Human Rights Violation Hearings

CHAIRPERSON: I would like to go straight on and call the next witness, Mamsese Mhlongo.

Good morning, Mrs Mhlongo. We are very pleased that you are here to join us. We are sorry it is so cold and you had to wait a long time. Are you okay with the ear-phones?

MRS MHLONGO: Yes, I am okay.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very much. Will you be speaking in English or in Sotho?

MRS MHLONGO: I will try to speak in English.

CHAIRPERSON: It is up to you entirely. Feel free.

MRS MHLONGO: Where I fail, I think I will switch on.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very much. Before you begin, could I ask you, are you prepared to take the oath? If so, could you stand.

MAMSESE MHLONGO: (Duly sworn, states).

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very much. Could I ask also, if you could just identify who is with you?

MRS MHLONGO: That is the - I am Mamsese Mhlongo, I am the deceased's sister, that is Dick Radebe. On my right-hand is my sister, Dick's younger sister.

CHAIRPERSON: Fine.

MRS MHLONGO: I am Dick's elder sister. She is Ruth Radebe.

CHAIRPERSON: Ruth Radebe, fine. We woud like to welcome you as well and thank you for coming. Will you also be

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participating? If you would like to, then could you also take the oath?

RUTH RADEBE: (Duly sworn, states).

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very much. I, myself will lead you in the evidence. If I could explain, Mamsese, you live in Straightview.

MRS MHLONGO: Yes, I live in Straightview.

CHAIRPERSON: Are you actually employed at Anchor School? Do you teach there or are you employed at the school?

MRS MHLONGO: At the high school.

CHAIRPERSON: You are a teacher?

MRS MHLONGO: Yes.

CHAIRPERSON: Well, thanks very much. That's in Umzinhlopi. We are talking about events of 1987, as I understand it, involving Dick Radebe. If you would like to tell us your story in your own time and in your own words. Thank you very much.

MRS MHLONGO: It was on the 16th of July 1987, it was a week before Dick's wedding. He had to take the wife home, to make the last preparations before the wedding. Unfortunately Dick did not return alive. We were made aware that Dick met an accident. We do not believe it was an accident, because there are conflicting statements. Dick's friend does not say anything about the accident. It is a policeman who tell us about the incident. So we were told on the Wednesday, at 12 midnight when he was at his fiancee's home in Ladysmith and then the following morning Dick was supposed to go to Welkom for a - to go and investigat a case, which up to this day we are not sure what the case was about.

He served articles under Priscilla Jana and on two

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occasions he flew to PE to go and make some investigations. We are not sure what the cases were about.

So that morning Dick did not come back home. We phoned Ladysmith, that was Dick's fiancee, to find out where Dick is because he was supposed to go to Welkom.

We also phoned Priscille Jana, to find out if it is possible that Dick left for Welkom without coming home. So Priscilla also, she was also surprised.

My sister phoned, I think the whole morning she did not work, she kept on phoning Ladysmith, that was Dick's fiancee. She asked her to find out what is happening. So she said she phoned the Red Cross, she phoned the hospitals, to find out if there was an accident and Red Cross there was no accident, they know of no accident.

Later we forced her to go to the police station, to go out and look for Dick. So at about six pm on Thursday, she phoned to say Dick is dead, Dick is at the police station in Ladysmith. The following morning at seven o'clock we left for Ladysmith to go and find out if it is really true that Dick is dead. We found him in the police station, at the mortuary. We were with Dick's friends and they went in and they asked us not to go in and see Dick. They wanted us to picture him the way he looked before. So we did not go in.

We asked about the friends and they said the friend is at the hospital. We left for the hospital. We found him. He only had a scratch on the forehead, a minor scratch, but he pretended as if he was, he could not recognise us. So we came back home.

