TRC Final Report

Volume 6

Section 1

Chapter 2

Subsection 6

51. There were times when four panels of the Committee sat simultaneously at four different locations, making the scheduling of applications for public hearings a challenging task. Once a hearing was finally scheduled, the chairperson of the Committee assigned a panel consisting of a judge and at least two other members to preside over the hearing. The leader of evidence was then responsible for the following:

a Issuing the necessary notices in terms of section 19(4) of the Act, and informing the applicant, victims and implicated parties of the date and venue at least fourteen days before the hearing.

b Requesting and confirming all logistical requirements and arrangements. As far as was practical and reasonable, the Committee was responsible for providing transport and accommodation for victims.

c Preparing the hearing documentation. This bundle contained all the applications and relevant documentation and could vary from fifty to 500 pages. Copies of these bundles were made available to all the members of the panel of the Committee, applicants, victims and implicated persons.

d Arranging for the services of a legal representative for those applicants and victims who were not legally represented.

e Arranging and conducting a pre-hearing conference with all the legal representatives involved. The purpose of this conference was, amongst other things, to identify and limit the issues, determine matters that were common cause and exchange any documents to be used at the hearing.

52. Once a hearing had been scheduled, it was the task of the Committee’s logistics officers to take care of all the logistical arrangements. The success of a hearing depended to a very large extent on proper logistical arrangements. The logistics officer was normally the first official with whom the applicants, victims, implicated persons, legal representatives and media made contact. Thus apart from performing their logistical responsibilities, logistics officers had to double as public relations officers. Hearings could last anything from three days to eight weeks, and the logistical arrangements normally had to include:

a Securing an appropriate and secure venue for the hearing. In determining a venue, one of the factors that needed to be taken into account was its accessibility to the various parties and the public. In line with the Committee’s decision to allow the community concerned to be part of the hearing, a venue was secured, as far possible, in the area where the incident in question had occurred.

b Taking care of the required security arrangements.

c Taking care of travel, accommodation and catering arrangements for members of the Committee, staff and victims.

d Arranging for interpreting services. Honouring the decision of the Commission that everyone should be allowed to give evidence before the Commission in his/her mother tongue, the Committee made use of interpreters contracted by the Commission. At certain hearings, interpretation into no fewer than six languages was required.

e Arranging for technical assistance for recording the proceedings and operating the simultaneous interpretation system. Bearing in mind that anything between two and four hearings per week took place simultaneously, proper planning was essential to ensure that these services were always available.

f Arranging for telephone, faxing and photocopying facilities.

g Securing the services of ‘briefers’ – qualified mental health workers who were responsible for attending to the emotional well-being of victims for the duration of the hearing. Briefers played an invaluable role in assisting grief-stricken victims and relatives. At times, the demand for these services was so high that logistics officers and evidence leaders had to double as briefers.

h Ensuring that all recordings were submitted to the transcribers for transcribing.

i Submitting a reconciliation of all expenses for audit by the finance department at the completion of the hearing.

53. At its inception, the Committee decided that, as an adjudicative body, it would not issue media statements or give interviews about its work or decisions. It also decided that the Commission’s media department and the Committee’s executive secretary would deal with all communications with the media. The Committee initially had reservations about media coverage of its hearings, especially television coverage. It felt that this might deter people from applying for amnesty or from giving evidence. Concern was also expressed that legal representatives might be tempted to exploit to their advantage the public exposure that television coverage affords .

54. Notwithstanding these concerns, the Committee agreed, albeit reluctantly, that full media coverage would be allowed during hearings, provided that the Committee had the discretion to disallow or halt coverage when it was in the interests of justice to do so.

55. It emerged, however, that the media were to play a very constructive and important role in covering amnesty hearings, and an excellent working relation-ship developed between the media and the Committee. The role of the media in communicating the essence of the amnesty process and involving the public in the proceedings cannot be underestimated; and it must be said that the process was considerably enriched by this contribution.