TRC Final Report

Volume 5

Chapter 4

Subsection 17

Inter and intra-community violence

148 By the 1980s, international pressures and local resistance forced the state to adopt alternatives to brute force. However, the introduction of reforms was accompanied by a destabilisation strategy that relied on collusion between elements within black communities which were beneficiaries of the status quo and elements within the state. According to Jacklyn Cock:

The reliance on vigilantes as a disorganising force represents a shift away from a reliance on the SADF and SAP to suppress black resistance. It is crucial to appreciate that this shift is part of a military strategy.²⁹

149 From the late 1980s, vigilantism and inter-community violence became a feature in many communities.

150 Destabilisation was adopted as a tactic on both sides of the conflict. In communities around the country, people mobilised around the slogan ’Forward to People’s Power’. Forms of opposition included the removal of illegitimate authorities and included strategies for destabilising the government at all levels. The call to make the townships ungovernable was heeded by activists who attempted to mobilise communities and replace what were described as ‘illegitimate’ structures with block committees, street committees, self defence units and people’s courts.

151 Community councillors became the fated symbols of the spiralling social problems within communities. Overcrowding, inadequate housing, limited sewerage and water facilities coupled with unemployment, poor education facilities and a host of other problems were aggravated by the provocative rise in service charges and rentals. Mr Mkiwane, a former councillor in Sebokeng, aptly described the mood of the day when he said, “their cup of dissatisfaction was full to the brim.”

152 Councillors were perceived as collaborating with the state and came to be seen as symbols of oppression and exploitation. This was one of the premises upon which so-called ‘black on black’ violence was founded. Community councillors came to be seen as the ‘faces’ of the system, thereby reducing the visibility of the state in the conflict.

153 At the Sebokeng post-hearing workshop, Mr Mkiwane described conditions in Sebokeng in 1984:

All hell broke out. Property was destroyed, houses were burned and belongings were either destroyed by fire or carried away by the very same people who elected us. Some of our colleagues who were found at home were brutally killed.

154 For councillors, the consequence was banishment from their communities. Those who left their posts found it difficult to find subsequent employment and many were unable to return to their previous homes for fear for their lives. Mr Maseko, a former councillor from Wesselton, was forced out of his community. At the Sebokeng post-hearing workshop, he said:

As a result, I still do fear for my life and I feel that I no longer have the dignity that I had at that time ... I still have this problem of not trusting my community.

155 There were also consequences for councillors’ wives and children. At the Worcester hearing, Mr Malinge Zweni, the son of a councillor who was killed in Ashton in 1986, described the community hostility his family faced.

We were called impimpis [spies]; we were called informers by the community. Children would throw stones and children would persecute us in the street.

156 He contemplated leaving Ashton because, “I had no friends and they were thinking that I was an informer as well.” Other children of councillors were afraid to go to school. Mr Mkiwane appealed for assistance from the Commission, saying, “we feel that something has to be done to bring us back into the community.”