- Email: [email protected]
Detention of Schoolchildren in South Africa
623
had questioned him about his appearance in a television programme about his detention broadcast in the United States.s The children described their experiences of physical abuse. Moreover, they talked about the widespread use of psychological torture, including solitary confinement, sleep deprivation, and humiliations such as being stripped naked. The conference was told of children who had been made to lie down naked in mortuaries with bloodstained walls. Threats of many kinds were made, and in one instance police put a rubber tyre round a schoolchild’s neck, doused it with petrol, and threatened to set it alight. One youngster recounted his arrest in the middle of the night without explanation to his parents. He was kept in solitary confinement for several days; attempts by his parents to find him were prevented; and police ate the food brought for him. He described electric shock torture to which he had been subjected for half an hour, then how he had been put in a refrigerator for
Detention of Schoolchildren in South Africa IN the
UK, the state intervenes to protect children from abuse; in South Africa, the state perpetrates the of children. A stark contrast. The evidence that schoolchildren in South Africa have been imprisoned and tortured on a massive scale is overwhelming--even whole school populations have been arrested.1-3Since the state of emergency and media censorship were imposed in June, 1986, figures have been more difficult to obtain, but it is estimated that 30 000 people have been detained, of whom about a third were under eighteen years. Some of the schoolchildren presented their disturbing testimonies at a conference in Harare in September last year.’ Over 200 doctors, psychologists, laywers, and religious leaders also came from South Africa to give direct accounts of their experiences of the treatment of detainees. They came, despite the risk they ran of detention on their return to South Africa, because they shared an overwhelming sense of duty to
torture
tell the international community what was happening to young people in that country. The seriousness of the risk was underlined lately by the murder of eighteen-year-old Sicelo Dlomo five days after police 1
Lawyers Committee
for Human Rights. The war against children: South Africa’s youngest victims. Washington. Lawyers Committee for Human Rights, 1986. 2. Amnesty International Briefing. South Africa. London: Amnesty International, 1986. 3 International Defence and Aid Fund. Apartheid’s violence against children. Fact paper on Southern Africa no 15 London: International Defence and Aid Fund, 1988. 4. Brittain V, Minty A, eds. Children of resistance. statements from the Harare conference on the repression of children in apartheid South Africa. London:
Khptown (in press)
half an hour before undergoing electric shock torture again. He was kept in a cell and frequently heard the screams of other children. To this day the boy’s sleep is disturbed; the screams of others seem to haunt him more than his own dreadful treatment. An elevenyear-old boy had been assaulted during his twomonth detention, with the loss of four teeth. He began to give evidence about his incarceration, but became frightened, saying "Vlok will get me". (Mr Adriaan Vlok is the Minister of Law and Order). He continued his testimony to a few people who heard that, among other examples of abuse, he had been taken to a mortuary, once at night, and forced to look at dead bodies. The National Medical and Dental Association (NAMDA), a progressive non-racial alternative to the official Medical Association of South Africa (MASA), has attempted to provide a service to schoolchildren on their release. In May, June, and July 1987, 83 children under eighteen years were seen at one clinic, of whom 68 were aged fifteen to seventeen years and 15 were fourteen years or younger. 64% complained of assault and 73% had been detained for 20 weeks or more. 14% of the schoolchildren had been subjected to electric shock torture and 13% had been kept in solitary confinement. When seen, 57% had psychological symptoms, a third had a definable psychological disorder, and a third had a definable psychiatric illness. Dr Don Foster, senior lecturer in psychology at the
University of Cape Town, told the Harare conference that the effect of psychological torture is to weaken the person so that they feel helpless and in a state of dread and dependency. The effects are often devastating and longlasting, with symptoms such as fatigue, sleeplessness, loss of concentration, poor memory, trembling, anxiety, and depression. Interpersonal relationships may break 5 The
down;
Independent. Jan 28,
a
1988
lack of
trust
in others,
even
in
624
relatives and
friends, is a particularly disabling Psychologists from a church sanctuary counselling team6 believe that in the South African situation they are witnessing what they call a "continuous traumatic stress syndrome". For
outcome.
