1 Fatima Laher LRC Oral History Project 2 nd July 2008 This is an interview with Fatima Laher and it s on the 2 nd July (2008), 10 am. Fatima, thank you very much for agreeing to be part of the Oral History Project for the Legal Resources Centre, we really appreciate it. I wonder whether we could start this interview by talking about your early memories, growing up in South Africa your background, etc, and the trajectory that led you into the legal profession? Well, I think it s quite interesting because I consider myself to be almost extinct, or becoming extinct, because, you know, I was born in 1963 and actually this is the first time I ve had an opportunity to actually speak about certain aspects. I obviously was born into the depth of apartheid, I can t say in retrospect that it was all unpleasant, there were some things about it now, that when I reflect, were actually very good. I lived in an Indian township called Actonville, with my grandparents, and from there I moved back with my parents, when I was thirteen. But they had their own interesting history, because we lived across the road from Alexandra Township, which was First Avenue, Wynberg. So basically, in the 76 riots, at the time, my you know, we were well, I was still with my grandparents, in my last year with them, but we were part of the whole issue you know, people who had actually run away from home and, you know, they all came to my grandparents and went back after the riots, and people that I knew had their shops looted and burnt. I came back to that area to live, from 1977 onwards, and I went to school a high school called Mia s Farm and I matriculated there, which was all Indian an Indian education, so to speak. From there I went I was very fortunate, I was one of the few that got into Wits University, did a BProc LLB, I did that because we were there was a lady called Zuby Dangor who, I understand is in Lenasia, doing a lot of gender work there, she was a psychologist with the Department of Labour, and we, in Matric, went there, and she did an assessment and she thought I d make a good lawyer. I actually wanted to be a social worker. So, then I did that, I did law and doing the BProc, and after that went on to do the LLB, but in my, I think it was 82, 3, 4, 5, 86, in 1987 when I was doing my, I think, my final year of my LLB, if I recall, that s when I applied for a Fellowship at the Legal Resources Centre, because some friends that I knew had spoken about it, and I decided to apply and I did actually get the Fellowship. In retrospect I think that was actually a very bad thing; I think I should have did the Fellowship after I studied completely, because, you know, I was I moved into a flat in Braamfontein with a friend that was half-blind, but she was white and she was very kind and she said: look, you can stay with me because my parents had now also uprooted from where they were. So and I continued to finish the two years part-time at Wits, and during that final year that I worked at the Legal Resources on the Fellowship. So, that s basically that part of my life. Ya. I wonder whether I could take you right back, because you said that you actually grew up in this township, which was near Alexandra, and you grew up with your grandparents. I m just wondering what that was like for you, as a young person, were you politicised living under apartheid conditions, did you find yourself sheltered in an abnormal situation, or did you find yourself becoming very aware, from a young age, that things were not as they ought to be?
2 No, strangely enough, I think, when I we lived in Actonville up until I was thirteen, initially we went to a school that was quite far away, and eventually schools were brought nearer to where we were. But, one of, I think, the most pleasant parts, or pleasant time of my life, was primary school. We had essentially, Indian teachers who came from Durban, and I think whatever I am now, I can attribute to those primary school teachers. They were excellent, I think they they excelled beyond the system, I m sure a lot of them I don t think they must be alive but you know, they they when you think about it, if ever education was about anything, I think it was about that. I was never politicised, I was never politicised even at high school. What I did feel when I got into university, is that things were fundamentally unjust, it wasn t a question of right it was wrong. So, I didn t have to, kind of, really feel that I needed a beating from the cop to do that, I knew internally that there was a system that was wrong, and it was more at varsity that I would say as black students we never we basically stayed away from everything. We never participated in the sports, we boycotted everything and that was my student life, we had an inactive student life. But, active in the sense that we would go to the political rallies, we would go toyi-toyi in front of the police, those types of things, we did. This was at Wits? Yes, ya. I became well, not politicised but more aware during that period. I think for me, the turning point was that I had put everything into study, and the reality had hit me when I finished and I realised that it was not easy to find work. I was Indian and I was female that definitely was very, very hard for me. So much so, I mean, and then I started, you know, with the one year Fellowship at Legal Resources. You also mentioned, interestingly, earlier, that you when you were growing up in 1976, the riots somehow affected you, and I wonder whether you could talk a bit more about that, because you were also a young person, and I m wondering how that sense of the Emergency and the state of unrest, how that impacted on you? You know, when I was thirteen and I we stayed in Actonville in Benoni, with my grandparents, the rest of the family was in this 1 st Avenue, which is across the road from Alexandra, and with the mob, they all had to run away. And I remember distinctly, it was a Friday morning, and I remember I came I was from school and for the first time I never knew what the word riot meant, and they said there were