Issued by: THE TRUTH AND RECONCILIATION COMMISSION
9 December 1999
At the moment the Truth and Reconciliation Commission is dealing with the last leg of its work, the Amnesty applications. The TRC had three components namely Human Rights Violation Committee, Reparation and Rehabilitation Committee and The Amnesty Committee.
One of the reasons for the TRC’s planned extention during the year 2000 , is that all amnesty applications have not yet been finalised and have to be processed. The Commission wishes to inform members of the public the status of the amnesty applications as at November 15, 1999.
Finalised Amnesty Applications Decisions
Amnesty granted 568
Amnesty refused 5287
Amnesty partly refused/partly granted 21
Amnesty Applications withdrawn 161
Decision outstanding 272
TOTAL 6037
Outstanding
Chamber matters 311
Hearable matters 347
Scheduled for hearings 157
TOTAL 815
From the above statistics the following can be noted:
The Amnesty Committee have dealt with 91% of all applications received, compared to the 70% at the end of 1998.
It is estimated that only 5% of amnesty applications received, still need to be scheduled for a public hearing.
These statistics should be compared to those of June 1997 when only 20% of all applications had been dealt with.
Originally 2500 of the total number of applications received, had been identified as matters that had to be heard at public hearings. During 1996, 70 applications were scheduled to appear before the Amnesty Committee, 200 during 1997, 720 during 1998 and approximately 1204 during 1999.
This means that approximately 300 applications may still need to appear before the Amnesty Committee. Although the Amnesty Committee has lost 6 of its members during the course of 1999, it has managed to hear 90% more applications than in 1998.
BREAKDOWN AS PER POLITICAL AFFILIATION
Political Affiliation Granted Partly Granted/Partly Refused Refused Total
ANC 383 2 167 552
AWB 56 0 23 79
IFP 28 0 20 48
NP 1 0 0 1
PAC 82 0 24 106
Security Forces 124 10 29 163
The above statistical information shows that both staff preparing and presenting the amnesty applications as well as The Amnesty Committee dealing with the applications, have increased their productivity enormously.
FINALISATION OF AMNESTY PROCESS:
In the absence of unforeseen circumstances, The Amnesty Committee is on track to finalise all hearable applications by end of March 2000 and to submit a final Amnesty Report to the President by end of June 2000. The objective is to use the months of April, May and June to deal with any specific applications that may require attention, to finalise the audit of all applications and to certify that all have been dealt with according the Act.
REPARATION AND REHABILITATION COMMITTEE
The main focus of the committee’s work since June 1998 has been on implementation of interim reparation and matters relating to long term policy development. To date, the number of completed and assessed applications for reparations sent to the President Fund is 9165.
The President Fund has processed 4608 of the 9165 applications received from the Committee. This represents the expenditure of R15,815,317.00. The major component of the interim reparation recommendations received from the Committee is the service recommendation, the President’s Fund informs the victim of what services has been recommended and refer them to a relevant department.
To date the following referrals have been made by regions, to the following services.
Province Education Housing Employment Physical Health Mental Health Welfare
Gauteng 647 181 75 688 1189 692
Eastern Cape 142 77 42 350 493 270
Northern Cape 12 0 1 31 28 9
Free State 23 18 5 42 53 26
Northern Province 8 22 2 16 32 18
Mpumalanga 40 35 2 48 88 53
North West 13 1 2 31 31 14
Western Cape 156 76 41 206 214 133
KwaZulu Natal 1101 1295 31 1197 1772 1159
RECOMMENDATIONS
The Reparation and Rehabilitation Committee has held numerous discussions with the Inter Ministerial Committee on reparations, the Premiers of the nine provinces, as well as the Director Generals of the relevant Ministries. The purpose of these discussions was to create an awareness and understanding of the long term nature of reparations or victims/ survivors as found in the reparation policy.
Most recently the Committee has focused their efforts to communicate the pressing need to establish a process within government which lead to the formation of reparation co-ordinating structure at local and national levels. This structure would be responsible for implementation of a long term reparation process, and serve as the responsibility for all outstanding reparations e.g. community, symbolic, administrative and legal, following the life of the Reparations Committee.
Given the emerging picture of the survivors needs, it is apparent that some are dire, life threatening, and cannot be met through a generalised reconstruction and development programme. The attempt to facilitate the reparations process from the TRC offices and President’s Fund, when all the service resources are within government department has not been satisfactory, and has happened as a result of the absence of such a structure.