example, they described an adolescent, who, in a six-week period, witnessed the murder of a well-liked community leader, had been in a house that was petrol bombed, and was arrested and beaten. During the same period the sanctuary harbouring him was invaded by police who shot and wounded 2 of the children there. Whilst there may be similarities between the trauma in child abuse and the trauma experienced by black township children, the power of the therapist to provide safety for children in these two situations is strikingly different. In South Africa, since the persecutors are people in authority, the children react with justified suspicion to any representative of the establishment. Psychologists found that to help child victims of torture who had taken refuge in the church, they had to show that their allegiance was to a body opposed to the apartheid state-in this case the church. Alternatively, they worked in conjunction with lawyers who were preparing an interdict to secure the safety of the children. They now believe that "health workers have a clear obligation not only to care about the suffering of individuals but, also, to be seen to be working with others against the oppressive state". The most disturbing aspect of the testimonies from doctors, lawyers, and religious leaders at the Harare conference was the scale of the events they described. These accounts were not about isolated episodes of ill-treatment, such as occur in many countries, but of an apparently calculated assault on the part of the South African state on black youth. The widespread detention and torture of children in South Africa has grave implications for doctors. There has never been an adequate response from official medical bodies in South Africa.7 Last year MASA and the South African Paediatric Association published guidelines8 about conditions and treatment of children in detention "of which we as South Africans may be proud." These guidelines contain statements such as: "In case of death the parents/ guardian shall have the following rights: To appoint an independent pathologist or doctor at their own cost to be present at the autopsy or to re-examine the body". (None of the 6 children under eighteen years who died in police custody since 1984 died from natural causes.) "Punishment should not be administered too often otherwise it loses its value completely in time. This is particularly true of corporal punishment." The central question of the detention of children is ignored. In fact, it seems to be 6. Straker G and Sanctuaries 7.
8.
Counselling Team.
Presented
at
5th National
Psychiatry
Conference, Cape Town, 1987 Rayner M Turning a blind eye? Medical accountability and the prevention of torture m South Africa. Committee on Scientific Freedom and Responsibility Washington: American Association for the Advancement of Science, 1987 Children in places of detention A code for their handling S Afr Med J 1987; 71 (suppl).
accepted that children are detained without charge for two days (or longer, if a court order exists), and even that parents might not be informed of their child’s arrest for 24 hours, or as long as 48 hours at weekends. doctors have taken action and have recognised their positive obligation publicly to make known information covered by the Declaration of Tokyo.9 Dr Wendy Orr’s moral action when, as district surgeon in Port Elizabeth, she sought an injunction to stop the prison authorities ill-treating detainees, has been widely commended by eminent members of the medical profession. 2 years later, at the Harare conference, she asked clearly "Why the deafening silence (about torture)? Why is Dr Ivor Lang, who carries the burden of Steve Biko’s death and the guilt of having ignored the assaults which I saw, now chief district surgeon in Port Elizabeth? Why have the Medical Association of South Africa and the South African Medical and Dental Council not acted to bring doctors who do not report torture to task? And why the apathy and lack of sanctions from the world medical community? My challenge to the world medical community and the World Medical Association is to take up the issue of torture and detention and the passive role of acceptance that South African doctors play". The banning of the United Democratic Front, the Detainee Parents Support Group (formed after the death of Dr Neil Aggett in custody), and fifteen other organisations makes it even more important that those organisations and individual doctors who have demonstrated their opposition to the brutality of the state’s treatment of children and detainees are supported. The role and responsibility of professionals in South Africa and Britain will be discussed at a conference entitled Children, Apartheid, and Repression in Southern Africa to be held in London at the City University on April 23, 1988. Details are available from the Harare Working Group, c/o SATIS, 13 Mandela St, London NW1 ODW.
