Pursuit of truth and reconciliation in South Africa

Africa Today

Volumn 45, Issue 1, 1998, Pages 103-134

  Graybill, Lyn S ^a  

^a NONE

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EID: 0032361672     PISSN: 00019887     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
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References (165)

1. "Debates of the National Assembly" (16-18 May 1995), second session, First Parliament (Cape Town, South Africa: The Government Printer, 1995).
2. Reinhold Niebuhr, The Nature and Destiny of Man (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1964), p. 254.
3. See Patricia Hayner, "Fifteen Truth Commissions - 1974-1993: A Comparative Study," in Neil Kritz, ed., Transitional Justice: General Considerations, vol. 1 (Washington, D.C.: United States Institute of Peace, 1995), pp. 225-261.
4. Books on the proceedings were subsequently published. See Alex Boraine, Janet Levy, and Ronel Scheffer, eds., Dealing with the Past: Truth and Reconciliation in South Africa (Cape Town: IDASA, 1994); and Alex Boraine, Janet Levy, and Kader Asmal, eds., The Healing of a Nation? (Cape Town: Justice in Transition, 1995).
5. Books on the proceedings were subsequently published. See Alex Boraine, Janet Levy, and Ronel Scheffer, eds., Dealing with the Past: Truth and Reconciliation in South Africa (Cape Town: IDASA, 1994); and Alex Boraine, Janet Levy, and Kader Asmal, eds., The Healing of a Nation? (Cape Town: Justice in Transition, 1995).
6. Peter Storey, "A Different Kind of Justice: Truth and Reconciliation in South Africa," The Christian Century 114, no. 25 (10-17 September 1997): 788.
7. Donald Shriver, An Ethic for Enemies: Forgiveness in Politics (New York: Oxford University Press, 1995), pp. 80-83.
8. Jamal Benomar, "Justice After Transition," Journal of Democracy 4, no. 1 (January 1993): 3-14.
9. John Stremlau, A House No Longer Divided: Progress and Prospects for Democratic Peace in South Africa (New York: Carnegie Corporation of New York, 1997), p. 21.
10. Hayner, "Fifteen Truth Commissions," p. 248.
11. Hayner believes that timing is of the essence when setting up truth commissions. If initiated by a new president overseeing a fundamentally unchanged military, for example, the initial weeks or months of the administration (when presidential power is strongest) may be the only chance to establish a truth commission. Ibid., p. 249.
12. Having an explicit time limit written into a commission's mandate bodes well for its success. Although the time frame of two years is longer than the average (six to nine months), setting a limit on its existence is valuable. See Hayner, "Fifteen Truth Commissions," p. 259; Boraine, Levy, and Asmal, The Healing of a Nation? p. 139.
13. Recent amendments to the act require the TRC to complete its outstanding work by 30 April 1998, except for the Amnesty Committee, which will have until 30 June 1998.
14. Promotion of National Unity and Reconciliation Act (Number 34 of 1995), Section 1.
15. Ibid., Section 3.
16. Ibid., Section 20.
17. Ibid., Section 20.
18. South African Press Association (SAPA), "Malan Admits Setting Up CCB, Ordering Raids" (7 May 1997).
19. Ibid.
20. SAPA, "NG Church Decides Against Submission to Truth Commission" (30 October 1996); "NG Church Confesses to Mistakes During Apartheid Years" (5 August 1997) . "NG" refers to the Nederduits Gereformeerde Kerk or Dutch Reformed Church.
21. SAPA, "NG Church Decides Against Submission to Truth Commission" (30 October 1996); "NG Church Confesses to Mistakes During Apartheid Years" (5 August 1997) . "NG" refers to the Nederduits Gereformeerde Kerk or Dutch Reformed Church.
22. SAPA, "FW Apologises for Apartheid but Denies Sanctioning Assassinations" (21 August 1996).
23. Transcript of the National Party Recall in Cape Town (14 May 1997).
24. Transcript of the ANC Statement to the TRC (August 1996).
25. Transcript of the ANC Party Political Recall in Cape Town (12-13 May 1997).
26. The ANC insisted, however, that the attack did not contradict the ANC policy of avoiding civilian casualties, faulting instead the government for placing strategic installations in high-density civilian areas.
