me to the police station where I could look for my son and when we got there I was told that there were no youths who had been arrested at that police station except for two bodies that were there at the mortuary.

I had a desire to go to the mortuary though I had a belief that my son was alive but I also wanted to go to the mortuary to see if I couldn't find my son's body and there are shelves at the police or government mortuary where they pulled out the top shelf drawer when I got there, and when I looked in I could see a female, quite a young female. I shut the drawer because that was not my child but when they pulled out the drawer below that I could identify the corpse as my son. I got very disturbed asking myself how he got to be there at the mortuary.

At that stage I got very confused. I was with Themba Khumalo who is quite a well-known person amongst our community together with Mr Mhlulu who is a teacher. They took me outside. I made a request that I wanted to see what injuries he had sustained because I could see he had an injury on his forehead and I wanted to see the rest of the injuries. Later on I was told that whoever shot at my son shot him from the right-hand side and the bullet went through to the left side. I went back home to tell my family that I had identified my son's body at the mortuary.

What disturbed me about the whole issue is that when I went to the police station to report the matter, we do not have a police force here because they have not yet changed and are still operating under the old regime. When I went to them to report this matter they told me that I should go and ask Andries Gamede and Josia Thabete as to where my child was. They told me that I should go and report what had happened to the police station but I thank my community for treating me in the manner that they did at that time of confusion and anguish. Sifundo and Numsa Maraso(?) are the children that got killed that day and the community was very helpful in preparing for the funeral. I thank the Thandukukhanya community for helping me through this very terrible time.

Quite a length of time elapsed before I could hear from the police as to what had happened and I feel that the police didn't help me in any way to try and find the killers. But what surprises me today is to hear people in Nelspruit very far from my place asking for amnesty for having killed our children. I would request this Commission to give these people a chance to come and address this Commission with regard as to how they killed our children because that is what we need to know. What makes me say this is that I do not want to comment on anything that I have read in the newspapers or heard over the radio or any form of media. But I would appreciate it if the Commission would arrange for these perpetrators to appear before us and the community. I do not care about who sent him to kill my child but if he can come before me, admit that he killed my son and why he did so, I would like to see that person. Because that is what I would like to know, who shot my child an why.

I would appreciate it if this Commission would make it possible for me to see this person because I feel that I am an indirect victim of the killing of my son because of the anguish that I have gone through since his death. I want to be able to have an input as to whether he should be granted amnesty or not. That's my request to the Commission because where these children were shot was in the street, on the main road. If they were attacking anyone's house I would say they were in the wrong and maybe deserve to have been killed, but they were travelling along the main road and I don't understand as to why they were shot on that particular night. So I would like the person to come forward and explain to me as to what took place that night.

DR ALLY: Did you attend the amnesty hearing in Nelspruit?

MR NDEBELE: No I never went there.

DR ALLY: Were you informed about the fact that there was going to be an amnesty hearing? Were you sent any letter in the post?

MR NDEBELE: I never received any form of notification. The first time I heard about it was over the radio.

DR ALLY: You said that when you went to the mortuary to go and see if your son was perhaps one of those people who had been killed, you said that the first corpse that you were shown when they opened the drawer was of a young girl. Was that Nomsa Mabasa who you saw?

MR NDEBELE: Yes it was Nomsa Mabasa.

DR ALLY: So you know the family then, I would assume. Her mother Juliet?

MR NDEBELE: Yes I do, but I don't know where she stays because ever since then she ended up not staying at the residential area.

DR ALLY: Because we also have a statement from Nomsa's mother about this day's same event that these people amongst whom was your daughter (son?) were coming home from a candle-light procession commemorating the death of Sithule Slezi when they were shot at. Now I heard you say that you don't want to comment on what you read in the newspapers but maybe you could, if you do know, share with us the names of the people who are directly implicated in this shooting. That's if you.., because in the statement which we've got from Nomsa's mother, she names quite a few individuals who she believes were directly involved in the shooting and the killing of her daughter.

MR NDEBELE: It's true there's quite a list of names that was called but I did not pay much attention to those names, but what disturbs me is when a person appears before the Committee saying that he did this because he was sent by so-and-so. I think these are the people that we can talk to because he testified in the Amnesty Committee that he's the one who did this.

DR ALLY: And your request to the Commission is that these people who are applying for amnesty should actually come to the community itself and give an account of what they did and why they did it.

MR NDEBELE: That is true, that is what I would like to happen. I would like those people to come and appear before our community and not appear in Nelspruit where they did not kill people, they should come before the Committee or the community in which they perpetrated some acts of violence so that even the community can know who the perpetrators are and the can know the reasons as to why they did this. But now they are moving far away from us and the procedures are taking place far away in front of people who are not directly involved in the whole conflict. So I'm asking myself as to why he will never come before me and ask for forgiveness. Maybe if he comes to me as well as the community of Thandukukhanya, maybe we can even consider forgiving him.

DR ALLY: Is this Keswa you're speaking about.

MR NDEBELE: That is correct.

DR ALLY: How old was Sifunda when he was killed? Your son, how old was he?

MR NDEBELE: He was 18 years old.

DR ALLY: And he was still at school at the time?

MR NDEBELE: Yes he was still at school.

