ADV MPSHE: Advocate Bizos, you are still cross-examining the witness Mrs Derby-Lewis?
MR BIZOS: Thank you Mr Chairperson.
CHAIRPERSON: Mrs Derby-Lewis, you are reminded you’re still under your oath.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, Mr Chairman.
MR BIZOS: Mrs Derby-Lewis, have you got an address for Mr Clarke?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I don’t but I can provide a telephone number where he can be contacted and I can provide a telephone number for Mr Faan Venter as well.
MR BIZOS: We don’t want to make it public, would you please just write the telephone number of a piece of paper so that we can hand it to the representative of the Committee. Yes, if that could just be handed over to Mr Mpshe please.
MR BIZOS: Thank you. Mrs Derby-Lewis, the list with 19 names on which was found on your computer, when was that list made, give us a date please.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I can’t remember exactly, I think it was towards the end of December.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: The end of December 1992, I’m not sure.
MR BIZOS: And by the time of Mr Hani’s death more than three months had passed since you wrote that list of 19 names?
MR BIZOS: Did you write letter to any one of the 19, asking for an appointment?
MR BIZOS: Did you phone any of the 19 to ask for an appointment?
MR BIZOS: Did you take any other step other than asking Mr Kemp to find the addresses - for whatever purpose, in order to communicate with these persons for the purpose you stated you drew it up - because you wanted to have interviews with them, did you take any steps?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, and I testified as to why I didn’t.
MR BIZOS: Because you were busy with an election?
MR BIZOS: Now, when was that election declared?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I think it was declared in January and the voter’s role closed at the end of February but there was a change of tactic by the candidate who had resigned and I think they extended the time to register the voters, until March but when we came back from Cape Town we only had until the end of February to register voters.
MR BIZOS: Could it - how is it that you allowed what was going to be a scoop which you hoped would shake the ANC and the people who - and the editor’s and the newspaper persons, how is it that throughout this period you didn’t find five minutes to make a single telephone call in order to execute this plan of yours that you considered so important?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, first of all, it was a scoop in the sense that it was my story but it didn’t have a time limit on it and that exhibit that I handed in yesterday which was taken from the ANC’s computer - when I finished the trial, I gave that exhibit to one of the newspapers and they published it as a story. It didn’t really have a time limit, it was published in October 1993 by Report and I have it here, I’d like to hand it in.
MR BIZOS: You had vital information on the ANC at the time and if you had the notion that you would obtain from these interviews with one or another or all the 19 people, how is it that you did absolutely nothing to execute that plan but the execution of the plan of eliminating one of the enemies actually was being discussed and serious steps were being taken in order to execute it?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: One had no bearing on the other.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I just said, I answered your question before.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I was a background journalist, my column was called: "Review and Comment", I didn’t write about current matters, I wrote about background matters. And I have here to hand in, a running list of those articles that I was writing about the gravy train so that the Committee can see that it wasn’t just something that I sucked out of my thumb and from the air.
I had been writing and it was a continuous process and it was again written in October 1993 - the same subject. That subject: "The Gravy Train" has been the talk of the country for years, it’s not a scoop that one writes about in five minutes.
MR BIZOS: You were a journalist on The Patriot which was a newspaper committed to the policies of the Conservative Party?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, that is correct.
MR BIZOS: Did you believe that Mr Nelson Mandela would give you an exclusive interview in his home?
MR BIZOS: Well, please answer the question, did you believe Mr Mandela would give you a private interview in his home?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, I’m a journalist.
MR BIZOS: Did you phone the secretary of the ANC in Shell House in order to prepare the possibility of the interview with the number one person on the list?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Mr Bizos, this is the third time that I have told you why I didn’t proceed with my plan, we went immediately into registering voters, this is the third time I’ve said it.
MR BIZOS: Yes. Try and answer my questions and ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: That is an answer to your question which you’ve asked me three times.
MR BIZOS: Yes. When did I ask you three times whether you phoned the secretary?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, you’ve asked me three times about the lack of urgency that I purportedly displayed by not getting stuck into what I ...[interview]
MR BIZOS: Please answer my questions without any comment.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Excuse me, may I finish?
MR BIZOS: Don’t interrupt me please.
JUDGE WILSON: She was talking, you interrupted her Mr Bizos.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Please allow me to finish, I’m explaining something - in fact, I’ve forgotten what I was saying.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I’ve explained to you how I worked. My column was called: "Review and Comment", it was not the sort of thing you write about on a day to day basis - there’s a difference between a journalist and a reporter.
MR BIZOS: Did you ...[interview]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I had been writing about this for a long, long time. My first article was March 1991, my second article was October 1992, this one was October 1993, so for three years I’d been writing about the same subject.
MR BIZOS: Did you expect Mr Justice Goldstone to give you a private interview in your - in his home?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, why shouldn’t he? - to ask a rhetorical question, I’m a journalist, I’m a registered journalist, I represent The Patriot.