riots. It sounded like a very kind of word riot what was and black power, I never knew, it was the first time I heard those words, riots and black power, and people that I knew, aunties and that, were ran with you know, they all lived in very simple conditions but they all basically had to flee. Now a lot of them were it was Friday morning, as Muslims, you know, it was Jummah, it was people were either going to get into the bath and I remember people pitching up with their pillowcases with jewellery and that a lot of them in their nightdresses, because they all basically got into the car and got out. I came back from school, but, you know, I don t know, I mean, I ve either never all these years really sat down and looked at this, but for me, as a child, maybe I was more secure inside. It didn t really shift me, big time, you know, where like, now, when you think if I ve got to leave my house I mean, seriously, you re talking big stuff now. At that time it just I think as a child
3 you don t it doesn t what s really going on or what you re standing to lose or whatever, you don t really I don t think one really gets in touch with that. And I don t think till today I was ever in touch I am in touch with that, it s like to me, I m relating I might as well tell you something that happened in a film. It s very much like that. But people did come back, including myself, I came back to live with my parents the following year and for years, I mean, life then continued, we still carried on transporting ourselves to school, to varsity. And then there was another resurgence, I think it was ten years later which was 86 if I m not mistaken, and I d finished my first degree, then I was you know, because we didn t live in good conditions and that s when my brother then who was a GP, he had a home in Heidelberg and we were still in Alex, that s when I decided that was somewhere in the middle of the night that we had to wake up Really. and people started going, ya, including my brother and his kids and that s when I said: no, I think I will go to Heidelberg; I don t want to stay there, because we were literally right in the township. But having said that, I never being Indian and having lived there I look, Alexandra has changed a lot, but it was nothing happened to me, I m here, I can t say to you that anybody, you know, was untowards towards us or that we tried ever to touch us or rape us or nothing nothing, nothing, nothing of that sort. So you didn t really feel targeted because you were Indian? Not at all. I think the riot happened because it was happening and, you know, people were angry and obviously in that they knew whatever, I mean, it happened that we were right it could be anybody that could have been there, they would have did and having said that, there was really not that much of violence. I know one very close people that I knew, their shop was right next to my dad s and their shop burned down. But, when you really think about how much of rioting there was, and what it eventually cost politically, they it was there was when they came people came back, their houses were still intact, you know, it was like we lived in, kind of, commune like houses, toilets were outside. No different to what the blacks lived, so, it wasn t much different, but I would never say that at that point, or even over all those years, that I specifically felt targeted, not at all, not at all. Ninety seven six also had a personal shift for you because you d been living with your grandparents Ya, and the following year. and then you moved to lived with your parents. How was that transition? I m wondering whether that in some ways fundamentally changed things about the way you saw life, etc?
4 Yes, I mean, I lived in an Indian suburb, so to speak, which was actually quite nice, and it s still very nice, and I came back to live with my parents which where they had lived most of their life and my parents have their own history. My mother got married when she was fifteen, she never saw my father. I had grandparents who loved my granny particularly, loved me, but she and my mother had a I mean, they just I mean, that is a whole rigmarole on its own. Before I was born my mom already then had heart problems, because of this extended family, my dad had to work for others, bring the money in. I had a grandfather that was an absolute ogre, very holy. So, you know, I lived with them but in very nice conditions and I was fortunate because the family, at the time when I was born I never saw poverty. And then I had to come to these conditions here with your parents? With my parents, and my mom was always weak and sick. And, I mean, the area the place where we lived was, to put it just simply, was filthy, you know, and as a young person, I mean, you come back at that age of thirteen and going to a school that is was Mia s Farm where you had to wear now trouser to go to school and, you know, very small community, so to speak. We were lucky, we had some Hindu children, but essentially, in Benoni, we had a lot of Tamil people who were very progressive thinkers. Right. Mia s Farm also had a reputation for being very strict, from what I can gather. Yes, ya. They had you know, it s just like everybody was, kind of, into themselves rather than out, and I think possibly, I ve been fortunate that I had that upbringing in Benoni. With your grandparents? It s my ya, it wasn t even the grandparents it was really the environment, the school that made the difference, that I think my I m still I still am I still consider myself to be out of the box, living you know, being in the same community. Because that, I think, had moulded me and I was very fortunate for that. So you had a very positive primary school education Yes, very positive, very, very positive. And that was the peak of apartheid, I mean, we sang that: uit die blou van onse hemel. And we had the English inspector, you know, the white inspectors, the white inspectors basically used to come around, you know So, when you went to high school, was that for you fundamentally different, in terms of the quality of education?
