TRC Final Report

Volume 6

Section 4

Chapter 2

Subsection 5

The case of Dikgope ‘Magic Bones’ Madi

46. The difficulties attending the identification process before an exhumation are illustrated by the case of Dikgope ‘Magic Bones’ Madi, one of the cases dealt with by the Johannesburg unit.

47. The case involved three MK combatants who had been killed at Tshipise, Venda, in August 1983. The family of one of the combatants, Mr Patrick Motswaletswale, contacted the Ministry of Safety and Security to ask them to investigate the incident. The Ministry, which passed the matter on to the Commission’s Johannesburg office, had established that the remaining two combatants were Mr Humbulani Mulaudzi and Mr Andrew Mandi. While they had managed to trace the family of the former, the only information they had about Mr Mandi was that he was originally from Alexandra. The Ministry of Safety and Security, via their Pietersburg office, further established that the three operatives had been buried at Mbaleni in Sibasa and that the location of their graves was known.

48. The Commission was requested to establish the identity of Andrew Mandi and to carry out the necessary exhumations. The investigation identified Andre w Mandi as Andrew ‘Magic Bones’ Madi, and his body and that of Motswaletswale were exhumed. According to the investigator, identification was made by an MK commander (now deceased) who had been based in Zimbabwe at the time.

49. The case illustrates some of the numerous difficulties and contradictions the task team encountered while auditing exhumation cases

50. The ANC submission to the Commission, which listed deaths in exile, contained no record of an Andrew Mandi. However, it did list an Andrew Madi as having been killed by ‘enemy forces’ in Zimbabwe in 1979. No record of Andrew Mandi or Madi could be found on the additional lists of MK combatant deaths obtained f rom ANC headquarters at Shell House, although both contained the names of Patrick Motswaletswale from Sibasa and an MK Basil Zulu as having been killed in 1983. One of the lists indicated that the incident had occurred in Venda sometime in August 1983. There was no reference to a third person, further complicating the matter.

51. The task team located an HRV statement submitted by Mr Matsutse Elias Madi (JB05983/01MPPIT) from Alexandra, Johannesburg. Mr Madi told the Commission that, on 28 August 1978, his son Dikgope Molefe ‘Magic Bones’ Madi had told him that a friend had promised to take him across the border into exile. Although the deponent was suspicious and warned his son not to go, Dikgope went out that evening and never returned. The deponent reported the disappearance to the police but was told to search for his son himself. He re turned home, ‘my heart bleeding’.

52. Some three to four years later, he received an anonymous letter saying that Dikgope was in Tanzania. He heard nothing further until after the unbanning of organisations in 1990. At this stage, another son, Ephraim, informed him about a woman, Ms Lovinest Nyerende from Malawi, who claimed to be Dikgope’s girlfriend. According to Ms Nyerende, she had last seen Dikgope in 1978 in Tanzania. He had then gone to Zimbabwe to fetch other exiles, but had never returned to Tanzania. She later heard rumours that he was dead. In July 1992, two ANC officials informed Mr Madi that his son had died in the war in Zimbabwe.

53. This version appeared to confirm the information contained in the ANC submission that Andrew Madi had been killed in Zimbabwe in 1979, thus suggesting that Andrew Madi could not be the same person as the Andre w Mandi who was killed in the Venda incident in 1983. However, the names were virtually identical and there was a strong coincidence in the fact that both were said to have come from Alexandra.

54. Two further HRV statements made to the Commission confirmed that there were indeed three people killed in the Venda incident, but neither shed light on the identity of the third person. Mr Mavhunga Abram Mulaudzi (JB01268/02NPVD) made a statement regarding the death of his son, Humbelani Elvis Tshifhiwa Mulaudzi, at Tshipise in 1983. According to the statement, Mr Mulaudzi identified the body of his son and one of the remaining two as one Mongqretswari ( presumably Motswaletswale), also from Venda.

55. Ms Jane Denga (JB01414/02NPVEN) made a statement to the Commission about the torture of her husband, Alfred Mafhungo Denga, who was detained on 4 November 1983 and taken to Masisi Police Station in Mutale. Her husband had been involved in the transportation of three MK operatives, one of whom was a Mutswaletswale from Thohoyandou.

56. Additional information in other records^{2 5} indicated that Mr Denga had subsequently given evidence in the trial of several persons charged with harbouring MK operatives. Denga had told the court that he had been introduced to three MK operatives in November 1981 and had assisted in transporting them on numerous occasions. Evidence to the court by the second in command of Venda Security Branch was that one of the three men had been killed in a joint SAP and Venda Defence Force operation on 29 August 1983.

57. These statements confirmed the incident of August 1983 and, notwithstanding the apparent evidence by the second in command of the Venda Security Branch that only one person had been killed, the identities of Mulaudzi and Motswaletswale. However, neither cast light on the identity of the third victim.

58. Finally an MK operative who had been based in Zimbabwe was able to confirm the identity of the third victim as Dikgope Andrew ‘Magic Bones’ Madi. This operative, who had been based near Beit Bridge, had fought with ZAPU²⁶ forces in the late 1970s. In 1983 he infiltrated South Africa but was detained shortly thereafter. While detained, he was taken to identify the bodies of three MK operatives killed in August 1983. He positively identified one as a person he knew as ‘Magic Bones.’ According to him, he had known ‘Magic Bones’ well as they had both been in Zimbabwe and had also played soccer together.