MR BIZOS: Do you know whether Justice Goldstone gave the Judgement alone or whether another Judge concurred in his Judgement?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I just read that he had given the Judgement. Are you referring to the Hillbrow Judgement?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Are you referring to the Hillbrow Judgement?
MR BIZOS: The Govender Judgement.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes. No, I just knew it was his Judgement.
MR BIZOS: Did you read the Judgement?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I didn’t, I read press reports about the Judgement.
MR BIZOS: Did you take the trouble to find out whether perhaps another Judge, Judge Myburgh, concurred in his Judgement?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I didn’t.
MR BIZOS: And before putting him on the list, didn’t you think that you should possibly try and find out something about this Judgement and how legally sound it was considered before you put him on the list as one of the persons to be exposed?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I didn’t put him on the list to be exposed, I was going to see who he was - I had already seen him once at a public meeting, and the Conservative Party’s newspaper had written many, many stories about Justice Goldstone. In fact the Conservative Party had issued statements against Justice Goldstone, so it wasn’t a personal vendetta on my side.
MR BIZOS: Yes. Wasn’t it perhaps an uninformed and prejudiced view which you were propagating?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I wasn’t propagating any view.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I had written two or three stories on his Judgements as seen from the Conservative Party’s point of view and the Afrikaans section of the paper had also commented and if the Committee would like to see those articles, I can present them.
MR BIZOS: Did you think that he was an activist Judge because he said that the courts - when they have a discretion, ought not to grant an ejectment order unless they are satisfied that the person has got another roof to go to? Did you consider that to be a Judgement which was so outrageous that it required a visit by you to his home to see what his standard of living was?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I didn’t think that was a Judgement so outrageous as to do that. It wasn’t particularly that, it was the fact that Hillbrow is almost uninhabitable now as result of Justice Goldstone’s Judgement and all of the people who were on the voters role in 1981 - 22.000 Whites, have all left there, so there must have been something in my reasoning - and he’s not living there either.
MR BIZOS: The question was whether you considered it so out of the way that the courts should require a person to have other accommodation before they are ejected, so out of the way that you required a personal interview with Mr Justice Goldstone for the purposes of saying that he was an activist Judge and that he was living in the sort of way that he was living - to write an article about him, is that what you thought?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, I considered that.
MR BIZOS: And you consider that a fair-minded journalistic purpose?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I consider that to be of interest to Conservative Party readers.
MR BIZOS: Yes. Now, your journalist or the journalists on the list, did you expect each one of them - having regard to your attitude to them and the purpose for which you were going to conduct the interview, did you expect them to give you interviews at their homes?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, because I differed from many, many other journalists in South Africa and I gave them interviews in my house.
MR BIZOS: Wouldn’t a simple telephone call to them whether they would be prepared to give an interview - before you handed the list over to Mr Kemp, have saved a lot of trouble?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, we’re back to square one again, I wanted to get their addresses, Mr Kemp did give me some telephone numbers and I wanted to go and see them and for the reasons that I explained yesterday.
MR BIZOS: The question was: "They were journalists in well-known newspapers, why didn’t - before worrying Mr Kemp to find out their home addresses, why didn’t you phone them and ask them for an interview, even if you asked them to at their home? Why didn’t you just pick up the phone, why did you give Mr Kemp so much trouble to find out the address if you did not know whether they would grant you an interview or not?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I intended to go and see them at their homes, it actually never occurred to me to phone them first, I wanted to know where they lived to get their addresses.
MR BIZOS: Did you think Mr Hani would ...[interview]
JUDGE WILSON: Sorry, do you mean you would go to their homes with no prior arrangements?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, no, I would phone them but I would know where they lived, no, I had no intention of going a-cold to their homes.
MR BIZOS: Did you think that Mr Hani would give you a private interview in his home?
MR BIZOS: So why did you want his address?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Because I wanted to see the way he lived.
MR BIZOS: But I thought that the purpose of getting the address was in order to go and have interviews to see whether they have persian carpets on their walls and on their floors and such matters.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Correct, but I personally didn’t think Mr Hani would give me an interview.
MR BIZOS: Why then was Mr Hani’s address and name one of the names that you gave Mr Kemp?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, for a couple of reasons, one that his name was on that MME list which I handed in and which I’ve now got here, which was published in October 1993 as getting R2.500-00 a month and in one of the reports that I had it said that he went to Seheti - he sent his children to Seheti school - which you know is quite expensive, R11.000-00 or R12.000-00 per child and I mentioned that in a previous article which I would like to hand in. I picked that up from overseas newspapers which I quoted and he ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: Would you confine yourself please to answering the questions.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I’m answering the questions as I see fit, as I see fit. If the Committee doesn’t like the way I answer the question, I bow to their decisions.
MR BIZOS: The question was: "Why did you give Mr Kemp Mr Hani’s name to find out his address if you did not expect him to agree to an interview or if you did not intend to even ask him for an interview because you knew he would not give it, why ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I didn’t say I knew he would not give it, I said I didn’t expect him to give it - I may have asked Mr Kemp to go and visit him.