Some
Breast Not
Necessarily Best
THE ideal food for normal full-term infants is breast milk, which will sustain their nutritional needs for at least four months after birth. However, there is consistent evidence that breast milk from mothers delivering at term, and who continue to express milk, is nutritionally inadequate for the needs of prematurely born infants.1.2 Breast milk is a
undoubtedly
9. The torture report. London British Medical Association, 1986 10 Anon. Human rights abuse in South Africa. Lancet 1988; i: 253 11. Birnstingl M, Black D, Booth C, et al Medicine and South Afnca Br Med J 1986; 292: 273. 1 Gordon HH, Levine SZ, McNamara H. Feeding of premature infants, a comparison
of human and cow’s milk. Am J Dis Child 1947; 73: 442-52 Adequacy of expressed breast milk for early growth Arch Dis Child 1977; 52: 296-301
2. Davies DP
in
preterm infants
had questioned him about his appearance in a television programme about his detention broadcast in the United States.s The children described their experiences of physical abuse. Moreover, they talked about the widespread use of psychological torture, including solitary confinement, sleep deprivation, and humiliations such as being stripped naked. The conference was told of children who had been made to lie down naked in mortuaries with bloodstained walls. Threats of many kinds were made, and in one instance police put a rubber tyre round a schoolchild’s neck, doused it with petrol, and threatened to set it alight. One youngster recounted his arrest in the middle of the night without explanation to his parents. He was kept in solitary confinement for several days; attempts by his parents to find him were prevented; and police ate the food brought for him. He described electric shock torture to which he had been subjected for half an hour, then how he had been put in a refrigerator for
Detention of Schoolchildren in South Africa IN the
UK, the state intervenes to protect children from abuse; in South Africa, the state perpetrates the of children. A stark contrast. The evidence that schoolchildren in South Africa have been imprisoned and tortured on a massive scale is overwhelming--even whole school populations have been arrested.1-3Since the state of emergency and media censorship were imposed in June, 1986, figures have been more difficult to obtain, but it is estimated that 30 000 people have been detained, of whom about a third were under eighteen years. Some of the schoolchildren presented their disturbing testimonies at a conference in Harare in September last year.’ Over 200 doctors, psychologists, laywers, and religious leaders also came from South Africa to give direct accounts of their experiences of the treatment of detainees. They came, despite the risk they ran of detention on their return to South Africa, because they shared an overwhelming sense of duty to
torture
tell the international community what was happening to young people in that country. The seriousness of the risk was underlined lately by the murder of eighteen-year-old Sicelo Dlomo five days after police 1
Lawyers Committee
for Human Rights. The war against children: South Africa’s youngest victims. Washington. Lawyers Committee for Human Rights, 1986. 2. Amnesty International Briefing. South Africa. London: Amnesty International, 1986. 3 International Defence and Aid Fund. Apartheid’s violence against children. Fact paper on Southern Africa no 15 London: International Defence and Aid Fund, 1988. 4. Brittain V, Minty A, eds. Children of resistance. statements from the Harare conference on the repression of children in apartheid South Africa. London:
Khptown (in press)
half an hour before undergoing electric shock torture again. He was kept in a cell and frequently heard the screams of other children. To this day the boy’s sleep is disturbed; the screams of others seem to haunt him more than his own dreadful treatment. An elevenyear-old boy had been assaulted during his twomonth detention, with the loss of four teeth. He began to give evidence about his incarceration, but became frightened, saying "Vlok will get me". (Mr Adriaan Vlok is the Minister of Law and Order). He continued his testimony to a few people who heard that, among other examples of abuse, he had been taken to a mortuary, once at night, and forced to look at dead bodies. The National Medical and Dental Association (NAMDA), a progressive non-racial alternative to the official Medical Association of South Africa (MASA), has attempted to provide a service to schoolchildren on their release. In May, June, and July 1987, 83 children under eighteen years were seen at one clinic, of whom 68 were aged fifteen to seventeen years and 15 were fourteen years or younger. 64% complained of assault and 73% had been detained for 20 weeks or more. 14% of the schoolchildren had been subjected to electric shock torture and 13% had been kept in solitary confinement. When seen, 57% had psychological symptoms, a third had a definable psychological disorder, and a third had a definable psychiatric illness. Dr Don Foster, senior lecturer in psychology at the
University of Cape Town, told the Harare conference that the effect of psychological torture is to weaken the person so that they feel helpless and in a state of dread and dependency. The effects are often devastating and longlasting, with symptoms such as fatigue, sleeplessness, loss of concentration, poor memory, trembling, anxiety, and depression. Interpersonal relationships may break 5 The
down;
Independent. Jan 28,
a
1988
lack of
trust
in others,
even
in
624
relatives and
friends, is a particularly disabling Psychologists from a church sanctuary counselling team6 believe that in the South African situation they are witnessing what they call a "continuous traumatic stress syndrome". For
outcome.
