Judge Farlam: Someone could come forward to solve Marikana ‘mystery’

The death of 34 mineworkers on 16 August 2012 could have been averted if the SAPS stuck to its original plan to disperse striking Lonmin employees early in the morning. Instead, it implemented an ill-conceived strategy in the afternoon despite the obvious risks, said retired judge and Marikana Commission of Inquiry chairperson Ian Farlam on Tuesday.

Farlam, speaking during an Institute of Security Studies (ISS) webinar, said it’s a mystery why the police were determined to confront and disperse thousands of striking mineworkers that afternoon when they had planned a relatively risk-free operation to encircle the koppie where the strikers would gather in the morning when few of them would be there.

He was speaking after the eighth annual commemoration of the massacre, which claimed 44 lives between 10 and 16 August 2012, was held on Sunday. The commemoration was marked by continued calls for justice for the relatives of the victims and for recommendations on police reform to be implemented.

“There was a mystery to which we never got the answer, and that was, why the police abandoned the plan they had,” said Farlam on Tuesday.

“It was never explained to us why and we tried very hard to find out why but the questions we asked were evaded and avoided. The only inference one can draw is because the answer was unsatisfactory and they knew it was unacceptable.”

Farlam said the version of the truth offered by SAPS members at the commission was a “disgrace”. They did not tell the commission of inquiry that the then-national commissioner, Riah Phiyega, had met provincial commissioners in the SAPS national management forum on the evening of 15 August 2012, where it was decided that the tactical phase of the operation would be implemented the following day.

Little is known about what was said in that meeting, but Farlam found that the forum had decided to confront the miners the next day and had communicated the decision with commanders on the ground. In a 6am meeting in Marikana with SAPS leaders on 16 August, one high-ranking officer headlined his notes “D-Day”.

Farlam’s report noted expert evidence that said the decision to confront the miners would not have been made without the input from the executive. Farlam didn’t go so far and made no such findings against the then-police minister, Nathi Mthethwa.

When “D-Day” arrived, SAPS commanders still hoped Association of Mineworkers and Construction Union (Amcu) leader Joseph Mathunjwa might be able to disperse the strikers. That didn’t happen and when the SAPS missed the opportunity for its operation designed to be implemented in the morning, commanders hastily put together another plan and confronted the mineworkers in the afternoon.

The police knew there would be bloodshed. Multiple comments attest to it and they had ordered four mortuary vans (only one arrived) and an extra 4,000 rounds of ammunition.

“They foresaw that there would be serious violence and they foresaw that there would probably be a number of deaths and what they foresaw happened and that is a direct result of the fact that they abandoned the original plan for reasons that to this day have never [been] discovered,” said Farlam on Tuesday.

Nomzamo Zondo from the Socio-Economic Rights Institute (SERI), which represents the families of 36 people who were killed in Marikana, said the SAPS has continued to use violence since Marikana with little regard for people’s rights.