MR BIZOS: Did you intend asking Mr Hani whether or not he would give you an interview?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, that was part of the overall plan, he was already mentioned in my article in 1992, I’d already written about this very specific subject.
JUDGE WILSON: Had you asked him for an interview before you wrote that article?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I quoted a foreign newspaper and it was from that - from the foreign newspaper, that gave me the idea of pursuing the issue. I quoted here from one of the London papers.
MR BIZOS: Yes. In relation to Mr Mandela, why did you think Mr Mandela would give you an interview but you thought it unlikely that Mr Hani would give you an interview?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I’m not quite sure, I didn’t know Mr Hani - I didn’t know much about him, he seemed to be less of a malleable person than Mr Mandela but that’s simply my opinion off the cuff now.
MR BIZOS: Yes. This list of 19, were there any names there which were put as camouflage?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, during my interrogation by Mr Deetleffs, I think it was quite clear that that slant which was brought up in the court was never even discussed, I’m not quite sure where that came from. I stated quite clearly in the interrogation why I wanted these names, I never talked about any kind of a call with satellite or padding names.
MR BIZOS: Did you ever - were you ever reluctant to speak to Mr Kemp about the list or the contents of the list, on the telephone?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, not at all.
MR BIZOS: Did you ever say to anybody: "After all we were speaking on the telephone"?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I don’t understand your question, to anybody who? Who would I be speaking ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: Did you say to anybody that you did anything in relation to the list or the names with Mr Kemp but not on the telephone?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I never discussed it with anybody.
MR BIZOS: All right. Now, what was your real complaint about the journalists - The Beeld and The Sunday Times Editors?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I would like to submit an article that was written by Karen Bruinhard in 1984 that actually ...[intervention]
CHAIRPERSON: Just please answer the question.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Sorry, I beg your pardon?
CHAIRPERSON: I think they want to know what was your complaint about ...[intervention]
CHAIRPERSON: What was your complaint about them?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I’m referring to my complaint.
CHAIRPERSON: Well, instead of referring and reading the article, tell us what your complaint was.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I have to look at this in order to ...[intervention]
CHAIRPERSON: Look at it please, look at it.
CHAIRPERSON: I’m trying to avoid the necessity of having long answers.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, it’s a quick answer, Karen Bruinhard wrote an article in 1984 about the Conservative Party which cost us an election and Doctor Treurnicht stated afterwards that this was the case and I wish to hand in evidence of that.
MR BIZOS: Well, ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: And as far as the other journalists are concerned ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: Just a moment please.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Sorry, you did ask me about journalists generally?
MR BIZOS: Just let me ask you - you’re intervening questions, don’t be so critical of my manner, let others decide about my manner. Please answer the questions Madam.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: But you asked me specifically about journalists plural.
MR PRINSLOO: Mr Chairman, ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: ...[inaudible] Chairman of the Committee. This person had written an article in what year?
MR BIZOS: And you thought that he must have been bribed in order to write that article?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, considering the evidence that’s come out afterwards - in terms of how many journalists are on payrolls of other people, I wouldn’t say that that too fanciful an idea.
MR BIZOS: A simple: "Yes" would have done.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I don’t think a simple: "Yes" would have done.
MR PRINSLOO: Mr Chairman with respect, Mr Bizos cannot prescribe to the witness how she must answer questions.
MR BIZOS: Now, if he had written this article in the early ‘80’s - which you thought cost you the election, did you not believe that he might actually have believed in good faith, that he was doing his duty as a journalist?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I could not understand the mentality of a liberal Afrikaans journalist.
MR BIZOS: Yes. And do you concede the possibility that some men and women who are Afrikaner journalists, don’t understand your mentality?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Absolutely, but you asked me my opinion.
MR BIZOS: Yes. And Mr Ken Owen, did you consider that he had been bribed?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, Mr Ken Owen was named as a spy in one of the articles, he was named in two articles as an agent, so my suspicions in fact ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: As an agent of what?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I haven’t got the full details here, I have to read it - if you want me to read it and the Chairman doesn’t want me to waste any time but I would like to hand it in, where Mr Ken Owen and Mr Tertius Myburgh and various people are mentioned to the Truth Commission in September 1997.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: 1997, this year.
MR BIZOS: Oh, I see, now we’re dealing with 1992, December 1992, why did you consider them to be agents who had to be accused of taking bribes?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I didn’t accuse them of taking bribes, Mr Ken Owen was a particularly vituperative antagonist of the Conservative Movement and I wrote to him on more than one occasion, asking if they couldn’t publish something about conservatism in his paper and he continually refused. And I just found him ...[indistinct] to our cause and I just simply couldn’t understand it.
CHAIRPERSON: Is that why you thought you’d have an interview with him?
CHAIRPERSON: Well, that’s a difficult explanation to understand.
CHAIRPERSON: You’ve come to the conclusion that he was particularly vituperative, he was antagonistic to the CP over a period of time and you had him on your list. And I understand the reason that you had him on your list was because you wanted to interview him.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, but you see, he owned a national paper and he was perhaps more choosy about what he put in his paper than what I would put in mine - I was only too happy to talk to somebody.