27. Eddie Koch, "Military 'Third Force' Walks Free," Mail & Guardian (16-22 May 1997).
28. Ibid.
29. SAPA, "We Never Sanctioned Violence, IFP Leaders Tell TRC" (5 September 1996).
30. SAPA, "Buthelezi Accuses Tutu of Theatrics" (9 May 1997).
31. SAPA, "Targeting White Civilians Was Never Official PAC Policy: Makwetu" (20 August 1996).
32. National Party press release, statement by Sheila Camerer, chief spokesperson on justice, "National Party Distances Itself from the TRC's Activities" (28 July 1997).
33. TRC press release, "TRC Statement - Settlement with NP" (22 September 1997).
34. SAPA, "No Peace Until ANC, IFP Leaders Reconcile: Buthelezi" (5 September 1996).
35. Fewer than 100 IFP members met the 10 May 1997 deadline for amnesty.
36. SAPA, "IFP Asks for TRC Probe" (14 August 1997).
37. Boraine, Levy, and Scheffer, Dealing with the Past, p. 67.
38. Ibid., p. 29.
39. SAPA, "Cabinet to Discuss Extending Amnesty Cut-Off Date" (25 October 1996).
40. SAPA, "TRC Members Not Morally Neutral: Tutu" (7 March 1997).
41. Apparently the ANC failed to recognize the traditional distinction made in Just War theory between jus ad bello (justice of war) and jus in bello (justice in war). The ANC's position led to a debate on Just War theory in South Africa sponsored by the Western Cape office of the TRC on 6 May 1997.
42. SAPA, "TRC Members Not Morally Neutral: Tutu" (7 March 1997).
43. Storey, "A Different Kind of Justice," p. 793.
44. Roughly one-third come from the church, one-third from the physical and mental health professions, and one-third from the legal system.
45. Boraine was also a Progressive Federal Party leader in Parliament, but resigned to set up the Institute for Democracy in South Africa (IDASA). It is no exaggeration to say that Boraine, more than any other single individual, is responsible for South Africa's TRC. In addition to forming the IDASA offshoot that planned the 1994 conferences on "Justice in Transition" that debated the need for a truth commission, he worked closely with the minister of justice, Dullah Omar, to prepare the legislation for Parliament.
46. Storey, "A Different Kind of Justice," p. 793.
47. TRC press release, "Archbishop Desmond Tutu's Address to the First Gathering of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission" (16 December 1995).
48. Ibid.
49. Ibid.
50. John de Gruchy, "Redeeming the Past in South Africa: The Power of Truth, Forgiveness, and Hope in the Pursuit of Justice and Reconciliation," paper presented at Deutscher Evangelischer Kirchentag, Leipzig, Germany, June 1997.
51. Fault Lines Conference, Cape Town, 4-5 July 1996.
52. Statement by Marius Schoon, whose wife and daughter were murdered by the explosion of a parcel bomb that was sent to his wife, Jeanette Schoon, in Lubango, Angola, where she was teaching at a branch of the national university. Cited by Charles Villa-Vicencio, "The Road to Reconciliation," Sojourners 26, no. 3 (May-June 1997), p. 36.
53. Seventy-seven percent of South Africans identify themselves as Christians.
54. See T. Dunbar Moodie, The Rise of Afrikanerdom: Power, Apartheid and the Afrikaner Civil Religion (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1975); William A. de Klerk, The Puritans in Africa: The History of Afrikanerdom (London: Rex Collings, 1975): and J. Alton Templin. Ideology on a Frontier: The Theological Foundation of Afrikaner Nationalism, 1652-1910 (Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1984).
55. See T. Dunbar Moodie, The Rise of Afrikanerdom: Power, Apartheid and the Afrikaner Civil Religion (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1975); William A. de Klerk, The Puritans in Africa: The History of Afrikanerdom (London: Rex Collings, 1975): and J. Alton Templin. Ideology on a Frontier: The Theological Foundation of Afrikaner Nationalism, 1652-1910 (Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1984).
56. See T. Dunbar Moodie, The Rise of Afrikanerdom: Power, Apartheid and the Afrikaner Civil Religion (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1975); William A. de Klerk, The Puritans in Africa: The History of Afrikanerdom (London: Rex Collings, 1975): and J. Alton Templin. Ideology on a Frontier: The Theological Foundation of Afrikaner Nationalism, 1652-1910 (Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1984).