5 Ya, it was, very different, very, very different, ya. Was the emphasis more on the vernacular than the secular or? No, I think we were given the six subjects that could have got us into university, I mean, that was there we had some very good teachers, also there, some of them there like the maths teacher, the one that was good, eventually left, so, you see, a lot in our times depended on your teachers, whether you made it whether you got into university and your marks really, really depended on your teachers, they were the only ones, there was nothing else. Because my parents were not as literate, you know, they were retail traders. So, they were the so if you had a bad teacher, it was downward spiral for you, you ve got a problem. But, you were very fortunate in that you seemed to have figured out that you wanted to be a lawyer, well it was also you wanted to be a social worker, really, and someone said that you ought to be a lawyer. Did you follow that because you thought she might be right, or did you follow that because at some level you thought: well this is something I could do very well? I think, you know, I lacked self-confidence at the time, you know, it was more difficult to get into BA Social Work than BProc Really? eresting....i had actually I think, in retrospect, I think I got the shot and I kind of, sold myself on that one, you know, because simply because I couldn t maybe I didn t believe I ll get into BA Social Work, it was easier for me to get into BProc, I don t know. I think there was that in me that possibly felt I wouldn t have made it into a BA. I think that had a lot to do with it, as well, something there snapped, I hesitated. You also got into a university that s historically white and very difficult to get into Ya, it was very hard, don t ask me how but there was some contact somewhere somewhere somebody something must have happened, I believe so. So, that s how I possibly got in. What were those years like, because you really were at university during the 1980s, which was a very volatile time? It was very strange, you know I think I ve had I must be some of the strangest university history, you know, as an Indian young person, I don t know. Sometimes when I really think about this we dressed up when we went to varsity, we were very conscious, part of not that I studied for that, but it would have been nice to have got the professional. You knew, everybody that was on campus that was Indian, were
6 obviously, like everybody else, were there by via special mandate because nobody it wasn t like in today where people could get in. They either had contacts, they had money, and I m not saying because that they were stupid, obviously you had to have the results, but the guys that were there were obviously...would be nice to marry one of them, because all of them must have been must have had some resources (laughter). So a lot of our I think a lot of our efforts were, kind of, you know, based around that, and then of course, along came the political rallies and we would join that, and it was really, very strange and also because we were not we couldn t we didn t do anything that really would have enhanced our careers later, in terms of, like, we couldn t get onto the... NUSAS?...the what the Law the Council, or we couldn t get onto the SRC or so we had this very let s say you were always, you know, you took part we took part in the boycotts, we took part in all those things, but with it was also this dressing up, and looking at the guys, it was a very it was a volatile time, but I think then also, it s your the fact that you are quite young, you obviously don t really, really think and realise, and I think as a student, it, kind of, the volatility tied your plans with your lifestyle, because basically you ve got you ve got nothing, so it didn t really matter at the end of the day, as long as you With me, it was very much I had to pass and that was something I set standards for myself and I had to do that. So, in between, to use the Afrikaans word, saamgekom, you know, you just kind of went along with things. That was very much what it was. When you were on campus at Wits, NUSAS must have been quite active Yes, ya. were the people at NUSAS people that you knew, etc.? Not really, by recall, I mean, they were there now that you recall, they didn t really even as I sit here they didn t make there must have been certain talks, there were certain rallies, but in terms of beyond that, not really, anything that really made an impression on me. So, would it have been SASO that you would have probably aligned yourself with? We aligned most of some of us just never aligned ourselves to anybody, and I think I was one of those. Ok, right. One of the things that s quite interesting is that there s lots of people who were on NUSAS, whether they were presidents or members, who came through to the LRC. Did you find that your trajectory actually melded with people who then came to the LRC?
7 Well, I knew Urmilla Bhoola, I don t know if you ve interviewed her? I ll be interviewing her. Ya. She her dad was one of our teachers, I don t know if she will remember me but, I mean, she was older than I was and because her dad was a teacher, obviously she had...i knew her A teacher at high school? At primary, at Benoni, you ask her she ll tell you, she was from there as well. And I remember, I had, kind of, communication with her as well as Shamima Salie, who probably you ll interview as well, we Shamima and I were together at school now, these were the people that I met up from Benoni that were at varsity, and I knew through them, that look, there is a Fellowship at this place called Legal Resources... Right, ok....and I actually came through that channel rather than to say you know, I wasn t I m not saying people who were NUSAS presidents were astute, but I wasn t astute enough to know: hey, you know what, that is the channel and that s where I ll land up. No. It was a very much another route through which I could come, and also I understood that the experience would be good. I also, you know, it was a good way to start off your legal career, you know? Sure, sure.you mentioned that you were doing the LLB part-time and you decided you d got the Fellowship and that you were a Fellow, and as I recall, at that time you couldn t get Article Clerkship It was very difficult, ya. I m wondering, you mentioned earlier that in retrospect, that was not a very good thing for you to do. I wonder whether you could talk a bit about that? Well, one of the things at the time, I started in what they had the Advice Centre Programme Is that Hoek Street? No, it was at Pritchard, but, you know, the one of the offices, there were, like kind of, sections and that s where I started off. And I think, for me, if I can be candid, coming to the LRC I ll tell you something, I lived in Alex, I consider myself to be a
