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 The pursuit of national unity, the well-being of all South African citizens and
peace require reconciliation between the people of South Africa and the
reconstruction of society.
The adoption of this Constitution lays the secure foundation for the people of
South Africa to transcend the divisions and strife of the past, which generated
gross violations of human rights, the transgression of humanitarian principles in
violent conflict and a legacy of hatred, fear, guilt and revenge.
These can now be addressed on the basis that there is a need for understanding,
but not for vengeance, a need for reparation but not for retaliation, a need for
ubuntu* but not for victimization.
- from the Interim Constitution of South Africa
For millions of black South Africans, the end of apartheid marked the end of
a brutal era of racial discrimination and violence. It also signaled the
beginning of a new life, one of freedom, equality and, it is hoped, peace.
But the years of brutiolence. It also signaled the beginning of a new life,
one of freedom, equality and, it is hoped, peace.
But the years of brutal, racist treatment at the hands of the
former government left deep wounds in the hearts and minds of many, black and
white, wounds that will be hard to forgive and even harder to forget.
Florida State University professor Charles Figley understands the pain and is
working to do something about it.
An internationally known traumatologist, Figley has already founded "Green
Cross Projects" in Florida, Oklahoma and Bosnia.
Now he has set up shop in South Africa to help the South African Truth and
Reconciliation Commission.
The 17-member commission, led by Archbishop Desmond Tutu, is investigating
and recording human-rights violations committed during the apartheid era in hopes
of bringing about reparations and reconciliation.
"We are meant to be a part of the process of the healing of our nation, of
our people, all of us, since every South African has to some extent or other been
traumatized," Tutu told members of the commission during its inaugural meeting in
1995.
For the next year the commission will continue hearing testimony from South
Africans nationwide, some of them having been granted amnesty for their part in
the atrocities in exchange for a full accounting of what they know.
When it's finished, the commission will write a report and recommend a
mechanism for handling reparations.
But the road to healing won't stop there. Strewn along its byways are the
lingering memories of the missing, the mutilated and the dead.
"A critical question which involves all of us is how do South Africans come
to terms with the past," Minister of Justice Dullah Omar wrote in a booklet
explaining the commission's purpose. "The President believes - and many of us
support him in this belief - that the truth concerning human rights violations in
our country cannot be suppressed or simply forgotten."
Nor can it be retold without pain.
So at the commission's request, Figley organized and helped train South
African traumatologists to help both victims and committee members cope with the
countless stories of men burned alive in front of their families, children gunned
down in the streets and innocent people carted off by police never to be seen
again.
The accumulation of stories is particularly stressful on the commission
members traveling the country to collect them.
"Just as they think they understand the full range of brutality, someone else
comes and tells an even greater story," Figley said. "They get filled up by it."
But unlike the victims who share their experiences in group sessions with
commission members and other victims, the commissioners have no one to turn to.
"Yet we've learned from our research here that you first have to debrief or
talk about that process; otherwise it will creep into (the commission members')
consciousness just as they are trying to get their mind off of it," Figley said.
"Most people need to talk about it to get it out of their system."
Figley said he plans to return to South Africa next year to evaluate the
effort and to address the first Congress of the African Society for Traumatic
Stress Studies, the South African chapter of an organization he founded in 1985.
"We believe that our projects should be completed in one year," he said.
"Otherwise they create dependency."
*The South African term "ubuntu" loosely translated means non-violent justice that causes public humilation.
that causes public humiliation.
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