CHAIRPERSON
... ask the witnesses to stand please.  Okay.  We are grateful for your presence and first I must introduce myself that I am not Dr Randera, who is supposed to be chairing the proceedings of the day, he will be, he will be chairing the proceedings tomorrow in Benoni and I must repeat, ladies and gentlemen, that we welcome you here.  We say to you, good morning.  You are all welcome at today's hearing.  That is we welcome you all for these first hearings of the year 1997.  It will be observed that we are starting the hearings at a time where the TRC is inundated with applications for amnesty and this is going to make the hearings the more meaningful and this is going to all go well not only for the TRC, but even for the communities that will be involved or they are going to get engaged in reconciliation, because reconciling from a position of information, reconciling from a position of knowledge of what has happened to the people, what happened to the victims is far easier than when we just talk about reconcile as though we say forget the past when we know that forgetting is very difficult, but we are striving and struggling largely for forgiveness and it is in this background that we are starting the hearings of year and it will be observed over and above that we are starting the hearings in this area, the East Rand area, which had carried most of the burden in the 80's and the 90's.  So with this I say, can we rise and get Reverend Friedman to open the occasion with a prayer, but he will be led, sorry.
OPENING CHORUS AND PRAYER