8 township person, I m married to a man from the UK who made a mistake of telling me that I m a township woman, and I said: you re damn right on that. It s a flag I hold very, very high. I may not hold a political flag high, but I hold that flag because it s where I come from. But for me, the LRC was a huge culture shock, if anything, I thought it was a disgusting place to work in. Right I mean, not everybody, and I m not saying everybody was like that, but there were some extremely rude people. Swearing was nothing, you know, I still think in all my years of experience, I m now forty-four, I think that was one of the most disgusting experiences I ever came across, even now. And having said that I come from Alexandra Township, so, I even classified that, way above that experience that I had here. So, I just felt that it was a question you know, I do at the moment, Impact Litigation at the Legal Aid Board, and we basically fund very even fund some matters with LRC, we re nowhere near it s just a unit that funds, besides its other offices, so it s not like the LRC, like that, and I don t believe that you ve got to, kind of, be very political to really make a difference, in my opinion, I don t if people want to that s fine but I think that s what I felt that They had a receptionist that everybody called Ma, which I took a lot of offence to, because I ve had workers who, may I say, were black whom I called Mama, but I had a very I still have a very special relationship with them. So, it wasn t about that, I just it was, kind of, this young person, everybody called her Ma and I had to call her Ma and my granny, whom I loved very much was my I just didn t like that. And I So you thought it was unprofessional? Well, I thought it was very, very unprofessional, very unprofessional. And in fact, the experience I had here, when I finished, I never applied for Articles because it had put me off completely. That s how badly it affected me that affected me. Right. I wonder whether you could talk a bit more about what exactly, in terms of the legal work that affected you? It wasn t the legal work it wasn t the legal work? oh, no, it was the people, the people that I worked with were were terrible. Were those the lawyers or the admin people? Both lawyers and admin, ya.
9 Did you feel one of the things about being a Fellow, the idea is that you get nurtured. Did you feel nurtured? No. I felt nurtured more towards the end of my thing because I had moved departments, but definitely not not I mean, one of the persons I worked with, just swore all the time and maybe at the time I was too young to understand, had I come across that type of a person today, that I would I now have different skills to deal with such a person, very much so. But, at the time, being a young Fellow, I don t think they realised the look, to me, to be perfectly honest with you, I think that damage that was done to me was far worse than the apartheid damage that was done to me. Really, I m talking of psychological, in terms of it, I almost abandoned my career. Was this the Advice Office behaviour or was it across the board? No, the section I worked in was called the Advice Office, so it was certain individuals that worked within that Advice Office Programme. Ok, and did you feel that, the swearing behaviour, the unprofessional behaviour was part of a way of pushing you, or did you feel it was just mannerism? I think it was probably more mannerisms... Right....ya, it was more mannerisms. I don t think it was necessarily, personally directed and I think at the time, I didn t have the skills to deal with it and I can t really blame myself for that, but, you know, that happened. Did you feel I m wondering it must be quite being a young person, being in a strange environment, as you said, it was a culture shock, did you feel as a Fellow, in any way that you had lack of recourse. Could you have then at some point gone to Arthur and said: look, you know, this is how I feel, this is what s happening? You know, I must just tell you that we talk of legal personalities that are almost beyond human, in a sense, they ve achieved such greatness, I never, ever had any he he we all saw him, but we never had communication with him, neither with him, neither with Geoff Budlender. I think my feeling is that they must have known what was going on, I wasn t the only one who was in that situation, there were Fellows before me, Fellows with me, and Fellows after me. If they re honest, they ll tell you. I don t think anybody I think there was a select to me and that s my opinion, I think that people just didn t want to do anything about it maybe because of the volatile because outside it was volatile, and maybe within the Advice Centre there were more black personalities dealing with you, maybe they thought it may become a black and white issue between them if they took the issue up, but I did feel
10 that they didn t do what was correct to rectify the situation. As much as we won t, and never went to go and tell them, but there wasn t a throughway we could go and express anything. Right. So, essentially what you re saying is as a person of colour, as a woman, and being a Fellow, did you find that there was a huge gulf between the white lawyers and? To some extent there was, yes, ya. Ok. Could you talk a bit about that? I think one of the things I would find that the Advice Centre Programme say you see, when they interviewed, say the Legal Resources would say now for example this year, for next year we re interviewing now, we re selecting let s just take for example, four Fellows, my exception has been and during the time I was there, it is the black Fellows that went to the Advice Centre, that was more manned by black people. The whites went down to the other sections that was manned by whites. Right, so there was this division, in terms of Ya, and it looks to me as if the person running the Advice Centre Programme...and they kind of when they interviewed they knew that one is going to come to me, so, they seemed to themselves had chosen it s almost, you know, it s a cycle, and it s almost a cycle of abuse, to put it that way, and I don t know if I m pushing it too far, but it s how I m just trying to explain it. It wasn t done on a basis that we re all interviewing for right you know three months three months three months and in fact at the end of my six months with the Advice Centre, I wanted to go back to the white...a white lawyer, I had no