On 15 April 1996, South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) came into operation with the purpose of promoting the peace-making process in a society which had been subjected to decades of discrimination and the violence of apartheid. The key to this about-face in the South African model was the guarantee of amnesty for the “perpetrators” in exchange for confessing their crimes. While the international community has praised this overcoming of the past by means of giving witness to the truth, the objectives, reach and dynamics of the TRC have raised debate and controversy in South Africa. In this article the leaders of the TRC —Desmond Tutu, Alex Boraine, Dumisa Ntsebetza— and the victims who participated in the public hearings assess and respond to the criticisms that this process of memory, grief, reparation and pardon has elicited.