In fact, before coming back home, we had to find out when should we collect Dick's corpse. Then we spoke to Sgt Bekker. Sgt Bekker is the man who was in charge of Dick's

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corpse. He said before we leave we must phone to find out if he is there. When we phoned on Saturday morning, ready to go and collect Dick's corpse, Sgt Bekker was on duty, we must phone on Monday morning to collect the corpse. Monday morning we phoned. My uncle went and collected the corpse. When they arrived there, Dick's head was gashed, as if he was hit with a sharp weapon on the head. But the policeman said to us that the accident was caused by a truck which knocked or it collided with a cow, and then that cow was wandering on the main road. Then the truck did not stop.

CHAIRPERSON: Sorry, can I just - that was a cow?

MRS MHLONGO: The truck did not stop after knocking the cow. From the police we learn apparently, I am quoting the police, that is Mr Pretorius. Because when we went there the second time to find out what actually happened, Van der Berg was transferred to a certain station, and the case was handled by Sgt Pretorius. He said to us apparently, I am quoting him, Dick's car was the tenth and unfortunately for Dick he fell out of the car and he died. So when we questioned where were the other ten, he told us that the ten were standing on the side. They actually saw him come and Dick was driving at a high speed and they could not stop him.

But when we spoke to Wisile Mafalan, I am sorry to mention names, the friend, the friend with whom he was, and he was supposed to be Dick's best man. He said to us when they left Dick's fiancee's home, there were people outside in cars and there is only one entrance from Ladysmith. So somewhere where they took a turn, they actually recognised a car coming from behind. Dick tried to drive fast.

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Unfortunately just before him there was a car which stopped. Then what happened when we asked Mfalane he says I slept. He doesn't tell us what happened. So he tells us nothing about the car.

We tried to ask lawyers to talk to him, friends to talk to him. All he says to us when we left Ladysmith there were cars and that one car followed us, one car stopped from the front and then what happened, I slept.

So nobody was able to force him to talk. Up to this day he is still quiet, he is silent. Dick's fiancee up to this day, she is silent. So we don't know what happened to him. But he is dead.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very much. I mean, it raises all sorts of questions. How do you feel, I mean do you think there is a reason for his silence? What do you think, why the silence?

MRS MHLONGO: Initially I thought he was scared of talking, because I have a suspicion that Dick was killed by the police. So he was threatened. In fact, they were both threatened, because not one of them has ever opened their mouths, up to today. So ...

CHAIRPERSON: You mean the fiancee as well?

MRS MHLONGO: Well, and the friend.

CHAIRPERSON: You mention in your initial statement, you said that when Sgt Pretorius spoke to you and described what had happened, that he was laughing. Is this why you feel that they might be involved?

MRS MHLONGO: Yes, I feel very much that they are involved because we went to the police station after the burial, to go and find out. So we met Sgt Pretorius. We got into the police station, a certain room where there are pictures

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right round, pictures taken of different accidents. He showed us one cow which is alive. He said to us this is the cow that killed your brother. He showed us another picture where it was flat, you could only see the skin. He said this is what happened when your brother died, this is how the cow looked like, after the ten cars went on it, drove over it. So he was actually laughing and he wasn't serious at all.

CHAIRPERSON: You mean if ...

MRS MHLONGO: We asked for a death certificate and a ...

CHAIRPERSON: Post-mortem or ...

MRS MHLONGO: Post mortem, yes. We asked for a post-mortem and the death certificate. We don't have that up to today. He promised that after the investigation we will get the post-mortem certificate.

CHAIRPERSON: So you haven't had the certificate. Was there an inquest?

MRS MHLONGO: There was an inquest. We were asked to go and right affidavits. My sister is one of the people who had to write an affidavit. Dick's fiancee had to write and the friends and my cousin, who went to collect his car. So the two affidavits, that is Dick's fiancee's affidavit and the friend's affidavit, never reached the magistrate. When we questioned. We went to Dick's friend's home to go and find out why didn't he write the affidavit. He said he wrote two of them. He took them to Orlando police station. He doesn't know why they didn't why they didn't reach Natal.

We asked Dick's fiancee why didn't she write an affidavit. She said to us she is not above the law. If the police said to her she mustn't, she could not write it.

CHAIRPERSON: So she actually admitted that the police had

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told her not to?

MRS MHLONGO: Yes.

