TRC Final Report

Volume 5

Chapter 7

Subsection 20

■ TWO NEGLECTED FACTORS

134 It is frequently unremarked that violence is perpetrated mainly by men. While it needs more research, this chapter has dealt with this neglected area above. Two further factors are also often neglected. The first is the place of special organisations, the second the role of secrecy and silence. Taken together, attention to these matters may enhance understanding of particular contexts of atrocities as well as pointing towards possible remedial actions.

Special organisations

135 Surely it is only some people, not others, and then only a relatively small number, who actually committed atrocities in South Africa. One may be tempted back to characterological explanations, but these, as we have seen, generally run into infertile ground. More fertile soil presents itself in the form of special organisations. People join up or are recruited, and are then selectively drawn deeper into the organisational culture in sequential steps of training, specialised allocation and ‘ideological acceleration’. South African history is littered with special groupings of a semi-secretive nature, designed to do either ideological work (the Broederbond) or repressive work, or sometimes both.

136 The military and the police are habitually semi-closed establishments, but within them, given the specialised divisions of labour of modernity, some sections are given even more clandestine tasks: the Bureau of State Security (BOSS), the State Security Council (SSC), the National Security Management System (NSMS), the National Intelligence Service (NIS), Joint Management Centres (JMCs), the Civil Co-operation Bureau (CCB) – a euphemism if ever there was one – Koevoet, Vlakplaas, the Roodeplaat Research Laboratory, the Afrikaner Weerstandsbeweging (AWB), C10, Stratcom and others that may yet be unearthed. On the other side of the struggle, for somewhat different reasons, there were also specialised organisations. Not least of these were the armed wings, such as MK and APLA, as well as SDUs, which also operated in clandestine ways. Special organisations within Inkatha, such as the Caprivi-trained group, as well as numerous township vigilante groups (such as witdoeke), constitute further examples. Within many of these organisations, yet smaller groups were given the task of special operations. According to John Deegan:

… becoming part of the culture … you have the police force culture and the plainclothes culture … and then you have the Special Branch and within the Special Branch you have still smaller and smaller cliques and inner circles and really there is such clandestine stuff.

137 There is appreciable evidence of the involvement of these organisations and special operations groups in atrocities. Further investigation is needed to explore the modus operandi of such special groups: methods of training, recruitment, hierarchical responsibilities, psychological profiles and the like. Until the work of the Amnesty Committee is complete, final conclusions would be premature. The role and place of specialised groupings in murderous deeds remains an important avenue for future research.

Secrecy and silence

138 Secrecy was particularly characteristic of apartheid rule. The massive curtailment of press freedom, restrictions on academic freedom, a considerable increase in censorship, the banning of organisations – all these went hand in hand with secrecy of the security apparatus and even of cabinet and parliamentary procedures. Along with secrecy went silence, and much of the country’s populace was silent, through fear, apathy, indifference or genuine lack of information. Finally, some of the victims were silenced – through death, being killed because they knew too much, or through imprisonment, detention, threats and torture. Collaborators, spies and double agents did their work in secrecy and silence. The silence of the media, the state and collaborators, along with the secrets held inside sequestered special organisations, all helped to jog the terrible process onwards. Much has emerged through the Commission; the amnesty process is still in progress. Yet many secrets and silences remain in various closets.

139 The antidotes are simple and clear. Open, transparent, accountable government should remain a central priority. Academic freedom and freedom of the press should be inviolable principles. Security forces should be prised open; their operations, budgets and methods of training opened to public scrutiny. Non-accountable vigilante groupings should be regarded with suspicion and concern. If atrocities thrive in the soil and climate of silence and secrecy, one must remove the conditions in which they flower. Much has already been effected through the new Constitution. More remains to be done to cultivate a climate favourable to human rights, in all social institutions.