SABC News | Sport | TV | Radio | Education | TV Licenses | Contact Us
 

Special Report Transcript Episode 4, Section 3, Time 10:26

Cross-border raids, a way for police and soldiers to earn medals. To exiled South Africans living in neighbouring states, it only meant death and destruction. This is the tragic story of Jaquiline Quin, her husband Leon Meyer, also known as Joe, their daughter, Phoenix and a close family Quin. The place, a suburb of Maseru, the time 4 days before Christmas, 1985. // Two days after Phoenix’s first birthday, the family were at home together. Obviously preparing for Christmas in a week’s time, because the present Jackie was making for Phoenix was at the sewing machine. In the middle of the night, under cover of darkness disguised, camouflaged men with silencers on their guns burst into Jackie’s home and murdered her; an unarmed, defenceless women in the supposed sanctuary of her home. They murdered Joe too, who survived long enough to drag himself to the neighbours and tell them what had happened. They left 12 month old Phoenix, traumatized, and alone with her dead mother in their home spattered with blood all over the place. It was disgusting, brutal, deceitful, treacherous, coldblooded murder. // On that morning I went to Maseru, stayed at the local hotel, what was the hotel’s name I can’t remember. Whatever, a hotel in Maseru, and Jackie wasn’t there to meet us and we waited and waited. And eventually some friend came and told us that Jackie and Joe had been shot the previous evening. The first thing was, we assumed it was the … the neighbours they told us that Joe had said ‘it’s the boere’ or something, that’s all he managed to get out before he passed out or died. So, we naturally assumed it was a hit squad from South Africa. // The next morning I think we were taken to the mortuary to identify Jackie. And the hospital had been looking after Phoenix, they were very good, because we didn’t know whether she was safe or not. And, eventually they could see by Phoenix’s reaction to Debbie that she knew us and they gave us Phoenix. // I want to ask society to redevelop the moral attitude that to kill another human being is a totally and absolutely unacceptable sin. I’d don’t care what they’d been through in their lives or what they’d been taught as children to believe, etc. they were adults who murdered my sister, they made their own choices, and like every other human being they had a duty to be conscious people, striving to be something better than [inaudible] or animals. Why else do they have life? And I want our country to be a place that never again allows people to damage the lives of others, especially not because of their colour or because of their living belief in justice and goodness, which is ultimately the reason why Jackie herself was killed.

Notes: Burnt vehicle; Destroyed home; Family on video; TRC testimony: Jane Quin (sister); Police photographs; TRC testimony: Philip Quin (father); TRC testimony: Patricia Quin (mother); TRC testimony: Jane Quin

References select each tab to search for references

Hearing Transcripts TRC Final Report TRC Victims Glossary
A South African teacher resident in Lesotho who was shot dead by Vlakplaas operatives during a raid on two houses in Maseru, Lesotho, on 19 December 1985. Her husband was one of eight other people killed, but their infant daughter Phoenix survived. Seven operatives, including the deputy commander ...
She survived an attack on 19 December 1985 in Maseru, Lesotho by Vlakplaas operatives in which both her parents were shot dead. Nine people were killed in the raid, three of whom were citizens of Lesotho. After the attack, the infant Phoenix was abandoned in the house with her dead parents for ...
An MK operative from East London who was shot dead by Vlakplaas operatives during a raid on two houses in Maseru, Lesotho, on 19 December 1985. His wife was one of eight other people killed in the raid, but their infant daughter Phoenix survived. Seven operatives, including the deputy commander of ...
An MK operative from Paarl, Cape, who was shot dead by Vlakplaas operatives in a raid on two houses in Maseru, Lesotho, on 19 December 1985. Nine people were killed in the raid, three of which were citizens of Lesotho. Seven operatives, including the deputy commander of Security Branch ...
The head of MK`s Western Cape military machinery in Lesotho who was shot dead by Vlakplaas operatives in a raid on two houses in Maseru, Lesotho, on 19 December 1985. Nine people were killed in the raid, three of which were citizens of Lesotho. Mr Mayoli was from Guguletu, Cape Town. Five members ...
A citizen of Lesotho who was shot dead by Vlakplaas operatives during a raid on two houses in Maseru, Lesotho, on 19 December 1985. Nine people were killed in the raid, three of them Lesotho citizens. Seven operatives, including the deputy commander of Security Branch Headquarters, the commander of ...
A Lesotho citizen who was shot dead by Vlakplaas operatives during a raid on two houses in Maseru, Lesotho, on 19 December 1985. Nine people were killed in the raid. Three of them were citizens of Lesotho. Seven operatives, including the deputy commander of Security Branch Headquarters, the ...
A citizen of Lesotho who was shot dead by Vlakplaas operatives during a raid on two houses in Maseru, Lesotho, on 19 December 1985. Nine people were killed in the raid, three of them Lesotho citizens. Seven operatives, including the deputy commander of Security Branch Headquarters, the commander of ...
An MK operative from Port Elizabeth who was shot dead by Vlakplaas operatives during a raid on two houses in Maseru, Lesotho, on 19 December 1985. Nine people were killed in the raid, three of them citizens of Lesotho. Six years earlier, in March 1979, Ms Mini had survived an SADF attack on Novo ...
Was shot dead by Vlakplaas operatives during a raid on two houses in Maseru, Lesotho, on 19 December 1985. Nine people were killed in the raid, three of them citizens of Lesotho. Seven operatives, including the deputy commander of Security Branch Headquarters, the commander of the section which ...
Was shot dead by Vlakplaas operatives during a raid on two houses in Maseru, Lesotho, on 19 December 1985. Nine people were killed in the raid, three of them citizens of Lesotho. Seven operatives, including the deputy commander of Security Branch Headquarters, the commander of the section which ...
 
SABC Logo
Broadcasting for Total Citizen Empowerment
DMMA Logo
SABC © 2024
>