57. See Lyn Graybill, Religion and Resistance Politics in South Africa (Westport, Conn.: Praeger, 1995).
58. Gerald West, "Don't Stand on My Story: The Truth and Reconciliation Commission, Intellectuals, Genre and Identity," Journal of Theology for Southern Africa 98 (1997): 10.
59. James Cochrane and Gerald West, "War, Remembrance and Reconstruction," Journal of Theology for Southern Africa 84 (1993): 25-40.
60. H. Russel Botman, "Narrative Challenges in a Situation of Transition," in H. Russel Botman and Robin M. Petersen, eds., To Remember and to Heal: Theological and Psychological Reflections on Truth and Reconciliation (Cape Town, Pretoria, and Johannesburg: Human and Rousseau, 1996). p. 39.
61. H. Richard Niebuhr, cited in Dirkie Smit, "Confession-Guilt-Truth-And-Forgiveness in the Christian Tradition," in Botman and Petersen, To Remember and to Heal, p. 98.
62. Shriver, An Ethic for Enemies, p. 7.
63. Ibid.
64. To the critics, it should be pointed out that the ideas of storytelling, remembering the past, confession, and reconciliation are not uniquely Christian concepts but are precepts that come from other faith perspectives and African traditions as well as various schools of psychology.
65. H. Russel Botman, "Pastoral Care and Counselling in Truth and Reconciliation: Types and Forms of Pastoral Work," in Botman and Petersen, To Remember and to Heal; pp. 155-157.
66. Etienne de Villiers, "The Challenge to the Afrikaans Churches," in Botman and Petersen, To Remember and to Heal, p. 151.
67. SAPA, "Churches Slam Indifference of Whites" (30 December 1996).
68. SAPA, "SA Churches Must Confess to Shortcomings, Says Tutu" (17 November 1997).
69. SAPA, "We Were Misled, Church Tells TRC" (17 November 1997).
70. SAPA, "Chief Rabbi Supports SA Wealth Tax" (18 November 1997).
71. SAPA, "SA Churches Were Not United Against Apartheid, SACC Tells TRC" (17 November 1997).
72. Ibid.
73. Ibid.
74. SAPA, "DRC Focuses on Reconciliation in TRC Submissions" (19 November 1997).
75. Fiona Ross, "Existing in Secret Places: Women's Testimony in the First Five Weeks of Public Hearings of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission," paper presented at the Fault Lines Conference, Cape Town, 4-5 July 1996.
76. SAPA, "Women to Testify on Abuse Before TRC" (6 August 1996).
77. TRC press release, "Special Hearings for Women" (15 August 1996).
78. SAPA, "Women to Give Testimony of Abuses at Truth Hearing in Joburg" (24 July 1997).
79. TRC press release, "TRC Focus on the Role of Children and Youth" (3 June 1997).
80. SAPA, "TRC Cannot Afford to Leave Children Out" (2 February 1997).
81. SAPA, "First TRC Children's Hearing to Be Heard in Durban" (7 May 1997).
82. SAPA, "2,267 Children Killed in Political Unrest Between 1960 and 1994" (12 June 1997).
83. SAPA, "Emotional Wreath-Laying at Hector Petersen's Grave" (11 June 1997).
84. "South Africa: Threats to a New Democracy." Human Rights Watch/Africa 7, no. 3 (May 1995).
85. Tina Rosenberg argues that Mandela's government was so popular that it probably could have reversed the constitutional provision of amnesty but chose not to because its leaders genuinely believed in reconciliation. See Tina Rosenberg, "Recovering from Apartheid," New Yorker 72, no. 35 (18 November 1996): 91.
86. Mark Gevisser, "Truth and Reconciliation: Can South Africa Face Its Past?" The Nation 260, no. 25 (26 June 1995): 920-921.
87. SAPA, "Amnesty Application Deadline Extended to September 30" (1 September 1997).
88. The Promotion of National Unity and Reconciliation Act (Number 34 of 1995), Section 20.
89. Ibid.
90. "Amnesty Committee Expands," Truth Talk 3, no. 1 (November 1997): 4.
91. TRC press release, "Amnesty Granted to 43 People" (28 November 1997). These were cases that were decided without public hearings because they did not involve gross human rights abuses and so could be handled quickly.
92. Mokgatle had been appointed by Bophuthatswana president Lucas Mangope to be chairman of the Tribal Council for the Bafokeng tribe, who rejected the regime's program of incorporating them into the Bophuthatswana homeland. The cases were heard on 20-21 May 1996 and were decided on 30 August 1996.