CHAIRPERSON: Could you just tell us a little bit about - you mentioned that he was going to investigate cases. You said in your statement, you described him as a political activist and said that he was involved in particular sorts of cases. Could you describe that a little for us.

MRS MHLONGO: Dick served articles under Priscilla Janna and on two occasions he flew to PE. I am not certain what the cases were about. The morning when he was killed, there was a case in Welkom which he had to go and investigate.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you. Before asking my lawyer colleague here to ask you some more questions. Ruth, would you like to say something now as well?

MS RADEBE: I would like to say Dick wasn't killed by an accident, he was murdered, because the car he was driving in didn't have a dent. When we went down to Natal to go and identify the corpse, the car had no dent on it and it had white seats, which didn't have a drop of blood on it. So it looked as if he was pulled out of the car and he had deep gashes on the head and on the neck. The neck was wide open here. So Dick wasn't killed by an accident When we went down for an inquest, those policemen took out photos to show us the cow which was alive. I asked them a question, why did they take that picture of a cow which was alive. They anticipated the accident. Did they anticipate that Dick was going to be killed by this cow when they took the photo of the cow which was alive. They couldn't answer me.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you.

MS RADEBE: So between the police and also I had an opportunity of talking to the guy which was his best friend,

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and asked him what killed Dick. So he told me why shouldn't I ask my sister-in-law, because they both know what killed Dick. That was Dick's friend. He and his fiancee, they both know. So we couldn't ask Dick's fiancee, because already she had an attitude.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you. Could I just confirm. This police station that you are referring to, where Sgt Burger and Sgt Pretorius were, that was the Harrismith police station?

MRS MHLONGO: Yes.

CHAIRPERSON: Could I at this stage ask Yasmin, as the lawyer amongst us, to carry on.

MS SOOKA: I just want to check something. You say that you were shown a photograph of a car that had been flattened. But that was not the car that Dick was driving in?

MRS MHLONGO: Not the car, the dead cow.

MS SOOKA: The dead cow?

MRS MHLONGO: We were shown the photographs of the cow whilst still alive and when it died, when it was actually lying on the road.

MS SOOKA: Okay. Dick's car, were you given an opportunity to have a look at it, what actually happened to it, once the accident had taken place?

MS RADEBE: Yes, my cousin went down actually to get the car back home. The car didn't have a dent but we couldn't drive the car back home. So when we were shown this is where Dick died and his car collapsed after the accident. It overturned after the accident, when it on top of the cow it overturned, but it didn't have any damage, it didn't have anything. Only the back wheels were done something, so that it couldn't move.

MS SOOKA: You said that Dick, it is impossible for Dick to

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have flown out of the sun roof. Was that because he was very big or ...?

MRS MHLONGO: It is not possible that Dick flew out of the top roof. I don't see how he could fly out of the top roof, especially that the friend said nothing about it. I think he should have indicated something of that sort, to say this is what happened to Dick.

MS SOOKA: Did Dick's employer try to investigate the matter?

MRS MHLONGO: She is one of the first people we asked to investigate, to call Dick's friend to the office and talk to him. She called him and she said that he was shivering throughout and he says nothing. The last words he said is "I slept", meaning that he saw nothing at all.

MS SOOKA: The friend and Dick's fiancee, what do they do, are they lawyers as well?

MS RADEBE: No.

MRS MHLONGO: They are at school together from high school, they went to Fort Hare. They were employed in the same company. They enrolled with (indistinct) and they were good friends. Whenever there was something they would be together. That is why he was supposed to have been Dick's best friend.

MS SOOKA: The fiancee?

MRS MHLONGO: The fiancee, they were at school together, they met at school. They have been together for some time before actually engaging for marriage. She did accounts. The fiancee did accounts and then the friend did the same course with Dick, BA Law and then LL.B.

MS SOOKA: Did Dick's employer ever come back to you to tell you she had been able to discover anything or did the police SOWETO HEARING TRC/GAUTENG

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ever come back to you?

MRS MHLONGO: Nobody has ever come to us, come back to us, no one.

MS SOOKA: And nobody ever came back to tell you what happened about the car either?

