Truth commissions: One option when dealing with the recent past in countries that have endured war or dictatorships

Published in CCTS Newsletter, Autumn 2002

Roberta Bacic, a Chilean working for War Resisters' International, provides more information about truth commissions as a way of dealing with the past.

How can those who tortured and those who were tortured co-exist in the same land?

How to heal a country that has been traumatised by repression and the fear to speak out is still omnipresent everywhere? And how do you reach the truth if lying has become a habit?'1 Diana Francis' recent book People, Peace and Power appears at a moment when it seems almost impossible to stop the war machine. In it she encourages academics and practitioners of conflict transformation to acknowledge the need for dealing with the past if we do not want 'conflicts to grow from the seeds of past suffering and hatred'.2 She courageously addresses the complexities and demands of justice, the realities of power, and the impact of social injustice - key topics in keeping the peace once hostilities end. Looking into any of the recent conflicts, this has been the reality: Kosov@, Chechnya, Afgahnistan, Irak, just to name a few. Truth commissions represent an attempt to deal with some aspects of the problem of dealing with the past. They have been set up in countries that have endured violent conditions or where human rights have been systematically violated. The new administrations - whether following war, dictatorship, or a transitional government - lack a system of justice capable of dealing with the consequences of the past. The existing systems cannot be relied upon to prosecute those responsible for human rights violations, because violence has usually been perpetrated by the state and its institutions, including the judicial system. At the very least, these institutions have been complicit in the violence by ignoring or denying its existence. We can also add the dimension that all of us who constitute society share responsibility in varying degrees for what has happened. In Anil's Ghost we read: 'We are often criminals in the eyes of the earth, not only for having committed crimes, but because we know that crimes have been committed'.3 Hamber agrees with this point: 'Responsibility needs to be taken not only for direct actions, but also for silence and covert support'.4 In the political discourse which accompanies the establishment of truth commissions, the individual needs of those who have suffered are generally subordinated to the interests and timetable of the new government. There is no acknowledgement that the healing process of victims may require a different timetable. Referring to the Guatemala Truth Commission, Beristain says: 'However, telling the truth and documenting it is not in itself any assurance. After the testimonies and the reports, it is crucial for the government to implement thorough structural changes to the institutions implicated in human rights abuses'.5 Truth commissions are established as independent bodies capable not only of conducting a proper investigation and but also of offering suggestions on how to proceed after the facts have been officially and openly acknowledged. They also aim at reaching some level of agreed understanding about the past. As we have pointed out, in most cases the legal system in the countries concerned has been part of the old order. Many of those who played a part in that system, and may continue to do so, supported the politics of the previous regime. We can not ignore the fact so well and clearly expressed by Ondaatje: 'Sometimes law is on the side of power, not truth'. In fact, I would add that this has been the case in most of the situations of this kind.

Truth commissions vary in terms of their degree of authority, legal capacity, moral acceptance and support from survivors, the size of their budgets and the number of their staff. The extent of a truth commission's authority will depend not only on the kind of people who serve on it, but on the strength of the new government and its acceptance by society as a whole. Usually the chair of the commission is a figure of moral stature who has struggled for justice, has international prestige and has managed to expose human rights violations in the past. A truth commission's legal capacity will depend on the mechanisms available to it to unearth evidence of human rights violations and on its ability to link up with the judicial system which is ultimately responsible for the prosecution of the perpetrators.

In my view - as someone not pretending to be neutral but standing beside those who have suffered the human rights' violations - dealing with the past means neither more nor less than learning to live / cope/ struggle with it in the present. Forgiveness and reconciliation may follow as a conclusion of the process. But they will not be my focus as generally the call for them constitutes a further demand upon those who have suffered human rights violations, made by those who have negotiated a political settlement to their own advantage and now exercise political power.

