Luthando Dyasop — Survivor, Activist, Author, Passionate South African

Once more it is what's involved and it is so good to have you along with us. Tonight we're going to be talking to an incredible man who's written a book and I know I often say that you know this is a must read book and etc etc to this one unquestionably you have to read it but I am going to put out a disclaimer right up front. This is a story that will tug at your heartstrings and you know what you might end up with more than a few tears but it's a story of hope and it's a story of resilience what am I talking about well I'm talking about a book that's just been released called Out of Quattro from Exile to Exoneration and the author is Lutando Jasop. Hello Lutando, welcome man. Hello, hello David and thanks too for inviting me and hello to the listeners. So Lutando you've written the book and it's taken me a while to kind of get through it because sometimes I just have to stop and shake my head but basically just to give a bit of a background of what the book is all about. Out of Quattro, now Quattro is actually the ANC's version of a concentration camp can I say? It's an ANC version of Gulag of the Soviet Union, concentration camp and the book is all about your story and your journey from when you were a youngster growing up the things that you like to do, joining Kontoweciswe and how you ended up getting into Quattro and then from there what has happened.

So let's start off at the very beginning so we can get to know you a little better. Tell me a bit about Lutando, you were born where, your early days, those kind of things. I was born in a small town called Kontoweciswe in the so-called Kontoweciswe in 1958 and I grew up there but I had this gift of art and I took art as my, I identified it as my future profession but then what happened is that I later fell in love with architecture but what was the problem is that in that system, you lived under an operating system, architecture was not a faculty for Black people, it was only for white people and that's when now I find myself involved in politics in a way which I hadn't intended to do. So that's how politics entered my life and then I couldn't understand why politics now were involved in my education and that led me, that's when one thing led to the other and I became disillusioned with funding education and that's when I even dropped out of school, when dropping out of school didn't mean that now I was no more educating myself, unconventional so to say. I went to the library, the family member of the library and educated myself in many ways but later on I became involved with my fellow friends in listening to the Parade of Freedom which was at the time, requested from SAGA but that's when now I came to know of the existence of MK, Mukundu Caesar, the ANC military wing and I so wanted to be part of it but at that time it was 1977, I couldn't, going to exile was a bit difficult, one had to get connections but it was until 1980 when I left Canada on my own and joined Mukundu Caesar in Masayori in Sotru in 1980 and I stayed there for almost a year, I left in 1981 ultimately to get my training in Angola which started in December 17th, 1981, yes.

