DR RAMASHALA
Are you all right Mr Mthamzeli.
MR MTHAMZELI
Ja I am all right.
DR RAMASHALA
Okay.
GAMA MTHAMZELI Duly sworn states
DR RAMASHALA
Chairperson I have been assigned the task of facilitating evidence this case involves the arrest and torture of Mr Gama Mthamzeli at Mossel Bay police station on or about June 17th 1985. I will ask Mr Mthamzeli to tell this in his own words, giving as much detail as is possible so that we can understand what happened. Could you proceed please Mr Mthamzeli.
MR MTHAMZELI
It was 1985, I was at school then, I was still in primary school doing Std 6. I was 15 years old. Policemen came at the school premises, there were three of them, they were seemed to be detectives. They said I am in need in the police station. They tried to hunt me at school, I had to flee - they took me to the police station. When we arrived there, I said nothing, they just put me into a separate room, there was a Coloured, I saw his name Captain - Gerhard Maritz - there was Captain Gerhard Maritz and Captain Jordaan.
They kicked me - after they kicked me asking me to say who burnt down the rent office in Nonqaba. I told them I don’t know who did that, they said I was also involved in that situation so I must tell the truth - they keep on kicking me - beating me with their guns. They said they saw that I am not saying the truth, they took my testicles and my penis - they put them into a drawer, Maritz it was Maritz he put them into a drawer. The Captain stood there in silence, I was 15 years then. They pushed the drawer inside with my testicles and my penis.
After that I had to cry because it was painful they said I must tell the truth, I told them there is nothing I know. They went out, leaving me alone in the room, they came back again and they said no - we been just accusing me. The other member who were also with you, they knew everything so you were also involved.
I told them that I know nothing about their telling me, if you want the truth just - just bring those people to me and you ask us with them. We had - I need the co-accused to come so that we can negotiate, even then they couldn’t - they kept on beating me and they put me into a cell.
I was not sent to a doctor because I was still very young to be beaten up that way. The way I was beaten was not right for a very young child - boy. The way policeman beat me up, it was not a nice thing to one who was watching if that person is already an adult. I stayed detained for 14 days - they took me to the Magistrate Court and I was put in remand. They said I can - they released me, I couldn’t even write the June examinations. I was behind at school because my - my mind was concentrating on this thing, these people who are were assaulting me, I couldn’t manage to go back.
My mother was a high blood patient, my father had sugar diabetes, now that my parents were sick, they were sickly and they were very old. I was there last born and I am still their last born. They said to me the school is your priority and it’s the best future for them, you must go to school and leave the rest.
I couldn’t afford to go to school because of the assaults, they were accusing me of something I didn’t do, some things like public violence at the age of 15. While my parents were so sickly the policemen use to come at home, but they couldn’t find me because I was a soccer player, I use to go out with - with the team when we are going to play out. They throw stones on top of the dak. On - on top of the roof and they - my parents tried to open the stone fell on the bed, on their pillows. I imagined what if the stone fell on one of their heads, that person would have died.
So they said I must go to school even if they did arrest me they will come and tell me as your parents. I was - I was sentences to be beaten seven lashes, because I was very young to be kept in a cell. They couldn’t take me to a doctor to be examined to see whether am I fit to take the sentence. Even the doctor who came to me because at that time I was a fit young boy and then he said no this one can go for a sentence. Those doctors - that doctor was a State doctor - that was the time of the apartheid.
I tried not to go to school when I come back there, because my brothers were sick and my sisters got married and they are looking after their families. The one who was in Lesotho in Maseru, the sister next to me, when she heard about this, she decided to come back - lost his husband - her husband to give support to the family. Because her husband couldn’t take the wife, the wife who was living in her home, so she decided to lose her marriage and her husband to come and look after her parents.
As I am talking to you now, my father has got one leg and they amputated his leg, that was during the time when the boers use come inside their house, a wardrobe fell on his leg, and the leg was swollen as he was a diabetic, so they decided to amputate - they first amputated three toes, as the time goes on, they could see during the ‘90’s that his leg was nog okay, so they decided to amputate before it affected the whole body, because he was a diabetic and my father had pains.
He can’t stand pain, he was - he is very old, he can tolerate any pain. While my father was in hospital on the amputation of his leg, my mother also fell sick because of what was happening to me. Her pressure has risen up, I usually go to court without my parents and I was still very young at the age of 15. I was born in 1969 on the 16th of July. I couldn’t go to the court with my parents, I had to take my aunt with me, because my sisters were also not there.
So my aunt gave me the support because my father was also in hospital. She died of heart attack. After hearing what was happening to me, she died of heart attack, that’s how I loose my mother.
In 1986 I was a part-time worker, there was a project in the location there was a white guy whom we use to call Oubaas, we were working under this guy, he was our employer, I was not at school then. I wanted to support my family because we were studying, I was trying my best, so that we can have shelter, I can supply food to my family. If everything went well I wanted to go back to school, so I tried my best to work.