After having worked with relatives of the disappeared for about twenty-five years in my country, having been part of the investigation team of the National Corporation of Reparation and Reconciliation for four years - the follow-up of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission - and having researched and lectured on the topic for several years, I would like to make a number of observations about these institutions in order to clarify how they can be extended and be as effective as possible at different levels of society. This is important in order to see how, when and where NGOs, grassroots groups, the educational system, professionals, individuals and social actors can act upon and be helpful in the healing process of both individuals and society as a whole.

1. Truth Commissions are capable of contributing to an acknowledgement of two substantial issues:
   • The institutions of the countries concerned are incapable of dealing with the human rights abuses that have taken place.
   • The violence and abuse have been known about all along by victims and perpetrators but have been ignored or denied by a large part of society.
2. Truth Commissions are set up to establish an accurate record of a country's recent past, to clarify uncertain events and to lift the lid off the silence and denial about a painful period of history.
3. They exist to respond to some of the needs and interests of those who have suffered abuses, and much of their time and attention is focused on these victims. However, as the president of the Association of the Disappeared of Chile stated when the commission was set up - 'It is crucial to understand that the Commission and what results from it are by no means a concession, but a minimal right and that we have nothing to be grateful for. It is fitting - that and nothing but that'. Storytelling, in relation to the input of both victims and perpetrators, is an important and substantial part of the commission's task.
4. Uncovering what happened can trigger a process of dealing with the past. But it is essential if this is to occur for grassroot groups as well as NGOs and state institutions to deal with the Commission when possible and make good use of the outcoming report and/or recommendations, and thereby contribute to the prevention of future violations.
5. The publication of facts makes it impossible any longer for the perpetrators and apologists of repression to hide behind euphemisms. So a 'crime' is a crime and not an 'abuse', 'torture' is torture and not an 'inappropriate and unnecessary use of force', and so on.
6. The existence of the commission and its subsequent report means that the topic that previously mainly engaged victims and perpetrators becomes the concern of society as a whole. Those who do not belong to either of these two groups have to take part in the discussion and take responsibility for what they previously ignored and for what they failed to do.
7. During and after this process there is a strong need for rebuilding social networks. Here active dialogue and the participation of individuals and social actors becomes relevant.
8. In the context of what is happening all over the world, the setting up of these commissions after war or dictatorship becomes a matter of aesthetics. It looks right to set them up and give them national and international importance.
9. In the realm of morality, commissions challenge society to face up to the necessity of deciding what is and what is not negotiable, and of balancing ethical demands against political constraints.
10. A few commissions have contributed to the achievement of justice and accountability. Others have argued the need for them to be linked to a processes of justice - a basic demand of the victims.
11. Commissions are supposed to make recommendations to overcome the problems of the past. They are expected amongst other things: to design a reparations programme and to propose programmes regarding the prevention of future wrong-doing.
12. They are well placed to assign institutional responsibility for abuses, and to recommend reforms. They can base their conclusions and recommendations on a close study of the records, whilst standing as independent institutions separate from the systems under review.
13. In many cases they have been thought capable of promoting reconciliation and reducing the tensions resulting from past violence.
14. They have contributed to establishing the right of victims, survivors and society as a whole to the truth.
15. In many situations, they have helped by allowing people to express what they have felt and known regarding the events under examination. This in itself has had a healing effect in many cases.

For those who have suffered violations and repression most directly, it is difficult and controversial to trust an institution set up by the government, since during the period of repression it was the state that was responsible for the violations, either because it perpetrated them itself, or because it allowed them to happen. They have no real reason to suppose that a new body created by the state will be trustworthy. On the other hand, those who supported the previous government will also be suspicious of this new body.