An ideal structure would be one similar the Inter Ministerial Committee for the children at risk initiated by government in 1995 or the current Youth Commission Structure. As with this structure, it will be essential for this structure to mandate the involvement of representatives of relevant Ministries, in consultation with NGO’s, Victim group, the private, and other interested parties.
The key principal is that the reparation office should have powers to enforce co-operation from all the Ministries.
It is essential that the proposed co-ordinating structure is located within government as from the beginning of December 1999, so as to allow government officials time to master information related to the reparation process before the end of March 2000, when the committee intends to close down its operations.
HUMAN RIGHTS VIOLATION COMMITTEE
The Human Rights Violations Committee identified at the end of October 1998, the following outstanding tasks:
· The completion of findings in respect of victims and the gross
human rights violations they have suffered;
· The national audit of the more then 5000 negative findings
made at regional level;
· The establishment of an Appeal mechanism to deal with the
negative findings that had been confirmed at a national level;
· The finalisation of "Out of the Shadows", the "popular"
edition of the Truth Commission report;
· The finalisation of the "Victims Volume", which would contain
a summary on each victim.
· The Committee had also undertaken to furnish the Minister with
three additional reports, i.e.
· an exhumation report which would identify outstanding
exhumations;
· a report on disappearances which would detail all
disappearances reported to the Commission and classify then into
classic abductions, missing in combat, disappearances in exile and
missing persons;
· a report on combatants.
The Committee in the course and scope of its work in January and February 1999, identified that the database would need to be audited to ensure that proper summaries could be written for each victim and to prevent the possibility of multiple payments to reparation beneficiaries. The transfer of assets and records from the regional offices of the TRC to the National office has also engendered a certain degree of chaos. A database audit team was appointed in March 1999 to begin the clean up and began work in April 1999. They completed their work in November 1999.
As at the 1st December 1999, the Commission has completed all outstanding victims findings. In addition the national internal audit of negative findings has been completed. This has resulted in the confirmation of approximately 1500 negative findings which include those out of mandate, those not considered to be political and those with insufficient information to make such a finding.
The communication of negative findings to victims is receiving a great deal of attention from the commission to ensure that it is handled in the most sensitive and humane manner. The Commission is also considering the setting up of a special victims’ line to deal with the queries that will be generated through the communication to victims.
The Commission is still receiving applications from victims’ groups that they be considered for reparation. The Popular edition was completed in September 1999 and was ready to go into print. However, the consensus within the Amnesty Committee is that it should be held back to allow the current work being done by the commission to be reflected in the Popular version. This will in all probability mean publication in June 2000.
The Summary writing project began work in October 1999. Already 50% of the summaries have been written and are ready for the first round of editing. It is envisaged that the vast majority will be edited by February 1999. It is envisage that this Volume will be published with the codicil to the final report. The remaining reports will be completed in February 1999.
The Commission is of the view that discussions need to begin with government on who will take over the outstanding work of the HRV committee particularly on an Appeals process. Presently the Commission deals with a vast amount of queries from victims and government will need to take this on boards as well.
LEGAL ASSISTANCE PROGRAMME
The TRC is empowered in terms of the provisions of section 34(3) of the Act 34 of 1995 to appoint a legal representative at a prescribed tariff to appear on behalf of any person. The commission realised at the beginning of the year that the TRC appeared to be footing the bill for virtually all categories of persons appearing before the Amnesty Committee whether they were victims, applicants, implicated persons or witnesses.
As a result hereof the Commission investigated the situation and discovered that approximately R327 806.23 had been paid on the TRC’s behalf by the Legal Aid Board to amnesty applicants who were members of the various liberation movements. In terms of paragraph 3(5) of the submission of the Minister of Justice to the Executive Deputy President, such members of liberation movements could be assisted by the State Attorney in obtaining funding legal assistance.
The TRC and the Office of the State Attorney in Pretoria agreed that in future such liberation forces members including IFP, Rightwing Groups would be assisted by the State Attorney. The State Attorney agreed to refund the TRC the amount which had been paid on behalf of liberation forces applicants for the last financial year.
PAYMENT TO LEGAL REPRESENTATIVES
Payments by the TRC to legal practitioners is strictly in accordance with the tariff which is prescribed in the Regulations Prescribing Tariff of fees. In exceptional cases and upon application to the National Legal Officer and after consultation with the Amnesty Evidence Leader a higher daily appearance or preparation fee may be justified.
LEGAL AID BOARD MATTERS
During August 1999, the Amnesty Committee resolved to terminate the mandate of the Legal Aid Board and gave that responsibility to the TRC’s Legal Department.
Inquiries: Phila Ngqumba 082 458 8463