TRC Final Report

Volume 4

Chapter 9

Volume FOUR Chapter NINE

Special Hearing:Children and Youth

■ INTRODUCTION

1 In light of the direct impact of the policies of the former state on young people and the active role they played in opposing apartheid, the Commission decided to hold hearings on the experiences of children and youth. Many of those who testified before the Commission were eighteen years old or younger when the gross violations of human rights occurred.¹ However, it was considered important that those who were under eighteen years of age during the life of the Commission be given the opportunity to testify. Indeed, before these special hearings, few children under the age of eighteen had approached the Commission to tell their stories.

2 The idea of special hearings on the role and experiences of children and youth was widely supported by a range of non-governmental organisations (NGOs), which were invited to participate in the preparatory process.

Children subjected to gross human rights violations

3 The hearings provided an opportunity to focus on the impact of apartheid on children and youth. Over the years, children and young people were victims of and witnesses to of many of the most appalling gross human rights violations in South Africa’s history. The effects of exposure to ongoing political violence may have had serious effects on the development of many of these children.² It was, therefore, considered imperative that the trauma inflicted on children and young people be heard and shared within the framework of the healing ethos of the Commission. Recognition of the inhumanity of apartheid was seen as a crucial step towards establishing a human rights framework for children and young people in order to ensure that they be given the opportunity to participate fully in South Africa’s new democratic institutions.

4 The report does not, however, claim to be representative of all children and youth. Given the Commission’s focus on gross human rights violations, those who gave evidence at the hearings on children and youth spoke mainly of the suffering of young people. Few chose to speak of, or to report on, the heroic role of young people in the struggle against apartheid. Many saw themselves not as victims, but as soldiers or freedom fighters and, for this reason, chose not to appear before the Commission at all. Others, fearing reprisals from family or community, remained silent. Sometimes close family members were unaware of or strongly opposed to the political activities of young people. This accounts for any apparent contradictions between the perceptions of mothers and other family members who gave testimony and those of the many young people who excluded themselves from the hearings.

5 These stories are not, consequently, captured in what follows. No concerted attempt was made by the Commission to encourage those young people who did attend the hearings to speak of themselves as heroes who had sacrificed their education, their safety and often their long term opportunities through their active resistance to apartheid.