South Africans who have been searching for loved ones who went missing during the apartheid era have appealed directly to President Thabo Mbeki on Friday to help locate their family members.
”We hope, and the families hope also, that as an individual and a father he (Mbeki) would understand our plight and help bring loved ones back home,” said Polly Dewhirst, of the South African Disappearance Project.
The project, affiliated to the Centre for the Study of Violence and Reconciliation, is an umbrella body for several groups including the Khulumani support group.
Dewhirst said the memorandum addressed to Mbeki and members of his cabinet on Friday asked for government’s assistance in locating those who went missing during the apartheid era conflict — some after they allegedly went into exile, others while they were in police custody.
The memorandum on disappearances contains several recommendations, including the need to set up a special unit for continued investigations and exhumations of people who disappeared during the apartheid conflict.
”Since the project started in 2000, we have documented about 200 cases, but this is just the tip of the iceberg. It is extremely difficult to estimate the true number of those who vanished, with the Truth and Reconciliation Commission documenting about 550 such cases,” said Dewhirst.
She said among the more famous cases the project documented was the disappearance of Boike Tlhapi, a Potchefstroom activist who disappeared from detention, as well the disappearance of Lawrence Mufamadi, the brother of Minister of Provincial and Local Government, Sydney Mufamadi.
”We have also documented the disappearance of (Thabo) Mbeki’s child, Kwanda Monwabisi, who went missing in 1981 when he allegedly went into exile. We have spoken to his mother Olive Nokwanda Mpahlwa,” said Dewhirst.
She said other recommendations in the memorandum included facilitation of access to information, with for example the National Prosecuting Authority sharing its information with families, even in cases where the families have chosen not to
pursue prosecutions.
Another recommendation was for the government to help facilitate the ”urgent” issuing of death certificates for the missing to families.
The project also called on government, former liberation movements and churches to set up a special fund for returning and reburying the bodies of those who found their final resting place in unmarked, pauper graves, including those who went missing in exile.
Dewhirst said the project provided psycho-social support to families via group counselling.
”We also go to mortuaries… to look at photos of unidentified dead bodies to see if we can recognise missing children. We also go to police stations to follow up on cases,” she said.
Shirley Gunn of the Khulumani support group, said that a ”consultative process needed to unfold”.
She said there were mass graves in the former liberation camps in Tanzania which were now being desecrated and vandalised.
”Unless the South African government, military, arts and culture keep these sites secure and maintain them, families will continue to worry… The ANC and PAC also need to officially inform the families of what happened to their loved ones,” she said.
Friday’s memorandum, signed by members of the Buyela Khaya Support Group, the Siyani Khumbula Support Group and staff of the Disappearance Project, was also copied to African National Congress general secretary Kgalema Motlanthe, Pan African Congress general secretary Mofihli Dikotsi, South African Council of Churches general secretary Molefe Tsele and Congress of South African Trade
Unions general secretary Zwelinzima Vavi. – Sapa