The youngest daughter of anti-apartheid activist Imam Abdullah Haron, who died in police detention in 1969, has wrapped up the testimony in the reopened inquest into his death.
Fatiema Haron Masoet has asked the High Court in Cape Town to overturn the original inquest finding of 1970, that no one is to blame for her father’s death.
The court has also heard the testimony of former political detainees, who described their period of solitary confinement and interrogation by the apartheid security branch, in particular the policeman, Spyker van Wyk, as torture.
Haron was arrested in May and held in detention until he was found dead in his cell at the Maitland police station in September 1969.
A former educator and political activist Yousuf Gabru has described the security branch policeman, Spyker van Wyk as pure evil.
Van Wyk was instrumental in the arrest and interrogation of Imam Haron a few years before Gabru’s arrest. He says, during his incarceration in 1976, Van Wyk threatened to throw him down the stairs at Caledon Police station, just as he claimed he had done to Haron.
“The reality your lordship is that Spyker van Wyk was an uncivilized barbarian. And he took great pride in his cruelty. he wanted to prove to you that he could be as cruel as was humanly possible, so when they threatened to throw me off the stairs, that’s what he was trying to do, that’s what he said to me don’t be too clever, I think words to that effect, this is where we killed imam Haron…he was pure evil, that’s what Spyker van Wyk was,” says witness Yousuf Gabru.
Stephanie Kemp, who was arrested in July 1964 for her anti-apartheid political activities, has testified about the incident while she was detained, in which Spyker van Wyk, knocked her unconscious in a store room at the then Caledon Square police station.
“He hit me across my face with his flat hand and then he pulled me to the floor, it was a wooden floor, and he banged my head on the floor until I was unconscious, I know that I was lying with my head and top of my body under the table and when I opened my eyes there were at least eight pairs of black shoes in the room that I could see, so I must have been unconscious for long enough for that to play out,” Witness Stephanie Kemp.
Shirley Gunn, incarcerated first in 1985 for over three months, and then again in 1990, testified that the security branch had free reign over detainees held at police cells. And that solitary confinement in itself is torture. Her path crossed with van Wyk’s, months before he died.
“The poster of evil. Spyker van Wyk was going to be the person that was going to knock sense into me to cooperate. They were going to bring him in and if you don’t talk, he is going to deal with you, you know what he’s done, you know what he’s done to other people like imam Haron…” recounts witness Shirley Gunn.
The Haron family believes the imam was tortured and that the true cause of his death was covered up by apartheid police, medical practitioners and courts.
A date for presenting closing arguments has not yet been determined.
VIDEO: Reopened inquest into death of Imam Abdullah Haron continues