Over the past twenty years, many truth commissions have been set up (around 30 by now), the best well-known being those in South Africa and Chile. Of crucial importance is the way they are organised: how they select their staff; their means of co-ordinating with other organisations that are able to provide information and insights into procedures, and how long they have been allocated to fulfil their task. These factors will affect the way they connect with society as a whole and the extent to which they can help build a society where human rights are respected. As a result of the suggestions set forth by the Chilean Truth and Reconciliation Commission, a law - NR. 19.123 - was passed by parliament, article 6 of which reads: 'It is declared that the location of the disappeared people, as well as the bodies of the executed ones, and the circumstances of that disappearance or death, constitute an inalienable right of the relatives of the victims as well as of the whole of Chilean society.'6

As these truth commissions get set up in countries experiencing political transition, following lengthy periods of repression and violence, their establishment has to be negotiated with the very people responsible for the oppression. Negotiated transition involves compromise. Perpetrators of human rights atrocities, many of whom still hold or seek positions of power in the new political dispensation, may refuse to submit themselves to justice. On the other hand, great numbers of victims demand accountability. The existence of such commissions is a result of the struggle of social movements which have organised around the concept of a right to truth, the right to end repression and the right to protest against an unfair and brutal society. These movements - often involving the relatives of the disappeared, victims of extra-judicial assassinations, the exiled and displaced - have been both a medium of resistance and a living testimony to what has been happening in their countries. They have drawn international attention to state-directed terror.

However, it is important to realise that, although these commissions may be said to have been established on behalf of the victims, it is not always clear whether or not they have in fact been helping them. In the majority of cases, the negotiation process and amnesty are likely to be of benefit to the perpetrators whose impunity will persist. As Gillian Slovo says through one of her characters - 'And the fact remains: the Truth Commission amnesty seems to be a way of saying that the guilty can go free'.7 Often victims' organisations play little or no part in setting up commissions or determining their procedures. Moreover, the granting of an amnesty may enable many perpetrators of human rights violations to stay in power. In Argentina, Chile and Uruguay, people accused of human rights violations have retained their jobs in the armed forces both during and after the transition period. As Rojas et al conclude: '… impunity constitutes in itself a human rights violation'.8 Zalaquett, who suffered political repression in Chile and had to come as an exile to Europe, and was later Director of Amnesty International, has stated: 'Dealing with the past injustices and human rights violations is both an ethical and a political task. This is true not only for politicians but for human rights activists as well… In a transition one is dealing with a situation where meeting ethical requirements and political restraints creates dilemmas'.9 To give you an insight into what it means to have lived through the disappearance or execution of a loved one, I invite you to read the following short accounts and then consider what the Truth Commission in Chile could have done, what could not be achieved then or ever; what other social organisations have done; and what could still be done. At the Seminar we could look into these questions.