example, they described an adolescent, who, in a six-week period, witnessed the murder of a well-liked community leader, had been in a house that was petrol bombed, and was arrested and beaten. During the same period the sanctuary harbouring him was invaded by police who shot and wounded 2 of the children there. Whilst there may be similarities between the trauma in child abuse and the trauma experienced by black township children, the power of the therapist to provide safety for children in these two situations is strikingly different. In South Africa, since the persecutors are people in authority, the children react with justified suspicion to any representative of the establishment. Psychologists found that to help child victims of torture who had taken refuge in the church, they had to show that their allegiance was to a body opposed to the apartheid state-in this case the church. Alternatively, they worked in conjunction with lawyers who were preparing an interdict to secure the safety of the children. They now believe that "health workers have a clear obligation not only to care about the suffering of individuals but, also, to be seen to be working with others against the oppressive state". The most disturbing aspect of the testimonies from doctors, lawyers, and religious leaders at the Harare conference was the scale of the events they described. These accounts were not about isolated episodes of ill-treatment, such as occur in many countries, but of an apparently calculated assault on the part of the South African state on black youth. The widespread detention and torture of children in South Africa has grave implications for doctors. There has never been an adequate response from official medical bodies in South Africa.7 Last year MASA and the South African Paediatric Association published guidelines8 about conditions and treatment of children in detention "of which we as South Africans may be proud." These guidelines contain statements such as: "In case of death the parents/ guardian shall have the following rights: To appoint an independent pathologist or doctor at their own cost to be present at the autopsy or to re-examine the body". (None of the 6 children under eighteen years who died in police custody since 1984 died from natural causes.) "Punishment should not be administered too often otherwise it loses its value completely in time. This is particularly true of corporal punishment." The central question of the detention of children is ignored. In fact, it seems to be 6. Straker G and Sanctuaries 7.
8.
Counselling Team.
Presented
at
5th National
Psychiatry
Conference, Cape Town, 1987 Rayner M Turning a blind eye? Medical accountability and the prevention of torture m South Africa. Committee on Scientific Freedom and Responsibility Washington: American Association for the Advancement of Science, 1987 Children in places of detention A code for their handling S Afr Med J 1987; 71 (suppl).
accepted that children are detained without charge for two days (or longer, if a court order exists), and even that parents might not be informed of their child’s arrest for 24 hours, or as long as 48 hours at weekends. doctors have taken action and have recognised their positive obligation publicly to make known information covered by the Declaration of Tokyo.9 Dr Wendy Orr’s moral action when, as district surgeon in Port Elizabeth, she sought an injunction to stop the prison authorities ill-treating detainees, has been widely commended by eminent members of the medical profession. 2 years later, at the Harare conference, she asked clearly "Why the deafening silence (about torture)? Why is Dr Ivor Lang, who carries the burden of Steve Biko’s death and the guilt of having ignored the assaults which I saw, now chief district surgeon in Port Elizabeth? Why have the Medical Association of South Africa and the South African Medical and Dental Council not acted to bring doctors who do not report torture to task? And why the apathy and lack of sanctions from the world medical community? My challenge to the world medical community and the World Medical Association is to take up the issue of torture and detention and the passive role of acceptance that South African doctors play". The banning of the United Democratic Front, the Detainee Parents Support Group (formed after the death of Dr Neil Aggett in custody), and fifteen other organisations makes it even more important that those organisations and individual doctors who have demonstrated their opposition to the brutality of the state’s treatment of children and detainees are supported. The role and responsibility of professionals in South Africa and Britain will be discussed at a conference entitled Children, Apartheid, and Repression in Southern Africa to be held in London at the City University on April 23, 1988. Details are available from the Harare Working Group, c/o SATIS, 13 Mandela St, London NW1 ODW.
Some
Breast Not
Necessarily Best
THE ideal food for normal full-term infants is breast milk, which will sustain their nutritional needs for at least four months after birth. However, there is consistent evidence that breast milk from mothers delivering at term, and who continue to express milk, is nutritionally inadequate for the needs of prematurely born infants.1.2 Breast milk is a
undoubtedly
9. The torture report. London British Medical Association, 1986 10 Anon. Human rights abuse in South Africa. Lancet 1988; i: 253 11. Birnstingl M, Black D, Booth C, et al Medicine and South Afnca Br Med J 1986; 292: 273. 1 Gordon HH, Levine SZ, McNamara H. Feeding of premature infants, a comparison
of human and cow’s milk. Am J Dis Child 1947; 73: 442-52 Adequacy of expressed breast milk for early growth Arch Dis Child 1977; 52: 296-301
2. Davies DP
in
preterm infants