JUSTICE FOR MY FATHER

HE HAS a vivid memory of being in church as a little boy and hearing the congregation singing songs commemorating his father.

- PECULIA MUSHWANA

Rhythmic stomping shook the foundations of the building as voices rose in unison.

"Fort Calata, siyamazi ngubaba wethu [we know him, he is our father]," they sang.

For Lukhanyo Calata, the words stung.

How could people claim the father he'd never had the chance to know himself? He felt like he was being forced to share him with hundreds of others.

The killing of his father, Fort, has haunted Lukhanyo all his life. He was just three when his dad and three other men - Matthew Goniwe, Sicelo Mhlauli and Sparrow Mkhonto - were murdered by apartheid security police in 1985. The killing of the Cradock Four, as they became known, would go down in history as one of the most notorious murders of the apartheid era.

The men responsible - Eric Alexander Taylor, Johannes van Zyl, Hermanus Barend du Plessis, Nicolaas Janse van Rensburg and Harold Snyman are all dead. But for Lukhanyo this is no comfort- and he's determined to see justice done for the father he was robbed of.

The six cops applied for amnesty before the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) but were denied it, which meant they could be prosecuted for the murders.

They never were - and Lukhanyo and 23 other families are suing the state for failing to prosecute apartheid-era killers despite recommendations of the TRC to do so.

"We wouldn't have embarked on this path if they'd done what they were supposed to do," says Lukhanyo (43), an author and journalist who was recently appointed director of news at eNCA.

In papers filed in the North Gauteng high court in Pretoria, he and the other families claim the government violated their constitutional rights by failing to deliver justice for the death of their loved ones. They're seeking R168 million in damages as well as a commission of inquiry to investigate why the killers weren't prosecuted.

They intend using the payment to support families affected by unsolved apartheid-era cases.