Special Report Transcript Episode 45, Section 1, Time 00:16

The image of skeletons dug up from secret graves will be one of the strongest visual memories of the Truth and Reconciliation process. And the reburial of these bones serves as a reminder that they belonged to real human beings with sons and daughters and mothers and fathers. Tonight we take you with us to one of these funerals that took place yesterday. There will be many such funerals in the days to come. Apart from four graves dug up near Aliwal North, we’ve heard reports of 40 more bodies in secret graves in the Free State and 18 near Pietersburg. We’ll tell you more about South Africa’s so-called death farms tonight and we look back on the Truth Commission’s first year. The statistics are shocking. In 12 months the Commission recorded 4621 killings. But we go to Durban first for yesterday’s funeral. A month ago nobody knew whether they were dead or alive, members of an Umkhonto we Sizwe cell, the Butterfly Unit: Phila Ndwandwe, Bheki Mkwanazi, Mbova Mzimela. And then five weeks ago the Truth Commission found the bodies; they were thrown in unmarked graves in KwaZulu-Natal. At the same time we have heard of the deaths of two others who had disappeared, Charles Ndaba and Mbuso Tshabalala - members of Operation Vula, the ANC’s ambitious strategy to create an underground military network inside the country. But there are no bodies. Ndaba and Tshabalala were not buried; they were simply dumped in the Tugela river. Yesterday these five ANC cadres were finally laid to rest.

Notes: Max du Preez