Okay so you started your training, where did the training start? In which country? The training started in Angola in 1981, December 17th. Now at that time you were still a young man and I'm fairly certain you were an idealistic man and you thought that you were going to be fighting for your freedom and the freedom of the people of South Africa, that is what the intention was and I think to try and put myself into your shoes, I don't think I can do that but sure you were thinking how incredible our country South Africa could be once we'd thrown off the yoke of apartheid and it was all of us living together in peaceful times, did you still practice your art at those times? Let me just go back a bit. Can I say I was idealistic at that time, yes I was idealistic but there were some little snakes once I was in Sotru. I think there were signs though we didn't take them seriously we thought maybe I just had little problems that will not that will just end here in Sotru because in Sotru we had a problem of we were not getting full support from the ANC, we had to fend on our own we understand we didn't have any support we only got support from the United Nations which are endurance demands and so we had a hard time in Sotru and when somebody goes through the doku in the city we got in details but so but then living in Sotru I remember on that plane hovering over South Africa towards the South Island I was so having so many hopes for my country but oh when I come back and the ANC will be in power all these shacks all these forums we call them matchboxes all these matchboxes will be gone people will be living in better will have a better living stand-ups they won't be hostels, dirty filthy hostels and I had so much hopes for my country and now and now landing in Angola yes I was I was so hopeful very much optimistic and idealistic as you see because we had this lovely document the freedom charter with all our hopes enshrined there so everything was just a looking rosy I can see that. Okay now the whole idea of Unconto West is where was it was a military wing so by going to Angola this is where you started with your military training or further your military training. Okay so what happened because it was all a bit of roses in fact what I think we must do is we're going to come back and I'm going to continue this discussion with Lutando and we're going to pick up his story from his time in Angola this is what's involved it's so good to have you along with us my special guest is Lutando Giasop who is the author of an incredible book called Out of Quattro from exile to exoneration we'll be back in just a bit and we're back with my special guest Lutando Giasop who is the author as I said of an incredible book Out of Quattro rather out of Quattro from exile to exoneration so when we left just before the break Lutando you just arrived in Angola so tell me what happened in Angola? Okay in Angola so we had there were training our military training like I said as I said on the 17th of December we started our training but then early in 82 there was a malaria epidemic in the camp so we had to leave that camp for another camp open another camp called Caculama that's when we finished our training later in the year later in the year but now what has been fascinating for us you know what we loved was the meetings we had call them criticism and self-criticism meetings where we were free to voice ourselves of any discontent we had because men it was of course in a good spirit and that spirit that anyone who loves ANC will love it enough to criticize it as long as it's not for destroying it but only to build it so that's self-criticism meeting and those sub-criticism meetings were actually good for the organization so they were not limited only to the camp matters but mostly to our organization as a whole because one aspect that is very much important about ANC credence that we were told we were taught that we are first politicians and we are not just any soldier who's being armed without any political glue so we were politicians first and so this stuck in us and as you know everybody knows you can't always see that is actually an honor of politicians from the great the earlier members like Nelson Mandela, Walter Sussan you name them these were first politicians so when these criticism meetings going on it was something which was actually in line with our in line with the programme of the MK programme of the AAC but then suddenly we were told that there will be normal self-criticism meetings the reasons for that were told but then it came up now in such a way that in a hostile way we were not going to argue that all right I understand we are in the army you only take orders from the top orders come from the top and we don't argue with the orders we just take them but now this here day was tasteful because we know ourselves to be politicians first so we felt a bit restrained somehow but then that was just the beginning because what happened is that we saw people being taken secretly we were told that no so-and-so is taken and partially we would see this in whispers that hate has been taken to collateral they say he's an energy agent then another one then another one so now that robust atmosphere was no more there we were now each was thinking of their safety first and now we were no more feeling free like we used to be but then that is when now I finished my training I was taken to another camp called cashito cashito is a camp where people who are going to be infiltrated inside the country for the last time there in the camp I was taught in anti-air aircraft ground-to-air missile weapon which is meant to neutralize helicopters and the like so we were was meant to go to Russia but then things changed the Russians will come to Africa and for the first time they will find a rations training people in Africa they came to train us we were such a special group we even had our special base in a special secret camp we had our special secret base but anyway to cut with us what we had finished the course when suddenly we were taken to the eastern front now instead of being sent to the inside the country South Africa to fight we were taken all sailed to the eastern front to fight the Angolan war we were told that you know it is going to take just three months and then after that maybe we had been prepared for an insurrection inside South Africa so we went to this a eastern French fighting unit well at first we thought that now this is going to be we know that after three months we will be sent inside the country because all along MKK does have been having this problem we always wanted to come inside the country at that time people inside were ready we could see a city organizations all over UDF all these unions people were all out for fighting they were only waiting for in controversy to come now and do the job now it seemed as if now okay we are going to go for this true us and then we will be sent inside the country so this was something we were all joyful about now but what happened is that we soon became disillusioned of that whole because the very people were helping did not like our presence they the Angolan people thought they didn't have enough political understanding they thought we were only keen on killing their own people but now we were also suffering casualties our guys were dying there and then that's when you said no no no we are we are withdrawn from this we called a we told the people like Christian who visited us in one of the places called Canada and told them no no no we went to that was in late 83 late 83 when December when christian came and they said no peace would like to live he said okay i'm going to tell the reduction just after that we suffered heavy heavy casualties 26 of our guys including a few of the Angolians died they perished in an ambush and that's when we said no no no we are now okay it ended up being in in reaching and we were forcing them now to take us to to withdraw us from this thing but what was it what happened is that we were taken back to Rwanda in a place called in the camp there called the end what happened also is that we said to ourselves now which we can't go to the front but we cannot go all of us to the front at the same time and what about there here here we are here because we still have our house is not in order we still have places like wahadro we hear people are being taken there and they it's high time the ANC security became accountable to us it should be dissolved we should know what is happening there in that world so now we see now things were a snowballing now if this muting so-called muting now muting was snowballing to be a political force and on the other hand we were calling for a national conference it was a since 1969 they had never been any other country national conference an elective national conference even in that 1969 national conference was came to be came to be after a after a a force from the members of the NK it was it yeah one other thing about the ANC is that the MK it always being pivotal in in the in the development of the ANC in the sense that even in that 1969 the conference it resulted ANC having for the first time now having all races as members now we we wanted to to to develop our we felt that our organization was stagnating we needed this and that and that and so we needed a national conference a elective national conference now this call for a national conference surely it was something which the leadership did not like we did not like the meat to that call but then on arriving in active Vienna we found the place and the people around the line those who were not had not been in the eastern ground they went they came in wanted to find out from us actually what was happening was they didn't have any rumors that were unruly we sat down with them and explained to them that no listen this and this in this we just like our house to be in order even before we can be same branch and all that we'd like to see our organization having a national conference where we can elect leaders of our own it didn't mean that we did not like these leaders but we wanted this a tradition of a conference a national conference to to be there because it is in the it was in the national in our constitution so but then it might have appeared to their leaders at the time as if we were a history but then what happened is that on the 12th of february 1984 there was a pre-don't rage organized by our leaders pre-don't raid by the fabla forces of Angola to come and squash us those guys were there to kill all of us with the orders from our leaders but it's so happened that we escaped they only killed one guy who must have woken up late and then they found themselves encircled they had encircled the camp but they didn't know that they themselves were encircled and when they when that when they discovered that they were encircled they knew that they wouldn't last and we knew that we would kill them but we wouldn't last long ourselves so but in that

