ADV POTGIETER
Let me just check with you Mr Lengs, do you hear the translation through the headphones.
MR LENGS
Yes.
ADV POTGIETER
Okay, well good afternoon and welcome here, is it your wife that’s accompanying you - sitting next to you.
MR LENGS
Yes it is my wife.
ADV POTGIETER
Well welcome to you as well Ms Lengs. Before we deal with your evidence, you will have to take the oath, so I am going to ask you Mr Lengs just to - just Mr Lengs to get up please.
TUTU PHILLIP LENGS Duly sworn states
ADV POTGIETER
Thank you very much you can sit down. Mr Lengs my colleague Pumla Gobodo will assist you with giving your evidence and I hand over to her now.
MS GOBODO-MADIKIZELA
Thank you Chairperson. You have come to tell us about how a group of people called NKATHA assaulted you, shot at you. We’ve had similar stories before this morning and in the past and it seems to us that the police worked in collaboration with a number of people to suppress anti apartheid activism not only in Ashton in the Boland, but in many other parts as well.
We’ve also heard how sometimes in fact very often people when they wanted to know - to find explanation to the type of things that happened to them and their loved ones, how the Courts were never helpful instead we heard how the Courts tendered to be on the side of those who perpetrated the crimes.
We’ve also heard how police worked in communities, within communities to split communities and create opponents within communities using members of the community to hate fellow compatriots, fellow members of the community. It’s very sad that this has taken place in our country and we understand how difficult it is for you and others to live among people who were perpetrators and working with the police. We ask you to help us to understand what has happened to you through the actions of those people called Incatha. In the beginning we ask you to tell us that those people known as Incatha, what were they doing
MR LENGS
Those people who were known as Incatha were people who beat others in the township even if you’d done nothing, you were beaten. I you were just sitting there and doing nothing they would get angry and beat you. Those were the people known as Incatha. They were helping the police to oppress us and to beat us and there was nothing that we could do in return.
MS GOBODO-MADIKIZELA
In other words those people known as Inchata were working together with the police?
MR LENGS
That name suited them, this Incatha because they were people who worked with the police to oppress us. So this connection between Incatha and Buthalezi and the youth comrades was that it was seen that those people were working on the side of the police against the comrades.
MS GOBODO-MADIKIZELA
Those people known as Incatha, were those people also known as vigilantes?
MR LENGS
Yes those were the very people known as vigilantes, those people who beat others.
MS GOBODO-MADIKIZELA
So sometimes they were known as Incatha and sometimes they were known as vigilantes. We would ask you Tata Lengs to tell us exactly what happened.
STATEMENT FROM WITNESS
I was sitting at home in my house at no 17 Majola Street her in Zolani when the police and NKATHA came into my house. In the house were my friends Abe and Msimeleli who is the neighbour. Also in the house was my wife Agnes and Mgcina, who was a young man then. It was during December 1985 when we were sitting and enjoying ourselves with some beers on the table. It was in the evening when two police vans stopped and parked in front of house facing each other. Two policemen walked in, it was a Coloured and a white guy.
Although I forgot their names the Coloured boy/policeman, I know him and his family from Bonnievale. The white policeman, I knew him before he was a policeman, as a speed/traffic cop/officer in Montagu. Both of them came as policemen from Montagu. As they were walking inside the house there were people walking behind the two policemen.
At the time there were people in Zolani that were state vigilantes, working hand in hand with the police. Their role was to beat the people in the community who were against the police or the Government structures at that time. These people were called or known as NKATHA who were only here to suppress the comrades/oumagabane in Zolani.
Apparently there were the people who were behind the policemen. The only people I can remember from NKATHA since they came from my community were: Watu Matroos and Kokoloi. Matroos are brothers from Zolani. Then there’s Phani Klaas and Lusizi Klaas who were relatives. They were all inside my house during the beating. I cannot remember the names of the others who were outside. They were carrying knobkieries with big heads in their hands.
Lusizi told Mgecini to go away because he did not belong in the house. Mgcini resisted but they forced him out of the house. When Lusizi came back he came straight to me and grabbed me by the chest and I did the same thing to him. Others came to help and overpowered me by beating me severely with he knobkieries on the head and on my arms and everywhere so as to knock me down. The two policemen did nothing to stop this, they only watched and enjoyed themselves. At the time I was loosing power and I think I was becoming unconscious because I could not remember anything afterwards. But what I could remember is when they beat me on my back against my waist, that was when I thought I was paralysed.
They actually beat me from inside the house and it moved out of the house on the stoep in front of the doorway. Seemingly after they thought I was helpless and unconscious they left me there. They further took my wife and Abe and put them into the police van. I do not remember when they came back. When I regained consciousness it was in the middle of the night and it was very quite outside. There was no-one. I thought I was paralysed because I could not make a move or stand up.
Fortunately a friend from around Msimelelo and a woman in the neighbourhood came to help me because there was no-one in the house. Only the children were inside the house but they were already sleeping at the time of the beatings. So they organised transport for me to go to the hospital in Montagu. At that time I was bleeding from the head, my joints were loose and my back was painful. At the hospital they stitched me on the head only and sent me back home. I was critical in the sense that my bones were paining and giving me problems at that time. Another problem I had was urinary in that my system was uncomfortable to an extent that my urine just came out at any moment.
I was helped by the MAG [Montagu, Ashton Gemeenskap] project by a person by the name of Dawie Bosch who was part of this project. Their task was to help the victims at that time. Dawie Bosch took me to Dr Beyers in Ashton who had his private surgery there. Dr Beyers tried to examine me and give me some necessary injections. He then referred me back to Montagu Hospital for X-rays. I brought them [X-rays] back to him. Through the X-rays Dr Beyers discovered that the bone at the back in my waist was damaged by the beatings.