A friend of mine came in, he stays here in George, his name is Dangiso Dagole, he told me they call me G. He told me that a State of Emergency has been declared so you - you won’t be lucky. I think he won’t survive, and he said how come because I am too young and I am no longer a student. I am working and he told me that’s why I am here, I also escaped from those - from that situation because there is no where else to hide.
I told him that I also had nowhere else to hide, so I advise you go to my employer and ask for a job up until the State of Emergency is over. And then you can go back home to George.
On the 16th of June Maritz came to me with my uncle Michael James, they took me there, I was at work, they beat me with the back of the gun and they also take Dangiso, we were taken and be beaten. I was sent to the prison in Mossel Bay. I was also beaten there, even my ears are still sore. We were beaten there like anything and we were thrown into a van and it was very cold, because it was winter. They took us to George.
We were detained there in George, some stayed there for three months, others for two months, I for one, I couldn’t get out because they said they were still searching, they wanted more evidence about me. If I didn’t get any influence with the students. I stayed there for a long time and I was released on the 6th of November. That’s how my story goes so far.
DR RAMASHALA
Did you say that Michael James was your uncle?
MR MTHAMZELI
Yes he is my uncle.
DR RAMASHALA
He was part of the group of policemen who arrested you?
MR MTHAMZELI
Was he the part? Michael James was an informer, because he became a kitskonstabel in 1987, he was still an informer then. Even 1985 and 1986 he was working in the rent office - in the family affairs. I couldn’t also believe it that my uncle could be an informer.
Policemen were there when these people were beating us, he was not part of the law enforcement people - he was not even a kitskonstabel then.
DR RAMASHALA
In our statement you say that you yourself was accused of being a sell-out by the police.
MR MTHAMZELI
Yes that’s what on he statement - that’s how I was accused of. Those were my co-accused some of them were my friends, some of them believed me - some they didn’t because the boers asked me to say the truth, because the others who are with you have said it already, you are the only one left, as they are using to the others, because Gama had done it, that has - told the truth.
So I think that was there procedure, they didn’t know that they are causing conflict between us, so even today you are still - we haven’t reconciled. Even if is there a social activity they just can’t tell me because we are no longer friends, I will just heard it some time after it had passed, because of what the boers did to us.
I would also like to know - I would also like my friends to know that it was the boers who tried to make this conflicts between us, it was not me, that is their way - that was their procedure of searching for the truth that were - they looking for.
DR RAMASHALA
You were detained for is it 19 days or 14 days?
MR MTHAMZELI
Before I went to court it was 14 days.
DR RAMASHALA
[indistinct] during your detention you say that they used the famous genital torture method, how many times did they do that during your detention?
MR MTHAMZELI
They did that in 1985 by the time they were accusing me of the public violence. It’s the time where they fetched me from school - as they said they were going to ask me some questions, they assaulted me that way.
DR RAMASHALA
Chairperson I will [indistinct] to my colleagues and I may come back for some other questions.
DR ALLY
Gama the first time they arrested you was in 1985 when you were 15 years old and you were accused of burning down the rent office, and cars and that time your punishment was 8 lashes - did you go to court and did they find you guilty, how did they decide on 8 lashes?
MR MTHAMZELI
They decided on this - we did go to court, but we changed the magistrate. It was not one magistrate who was taking control of my case. When we went out for tea time - then I come - we come back, this is not the person on the chair as - as it happened even after lunch, the person on the chair was not the one who was there before the lunch time.
DR ALLY
[indistinct] any lawyers who - a lawyer who was representing you?
MR MTHAMZELI
We had no lawyers then - we tried - the youth organisation tried to get some lawyers, that was late in 1986 that is when I joined [indistinct] so it’s then they tried to get lawyers for us, but in 1985 I had not lawyers, it was me and my co-accused we were not having lawyers.
DR ALLY
So did the State provide any legal representation for you in 1985?
MR MTHAMZELI
No not at all the Government of apartheid didn’t do that - he didn’t have - the Government didn’t have that sympathy. They couldn’t even take the juveniles out and let them come back after some time, so we had no lawyers all in all.
DR ALLY
[indistinct] you ere arrested again, that was the second time under the State of Emergency and your statement says that you were sentenced to nine months imprisonment, what was the charge?
MR MTHAMZELI
I was not accused of anything in 1986 - I was working then I was a part-time worker, they just took me from my work place, I asked the reason and they said no you are going to be detained, because you are well known even in the law enforcement place like police stations. You can’t stay out - you must be detained because you can - you will apply and influence other children.