many there was a mini battle there because I and the couple of guys four guys we were stuck in a trench right behind them they didn't see us we're 20 meters behind them they were facing the camp we were behind them but we couldn't leave that trench because if we went left if we ran towards the bush those guys of ours in the bush we fangled with the Angolians then they shoot us so we were stuck between a the Angolians and our guys and we just had to stay there and that's when they saw us when the sun came up they wanted us to deal to disarm and they asked them why are you doing why do you want to disarm us they said no they've been given orders actually this guy was already taking a big grenade he was about to throw it into the trench where we were the 20 meters away that's when I released a rocket I had my bazooka ready and it was aimed at the interesting so as to disrupt him to disturb him so that he couldn't throw it freely because I knew that once that grenade landed in the in our trench we were dead so I shot at the with my bazooka I shot at the APC how much personnel came and with all my shells which were five those rockets with those rockets I destroyed that APC and the driver died

and sort of those of those accounts I apologize in the book about that yeah we can get more into this because you know that was also the part of the book and and you've we're not going into depth here because in the book uh lieutenant goes into more into more depth about these things that happen and everything to me though what was one of the most shocking things was that their own leadership so so lieutenant the ANC leadership had planned this raid I mean you must have felt incredibly betrayed but let's get back to that uh in just a bit when we come back this is what's involved so good to have you along with us uh my guest lutano jasop who is the author of out of quattro from exile to exoneration we'll be back in just a bit and we're back with my special guest uh lutando jasop uh the author of out of quattro from exile to exoneration so lieutenant you'd now and I know that that that particular experience was one of many experiences that stuck with you um the destroying of the APC and and the killing of the people involved from there what happened because I want us to get to how you got to get sent to quattro because you didn't actually know you were going to quattro initially did you I know I didn't know what happened after that now you can imagine now us shooting the the APC now these guys my colleagues on the front in the trench they were also shooting but shooting in just to scare away the Angolans and the Angolans were running helical skeleton towards the king but then we that's when we got a chance to run for to catch for the for the bushes which were closed by when they heard that they were stopped by a shooting a tent and they they were shooting it is a miracle that no one or none of us was a was injured and then that's when now the way talks now between the leaders the the commanders of the papa forces and some of our guys

said no no no okay they were saying they saw that now they are going they cannot last because they are inserted and then we also saw that no no we cannot we can we can win this but we won last this the whole day but by the end of the day we'll be tracked down by the Angolans army and we'll be dead so that's when we started talking then it was

it was a agree that we will disarm and we said no let the whole is let the whole entry guys in a world in in new and at this um because we are afraid of the security agreements of me of the mk these guys are cruel they are going to to brutalize us so how about uh all of us this ami okay they said okay all of mk members were the disarmed but what happened that on the following day they saw christianic arriving with the security guys they were armed

in the to cut whether short very soon it was there that they came with a list that these people