However, I must mention that Dr Beyers was a very hard doctor, he was not co-operating voluntarily. He had to be forced by Dawie Bosch and another guy whom I think was Mr Marc from MAG, in order to realise that my health situation was in a critical condition. For instance although he discovered these things he never did anything practical. He only gave me pain tablets. Dr Beyers was not helpful and he only did this for a day or two.
After that I had to find doctors on my own. Further than this Dawie Bosch of MAG took me to the police to report the case because the police did not take statements from victims of NKATHA/police. So Dawie had to use his powers and influence to report the matter to the police station in Ashton.
I therefore gave my statement which I had already given to Dawie. So this written statement was given to Hansen in order to read it, sign it and do something about it. Hansen was like a head of the police station at Ashton. The response I got was that my case had been dismissed and it was signed by the Station Commander WH de la Querre dated 1986/07/09. In fact before I got this letter from Ashton Station Commander, I had already received a letter from Dawie Bosch that my statement was not considered. After that there was a total silence about my case.
At the time the situation had not changed in Zolani. People were daily beaten by NKATHA and policemen from Ashton and Montagu. In 1995 I gave another statement to the Trauma Centre in Zolani.
REPORT OF THE INVESTIGATIVE UNIT
Investigators interviewed this victim at his work address in Ashton. He stated that he was at home in December 1985. Two police vans allegedly stopped in front of his house two policeman came towards his house, followed by other people known as NKATHA. [Note this may refer to the vigilante group known as Amasolomzi or to the Municipal Police]
He named the following people as being members of the Inkatha Group:
Watu MatroosKokoloyi MatroosPhani KlaasLusizi Klaas These people entered his house, Lusizi grabbed the victim’s chest and he and the other aforementioned people severely beat the victim with knobkieries. The two white policemen did not respond. He was left unconscious by these people.
Investigators asked the victim if he knew why the police had come to his house. He stated that he was one of the only people in the community who had a television and many people came to his house regularly to watch TV. He suspected that the police thought he may be having meetings at his house.
Investigators attempted to retrieve relevant documents from the Ashton police station but found that these documents had been destroyed.
Investigators attempted to retrieve medical records from the Montagu Hospital but found that these records had also been destroyed. Investigators will attempt to retrieve records from the Montagu Ashton Gemeenskap Diens but it is not certain whether any records will be found.
RESEARCH NOTES
Mr Tutu Phillip Lengs was one of the people who filed an affidavit in January 1986 in a bid to apply for a Court interdict to restrain Amasolomzi from assaulting Zolani residents. In his affidavit, he related events of assault by Amasolomzi that took place on him and his family between 7th and 21st December 1985. In those incidents, Mr Lengs mentioned the following names of Amasolomzi and policemen as people who assaulted him and his family:
Watu Willie MatroosWilliam Sizi KlaasStanford Kokoloi MatroosJan Solomons [a policeman]Laing [a policeman from Ashton police station]A tall white policeman from MontaguShort man PhaniMatsobi George JonasADV POTGIETER:
Thank you Pumla - I just want to ascertain whether my colleague Ms Wildschut has got any questions that she wants to put to you Mr Lengs.
Glenda Wildschut.
MS WILDSCHUT
Mr Lengs I just have one question for you and that is to find out whether you have had any special tests whether the doctors did any special tests after you were discharged from hospital, till today, have you had any special tests done on you?
MR LENGS
No there were no special tests except that I got pills on that day from Beyers and Bos, I got pills on that day and that was all.
MS WILDSCHUT
And do you know what type of tablets those were?
MR LENGS
No they were just ordinary tablets, they were pink in colour.
MS WILDSCHUT
Okay, so you - you don’t know exactly what is the cause of these pains that you are having now, the pains in your joints?
MR LENGS
Ever since I was beaten those pains are there. I’d been beaten on the kidneys and ever since then I’ve had these pains and I’ve never received treatment for it.
MS WILDSCHUT
Thank you very much Mr Lengs.
ADV POTGIETER
I would just like to enquire from Ms Lengs on the instruction of my colleague, request of my colleague Ms Gobodo, whether you - you wish to say anything, add anything to the evidence, because if so, then I am going o have to ask you to take the oath as well.
MRS LENGS
I’m sorry there’s nothing I’d like to say, he’s said everything because his sickness that he’s got ever since the day he was beaten, he’d just go to work for 2 or 3 days, there’s nothing he can do. He doesn’t have a permanent job and yet he is still supporting his kids who are still at school, thank you.
ADV POTGIETER
Ms Lengs thank you very much as well for - for that statement, I’ll just check if there is anything else that my colleagues want to clarify before I finish off.
Okay, Mr and Ms Lengs we must thank you for coming waiting until the afternoon to share your story with us, with the Commission and with the people who are here. It’s a story that we have - or a circumstance I should say that we’ve heard often today, which prevailed in Zolani. We’ve heard a lot of witnesses speaking today about the conflict which existed there between the vigilante’s, Amasolomzi and a section of the community.
We are surprised that an innocent activity like watching TV can spark off an incident like the one that you have testified about, that’s the only possible explanation that you can think of for the viscous attack that was launched on you. We have noted your request, we have limited capacity and limited means as a Commission, but we will certainly seriously consider your evidence and your request and see if there is anyway in which we can somehow try to help you to ease the pain that you obviously still have, which we have witnessed this afternoon.
But to both of you, thank you very much and go well.