93. TRC press release, "The Decision and Reasons of the Amnesty Committee in the Matter of Boy Diale and Christopher Makgale" (30 August 1996).
94. TRC press release, "Decision and Reasons Therefore in the Matter of Johan Van Eck (First Applicant) and Hendrik Gerber (Second Applicant)" (2 September 1996).
95. TRC press release, "Application #2586/96-Applicant: Brian Mitchell: Decision and Reasons, Therefore" (10 December 1996).
96. Ibid.
97. SAPA, "Amnesty Will Cause Heartbreak" (11 December 1996).
98. Ibid.
99. Ibid.
100. Realizing it would be unable to meet the December 1997 deadline when the commission's mandate expired, the TRC requested that Parliament increase the size of its five-member committee to thirteen (later increased to nineteen) to speed up the processing of applications. With additional members the committee could hold continuous public hearings or sit simultaneously in different parts ot the country.
101. He has admitted to, among other things, bombing the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) headquarters in 1987; bombing ANC headquarters in London in 1982: participating in bombing raids on Botswana in 1985 and 1986 in search of ANC operatives; bombing Khotso House, the headquarters of the South African Council of Churches, in 1988; and running guns to Buthelezi's Inkatha movement in 1990, which fueled conflict between Inkatha and ANC/UDF supporters.
102. SAPA, "7,700 Amnesty Applications Received by Midnight Deadline Saturday" (10 May 1997).
103. SAPA, "Truth Commission Hostile Against SADF, Says Former Chief" (15 March 1997).
104. Ibid.
105. SAPA, "Amnesty Applications Stream In" (11 December 1996).
106. Timothy Garton Ash, "True Confessions," New York Review of Books 44, no. 2(17July 1997): 36.
107. SAPA, "We Robbed Banks, PAC Admits in Amnesty Application" (6 May 1997).
108. Gaye Davis, "Past Flashes By in Death of a Golden Girl." Mail amp; Guardian (11-17 July 1997).
109. Ibid.
110. Ibid.
111. SAPA, "Amy Biehl's Parents Believe Her Killers Are Genuinely Sorry" (9 July 1997).
112. SAPA, "AGs Now Duty-Bound to Prosecute Apartheid-Era Criminals: Omar" (11 May 1997).
113. Eddie Koch, "The Truth and Reconciliation Commission," Mail & Guardian (19-25 May 1995).
114. Although the commissioners are working under time constraints and attempt to hear ten to twelve witnesses a day, their efforts to get witnesses to stick to their presubmitted testimony, to stay on track, and to tell only what is relevant, go unheeded. Even when told to start at a certain point, the witnesses invariably say they will start somewhere else in the story (often much earlier) and then proceed to do so!
115. Ironically, the state will foot the bill of former government officials and functionaries prosecuted in the courts, because they are claiming their innocence, but not the legal bill of those going the TRC route, because these people are admitting their guilt - another disincentive for coming forward. However, if subpoenaed, the TRC is authorized to offer legal assistance.
116. SAPA, "Failure to Deal with the Dark Past Spells Disaster: Goldstone" (14 August 1997).
117. Chris Hani was the Communist Party leader gunned down in April 1993 by former Conservative Party politician Clive Derby-Lewis and Polish immigrant Janusz Walus. In 1993, they were convicted and sentenced to death (later commuted to life imprisonment); they later applied for amnesty.
118. SAPA, "Failure to Deal with the Dark Past Spells Disaster: Goldstone" (14 August 1997).
119. SAPA, "South Africans Find Truth and Reconciliation a Tall Order" (25 August 1997).
120. Ibid.
121. Storey, "A Different Kind of Justice," p. 793.
122. Gaye Davis, "How the Truth Commission Will Work," Mail & Guardian (28 July-3 August 1995).
123. TRC's First Interim Report (June 1996).
124. Rehana Rossouw, "Cash No Balm to Gross Human Rights Abuse Victims," Mail & Guardian (11-17 April 1997).
125. Personal observation at hearings I attended in Pietermaritzburg in July 1996.
126. TRC press release, "Policy Framework for Urgent Interim Reparation Measures" (11 November 1996).
127. SAPA. "Swiss, Danes Come to Aid of Apartheid's Victims" (24 February 1997).
128. SAPA, "R1, 5M Swiss Payout for Apartheid's Victims" (25 February 1997).
129. SAPA, "Forgetting the Past Is Wishful Thinking, Says Tutu" (3 April 1997).
130. SAPA, "Billions Needed for Victims of Apartheid Rights Abuses" (3 April 1997).
131. Ibid.
132. TRC press release, "Introductory Notes to the Presentation of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission's Proposed Reparation and Rehabilitation Policies" (23 October 1997).