will be taken to the

prison national prison of of angola in in in luanda and we were all the rest were taken to to other camps the very camps that we've been taken from before going to the eastern plant at that time what had happened is that another guy had claimed that he was the one who had shot the atc one of our guys i was making the trench he had taken my bazooka and the parade at it saying yeah i'm the one who shot the but the atc and i was wondering whether this guy is is aware of the consequences but then that's how he was taken to the prison of angola they thought that it was him because he had been boasting that it was him and i was taken back to another camp in the north uh bango and that camp i knew that very soon or later that guy in the echo came in there go will tell them the truth but i'm sure under jores they'll tell them that no no it was not me it was returned and all the time i was in that bango camp i was awaiting the time when they'll come and take me and really they came and they said they are going to take me to the front i said no i'm not i don't feel like going to the front because at that time i knew there was no they were not taking me to the front but i wanted the people around me to know that actually i'm the one who shot that they pursued because we and let there be no misunderstanding that i'm going to the front when they don't see me anymore they shouldn't be on the front i might be dead or i might be in quadro so i said no no i'm not going to the front just take any other guys i was prepared to go to the front you should know we want you these were the guys of the situation you want you so these other guys i was with them to come they said no why are you why don't you go to the front i said i told them the truth no guys actually i'm the one who shot that they're good was just claiming something and i'm sorry now they're going i'm sure they're suffering because of of that but i couldn't go leave this place i wanted you to know the forehead that i'm the one who shot the imprecise and whatever happens to me you must know that this thing of going to the front is just a facade there's nothing i'm not they're not taking me to the front it's either they're taking me to that prison or are they taking me to quadro so after that i told myself that okay now whatever happens everybody knows the truth about the story of the HSC and that's when now when they came for the second time asking me to go there i said okay i'm going there i'm going to the front or wherever but they took me via the lander and i could see that no these people are just

playing with my mind these are playing they're playing mind games something later yeah but lieutenant that was the time when they said to you that they had to take a detour to go and pick up another guy isn't it yeah yeah and you knew fact then that there wasn't another guy they were going to pick up yeah yeah and then they said no

instead of taking me to cashito again for your refreshment they said now we've got this other guy in another camp i said okay okay but then on the way that's when now the whole masquerade came to an end they left they they stopped the truck they stopped the van right in the stand of a long street with bushes both sides and then they sat around i was left inside the truck they said come out with that ordering voice and when i came up they ordered me to lie on the on the street and they i thought they were going to kill me they but they instead they they tied me on the back my hands on my back and then they kicked me and then they shoved me into the van again i had to lie on the stomach and they piled a lot of newspapers on top of me so that you as we are passing these checkpoints of the Angolians along the way they wouldn't see me when i i arrived in a truck i was wet wet with sweat from head to toe and they that to that chain just from they must have been or around two hours i was it was like i was leaning over it was so hot and when we because the events came to a stop that was when i was in quad all right letando um we kind of are running out of time so um this part of of when you were in quatre i mean you know i think it says in the book there because it's the beginning of of part four if i'm not mistaken where they you say that everybody that that reads this should start off by going yo yo yo because quatro is is a nightmare so how how long were you in quatro four and and just let's briefly talk about that and talk about the conditions and the kind of torture that you went through there while you were being i think the correct term that they used there was uh re-educated yeah you quite literally i think they were saying that initially it was supposed to be a

not a concentration camp but a rehabilitation center for people who were being disciplined or enemy agents but then that was not the case on arrival in quadro

i was beaten from the from the time i was uh disembarking from the from the land and between that point and in the office i had already lost my tooth and no mine is not to ask why it is just i don't know how it happens but you just feel that now you are in a different place you have no rights you cannot these comrades are no more comrades now and you are no more a fellow south african you are now something else something else they first of all they say you are no more a you can be just or your mk name you are going to have another name you get another name you say they tell you that you you have no rights here your right is to be beaten your right is to work hard and the and none of you is going to tell us that he is tired and it's just like that most of all i was taken to a cause a an isolation for two for two months i was in isolation anytime there in quadro you get beaten just being there in quadro gives those guards a right to to beat you and this is if there is a competition among them as to who's the who's the most

and you're the you're the victim you have to a stomach that you don't have to

complain because in quadro i told that all those rooms but you are never told when you are going to leave or why you are there or when you are going to leave

it's like it's like you have come to the end of your journey in life and they every day you wait for the time when somebody comes in and just beats you with no reason