choice, I wanted to go, I was asked if I wanted to make that move. It wasn t like, three months here, three months here, three months it was that almost you were disloyal to this black unit...you want to go down there. That is what I felt very strongly. That is to me, what was going on. So internally, it had its own politics as well, huge politics. For me, as a Fellow, it was huge, you know, ya. Of course, of course. Was this politics ever talked about, was it discussed in any way? I m just trying to imagine what it must have been like, did you feel really? I discussed it with one of the persons that was in charge of the Fellowship programme towards the end of my year. He listened, but as far as I know, that was it. And I had just lately, I think two, three years ago, also brought it, just kind of mentioned it to somebody as well, again. But it was just as a matter of mentioning it. Sure, sure. And do you think that one of the things that from my interviews, always got a sense that there was a whole lot of lawyers that came in through the NUSAS
11 route, as I mentioned to you, and then there.lawyers who came in through the historically black universities, etc, etc, and it seems to me that there was this, almost natural tension between the two? Ya, there was. Were you privy in some ways to? Ya, I think I it s difficult because I can t really don t want to mention names but one of the persons who was in charge had a thing with one of the other white lawyers, it was clear, yes, I definitely could see that. Right, ok. And do you think that impacted on you, on your work? Definitely, I think it impacted, if anything, in my opinion, I think it overtook the entire programme, I ll be honest with you. I think it was if that s what they were all about, I don t think that they should have projected themselves to...for Fellowships, and I don t think they should have recruited Fellows at all, because they did me a disservice in that. Right. Fatima, in terms of advice work that you did in the Advice Centre, was it largely consumer work or was it? Ya, I remember at the time, it was like, a lot of it had to do with UIF, you know, people that try to access UIF, so, you had to help them to get UIF and there was these furniture shops, you know, that kind of repossessed and they were not supposed to repossess. So, it was it wasn t political major political stuff we did, it was really, you know, run of the mill, fish and chips rubbish that we did, you know, but maybe it may be a bit meaningful but for one or two of the people, but it wasn t, like groundbreaking stuff at all, we I was never involved in that, in the groundbreaking stuff, that the Legal Resources I remember there was one application for it was a detention, you know, without trial, and I remember Advocate (Denis) Kuny I don t know if he s still alive, or how senior he must be he argued that and that was what I had privy to when I I didn t even work on that case, I just went in to listen. So, I did a lot of that, you know, it didn t but it was nothing of substance. But I did work later with Charles Nupen in the Labour Unit, and I must say, I felt my experience there was very good. There I and I kind of he would, like, involve me in his meetings with the union with the labours, drawing up the conciliation, whatever, papers, that experience was good, and we did a lot of labour work. Right. And that was towards the end of your Fellowship? Towards the end, ya.
12 So, you said that you didn t actually go on to Article Clerk, what happened? I just, I pushed in the towel. I became very despondent, in fact, after that, I went into major depression, to an extent. I worked for an Alexandra Clinic, which was nothing much, I worked for a year, but in that year I got very sick. And I think it was just the whole thing coming together for me, you know, possibly at that point, I think everything got to me. And when I really started, I suffered from major anxiety and I think this is where everything came together, because I had this very bad experience and I realised that this profession, and it was wrong of me to think that way, but my experience gave me no hope. I also didn t ref therefore myself refused to apply for Articles, I was...and obviously, as an Indian woman and educated, I got no nurturing and no support from family, because they didn t understand and they basically were unavailable, so, for me, it was really my entire world shattering. Because you know, you always think of graduating and life changing and I realised it wasn t going to happen that way. But then when I started with the anxiety disorders, and I became really ill, I thought this is the end of the line for me, I m now either dying or I m off here, something s...you know? I couldn t get Articles, and I actually did a very strange thing, I actually spoke when I went to one or two Indian attorneys, they always said to me: hey, they won t give you the job, but they d say to me: you know, a lot of people are prosecuting, why don t you go and prosecute? And I actually did that, I applied. And I used to phone this woman at the Department of Justice...I...you know, I don t even know how I got this job but that was through no contact but I thought they used to tell you to put in your CV, it was a very ad hoc thing, it wasn t, like, advertised, and it went to this woman in Pretoria and I was pro-active, I got her number and I used to keep telling her: look, man, I need it doesn t matter where it is, just send me. And you know, I was posted in Newcastle as a prosecutor with no experience during the 1980s? hey I m telling you and I worked with this white Afrikaans, never mind the word, but oh she was she was terrible eh but, mind you, not as bad as LRC, but bad enough (laughter), you know right so, you had a lot of experience but very she couldn t I think she would become totally masculine over the years, she had no balance, this woman, so, anyway, but there was a very nice magistrate there, and I said to them: look, I ve just got into the Justice system. And I said: Now, I want to go back home. And I was very, very fortunate, I think God was on my side, I got through that two months and I got posted to Jo burg Magistrates Court, but that was the best time. I worked with a magistrate called Bester, was who s now died he was inaudible Afrikaans magistrate, he spoke nothing but Afrikaans, but a wonderful person, and I prosecuted and this is so good to say this, in one way or the other I prosecuted under the Afrikaans system, but, the people I came across were one of were, till today, have left very positive things for me. And what I ve learnt with them, is what I carry today, in the profession.
