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Tempe: a year on, families still struggling
14/09/2000 15:54 - (SA)
Bloemfontein - A year after eight white soldiers were mowed down at the Tempe
military base in Bloemfontein, their families are still waging an
emotional battle to accept their loss -- and a legal one for
adequate compensation.
"I feel as if I have been robbed of life. I am not living, I merely
exist," said Marie Lombard of the 16 September shooting which
claimed the life of her husband, Sergeant Major Johan Lombard.
"My children have lost their confidant, their adviser and their
best friend. We still haven't been able to pick up from where he
left us."
A year ago on Saturday, Lieutenant Sibusiso Madubela shot dead
seven colleagues -- six soldiers and a civilian woman -- at the
Tempe military base. He injured five others before being killed in
a shootout.
One of those wounded died in hospital a week later, bringing the
total number of Madubela's victims to eight.
Lombard believes her husband was at the wrong place at the
wrong time. He was investigating a commotion when the gunman saw
him and opened fire.
"There is a slip in my husband's wallet indicating that he had lent
Lieutenant Madubela R100 on the day before the shooting," she said.
"It may not have been much, but he tried to help. Why shoot him?
And why three times?"
Lianda Coetzer, widow of Major Jacques Coetzer, said she and her
two-and-a-half year-old daughter, Liani, were struggling to accept
his death.
"I keep thinking that he is only on a course, and that he will be
returning any time."
Her daughter, Coetzer said, hated Jesus, "because we told her that
He had come to take her father".
Annelize Douglas, who lost her husband Staff Sergeant Richard
Douglas in the shooting, said she was bitter.
"How can something like that happen in an army base -- the very
place where one expects to be safe?" The 25-year-old widow said her
son Richard, three-and-a-half, asked her last week when his father
would return from Jesus.
"I told him that daddy is not coming back, he was shot dead.
Richard said he wanted to kill the man who did it, but I told him
he was also dead, only not with Jesus."
Madubela's other victims were Major Zirk Coetzee, Sergeant Major
Reginald Sieberhagen, Sergeant Tertius Lombard, Sergeant Willie
Nell and clerk Marita Hamilton.
Families of his victims have sued the SA National Defence Force for
R5 million in damages. The plaintiffs also include three of those
injured by Madubela, and another two claiming psychological
distress.
Their lawyer Andries Spangenberg said this week he still had not
received a response from the SANDF on his request for an admission
or denial of accountability for the incident.
He would meet his clients on Friday to decide whether or not to
issue a subpoena against the defence force.
The SANDF this week confirmed acceptance of Spangenberg's letter,
and said it had been forwarded to the State Attorney for
consideration.
Spangenberg said some of his clients have received money from the
Compensation Commissioner, but "this is merely a drop in the
ocean".
In May this year, a judicial inquest found that Madubela alone was
accountable for the deaths.
The inquest heard evidence that Madubela had been quick-tempered,
easily provoked and an unfit officer, yet nothing was done about
it.
Evidence revealed that his shooting rampage was deliberately aimed at
whites, with numerous black colleagues being spared along the way.
Madubela apparently associated whites with a system which he felt
had betrayed him.
The shooting was apparently sparked by Madubela's anger over his
salary being stopped after he was declared "absent without leave"
for failing to return promptly from his father's funeral.
While the victims' families are struggling to get to grips with
their loss, the SA National Defence Force is still grappling with
racism in its ranks.
The Tempe shooting prompted the creation of a ministerial inquiry
to probe racism in the SANDF. The four-man team submitted an
interim report to Defence Minister Mosiuoa Lekota last month, of
which the contents have not yet been made public.
Bethuel Setai, chairman of the commission, said this week a
supplementary interim report would be submitted by the end of
November with "substantial recommendations".
The final report is due in mid-2001.
Setai said the commission had received thousands of submissions so
far, mostly from black soldiers.
Lekota's spokesman Sam Mkhwanazi, said the Setai report would help
the SANDF develop a comprehensive plan to deal with prejudice in
its midst. In the meanwhile, cases of blatant racism were being
dealt with on a continual basis.
Mkhwanazi said racism was limited to a very small clique of white
commanding officers.
"All the bases that we go to where black soldiers stand up and say
there is racism, they don't say that all the whites are racist.
They call them by name, and usually it is just one or two."
Most white commanding officers were doing a very good job under
difficult circumstances, he said. - Sapa
- SAPA
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