JUDGE WILSON: But surely if you wanted to speak to somebody like Mr Ken Owen about what he put into his paper, you would have gone to see him at his office.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I faxed him, I faxed him.
ADV POTGIETER: Mrs Derby-Lewis, why did you wait until December ‘92 - in regard to Miss Bruinhard who had written an article in 1984, before ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, she had written many - sorry, sorry ...[intervention]
ADV POTGIETER: Just give me a minute - before you decided to write something about her or to interview her.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, she had written many articles since then, this was the only one that I could find in my files last night when I looked through. She had written many articles, this was The Vaderland and then she moved over to some other Afrikaans press newspapers.
ADV POTGIETER: But which article persuaded you to pay attention to her?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, this one highlighted her animosity.
ADV POTGIETER: Yes, because it seems as if this was a particularly negative one from your perspective because it cost the Conservative Party an election.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, correct.
ADV POTGIETER: Now, I’m just trying to clarify why you didn’t show an interest in her earlier than December ‘92.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, because this was when I decided to expand upon the theme that I had being doing about writing about the gravy train - everybody was talking about it then.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Mr Wepenaar was Editor of The Beeld, I think he’s since deceased or retired.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I think he has since deceased or retired.
MR BIZOS: Yes. And what did you have against him?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, it was The Beeld newspaper as a newspaper. The Beeld newspaper was considered and stated by Doctor Treurnicht - quote, unquote: "as the enemy of the Afrikaner nation"
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Doctor Treurnicht.
MR BIZOS: Oh, yes. And did you think that he was also bribed?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I couldn’t understand his attitude as an Afrikaner, surely he wanted to secure the future of his people as a people.
CHAIRPERSON: Anybody who opposes your particular view, was either because intellectually he differed from your view or because he was bribed, is that how you look at it?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I couldn’t, I - to a certain degree yes, I couldn’t understand particularly an Afrikaner who would cast aside the future of his people as a people - that is my opinion. I may be wrong and I admit that other people have other opinions, I’m simply giving my opinion.
MR BIZOS: And Mr Tim du Plessis?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Mr Time du Plessis yes, he was the Assistant Editor of The Beeld and he was a particularly vicious supporter against the Conservative Party.
MR BIZOS: And did you have any reason to believe that he was also bribed?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, well, from my point of view I couldn’t understand his attitude.
MR BIZOS: Yes, now ...[intervention]
CHAIRPERSON: Your view of the matter, does that now seem irrational to you?
CHAIRPERSON: You still believe it is not irrational, just because ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I believe Judge, in nationalism as a force in world politics.
CHAIRPERSON: No, I understand.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: And I can’t understand how for example - if I may expand, President Mandela stands up for his own people.
CHAIRPERSON: No, please, don’t go into that.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, but I’m giving it as an example and I can’t understand why an Afrikaner would turn against his own people.
CHAIRPERSON: I believe you must concede that the Afrikaner people - over a period of 200 or 300 years, have produced people of varying political views. They don’t all think - there was no homogeneity in their thinking, so why should people who hold different views be people who were necessarily bribed?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Because he held the very important position of influence in the press. If he had been somebody who lived next door to me and held a diametrically different view, I wouldn’t have bothered because that was his prerogative.
CHAIRPERSON: Anyway, thanks very much, I get your - I understand your approach to the problem.
JUDGE WILSON: Sorry, can I clarify my understanding? You are not suggesting all these people were bribed, as I understand it certain of these people you just couldn’t understand their attitudes, what had caused them to adopt the attitude they did and you didn’t necessarily believe that this was bribery or did you believe they had all been bribed?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, because of the preponderance of journalists being on payrolls, I was inclined to believe that of the journalists.
CHAIRPERSON: If they were not bribed then they were agents?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, on somebody’s payroll as - for example, when you start off with asking for an article, I mean even Mr Kemp in his evidence - the evidence that Mr Bizos, Mr Kemp was on the payroll of Mr Pieterse although ...[End of tape 1, Day 5 - no follow on as English only tape broke]
JUDGE WILSON: You didn’t necessarily mean bribed in the ordinary sense, you meant they were under somebody else’s control - on their payroll?
MR BIZOS: We know that Mr Kemp was on the payroll, did you investigate him?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I didn’t know ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: Because he wrote the right things.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I didn’t investigate him. I had no reason to investigate him because he wrote a conservative approach the way I did, he agreed with me and I thought that my approach to nationalism was a normal human approach and I never queried it, I didn’t know he was on somebody’s payroll.
MR BIZOS: Let us just remind ourselves that you said that the reason why you wanted to get in their homes in order to assess their income, that they could not have done these things on a journalist’s salary, was that your purpose?
MR BIZOS: Were you going to ask them whether perhaps their wives were working or had money of their own or if they were women, whether their husbands were good earners, were you going to ask them that?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I could have assessed perhaps as I saw how they lived. I went - I don’t know, I couldn’t go up to a man and ask him how much his wife earns.