13 eresting. Not what I learnt at the LRC. They truly I worked obviously, you know, being with justice, if I was there today I would have become very we would progress. So, you were stagnated in a way, so you d been at District Courts for a while, I did the Maintenance Court, I was at Hillbrow Magistrates Court when I finished up before I got married I was doing Regional Court at Jeppe and I did all the control decisions. So, had I you know, it it I learnt a lot I learnt a lot, both in court and otherwise, and I can today stand up and do a trial in Afrikaans. But the way those magistrates inducted me, I never felt I was forced to speak Afrikaans, I just spoke it. Until today, I can t say to you I was forced. There s a kind of irony...i was never intimidated and you must remember, it s a second language, I never spoke it, but it was done with so much of...i don t know you know, they always the magistrates were older, they were all most of them were Afrikaans, always looked upon you as a young person and treated you that way. Ya, it was just amazing. It sounds it seems almost ironic Ironic, isn t it, and I m the living example of that irony, you know? So how did you reconcile all of this, because in a way, the experience of becoming quite anxious and depressed must have left some kind of marker on you, in a way in which you then related to the legal profession, or to certain aspects of work-type behaviour? I think you see, strangely enough, when I got into this position, into prosecuting, and I came back to Jo burg because we earned a reasonable salary for those years and we had very good medical aid, I immediately went into therapy for many years, so that got balanced out. But perhaps my therapy I think my therapy also we looked at a lot of my personal stuff, in terms of the lack of support, in terms of what was happening on that front. So, I focused a lot on that, and work seemed to have went reasonably well for me. You know, it...the work never was a problem. Just reflecting a little bit about your experiences at the LRC, would you say, looking back, that you felt that you were bullied? You know, I can t say the word bullied, it goes to me it s not bully it s something else
14 Some people have mentioned to me that, part of it might have been that black lawyers felt that, in order to survive under apartheid, you had to be really hardened and, so, there was a sense you had to be pushed very, very hard? Could be. But I don t know it s the first time I ve ever understood that, I ve heard about it, I I it s not how I understood that if they think that it what are they saying that it s like a camp to make you into another bully, that s I m sorry, that s bullshit, you know, because that s the biggest shit I ve ever heard because I ve never in my time there ever understood it to be that way. I understood that if you come in and you re a man and you say: oh, fuck, fuck, fuck and shit, shit, shit, the whole day, then that to me can never in any way make a person tough. And I think internally, even as women, you either have strength or you don t, you can t make people like that, you know? I mean what type of a voice would she have? I would never I I ve never seen it that way; it s a revelation to me. But perhaps, you may be right, that that could may well have been. No, this is something I m merely throwing out It could well be, maybe that was their philosophy, but it s not how I saw it. Right. I m also wondering you mentioned how, towards the end of your stay, you had a very positive time, especially with Charles Nupen Looking back, do you think that Fellows might have at least had an opportunity to to try to get experience in different things so that when they did in fact apply for Article Clerkship, that they would have become more equipped, rather than just doing the Advice Office? No, I think we it became...as I said, the way I see it, is that it looks from the onset probably, that they took they picked it wasn t done in a way where, if I m running the department that I should choose you, it shouldn t have been done like that. There should have been a separate HR person dealing with those issues and say: ok, you know what, these are the Fellows we ve chosen, what is our programme, so Fellow A, B, C, D, four Fellows. So the first the A, this one will start for three months and then move and move so it was became a more rounded thing. I definitely didn t think of it, it was like that at all. You see, I think, that to me, when I rethink about it today, I think that was lacking. So this lack of giving people experience, etc? When you were here did you have any experience of the test case approach, were there discussions about how...? No....the LRC was unique in that way?
