10 july 2000
The TRC's Amnesty Committee today refused amnesty to two Ciskei Defence Force (CDF) soldiers who applied for amnesty for their role in the Bisho Massacre which took place on September 7, 1992.
The Committee found that the actions of Vakele Archibald Mkosana and Mzamile Thomas Gonya who were members of the CDF were not actions constituting acts associated with a political objective. The Committee further found that there was no doubt that some of the marchers acted in breach of the conditions of the permit when they burst towards the stadium.
" But to simply open fire on everyone under the pretext of enforcing the conditions of the permit was totally unjustified in the circumstances. Indeed this reaction was irrational and disproportionate and that it cannot be accepted that the leaders of the marchers who left the stadium should have forseen this reaction," the presiding Judge Denzil Potgieter said.
The Committee also found that the probabilities are that warning would have been sufficient to cause the breakaway group to turn back. The Committee described the conduct of the Ciskei Defence Force troops as reckless on the day of the shooting.
The panel rejected Gonya's evidence that on that day of the shooting he used the rocket launcher in execution of orders from Mkhosana who was a Senior Officer. Gonya testified that as soldiers they did not see the need to shoot and hesitated before they carried out the order.
Mkhosana however denied having given Gonya an order to use a rocket launcher. The Bisho massacre occured when leaders of the ANC led alliance organised a march to Bisho demanding the resignation of the Ciskei Military Ruler, Brigadier Oupa Gqozo and that the Ciskei be placed under an Interim Administrator. Twenty eight people were killed and more than 300 were injured when the homeland soldiers opened fire on the marchers. Also refused amnesty by another Committee are Nkosinathi Nyawuza, Elijah Nyawuza, Francis Meyiwa and Gilbert Ndimande all ANC supporters for the killing Victor Lembede at the Ngonyameni Reserve in KwaZulu Natal in June 1991.
Issued by: Truth and Reconciliation Commission
PHILA NGQUMBA ( 021) - 4238741 OR 4245161