MR BIZOS: Or whether she inherited money or anything like that or whether he inherited money, were you going to do that or were you just going to go on face value on the nature of the furniture and the nature of the carpets?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, if I may say that somebody I knew was a house friend of Dieter Gerhard who turned out to be a KGB spy and the reason - the house that he lived in was opulently furnished and the story was that his wife had inherited the money but in fact the money came from the KGB and that was some years ago and eventually he was found out and so forth - I’m giving that as an example that sometimes people give other reasons for living well.
MR BIZOS: Were you going to investigate as to whether - you did see any wealth, whence it came from?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I hadn’t thought any further than that, I would have probably decided what to do had I moved forward.
MR BIZOS: Mr John Qwelani, did you expect him to give you a personal interview in his home?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, Mr John Qwelani was a journalist of note, there’s no reason why he shouldn’t have given me an interview.
MR BIZOS: And Mr Pik Botha, would he give you an interview at his home?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I think Mr Pik Botha would have given anyone an interview.
MR BIZOS: Yes, but did you have any connection at any time with the Information Department?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, I worked for three and a half years for the Information Department.
MR BIZOS: And that may have given you an entrée to Mr Pik Botha’s - the name.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, to a certain extent - when I worked for the Information Department, we didn’t have much to do with him.
MR BIZOS: Did you continue working for the Information Department after your official connection with it ceased?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, definitely not.
MR BIZOS: I’m just going to go through it, did you expect Mr Casserells to give you a personal interview?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I had already been speaking to Mr Derek Hanekom on a personal basis so I can’t see why - you see as a journalist, you can ask anybody for an interview.
MR BIZOS: I know ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: And I didn’t expect him to say no, after all we were the Conservative Party. Doctor Hartzenberg had asked me to go down to the ANC office and collect various documents on the ANC’s White Paper on Agriculture and they were very courteous to me when I went there and we chatted.
MR BIZOS: Yes. And Mr Naidoo, did you expect him to give you a personal interview?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, all of them. I didn’t expect to be rejected as a journalist, if I was rejected then I wouldn’t have been shocked but most people will give a journalist an interview, they don’t hold a personal grudge against somebody who belongs to a different paper - on a purely interviewing set-up.
MR BIZOS: Do you hold grudges against people?
MR BIZOS: Do you hold grudges against people?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I don’t hold grudges against anybody Mr Bizos.
MR BIZOS: Good. Now, I am going to put to you - I won’t put the rest of the names, I am going to put to you that your story that this was for the purposes you now say, is a fairy tale Madam and that the real purpose was the drawing of a shorter list, numbering the order of execution and executing one of them.
CHAIRPERSON: That is put to you as a question.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, that’s - is that a question?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, that is ludicrous. First of all, if I had intended to get a shorter list then I would have done it myself, I wouldn’t have gone to somebody else and secondly, I would never have written out a list of 19 people that I wanted murdered - I’m far too meticulous for that, I wouldn’t even know where to start and thirdly, I wouldn’t send it down on an open fax to The Citizen newspaper and fourthly, Mr Arthur Kemp drew up the list and it was found in court with no sinister motives. So, padding it was never ever revealed in the tapes of my interrogation, it was quite clear during the interrogation why I drew up the list. There was never ever ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: The finding ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: There was never any - excuse me, there was never any other version.
MR BIZOS: The finding of the court that you quote, was partly based upon your untruthful evidence that you had no knowledge as to how the short-list came into the possession of Mr Walus.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, but that’s not what you’re asking me about now - that’s a separate issue, you’re asking me about the names on the list and how the smaller list emanated from that, the other list is a separate issue.
MR BIZOS: Yes, you can separate it if you so wish. You made an application for bail, did you?
MR BIZOS: In your application for bail, did you want to be as frank as possible to the court?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Sorry, you said I must be as frank as ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: Did you want to be as frank as possible to the court?
MR BIZOS: When you made your affidavit?
MR BIZOS: In R2, page 94 Mr Chairman, paragraph 4
"Defence to Charges - I am charged with murder, conspiracy to commit murder, unlawful possession of a firearm and unlawful possession of ammunition. I confirm my instructions to my legal representatives that I would plead not guilty to each and every charge.
The nature of my defence will be fully disclosed on the 4th of October 1993, being the date on which the trial has been set out for hearing. I am however prepared to state that I categorically deny that I am guilty of the charges contained in the indictment as amplified by the summary of substantial facts and further particulars.
I respectfully submit that the State extensively relies on inferences to be drawn from facts to be proved. I categorically deny any involvement whatsoever to a conspiracy to kill the late Mr Hani or any other person.
I further specifically deny being the author of the so-called: ""hit-list"" Annxure A, to the indictment or that I caused same to be drawn with the purpose and intent alleged by the State. I again ...[indistinct] to iterate that the State is trying to link me with the assassination of the late Mr Chris Hani, mainly because it is alleged that Annexure A was found in the possession of accused number one.