15 I kind of knew that the LRC in fact, it is today when I see people who are LRC, sitting and being judges you know, I ve been away in the UK, I got married and I stood out of the profession for thirteen years. Oh, right, ok. My husband s from there, I got married, went there, bought a guest house in Cape Town, restored and renovated a hundred and twenty year old building for five years, went back to the UK, came back and decided to come back, after thirteen years, and after thirteen years I say: huh, judge, huh huh ok, you know. I didn t even realise I mean, look, I knew, like people like Arthur Chaskalson, I mean, those are people you knew were there and they were you know, obviously with you knew in the Constitution when it was he was one of the I m not talking of those type of figures. I d known that I find it amazing that people I ve worked with are in these positions, and I m not saying they don t deserve it, but ya, I mean, there you are, I mean I just, like, huh? Ok. So this was the new South Africa that greeted you? This was the new South Africa, ya. So, I m trying to you went into the prosecution in Newcastle... Ya....and how long were you there for? Oh, no, there I was very lucky, I was there for, like, two months, hey, ya, and they were very good, that magistrate helped me to get a transfer, ya. Right, ok. So, then you came to Johannesburg? Ya, ya. Ok, and then how long did you work there? No, I worked about all in all I prosecuted for four years, ya. Right, and during that prosecution time in Johannesburg, did you then work with LRC at all? No, no, no.
16 So, and then you left for the UK? Ya. So what period would that be? I got married in 93, end of 93. So you left at the end of apartheid, really? Ya, ya. Ok. And so you went away and then? I must just tell you, 93, I had despaired that we d ever get a new dispensation. Really? Ya. Who knows, I probably would have never got married if I had known that things were going to change, seriously, I had given up. Why was that? I think I just felt it was never going to happen. Was that because of the different CODESA difficulties? I m not sure. My perception was that it was just not going to happen, bullshit. I just had given up. The ANC had come in and? Ya, it s just you know, my perception because I think things were going, going, going, but nothing we didn t see anything. it was a frustrating time?
17 A lot of it was also closed doors, which is good, but I m just saying, for me, I didn t think it was ever going to happen. Strangely enough, I remember that as a very, very clear perception. So, you went away for thirteen years? No, ya, well, out of the profession, but not out of the country. Right, ok. So, you left, you went to Cape Town...? Ya....for five years...? Ya....and then you went to the UK? Ya, and came back, ya. What made you come back? Well, strangely enough, I mean, that s another history. Basically I my husband has been there all his life, he s got four degrees and he s he was a lecturer and he left lecturing when I got married, he s twelve years my senior. But, I...you know what, to use the Afrikaans word, I just got gatvol, you know, I lived in apartheid years, and I went there because my husband was from there and I liked him and I married him and he s also family, so it s not that I didn t go to immigrate, it was a nice change, but it wasn t I didn t leave my country, so to speak. But, you know, I...we were always going to come back, which we did and then at the end I decided to go back because my husband had never really settled down here and I decided it was best. (Cellphone ringing) Can I take this? Sure, sure, let me just stop this. (erruption. Recording resumes after a brief while) So you mentioned that you wanted you thought of going to the UK, not as emigration, but really because of personal Ya, ya, and then when I went the last time, which was, like, seven years ago, you know, why people never speak about this at the end of the day, you are an immigrant.
18 I had already come from apartheid, I wasn t going to be an immigrant in somebody s country, I m very sorry. There was also other types of oppression, you know, at the end of the day, the British are very curt, they re not bad people, I m not talking of the British people that s bad, but what I m saying is that they re very curt, basically, there s millions of you, they don t give a shit, really, they really don t care at the end of the day and my husband, you know, his brother was in the British Army, so they were more British than the British, so they had their own kind of very insincere value system, I really didn t want my kids to be brought up like that. When I m talking of oppression it s not oppression as in apartheid, you know, I realise one...such a critical thing, you can be in one of the most advanced countries in the world and you can be very oppressed. And by that, I m talking of a simple thing, I had children, I lived in a two-bedroom flat, it was a nightmare, it was an absolute nightmare. We were not going out at night, up with everything there is in this country whether it s apartheid, whether it s current crime, I promise you, I lead a ten times more liberated life than I did there. And, support structure very, very bad, you know, I m talking of personal support structure, the whole thing where you ve just got to go out and put your kids at school and go to work, I mean, that is a whole oppression, and not because you ll be sitting with maids all the time. I mean, I have a maid, I pay her, she keeps her hours, I m not talking of that, there is something about the lifestyle. And then the disobedience of the children, the whole thing, and at the end of the day you become nanny number one. That s what you are, you know, your respect as a mother, because I was very the one thing apartheid did to us or positively, the communities were together, we built up very strong value systems and very strong, you know, your community, you didn t have to if certain things were there, they were unsaid but they were very powerful. The status of a mother, we didn t talk about that, we knew what the status of a mother was, when I went there you could see that the status didn t exist, it fell apart, somewhere along the line it got lost. I mean, I could have been a nanny for all I care, and I think those were the issues, that I said: no, I m not going to take this. Besides the fact my husband was very sophisticated, but that is an issue in itself because he, himself, was very British in one way, but when it came to us, he had his own double standards, where he became he was very almost