Fake signer at Mandela event says he hallucinated

JOHANNESBURG (AP) The sign language interpreter at Nelson Mandela's memorial says he suffersfrom schizophrenia and hallucinated and saw angels while gesturing incoherently just 3 feet awayfrom President Barack Obama and other world leaders, outraging deaf people worldwide who saidhis signs amounted to gibberish.

South African officials scrambled Thursday to explain how they came to hire the man and said theywere investigating what vetting process, if any, he underwent for his security clearance.

"In the process, and in the speed of the event, a mistake happened," deputy Cabinet ministerHendrietta Bogopane-Zulu said.

She apologized to deaf people around the world who were offended by the incomprehensiblesigning.

However, she declined to say whether a government department, the presidency or the rulingAfrican National Congress party was responsible for hiring the sign interpreter, telling reporters itisn't the time to "point fingers and vilify each other and start shouting."

The man at the center of the controversy said in an interview with The Associated Press on Thursdaythat he began hallucinating while onstage in the stadium filled with tens of thousands of people andthat he tried not to panic because there were "armed policemen around me."

Thamsanqa Jantjie added that he has schizophrenia, was once hospitalized in a mental health facilityfor 19 months and has been violent in the past.

The disclosures raised serious security concerns for Obama, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moonand other dignitaries who stood next to Jantjie as they eulogized Mandela at FNB Stadium inSoweto, the black township at the center of the struggle against racist white rule. Mandela died onDec. 5 at 95.

In Washington, Secret Service spokesman Ed Donovan said vetting for criminal history and otherappropriate background checks of the people onstage were the responsibility of the South Africans.He added that Secret Service agents are "always in close proximity to the president."

White House Press Secretary Jay Carney declined to comment on how South Africa handled thehiring of the translator.

However, he added: "If in fact the individual was not signing, that's unfortunate because that meantthat people who rely on sign language to follow the speeches were not able to."

Jantjie has been seen on video performing sign language interpretation at other prominent events inSouth Africa criticized as fake by advocates for the deaf, including at an appearance last Decemberwith South African President Jacob Zuma.

The government left many questions about the bizarre episode unanswered, including how muchmoney the translation company was paid and Jantjie's precise role in the company and even whetherit really exists.

AP journalists who visited the address Jantjie provided for SA Interpreters found a differentcompany, whose managers said they knew nothing about the translation firm. A woman whoanswered the phone at a number Jantjie provided said she worked for the company that hired himbut declined comment and hung up.

The government said it tried to track down the company but the owners "have vanished into thinair," according to Bogopane-Zulu, the deputy minister of Women, Children and People withDisabilities.

She said the translation company offered sub-standard services and the rate they purportedly paidthe translator, $77 a day, is far below the usual rate of up to $164 an hour.

Ordinarily, sign language interpreters in South Africa are switched every 20 minutes to maintaintheir concentration levels, she said. Jantjie was onstage for the entire service, which lasted morethan four hours.

Jantjie, meanwhile, insisted he did proper sign language interpretation of the world leaders'speeches. But he also apologized for a performance dismissed by many experts as gibberish.

"I would like to tell everybody that if I've offended anyone, please, forgive me," Jantjie told the AP athis tidy home on the outskirts of Soweto that was outfitted with a big-screen TV in the living roomand two late-model cars in the carport.

"What happened that day, I see angels come to the stadium ... I start realizing that the problem ishere. And the problem, I don't know the attack of this problem, how will it comes. Sometimes I reactviolent. ... Sometimes I will see things that chase me," he said.

"I was in a very difficult position," he added. "And remember those people, the president andeveryone, they were armed, there was armed police around me. If I start panicking I'll start being aproblem. I have to deal with this in a manner so that I mustn't embarrass my country."

Asked if he had ever been violent, he responded: "Yes, a lot."

He declined to provide details, but responded to another question about his past violence bysuggesting his illness was behind it. "I'm suffering from a very difficult illness. The illness that youare not in position of understanding yourself at times."

Jantjie said that on the day of the memorial service he was due for a regular six-month mental healthcheckup to determine whether the medication he takes was working or needs to be changed, orwhether he should enter a mental health facility for treatment.

He did not tell SA Interpreters that he was due for the checkup, but said an owner of the companywas aware of his condition.

Police went to his home later Thursday to check on his well-being and determined that he was not adanger to himself or others, police spokesman Brigadier Neville Malila said.

A medical expert with University College London said Jantjie's unusual sign language didn't look likeit was caused by schizophrenia or another psychosis.

"The disruption of sign language in people with schizophrenia takes many forms, but this does notlook like anything I have seen in signers with psychosis," said Jo Atkinson, a clinical psychologist andresearcher at the Center for Deafness, Cognition and Language.

Jantjie said he is officially classified as disabled by the government because of his schizophrenia. Hesaid he has been on medication for nine years, and had taken it the day of the memorial service.

Jantjie said he received one year of sign language interpretation training, though advocates for thedeaf say qualified interpreters in South Africa must undergo five years of training.

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Associated Press reporters Ray Faure and Nastasya Tay in Johannesburg and Nedra Pickler inWashington contributed to this report.

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