| Time | Summary | |
| 02:37 | They had said that they wanted to plant sugarcane. This was actually their slogan. They would say that just before they attacked the residents. // In farming terms you clear the ground to plant the cane. In this area of Natal it came to mean that UDF and ANC supporting communities would be violently cleared out for IFP takeover. This week a journalist relived his experience of the events in March 1990 in the Edendale valley. | Full Transcript and References |
| 33:08 | Please get a helicopter, I don’t care how you do it, but please charter one. We have got to fly above the valleys, above the valley of death to see what’s happening. The cops say they are scared. At 01:15 we fly from Oribi Airport in a light plane. We are above 1000 feet above the burning valley. We have just counted 820 homes bulging flames. The sky below us is blue with smoke. The smoke threatens our nostrils with carbon monoxide. It’s really a gory sight, which even Hollywood movies have never been able to capture. We see bodies lying on the ground. | Full Transcript |
| 04:00 | Edmundt Zondi came to the Commission this week to tell how his sister and his son were killed, his house was looted and set alight and his livelihood, his taxi, burned out. // On the 25th of March 1990 IFP had a rally in Durban, so on their way back one of the buses stopped there. My son alighted from the kombi which came after the bus, not knowing that this bus which was parked there was an Inkatha bus. On the veranda, before the veranda they met with the Inkatha people and they shot them both and killed them. // Rev Tim Smith was stationed at a mission a few hundred meters from the house of David Ntombela an InDuna and now member of the provincial parliament. Ntombela’s house is in the lower part of the valley. | Full Transcript and References |
| 04:58 | On the evening of the 27th, that’s the Tuesday, that’s when the big meeting was held at Ntombela’s house. I drove past there at about half past six that evening and saw a large number of vehicles there. Wednesday morning the 28th they summoned everybody from this area to his home. In the morning and when they arrived there, there were trucks from Table Mountain area carrying more men, reinforcements. The beginning of UDF territory, or Amaqabani territory from here down into the valley. And this is where the first attacks took place on the 28th of March 1990. This is Gezabuso and you’ll see on the hill opposite many of the houses that were destroyed are no more. Further across to the left you can’t see too well from here, is KwaShange, there were big attacks there too. | Full Transcript and References |
| 05:47 | We are divided by the river, the Umsunduzi river, down there at the valley. That is KwaShange and this is KwaMnyandu. So, when I looked there across I saw that there were many houses burning, sound of gunshots and all that and there were trucks moving up there with some impi’s, people in the trucks carrying weapons. When I went out the gate I saw people were running all over that hill now; our people here were running away. Now, there were gunshots, people were coming all over, now, shooting, sound of guns all over. | Full Transcript |
| 06:25 | Higher up the valley the community of Ashdown decided to defend themselves. Mlamuli Mngadi was one of them. He was armed with a bush knife. // And after that they came, others came that side, ran, trying to come this side. Others were trying to come this side and others were coming that side. Also that side near the school. The police came at about 11 am. And they watched and watched, and after that they get back in their cars and went away. The fight continued again. | Full Transcript |
| 07:03 | Like the Umsunduzi river which runs through the Edendale valley a thread of police complicity runs through the story of the 1990 massacre in this valley. But senior men in the police and army have not taken any responsibility for those seven days of death and destruction. It is the foot soldiers, the young riots policemen and special constables who just followed orders who broke the bonds of secrecy. | Full Transcript |
| 07:35 | Because I made a confession today, here I leave today as a marked man. For the rest of my life I will be stigmatized which will declare to the world that I am a traitor, but had myself, Erasmus and Mdlala we would ever think that we would walk out of here scot free. | Full Transcript |
| 08:04 | Nhlanhla Mdlala, Billy Harrington, and Frans Erasmus are in prison for killing an ANC youth in 1990, soon after the seven day war. They killed on behalf of the IFP and the National Party government. They were told by their seniors that if they murdered UDF and ANC supporters they would not be prosecuted. | Full Transcript |
| 08:28 | We continued to work under captain and he always told us that whenever there was a fight that broke out we should always side with the Inkatha members, even when we got guns that were possessed by Inkatha members we should not take them. But if they were possessed by UDF members we should take them. Even if we could shoot or kill the people we should not worry about prosecution. | Full Transcript and References |
| 08:58 | Each shift that I worked, on each of these shifts there were assaults and if you want me to estimate the number I would say a 1000 plus people in my career, in my short career in the police. // I did as I pleased. I had the power in my hands. It was so obvious that a former Lieutenant Meyer called me to his office and told me that I thought I was a little God. And I felt like a little God. I had that power over people. // As they say we were brainwashed. But today we can look back and say that it was wrong… | Full Transcript |
| 09:56 | With that sort of background Mdlala and Harrington did not question their biased roles in the seven day war. Mdlala was called to arms on day three when Ashdown and Xaluza were attacked by two impi’s. Mdlala was in the group from Elandskop; IFP InDuna David Ntombela’s stronghold. // It was at the place of the InDunas, but because there were so many of us we couldn’t all fit in there. Next to this place there’s an open area and behind it there are very high trees. When we arrived there we were told by the same Ntombela that the people of the chief were being wiped out the other side and we must go and help them. | Full Transcript |
| 10:40 | He says they were given 30 minutes to destroy. An indication that the attack was planned. // A lot of these houses were burnt and that big house over there was the first to be attacked, it was the first to burn after people had run away. // You also travelled up to this point? // Yes I travelled up to this point. When we were going up after the helicopter had gone past in that direction because this helicopter had appeared from just over here. // So, if the helicopter went past you were actually still here? // Yes like Thabane had said, the helicopter will go past and spray teargas and that would be the time when we have to go back. | Full Transcript |
| 11:25 | That the whole of South Africa and the people of Natal can see that there was a war against the ANC. That there really was a third force… there was a third force. Senior officers can deny it but those of us who were involved in it can testify. There is no other word for it. // People who still say there is no third force … what I said today what is a third force then? People who go out of control who are basically used. | Full Transcript |
| 12:08 | Senior police and army officers maintain a stony silence on their third force strategy. And the IFP, though central to every testimony on the massacre also chose to be silent about its version of the seven day war. IFP provincial MP mister David Ntombela made a stormy appearance. He claimed that the KwaZulu-Natal Truth Commission members were biased and demanded their resignation. Only then would the IFP participate in its hearings. | Full Transcript |
| 12:44 | I don’t believe that the kind of kangaroo court atmosphere which prevailed yesterday can contribute at all to peace and reconciliation because there was no element of peace there yesterday. There was just naked lust for revenge. | Full Transcript |
| 13:02 | This is South African police footage shot from a helicopter which shows David Ntombela’s car driving over the bridge over the flooded Umsunduzi river as the AmaButho to attack the rural community of KwaShange in Vulindlela. It is significant that the police had full awareness of this event taking place as witnessed by this footage which shows the person who has been named as a major perpetrator in these events. | Full Transcript and References |
| 13:42 | Mister Ntombela was a member of parliament. For him not to have been here during that period would have been problematic. He was a community leader, an InDuna. There’s a fundamental difference between his presence in the area and his participation in what happened. | Full Transcript |