MRS MHLONGO: No, we reported the car and we asked to look for it. In fact, we spent almost three hours running around from one point to the other, going to the scrapyards, to the police stations, trying to find the car. No one has ever come back to say or find out how far have you got with the investigation.

MS SOOKA: Do you remember what the make of the car was and what the registration was?

MRS MHLONGO: I don't remember the registration but it was a Golf, a white Golf, an '83 model.

MS SOOKA: You didn't get your own doctor to be present during the post-mortem?

MRS MHLONGO: Yes, it is unfortunate that when we received Dick's, I mean, the - when we were told that Dick was dead, we just couldn't think, we were all disappointed, we are all, I cannot describe how we felt. And I think during the process no one amongst us, the families, gave us that idea of finding our own doctor to investigate. Even after we realised that this is not an accident, we actually saw him and we realised that this cannot be an accident, but we couldn't think about finding our own doctor.

MS SOOKA: I see in your statement that you say that Famasele was also questioned by attorney Mophoso, was he your attorney?

MRS MHLONGO: Mophoso, yes, Mophoso is my cousin, my aunt's son. He came to help us. He also helped us to find an

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attorney, Monks from Durban.

MS SOOKA: Do you still have any particulars about the attorney who helped you?

MRS MHLONGO: We have, we have all the particulars, we have letters. One of the letters he wrote, when we went for the inquest, Monks was there with us, where he actually asked the magistrate how come you know the names, the addresses of the people, the witnesses, because he actually told us that when Dick overturned, there were 13 witnesses and all the 13 witnesses he has their names and addresses, but they don't seem to be real people. They are just fake names.

MS SOOKA: I think that if we were to have a look at this matter, obviously we would need to look at the record in your possession. I think you should make that available to us.

MRS MHLONGO: I have them right now, in the car, in the boot of my car. I could fetch it.

MS SOOKA: I think once the - one of our briefers could possibly get them from you and make photocopies. They will be useful for us to take it over.

MRS MHLONGO: Okay.

MS SOOKA: Thank you.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you, Commissioner Sooka. Hlengiwe?

Tom?

MR MANTHATA: Did you ever have an idea - did you ever have knowledge of the kind of case that Dick was still tracing at the time?

MRS MHLONGO: We have no knowledge of the kind of case. All we know is he flew twice to PE to investigate cases. We are not sure what those cases are. He was working for a civil rights lawyer, who is Priscilla Janna. So we think it was

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civil rights cases.

MR MANTHATA: And then from the lawyer, you never got to know the names of the people that Dick's cases he was following?

MRS MHLONGO: We have never made that attempt to find out from Priscilla Jana.

MR MANTHATA: Is the friend, Mafalala, a practising lawyer?

MRS MHLONGO: No, he didn't complete his LL.B, he is not practising as a lawyer.

MR MANTHATA: When last did you have the assistance of Priscilla Janna in this case?

MRS MHLONGO: In July, when we immediately heard about Dick's death. We went to his office to go and find out about the cases Dick was investigating. I don't remember her telling us what the cases were. All she said to us was she doesn't believe the cases could be the cause of Dick's death and that's where it ended. It was in July when we buried him in July 1987, the 25th.

MR MANTHATA: Had Dick before this case, had any brushes with the police?

MRS MHLONGO: I suspect the only time he had brushes with the police is when he defended cases. Because he had some cases in Protea. I remember, I think once or twice he went to Protea. He was serving articles, I think he was sent for investigation.

MR MANTHATA: Did he never have cases in Harrismith?

MRS MHLONGO: No, not to our knowledge.

MR MANTHATA: Thank you.

CHAIRPERSON: Mamsese and Ruth, I would like to thank you both very much for coming. I would like to commend you for, I think for the clarity that you have used in presenting

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this very complicated story to us, and the courage that you have shown obviously in again, a case of feeling that you don't know what has happened. You feel that something has gone wrong and needing to get to the bottom of it. We as the Commission will do what we can to help with that investigation and we would like to again offer our condolences and thank you for coming. Thank you very much.

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