If my involvement in this is related purely to the existence of Annexure A of the indictment and I were to be connected to the charges as a result of that, I could easily have absconded as suggested in paragraph two supra. I respectfully submit that the fact that I never made any effort to hide from the arrest or abscond, is indicative of my innocence.
It is further evident from the indictment ...[indistinct] amplify it by the fact of substantial facts and further particulars. I did not commit the murder which I am charged with. I finally deny having ever possessed a firearm or ammunition as alleged. I am confident that I will successfully defend all the charges against me"
"I further specifically deny being the author of the so-called: ""hit-list"".
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: But I wasn’t the author of the so-called: ""hit-list"", Mr Kemp was.
CHAIRPERSON: I think you better just wait for the question, the question hasn’t been put to you.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I beg your pardon.
MR BIZOS: If you were to have given a full and honest explanation on your present version, you would have said that
"I did not draw up the "hit-list", Annexure A to the indictment, it was drawn - it’s a shorter list of a list that I made with 19 names on it"
That would have been an honest and open way of dealing with it, would it not?
MR PRINSLOO: With respect Mr Chairman, the question that’s posed ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: This application was drawn up by my attorney, they are the words of my attorney and I took his legal advice as to this being the correct wording of my application.
MR BIZOS: Had you told your attorney what you have told us now - that you had drawn up a list of 19 names from which the "hit-list" was extracted ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: It wasn’t a "hit-list".
MR BIZOS: The list described by the State as a "hit-list" annexed to the indictment.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, if the State described it as a "hit-list", it wasn’t a "hit-list" in my estimation ...[intervention]
CHAIRPERSON: No, I think that - please ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I’m sorry, I don’t ...[intervention]
CHAIRPERSON: Just let’s not have anymore argument, there has been reference to this document as a "hit-list" in the evidence and let’s leave it at that. You are disclaiming responsibility for that document, so you don’t have to go around arguing whether it is a "hit-list" or not - you’re disclaiming responsibility for that document aren’t you?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Which, the second one or ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: The short list yes, Mr Kemp drew it up.
CHAIRPERSON: Yes. Well now, I don’t want you to - when you answer the question, get carried away on whether it should be called a "hit-list" or not, just try and answer the question please.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: But - I’m sorry, I - Mr Bizos has lost me, this application was made by my attorney and based on what he knew and what he discussed with me at the time. I - if there are any hypothetical things that should have been put into it then perhaps it was something that my attorney should have handled - I don’t know, I was in his hands.
MR BIZOS: Mr Chairman, yesterday an attempt was made to hand in the affidavit of Mr de Waal and it was not received by the Committee, we’ve had an opportunity of perusing it and we would ask the Committee to receive it because I intend asking questions on it and we consider that it contains relevant matter that I have to put to the witness.
MR PRINSLOO: Mr Chairman, is Mr Bizos going to call Mr de Waal - like it was posed to me yesterday?
MR BIZOS: Mr Chairman, this is ...[inaudible] by the Commission, the Commission calls witnesses and not I. I - a document was tendered and I want to make use of the document, it was tendered yesterday - I don’t know what the - I am told that Mr - I have asked Mr Mpshe and he’s trying to get hold of Mr de Waal. If counsel for the applicant has any information about his whereabouts, we will welcome it Mr Chairman.
MR PRINSLOO: With respect Mr Chairman ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: ...[inaudible] and may I ask questions on it.
MR PRINSLOO: With respect Mr Chairman, yesterday we retracted the document, so it was not handed in by myself, so if it’s going to be handed in by Mr Bizos then we accept that he will call Mr de Waal as a witness - as was put to me yesterday.
CHAIRPERSON: The document will not be handed in as evidence, I’m not going to admit that document as evidence. You may put questions arising from that document but it contents will not be evidence until Mr de Waal gives evidence.
MR PRINSLOO: As it pleases Mr Chairman.
JUDGE WILSON: As I recollect it, Mrs Derby-Lewis in fact quoted from part of the document yesterday, she said: ‘He says this in his affidavit or in his statement"
MR PRINSLOO: Mr Chairman, it was put to Mrs Derby-Lewis - if that would be said by Mr de Waal, in view of the fact that he was not called as a witness. So if - should you be called at least then Mrs Derby-Lewis’s version will be on record, that was the only purpose.
CHAIRPERSON: Put the question but the document will not be regarded as evidence unless Mr de Waal comes and swears to it before us.
MR BIZOS: You have read this - will it be as Exhibit Z Mr Chairman?
CHAIRPERSON: The document will not be handed in as an exhibit because the moment it is handed in as an exhibit, it then becomes part of the record, so I’d rather you put your questions - she has a copy of the affidavit.
CHAIRPERSON: You may put questions from the document you have in front of you.
MR BIZOS: But I don’t know how members of the Committee will follow Mr Chairman, it it’s not before them.
