The failure of the TRC in Steve Biko's death
Answers
Answer:
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Explanation:
Portions of Nkosinathi’s letter were read in Episode 36 of the Truth Commission Special Report Series, an 87-part television series that was broadcast weekly on Sundays from April 21, 1996 through March 29, 1998, covering the beginning of the TRC hearings in South Africa series was funded and produced by the South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) and was narrated and produced by South African journalist Max du Preez, whose work during apartheid was significant in its coverage of South African death squads.[2]
The South African History Archive and the South African Broadcasting Corporation launched a website in 2013 making the television series accessible online, complete with links to the TRC’s final report, a list of victims, a glossary of terms related to the TRC, hearing transcripts and transcripts of the television episodes.[3] The online archive allows users to situate the television series within the context of the larger efforts of the TRC. Although the website as since been changed to feature new content soon to be added to project, I analyzed the original introduction to the site in a previous review for MSU’s HST830: Digital South African History, and wrote about the site’s focus on the danger of forgetting as a major reason for establishing the online archive. Although the introduction on the site’s homepage has since been revised to reflect new materials SAHA has acquired, the previous introduction in March read:
South Africa seems in danger of forgetting the work of the TRC. Most South Africans have not seen the findings and recommendations of the Commission. Little has been done to build on the ideals that undermine the TRC’s initial establishment and a persistent lack of political will and resolve to follow up on the recommendations made in the TRC Report in relation to reparations, prosecutions, ongoing truth recovery and the accessibility of the TRC archive prevails. To mark Human Rights Month in South Africa in 2013, the South African History Archive (SAHA), in conjunction with the South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC), launched this website on the work of the TRC, centering on the 87-part ‘Truth Commission Special Report’ television series, last broadcast 15 years previously. [4]
The references to the intentions of the TRC beg the question of the role the television series plays in supporting the TRC’s main goals as it shapes historical narratives of political figures, activists, perpetrators and victims of apartheid. In order to examine the relationship between the Truth Commission Special Report and the TRC, this paper will first frame the intentions of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, specifically placing it in context with themes of establishing truth and promoting national healing through reconciliation as a way of moving forward to a brighter future for South Africa. The monumental case of Steve Biko’s death is used as a case study in my analysis in order to examine the tensions between the methods of the Truth Commission and its desire for a unified nation and the concern’s of Biko’s family and others, who were not supportive of the opportunity Biko’s perpetrators had to apply for amnesty of acts that supported and oppressed the victims of apartheid. In analyzing the ways in which Biko’s trial is progressively represented throughout the two years the Truth Commission Special Report was aired, the TRC’s mission of national healing, and the role the series may have played in affirming such a mission, can be better understood, while also understanding how dissatisfaction with the reconciliation process is handled on screen.
Explanation:
“In the midst of postmodern skepticisms, truth commissions can seldom be wholly naïve about their task. Indeed, their setting, typically in the context of a politically negotiated transition from authoritarian rule, may produce contentious debates about the robustness of truth-telling standards, themselves often shaped by the politics of compromise.”[5]
The introduction goes on to state that the “aggregated truth” that is established through the truth commission activity essentially becomes the base of which all objective, informed judgments of the past are based to prevent recurrence and resolve historical conflicts.
These concepts are in line with the reasons in which the Truth and Reconciliation Commission was formed. According to MSU’s online resource Overcoming Apartheid, South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission was formed in 1995 with the passing of the 1995 Promotion of National Unity and Reconciliation Act, which gave the commission the authority to investigate human rights violations that had taken place from 1960 to 1994 under apartheid. Goals for the TRC included preventing future apartheid-like atrocities from occurring, to bring together previously oppositional groups and to provide those who pledge amnesty the opportunity to honestly explain their activities during apartheid in hopes of providing answers to the families of victims.[6] Listening to witnesses, victims and perpetrators from 1996 to 1998, the TRC received statements from approximately 22,000 victims. In addition, approximately 849 people who applied for amnesty had their applications approved out of a pool of 7,112. The TRC was divided into three subcommittees: The Human Rights Violations Committee, the Amnesty Committee and the Reparation and Rehabilitation Committee. The first “gathered testimony of politically motivated gross human rights abuse,” the second, “dispensed amnesty to perpetrators who gave ‘full disclosure’ of atrocities they had committed for political ends,” and the third provided the South African Government recommendations for relief for victims through long- and short-term reparations.[7] When the three committees finally finished their initial report, it was presented to Mandela in October 1998, with two additional reports completed in 2003. Posel and Simpson refer to truth commissions as “political interventions, usually under highly charged and volatile conditions, in countries marked by histories of extreme violence and conflict.”[8]
In the case of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, this can be seen in the relationship between the National Party and the African National Congress throughout the transition from apartheid to democracy. Truth Commissioner Alex Boraine defends the logic behind the Truth Commission as a way to move South Africa into a productive, forward-thinking nation in his book A Country Unmasked. With the desire to move forward and for the “sake of justice,” Boraine argues that accountability for the past was necessary in South Africa, and that such accountability did not warrant criminal trials and punishments.[9] Although the international community somewhat advocated for punishment of those who had perpetuated the apartheid system, critics of such an initiative expressed concern for the effect this could have on a democratic future for South Africa. Boraine credits aspects of South Africa’s ‘peaceful’ transition away from apartheid, in part, to the collaboration between the ANC and the security services of the national party:
“Simply put, it was impossible for the ANC in particular to accept the protection of the security services throughout the negotiating process and then say to them, ‘Once the election is over we are going to prosecute you.’ If they had done so there would have been no peaceful election. It is as simple as that. The generals of the old regime had made that abundantly clear. It follows that there would have been no democratic constitution and the country would have deteriorated into a state of siege with many more deaths and further destruction of property. We really had no choice but to look for another way of coming to terms with the past.”
Mary Burton, another commissioner who was originally born in Argentina, moved to South Africa in 1961 upon marrying a South African man. She served as a Black Sash member starting in 1965 and held the position of Black Sash President from 1985 to 1990. Burton was appointed to the Human Rights Violations Committee of the TRC, and reflected on her time with the commission in a 2005 interview with Ruendree Govinder published on the South Africa: Overcoming Apartheid, Building Democracy site. When asked about the process of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, Burton was somewhat skeptical about the ways in which the TRC’s success can be defined: