POLICE have always maintained they only fired live rounds at Marikana miners in self-defence. Yet affidavits from mortuary workers indicate that cops had instructed them to be on standby with mortuary vehicles . . . hours before the actual massacre took place.

The affidavits by workers at different mortuaries were submitted to the Marikana Commission of Inquiry yesterday after the commission had been in recess for two weeks.

Evidence leader Advocate Matthew Chaskalson submitted that cops had anticipated that people were going to be killed during their operations.

Chaskalson said this was in line with provincial police commissioner Lieutenant-General Zukiswa Mbombo’s statement, who had earlier said cops were going to end the strike that day.

It has also been confirmed that 4 500 extra rounds of live R5 ammunition were delivered during the Marikana massacre.

The police have always maintained they shot at the miners in self-defence. In affidavits Chaskalson submitted, evidence suggests cops started making calls as early as 8am to mortuaries, demanding extra vehicles. In some instances cops were asked to make the requests in writing and complied.

Mortuary worker Josephine Ngake said Colonel Classen from Phokeng Police Station requested four mortuary vehicles to be sent to Marikana.

“I said I could only send one vehicle and asked Classen to send a letter of request,” she said. Later she received the request by e-mail.

Another mortuary worker, Simon Laka, from the Phokeng government mortuary, said he and other workers were summoned to Marikana. They were told to be there at about 6pm, two hours after the first shooting. He said they spent the night at Marikana and collected about 30 bodies from 5am onwards the next morning, which they took to the Phokeng mortuary.

Police strategist Colonel Duncan Scott denied any knowledge of the order for live ammunition and denied knowing about the request for mortuary vans.

He agreed with Chaskalson that it might have come up at meetings but he could have been preoccupied with other things.

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