1. The Leveque family, an old family of workers from Osorno of Mapuche origins, was very involved with Salvador Allende's Government of Popular Unity. Don Pedro had practically founded the Communist Party, in which he always participated publicly and actively. He had many sons and the eldest, Rodolfo, was 21 years old at the time of the military coup and about to finish his studies in Anthropology. The police took them away, together with a disabled younger son, Wladimir. Don Pedro survived three hard months of detention and torture but his sons are still missing. Uberlinda, Pedro's wife and mother of the two who disappeared, was for years President of the Agrupación de Familiares de Detenidos Desaparecidos. She made countless trips to Santiago representing her Osorno group, looking for her sons and requesting medical help because the search was 'upsetting her' as she put it.
   In our meetings she kept repeating - 'It hurts so much that they took my sons away. Rodolfo knew very well why they were looking for him, but Wladi could not have done any wrong because he was paralysed. They did not let me give him his crutches and I despair to think how he could have managed to go to the lavatory because he could not move without them'. Doña Ube, as we call her affectionately, lived with Don Pedro until his death a couple of years ago. She delegated the presidency of the association to her daughter in law Angélica and has not given up looking for her sons, concentrating on her disabled son because - 'He needs it more, he only has me; Rodolfo has his wife and his son, who is now a man'.
2. Carmen, a short, stout and kind country woman who lived in a tiny house in one of Osorno's poor neighbourhoods, always arrived at the meetings with a small basket filled with home made bread or biscuits. She prepared them with special affection, to share generously her scant resources. At the time of her son's detention, which she witnessed because the police came to the family home to get him, she lived in the country with her son Carlos and her small granddaughter. Carlos drove the farm tractor in those days. She could remember that they told her - 'We are taking him to ask him questions and he will be back soon'. She waited for him with an unlocked door for twenty years, his clothes always clean and ironed, leaving food ready for him in case he came by night dodging police vigilance in the first year of the State of Siege. Five days after his detention the farm owners evicted her from her small house and that is how she ended up in Osorno. She lovingly brought up her granddaughter, who eventually became a University student and secretary to the Agrupación de Familiares de Detenidos Desaparecidos. In 1992 she approached me at a group meeting and offered me a home baked roll, as usual. When I thanked her she said: 'I have been a very bad mother'. This categorical statement surprised me and I told her why I thought she was a very good mother. She let me take her to a corner where she told me the reason for her words. A few days before the meeting, shortly after the inauguration of the first democratically elected government after the dictatorship, the National Television channel had presented a programme about torture. It was in reference to this that she accused herself of having been very selfish. 'I always wished for myself', she explained, 'that my son was alive somewhere and that he would come back any moment. Seeing and listening to those testimonies about torture I wished instead that my son had died immediately, without having to suffer so much.' After that she did not wait for him any longer, but she demanded that his remains be found to be able to give him a 'Christian burial' next to her husband. This could not happen, as she died very recently. So, it is she who lies next to her husband.

Suggested further reading

• A. Rigby, Justice and Reconciliation after the Violence (UK, Lynne Rienner Publishers inc., 2001)
• B. Rolston, Unfinished Business. State Killings and the Quest for Truth (Belfast: BTP Publications Ltd., 2000)
• B. Schlink, The Reader (London: Phoenix Paperback, 1998)
• D. Tutu, No Future Without Forgiveness (London: Rider, Random House, 1999)
• F. Fernández-Armesto, Truth (London: Bantam Press, 1997)
• J. Eldestein, Truths & Lies (London: Granta Publications, 2001)
• P. Hayner, Unspeakable Truths, Confronting State Terror and Atrocity (London: Routledge, 2001)
• P. Pérez, R. Bacic, T. Durán, Muerte y Desaparición Forzada en la Araucanía: Una Aproximación Etnica (Temuco-Chile: Universidad Católica, Septiembre 1998)
• R. Bacic et al, Memorias Recientes de mi Pueblo 1973-1990 Araucanía (Temuco-Chile: Universidad Católica, Marzo 1998)
• R. Bacic, 'Dealing with the past: Chile - human rights and human wrongs', Race & Class vol. 44, 2002
• S. George, The Lugano Report, on preserving capitalism in the Twenty-first century (London: Pluto Press, 1999)
• T. Bell, UNFINISHED BUSINESS. South Africa Apartheid & Truth (South Africa: Red Works, 2001)

Roberta Bacic

Notes

1. A. Dorfman, Death and the Maiden (London: Nick Hern Books, 1999)
2. D. Francis, People, Peace and Power (London: Pluto Press, 2002)
3. M. Ondaatje, Anil’s Ghost (London: Bloomsbury, 2000)
4. B. Hamber, Past Imperfect (Derry: Incore, 1998)
5. C. Beristein, in R. Godley, C. Kee and R. Norton (eds.), Guatemala: thinking about the unthinkable (London: Association of Artists of Guatemala, 1999) 6. ‘Ley No.19.123’, Diario Oficial (Santiago de Chile, 8 February, 1992) 7. G. Slovo, Red Dust (London: Virago, 2000)
8. P. Rojas et al, Crímenes e Impunidad (Chile: CODEPU-DIT-T, 1996)
9. J. Zalaquett, in A. Boraine, J. Levy and R. Scheffer (eds.), Dealing with the Past (South Africa: IDASA, 1994)