JUDGE NGOEPE: We will need to have copies thereof - whether or not they’re handed in as exhibits, surely we need to have copies thereof.
MR PRINSLOO: Mr Chairman, I do have a copy of Mr de Waal’s statement yes.
CHAIRPERSON: Yes, please let’s have copies thereof.
MR PRINSLOO: Mr Chairman, yesterday we tendered the copies we had to the Committee, it was then withdrawn and was not returned to us.
CHAIRPERSON: I’m sorry, they were.
MR PRINSLOO: May I just ascertain from my colleague whether she received it Mr Chairman? Mr Chairman, I’m told that my colleague did receive them and I apologise for that.
CHAIRPERSON: I’ve consulted with my brethren and we’ve come to the conclusion that this document will be handed in as an exhibit but it’s contents will not be regarded as evidence unless confirmed or otherwise proved, so this document will then go in as Exhibit A(c) . You may proceed Mr Bizos.
MR BIZOS: A(c), thank you Mr Chairman.
Now, you spent a lot of time yesterday telling us of how badly you were treated by the police Mrs Derby-Lewis.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I didn’t spend time, I handed in a document because the Chairman said that he wished that I shouldn’t read it - I just handed it in.
MR BIZOS: Yes. Tell me, when did you say to any person - whilst you were in detention - I’ll rephrase the question, did you tell any person - whilst you were in detention, that you were being compelled to make incriminating statements against yourself, against your husband and against Mr Walus?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I was in the company only of policemen, so there was nobody to tell.
MR BIZOS: You were visited by your own doctor.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I was visited by my doctor in the company of the district surgeon and I didn’t discuss my case at all with him ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: Was ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Except that I felt bad and there was something wrong with my heart - it was only on a medical basis.
MR BIZOS: You’re anticipating a number of questions, please try and answer the questions one at a time. Were there any police officers present when you were consulted by your doctor in the presence of the district surgeon?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I was in the surgery, I think the police officers were waiting outside.
MR BIZOS: Did you trust your personal doctor?
MR BIZOS: Did you have any reason to believe that the district surgeon was anything but an honourable man in an honourable profession?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I had no reason to believe that he was anything other than a professional person.
MR BIZOS: What was the date of the consultation?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I think it was Monday the 26th or 25th, I’m not sure - 26th.
MR BIZOS: Had pressure been put on you in order to make false admissions against yourself and against your husband and against Mr Walus before that visit?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I - according to my memory I started writing on the 25th, although the statement produced was only dated the 27th and in that document that I handed in I remember writing
"I must have written more than a 100 pages"
So, the pressure must have started on the 25th, although the statement wasn’t produced until the 27th.
MR BIZOS: But wasn’t the pressure of detention and the behaviour of Mr Deetleffs and the behaviour of Mr de Waal start almost from the beginning - according to what you told us yesterday?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I was under detention with Mr Deetleffs until the 24th and then Mr de Waal moved in and he was with me from the 25th to the 30th and occasionally Mr Deetleffs came in just to check on statements but I wasn’t under ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: When do you say the pressure on you started?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: The pressure on me started the first half an hour that I was in Mr Deetleffs office.
MR BIZOS: And it was made clear to you that you would not be released unless you made damaging admissions against yourself, your husband and Mr Walus right from the beginning?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I said: "What is to become of me"? and he said: "You will be here for - you will get 15 years jail" and then after he put me under Section 29 - which was at 3 o’clock in the afternoon, I said: "You can’t keep me here" and he said: "I can keep you here as long as I like" and I would say that it was after the introduction of Section 29 at 3 o’clock in the afternoon, that I started to feel threatened and afraid.
MR BIZOS: And on what date was that?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: That was the date of my arrest, the 21st of April.
MR BIZOS: So, by the time you saw your doctor, how many days had you been in detention under Section 29?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Four days, four days.
MR BIZOS: And you had been interrogated by Mr Deetleffs in the meantime?
MR BIZOS: And he was the one who was suggesting to you that you should make false allegations against - false admissions against yourself and false allegations against the other two?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, Mr Deetleffs - it was simply his manner and the fact that I was very, very tired and afraid, it was a personal fear that I had of Mr Deetleffs - the actual statement about: "You will write this and you will write that", came from
MR BIZOS: So let’s deal with one police officer at a time, are you saying that Mr Deetleffs told you - at any time, to make false admissions against yourself and make false allegations against your husband and Mr Walus at any time?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, when I first arrived in his office he wrote out a statement - which is in the record, and he asked me to sign that statement and in that statement were allegations - I can’t remember the full contents unless I look ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: Which date did you sign that statement on?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I didn’t sign that statement, I asked for my attorney and I was still - I wasn’t under Section 29.
MR BIZOS: Now, please tell us what pressure had been put on you before your doctor saw you - to say what? What the pressure was and what the purpose of the pressure was?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, he told me that first of all, I wouldn’t get out, secondly I was - well, his treatment was quite brutish and insulting and he told me that my husband would get 15 years and I didn’t have any sleep and he asked me about the list was drawn up to kill people and various things like that. He suggested things, he brought in words like: "the enemies - your enemies" and so on and so forth.
