Investigator unable to find key witnesses in Luthuli inquest
A police investigator tasked with collecting evidence in the Chief Albert Luthuli inquest says he has been unable to locate three crucial witnesses.
Tuesday was the second day of the re-opened inquest into the anti-apartheid activist's death in 1967.
The apartheid government concluded that he died after being struck by a train in Groutville.
The Nobel Peace Prize laureate’s family believes he was deliberately killed.
Colonel Thomas Steyn, an investigator in the Hawks Truth and Reconciliation Unit was tasked with finding witnesses from the original inquest in 1967.
Steyn told the Pietermaritzburg High Court that in efforts to track down the three witnesses, he first went looking for the conductor of the train at a property in Durban.
READ: Luthuli investigator: Key records missing
"I managed to trace the house, but only parts of the house were still standing. I met a security guard who was guarding the house next door, and he informed me that no person stayed in the house for years. The person, Pieter Van Wyk, was unknown to him."
He then tried to track down a fireman who testified in the investigation.
"On 17 October 2024 at 07:30 I went to the St Andrews Hotel in St Andrews Street, Durban. The building is in a bad condition. I did inquiries inside the building, but all the workers [have not been] working there for a long period. Daniel Lessing Greyling is unknown to them.
A search for the train driver also turned up nothing.
The inquest continues.
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