DR ALLY: Thank you very much Mr Ndebele and we hear your request and I am sure that we will try and see what can be done through the Commission. Thank you very much.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Manthata.

MR MANTHATA: Mr Ndebele I may have just one question. We were talking about a disturbing thing where you hear people say we were sent by so-and-so. Do you perhaps know the name of that person who is alleged to have sent people to kill others?

MR NDEBELE: According to the newspaper reports the name was mentioned but under the circumstances I will not be able to disclose the name. The situation is still very tense. That is why I say I do not want to comment any further on any newspaper reports as well as radio reports. I do not feel safe even today, so I'm scared to mention the person's name.

CHAIRPERSON: Excuse me. I'm not going to allow any more handclapping, okay! This is the last time, so please, I know you want to show your support. Let's show the support in some other way.

MR MANTHATA: Mr Ndebele, some of us may not have come across that newspaper clipping, is it possible for you to find that newspaper clipping so that on the basis of that not on the basis of what you say, as you put it, perhaps we can make a follow-up of that information?

MR NDEBELE: If I'm not mistaken, I think I still have that article at home, I think I do have the article at home, I can bring it.

MR MANTHATA: Thanks I've just been corrected, that we have got the name in the amnesty application and we can only hope, I don't know whether this is what the community has, we hope that person perhaps has applied for amnesty and if he has not done so, I think we have had the pleas from Archbishop Tutu, from the Minister of Justice, from the Minister of Safety and Security that people who have done those acts and have not applied for amnesty, and the date for amnesty has expired, are liable to prosecution in which case it gives one firm assurance that if it is found that those people have not applied for amnesty, then people are at liberty to proceed with civil action against those people. Thank you.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Lewin.

MR LEWIN: Mr Ndebele, could I just ask some advice? Because what you have been talking to us about is very similar t another case that we have heard today which also took place in 1993 and which involved the same people. And in that case we were told that the action that took place was cold-blooded murder. Now in the amnesty applications people are granted or can be granted amnesty if it is shown that the actions in which they were involved took place within what is called the political context. So we have on the one side someone describing something as cold blooded murder, which would imply that there is no political connotation, and the other, the same people in an application describing it as an action which took place because of a political motive. Could you perhaps advise us, comment on that distinction an in, certainly in your own case, would you describe it as murder or something within a political context?

MR NDEBELE: In my own opinion, or maybe that is just a wish, if a person comes before the Amnesty Committee, I think he or she deserves to be forgiven, but with regard to the incident that took place in Thandukukhanya here in Piet Retief, I think it has nothing to do with politics because I think it was a criminal act. It was just common criminals using the vale of political organisations in order to hide their act or disguise their acts because at the end of the day we discovered that these people had been sent or bought for a sum of money in order to go and kill certain members of the community who were either not wanted by a certain member of another political organisation but it was not a genuine political issue. I think the political organisations were used in order to perpetuate criminal acts that were committed during that time. I don't believe it had anything to do with politics because it also involved sums of money that were paid to certain people.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Ndebele I just want to ask one question. There was a court case of the two individuals who have been mentioned already, one by you, Mr Keswa and the other person, Mr Zwane. Did you attend that court case?

MR NDEBELE: Yes I did.

CHAIRPERSON: And can you tell us how many years those people were sentenced to?

MR NDEBELE: It was not a court case, and it ended in the inquest it was presided by the Piet Retief magistrate and the conclusion or the decision that he reached was that Zwane was involved and he could be accused of murder and that was the end of the inquest. I do not know what became of it thereafter and then later we heard about Keswa as well as Mdu(?) Mdu Nsibi, their case went on until the conclusion of the trial. We were present and we were attending the case. They were both convicted. If I remember very well, I think Keswa was given 25 years. I don't remember about Mdu, but he was given 30-something years. And we don't know what happened thereafter because they did point out during the court case that they were sent by certain members of their political group to go around killing members of the community. And as the case went on, when it transpired later on, we realised these people knew a lot about Piet Retief and they were directly involved in killing members of the community including my son.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Ndebele, so many young people killed and disabled as we've heard today, your son Sifundo was one of those, an 18-year old who on the eve of our democracy gets killed and of course you are left with the pain, and we see the pain even with you today, four years after the event. I in fact have the name of the other person here in the statement of Juliet Zwane and that person was informed about this hearing. I'm going to actually respect you as well as all the others today who've said things are too tense at the present time for us to want to mention the person's name. I, from my discussions at lunch time, clearly there are many people, probably the entire community who was here today, who knows the other person, but you are right, the people who killed were sentenced, have applied for amnesty. Those people we know already and as to whether they'll come forward in front of you and other people who appeared today, that has to be their conscience. As people have read in the newspapers, there have been times where these individuals had been granted amnesty or are applying for amnesty, have come forward to the Commission and said, can you please facilitate a meeting with the families involved or the communities involved, and we've done that. We did that with Brian Mitchell in KwaZulu Natal and more recently, where one of the police officers was implicated in the killing of Goniwe and others. So that is possible to do, but we still don't know whether these individuals have been granted amnesty and we await that decision from the amnesty committee.

I want to warmly thank you and I know you were not expecting to come here and talk today but by coming you have not only talked about your son but you have also made us hear the story of Nomsa. Thank you very much for coming.