SDU member tells of stealing Casspir

JOHANNESBURG -- A former member of the Thokoza self-defence unit described at an amnesty hearing here yesterday how he and his comrades robbed police of a Casspir, which they used to attack a hostel.

Aubrey "Magidi" Radebe, told the TRC's amnesty committee that in 1991 he and other members of the African National Congress-aligned SDU planned to attack and disarm a group of policemen in a Casspir at Phola Park squatter camp.

They shot at the policemen who returned fire.

During the exchange one policeman was killed, but Radebe said he did not know who fired the fatal shot.

"We gained access to the Casspir and drove off," he said, adding they used the vehicle to attack the nearby Khutuza Hostel occupied by Inkatha Freedom Party supporters.

"We drove into the hostel where we fired several shots at the windows and threw petrol bombs."

They later abandoned the Casspir and fled.

Radebe also described an attack on a bakkie that the SDUs believed was used to carry people harassing the local community.

He said shots were fired at the vehicle, but nobody was injured.

James Koena, 25, another of the 56 SDU members applying for amnesty for their part in violence on the East Rand in the early 1990s, told the committee he killed a man he suspected of being a police informer.

He shot Cri Mangaso in 1993 after receiving information that the man was a police agent.

However, his claim was denied by the dead man's sister, Ms Thabesile Mangaso, who is opposing his amnesty application.

She told the committee the death of her brother had nothing to do with politics, but was purely a criminal act.

On Tuesday evening the former SDU members became involved in a dispute with TRC officials over demands for compensation for their travel costs to and from the hearings.

When they were told the TRC did not pay the travel costs of amnesty applicants, some of the group threatened to confiscate a cellular telephone belonging to a TRC member to pay for their travel costs.

TRC spokesman Mbulelo Sompetha said the matter was later resolved when the ANC in Thokoza agreed to pay the travel costs for the former SDU members.

The hearing continues today. -- Sapa