Date: 25 August, 1985 According to Coleman (ed.) in A Crime Against Humanity, the mutilated body of Toto Roy Dweba, member of the United Democratic Front (UDF) and of the Natal Freedom Charter Committee was found on this date at the Natal North Coast. Giving testimony before the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC), Dwebas widow Daphne stated that her husband was abducted from his place of work on 19 August 1985. He was fatally stabbed and mutilated in Eshowe on 20 August 1985. She said that she had received strange phone calls, and suspected that the caller was responsible for the abduction and killing. On 27 August, a petrol bomb was thrown at the Dweba house. It was suspected that the special branch wanted to destroy the whole family, as Dwebas death was becoming a matter of public scrutiny. He was buried on 5 September. Two weeks later his hands were found in a plastic bag in a cane field. After forensic tests in Pretoria had confirmed that it was indeed his hands, Dwebas uncle, police officer Maxwell Dweba, was contacted by the Empangeni police station and told to fetch his nephews hands, which were then buried. Three months after the funeral, an unknown White man in civilian clothing sought out Maxwell Dweba and took him to a white Ford Escort in Gillespie Street, Durban. In the boot were his dead nephews clothes, which, the unknown White man said, were from Pretoria. In evidence given to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) in section 29 by Security Branch member Vusi Ismael Spyker Myeza, Myeza indicated that Dweba was suspected of being a courier of guns for the African National Congress (ANC) from Swaziland. The Commission found that Dweba was killed by, or on orders of, unknown security forces members, and that his death was a gross violation of human rights, which entailed deliberate planning on the part of the said security forces. Dates differ in various sources.
Posted on: Mon, 25 Aug 2014 04:26:05 +0000
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