yeah lieutenant this was probably the most difficult part of the book for me as well but i don't want to i don't want people need to go out and read this book because it has definite impact on on our politics on the a and c what where we are today so let's skip forward you now took this amount of time to be able to write a story about something that doesn't get discussed so you've you've written the story where where is lutando now are you are you sort of i mean because you know everything that you stood for um suddenly in quadro was was totally different i mean you you you had no rights you were beaten and these by your own people the people that you believed initially were fighting for for freedom for south africa so how do you feel about it now i mean this book must have been difficult to write it was difficult to write but to to a master write it was sort of a way of cancelling myself because we never had any cancer in our lives but there are so many issues because i was not there alone i had my friends with my my comrades who some of whom died today right in front of my eyes and i just wish that they are they shouldn't be forgotten now it is yes lutando i mean it's an incredible story but now how do you feel now i mean about about the a and c itself because i know you know in today's times in our countries if you look at back to the freedom charter and you know what it originally stood for and where we stand today they're not necessarily the same thing are you still a supporter um or are you still an exile in terms of of mk actually yes you know the ideas we were fighting for uh no more the uh i cannot i cannot say i see them coming to fruition right now because the freedom charter was just a simple document we were all fighting for but now i see that we've deviated from the freedom charter and that is when i say it is a simple detriment because what we where we are now we are not in any way those simply it might seem but we are no way closer to to achieving what the freedom charter was set out for us to achieve we are actually a and c now is like a rudder ship in the ocean headed for the ice bags

we we we do not have any direction because we what i i can say is that

i refute that there is democracy within the agency because we huge we would never have been

we would never have been convicted in quadrant had there been a democracy in the easy they saw that we were fighting for democracy within the party intraparty democracy which is not existing even today

my friend who died in front of me in in in in tartan had had had been his his call which had been his call that we should elect people that we love we we should we should be choosing our leaders it is in a nc a principle of policy that we should it is what we've been talking about you see that we should choose people that we we like but then the very a nc is not a practicing that you come up with that fundamental principle you are now against what the a nc is practicing because this what is happening that a a nc people vote for the a nc not for the reader is not the fundamental

practices or the aims or the policies of the a nc so right now i find that the a nc is it is of causing we've adopted this soviet centralized democracy which is not democracy at all it's where we members we just have to abide with the decisions of those of the executive and the close rank close rank we are the ones who are accountable to them not vice versa which should be the case the leaders of the nc should be the ones who are accountable to the to the public to the members and as such they would things like corruption would be curtailed has there been this democracy which with the way i i note not centralized democracy centralized democracy is something we adopted from the soviet union from the communist parties it is not democracy at all and i find that it's not even it's not a nc alone even other parties this intra-party democracy is something that we people of South Africa should look at closely because we might uh tomorrow have another party in power only to find that it also practice this does not have any intra-party democracy so in other words what we were fighting for and what the a nc was was resisting is this intra-party democracy we wanted to democratize this as our own organization but it had to go to the lands of building quadro and in the incarcerating people killing people so is to have this centralized democracy and when we came back home it was open season the economy the the fiscal it was open season for them there was there was no resistance from the people people were heavy democracy blah blah but they knew that voices like ours people were in asa we saw this we were afraid we were actually we were we were forced to sign on leaving a quadro you're supposed to sign that i will never talk about quadro or else i might face a death sentence or firing square so it's like the sadly my friend we we are out of time now um before i let you go the book is available in all good bookstores i assume it's available online as well um it's called out of quadro from exile to exoneration under one last thing do you have hope in these days with where we sit now do you have hope for our country and for the party and for the party for the a nc is there uh let me start with the second question you know i there came a time when i i was to question things like it from the uh attorneys from the leadership that the a nc first then the congress again to me was vice versa i i thought the the a nc was the best that we were using to to liberate the county with the country being the our first priority our most important priority is the county so for the country i have hope really i have hope but we have to work hard

we must work hard but there are times now that people are being disillusioned of promises after promises as years go by without anything happening i think these are these are substantiated these do these grievances from the people they do have substance and i hope that people should now realize that the power that we've always been saying power to the people is not yet in our hands but in the hands of those few it is high time we we took the power back into our hands and made those in power accountable to us and i think slowly and slowly we're getting there i do have hope for my country for the a nc the the present president is talking about instant renewal i think a senior renewal would be actually going back to the a nc fundamentals of letting the membership be a participatory in so as to when we talk of democracy we should talk of participatory to recall whoever they feel is not performing okay the people should be empowered no people should empower themselves okay wonderful lieutenant thank you so much mate for your time thank you for your bravery because i know what it must have taken to write this book and i know why you kept silent for so long but i think this is a very very important book that you wrote and also some some very valid points of view there so thank you lieutenant is the author of out of quattro from exile to exoneration do yourself a favor get the book and read it it's there's some great moments in there there's some terrible moments in there but it's a book that every South African i believe needs to read it thank you so much thank you david thank you lord there we go that was my special guest lieutenant jasop author of out of quattro from exile to exoneration that wraps it up for this edition of what's involved to each and every one of you look after yourselves take care and thank you for listening