They had nothing to accuse me of. Even by the time they were trying to take me to the police station, I tried to beg them and told them to ask my employer about my money and my service there so that it cannot be terminated - take it to my parents, more especially my mother was not even a pension - didn’t get any pension fund then, it was only my father, but she was still on the waiting list, that’s why I begged them to talk to my employer.
I told them to talk to my boss, they can do anything as long as they talk to my boss with my financial [indistinct] they couldn’t even do that, even when I went out - when I was released from prison, the project was over and that - the employer was gone.
DR ALLY
[indistinct] I am just going to read something from your statement which I’d like you to - just to explain to me. In your statement you say that:
On the 16th of June they arrested me in terms of the State of Emergency, they hit me with the [indistinct] of the gun in order to me into the Casspir. I was sentenced to nine months imprisonment.
Now were you sentenced to nine months imprisonment or were you detained for nine months?
MR MTHAMZELI
It was - I was detained, it was nine months, it was six months that I was detained of, not nine months imprisonment, six months in detention.
DR ALLY
[indistinct] in 1986 there was never any court case against you.
MR MTHAMZELI
That’s what I am trying to say in 1986 there was no court case, the court case was only in 1985 where I was sentenced to 8 lashes, not in 1986.
DR ALLY
One last point, you say that as a result of the torture, as a result of them jamming your penis in - in a drawer, you can’t have any children. Have you actually had any medical examination done on your to establish that fact.
MR MTHAMZELI
I never get any examination, that’s what I want to do because I think now I am old enough then I was very young, my parents didn’t have money that’s why I couldn’t go there, more especially us blacks.
We couldn’t even get the courage to sit down with your parents and discuss the situations like these, because they were going to ask what am I talking about that’s customary. That’s what I couldn’t - that’s why I couldn’t go to the doctor then, it’s - that’s my aim now, I want to go to the doctor. I am 27 years, next month I will be 27 years full on the 6th of July.
It’s time for me to be in love, I have got three years with this lady this is her third year because we wanted to see whether I could conceived any children. And then I told her not to let her go off the injection so that we can’t have any children. Unfortunately she did, but during then I could - she couldn’t conceive, so that’s why I am doubtfully, that’s why I am doubtfully, I am not sure that I will bear any children in future. So I am worried about that.
I am sure that I won’t have any children, although I haven’t go to the doctor yet, so I would like to go to the doctor and get an examination. I think I do need funds to go there.
DR ALLY
Thank you I am sure that the - the people in the Reparations and Rehabilitation have heard your request and I am sure that they will try and do something about that particular issue.
MS BURTON
Mr Mthamzeli you were detained in Mossel Bay did they keep you in the police station or in prison cells, was there a particular people where people who were detained were held and interrogated?
MR MTHAMZELI
I was in police station - police station cells, after they have assaulted me and tortured me they didn’t put me in prison cells, I was eating half a slice of bread or a quarter with a mug - a big mug - half of it had [indistinct] half of it had coffee. And it was tasteless, you couldn’t even know which kind of coffee is it, even the sugar was not enough.
My parents couldn’t afford to buy me food and brought me something to eat, my friends also didn’t have financial means to help me with food, because they - I was not allowed to get some food where I was.
MS BURTON
[indistinct] was in the police station, police cells?
MR MTHAMZELI
During the six months detention I was in the George Prison where I was with the other prisoners who were sentenced already. Although it was not a nice meal to had for a day, although I had something for my stomach, unlike the one I had in the past.
MS BURTON
We have tried to find some of the records from the police stations from that time, but they are not available, so we would be glad if you could give us the names of people for instance who were in prison with you at the same time, so that we can follow up witnesses statements.
MR MTHAMZELI
I can give you the names.
MS BURTON
And then there is another question that I would like to ask, you referred to Mr Michael James, where is he now and what is he doing now?
MR MTHAMZELI
He is still working in the municipality offices, because he resigned from the - as a kitskonstabel after he finished shooting children, they youth - in 1986. 86/87 he was still a kitskonstabel and then in 1989 he went back to the municipal offices, where he is - he working - he is still there, he is in the location of Nonqaba in Mossel Bay.
I did reconcile with him and he also greets, I don’t have any grudge against him, I am trying to show him that I am in reconciliation with him, the way he was, it was during the apartheid era. I was trying to show the let’s forget about the past - I am not a revengeful person, because I was born with people who had peace.
DR RAMASHALA
Chairperson I want to observe the tragedy in South Africa where some of the doctors - the role they played during the oppression years. Doctors take their Hippocratic oath to save lives, the role they played during the oppressive years, actually certifying people to ensure that they can withstand torture - this is very unfortunate.
Mr Mthamzeli, we would like you to see a doctor, to confirm that your genital torture has actually caused infertility. We thank you for being here, and commend your bravery in describing what’s happened to you. Thank you very much.
MS BURTON
Thank you very much.
MR MTHAMZELI
I also thank you a lot.