worse than as if he was I think there were people it s even derogatory to say, people from India behave like that, but, you know, he was then would, kind of, almost be retrogressive with us. So, there were all these issues, and when I did come back, seven years ago, I must tell you, I came back with nothing, we had the guest house in Cape Town but I didn t want to go back. I came back with my kids to live with my parents, with no job, and without the consent of my husband; he thought I was on holiday, and I never went back. Wow. So, you know, I felt, what I went through there, still today feel very strongly about that, and I ve come back to South Africa, almost not that I ve ever said it was never political, but I think really, sincerely believe, ne, that people here, I don t think they actually know what they have. It s a lot of good, yes, it s a lot of negatives, a lot of good. And I am that person that can see it for what it is. I feel I have I can say I have that wisdom, even now my children have dual citizenship, I have indefinite status, what s stopping me? And what s even nicer, now, the British Government you
19 remember in the days of apartheid, you couldn t do the British exam here, now you can do it and go and work there. So, there you go. So, when you came back did you go immediately into the legal profession? No, I suffered badly, physically, because the cold had got into me, so I was in a bad way physically, I had also put on a lot of weight. So, my first two to three two years I got the children into school into a decent school, I got my body into shape, and myself into shape. Then I was admitted as an advocate, I never practised, so, I got off from that, and I then decided, you know what, one hand what they say one bird in the bush...one in the hand is worth two in the bush, so I decided to do practical legal training here, that s about 2004. Again there, my husband didn t want to pay, neither did my family, I borrowed the money, and I went and I did the PLT, I got through very, very well and I then decided to stay at home. I did my Board Exam, I got through, I had one oral, got through, I did a few things at home, and when I was physically ready, I then applied to the Legal Aid Board and I got the position as Candidate Attorney at Impact Litigation, and I completed my Articles with them. I did a year at the Children s Unit at Alexandra, which was very nice for me. I was a bit unhappy with certain aspects of the administration there as then I had resigned last year, but they called me back at their unit and I did interview there for the position, and I got it. So that s where I am now. One aspect about the legal profession, I have to say to you, when I just got to Cape Town in 95, 96, I had came back from London and I had my son then, he was about a year old, I decided to do pupillage in Cape Town, it was a very bad experience. The reason I say that, I didn t know anybody there, I did pupillage with a woman of colour, very, very similar experience to what I had at the Legal Resources, also F and B person, you know, the fuck fuck person, very much like that, in fact it was so terrible, she was the type who would send you to buy her cigarettes, by the way, later, madam sat as a judge as well. Really? Yes. I actually went to...you know the person who s senior, like he was a white guy, old man, who like kind of what do you call them, they had the certain portfolios in the Bar Council, I went to him, he changed me, I then completed my pupillage with a Jewish chap, because he was more calm and in the chambers across the road. I took the exam but I didn t get through; that was also not a good experience, very bad experience. Both of my experiences that were very negative, were people with people of colour, hey? Right, gosh. So, the Legal Aid Board that you work for now, what sort of work do legal work do you do? Well, very much...my unit, not the other the Legal Aid Board, as you know, it does criminal defence, the reason I work in this unit, it s very much like what LRC does, but different, in the sense that we have a budget, our unit has a budget of five million, and what we do is that we fund and we litigate constitutional matters or matters of impact. So that s what I do. At the moment one unfortunately the manager of the
20 unit I came in there on the 14 th, she unfortunately fell ill, she was not well, she hasn t been to work since then, she subsequently resigned, I ve been running the unit from then up until now. Gosh, so, you re an acting Single-handed not even, but as a PA, ya. So I do everything. But at the moment I don t litigate because it I do take one or two on, if I feel I can push this one in, because our main thing is the funding as well. And it s a bit dangerous to litigate if you re one person running a unit like that. Although I have an executive, but I do all the groundwork so that, you know obviously he can t do that. I m just curious you entered the legal profession at a time when apartheid was in the throes I m wondering whether you thought that the law could be used as an instrument to actually overcome apartheid which it was legally entrenched in? So in one way, I suppose what I m really asking is that if under apartheid, parliament was supreme, do you think that the laws could then be not victories could have been overturned? You know, it s interesting, your question, you know, today I think differently when I see parliament, maybe I m so much more mature, but at the time, having come out just fresh under university, I think your level of maturity s not there to think along those lines. I didn t have that level of wisdom or maturity, really think you know, you obviously knew you could contest things, but you I think you just never understood the power of something that could be done in that situation, because we were always government was always so powerful and I suppose, as a child, it...government is always overwhelming. Right, right. So, I don t think I understood it completely, at the time, I don t think so Right. I m also wondering, subsequently, after you left the LRC, what s your level of contact been, either professionally or personally with them? Nothing. Nothing at all? Ya. I ll tell you where it started when I realised people have actually moved out of LRC, oh, ya, ok, there s no more Ma at reception, ok, good, but where I ve had contact in fact it was interesting, because...the CV when I put in at Legal Aid Board, I had said I was a Fellow here and they d realised I had some background to this type for work. When I just came in as a as a Candidate Attorney, at a very older