133. Ibid.; in U.S. dollars, the total payment over six years would be approximately $21,000 ($28,000 for those receiving the larger grant). Calculation based on an exchange rate of R 4.8 per U.S. dollar.
134. SAPA, "TRC Might Have to Pressure Government" (4 April 1997).
135. Sarah Britten, "Telling the Truth," Agitate (September 1996) (http:// www.agitate.co.za).
136. Panel presentation at the Fault Lines Conference, Cape Town, 4-5 July 1996.
137. Claudia Braude, "Media Should Get the Truth Out," Mail & Guardian (7-13 February 1997).
138. Ibid.
139. "More Whites at TRC Hearings," Echo Witness (25 July 1996).
140. SAPA, "TRC on Afrikaner Community Attitude Toward the TRC" (9 October 1996).
141. While acknowledging that forced removals may be considered "severe harm," only human rights violations - such as torture and murder - come under the TRC's purview due to time and fund limitations.
142. SAPA, "District Surgeons Slammed in TRC Submissions" (18 June 1997).
143. SAPA, "MMP Makes Submission on Media's Apartheid Role to the TRC" (29 May 1997).
144. SAPA, "White-Controlled Press Colluded with Apartheid: FBJ" (21 June 1997).
145. Rosenberg, "Recovering from Apartheid," p. 95.
146. Interview with Gerald West, University of Natal, Pietermaritzburg, South Africa (July 1996).
147. Gevisser, "Truth and Reconciliation: Can South Africa Face Its Past?" p. 919.
148. SAPA, "Blinded Man Forgives Soldier Who Shot Him, TRC Hears" (5 August 1996).
149. Glenn Frankel, "Apartheid Victims Seek Justice," Washington Post (17 September 1995).
150. Eddie Koch and Gaye Davis, "Firing Up the Truth Machine," Mail & Guardian (26 July-3 August 1995).
151. Antjie Krog, "Unto the Third or Fourth Generations," Mail & Guardian (13-19 June 1997).
152. Ibid.
153. Although the National Party settled its lawsuit with the TRC, its commitment to the process is not assured.
154. In July 1997, the IFP's national council resolved to withhold future participation in the TRC, describing it as biased, superficial, and irresponsible. Through newspaper ads, Buthelezi urged Nelson Mandela to appoint a judicial commission of inquiry to investigate whether the TRC is functioning in terms of the law.
155. Kader Asmal, Louise Asmal, and Ronald Suresh Roberts, Reconciliation Through Truth (Cape Town and Johannesburg: David Philip Publishers, 1996), p. 51.
156. Michael Lapsley says there are three kinds of stories to tell: What was done to me, What I did, and What I did not do. See "Tears, Fears, and Hope: Healing the Memories in South Africa," Southern Africa 7, no. 1 (January-February, 1997): 1.
157. Rosenberg, "Recovering from Apartheid," p. 95.
158. Asmal, et al., Reconciliation Through Truth, p. 49.
159. Alex Boraine, "Alternatives and Adjuncts to Criminal Prosecutions," paper delivered at the conference "Justice in Cataclysm: Criminal Tribunals in the Wake of Mass Violence," Brussels, 20-21 July 1996.
160. Reinhold Niebuhr, The Nature and Destiny of Man: Human Questing (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1964), p. 254.
161. SAPA, "South Africans Find Truth and Reconciliation a Tall Order" (25 August 1997).
162. Rosenberg, "Recovering from Apartheid," p. 90.
163. Wilhelm Verwoerd, "Justice After Apartheid? Reflections on the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission," paper delivered at the Fifth International Conference on Ethics and Development, Madras, India, 2-9 January 1997.
164. Boraine, "Alternatives and Adjuncts to Criminal Prosecutions."
165. Cited in Allister Sparks, "The Secret Revolution," New Yorker 70, no. 8 (11 April 1994): 59.