MR BIZOS: Did he say to you, you must implicate yourself, your husband and Walus or not?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I’m just ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: Whether it’s true or ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Sorry, I’m just looking at the statement that he asked me to sign. Yes, he did, on page 396 he said that I should say - that I should sign: "I know that Cuba Walus and my husband are involved in the murder of Chris Hani"
MR BIZOS: Just give us the page again please.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, it’s 396 or 346 - apparently this was photostatted twice.
MR BIZOS: 396, yes. What paragraph?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: 396, paragraph 3 on page - well, on that page.
JUDGE WILSON: What numbered paragraph is it?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: It’s the third paragraph down - sorry, paragraph 9, on the left is the number.
MR BIZOS: What date was this put to you?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: This was put to me when I first got into his office in the morning.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: 21st of April.
MR BIZOS: And he suggested to you that: "Cuba and Walus my husband, is involved in the murder of Chris Hani without getting to know it by reading it in the press or overheard it on the radio or television or mentioned by any other person but only know it from my own knowledge or what my husband told about his own and Cuba’s involvement in it". This was a clear indication that you must lie against Walus and your husband?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: A clear indication - I’m sorry, that he?
MR BIZOS: That you must lie about them.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, he wanted me to sign something that was not true.
MR BIZOS: Yes. Weren’t these the allegations that he was putting to you and you exercised the right to say: "Answer - No comment"?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, that’s correct.
MR BIZOS: So, he didn’t force you to say anything untrue?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Not at this stage.
MR BIZOS: The question was ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: It was because I didn’t answer this that he put me under Section 29, they came in and told me that I wasn’t co-operating.
MR BIZOS: The questions was: "When did Mr Deetleffs tell you to falsely admit that you were responsible or that your husband and Mr Walus were responsible? When ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: He said that many times ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: When did Mr Deetleffs tell you that?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: He said that many times when he was interrogating me and ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: From the 21st onwards?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: From the 21st onwards - no, yes from the 21st onwards.
MR BIZOS: Please tell us the precise words that Mr Deetleffs used to indicate to you that you must lie about your husband and Mr Walus and you must lie about your own participation? What did he say?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Mr Bizos, if I could remember the precise words - I was under Section 29, I had no sleep, I was disorientated and ill, I can’t remember the precise words.
JUDGE WILSON: Did he ever tell you that you must lie or did he tell you that you must agree with what he believed to be the truth?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, he said to me ...[inaudible] the other leg and that sort of thing and: "You new about the gun" and various other statements and I just said: "No, that’s not true".
JUDGE WILSON: Didn’t this indicate he didn’t believe you, that he was saying what he thought what was the truth? Mr Bizos is putting it that he was putting lies to you and it seems to me ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, maybe he did believe it but I - for me it wasn’t the truth, maybe Mr Deetleffs believed it to be the truth - yes of course, maybe he did but from my point of view it wasn’t the truth.
MR BIZOS: The question was - I’ll rephrase the question and I’m indebted to Justice Wilson for the distinction, when did Mr Deetleffs put any pressure on you to admit as true, what he might have believed but you what you knew to be untrue?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, he did that during the interrogation.
MR BIZOS: And what pressure did he put on you in interrogation on the 21st, in order to induce you to agree with what he believed to be the truth?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, the 21st was just the first day, there were two or three days after that that I was under his interrogation.
MR BIZOS: Let’s confine with the first date, did he say anything to you on the first day which induced you to tell what he believed to truth and you knew to be untrue?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, I repeat, in the morning he wrote out a statement which I didn’t believe to be true, then after that - 3 o’clock in the afternoon, he put me under Section 29 and then he left me sitting there until about 10 o’clock in the evening, so that day I don’t think much went on - I’m not sure, I’ll have to go over my notes again. And then the following day ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: Now, let’s stick with the first day please Madam, we want to know what it is that you are accusing Mr Deetleffs of and we are going to get certainty from your allegations are. On the first day, what did he say to you which pressurised you into or might have pressurised you to say what was not true?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, when I first got to his office he said that I would never get bail and that I would get 15 years and that I was guilty and that I must sign a statement and this was the statement that he wrote out.
MR BIZOS: Those are the things that he said?
JUDGE WILSON: Could you please - Mr Bizos you’ve been talking about 396, will you look at page 397, the paragraph 13 - I’m not satisfied with the wording, I’m going to change it slightly.
Did Captain Deetleffs say to you:
"I also believe that if I make a statement under oath which only consists of the truth in which nothing is stated which incriminates me or any other person mentioned in questions 1 - 13, there’s a possibility that I can be released"
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I don’t remember him saying that, my attitude was that I would not sign anything or agree to anything unless I had an attorney with me, so whatever he said - whether it made sense or not, I said to him I’m not prepared to co-operate because I need to speak to an attorney.
JUDGE WILSON: So, he then went on to deal with that in paragraph 15?
JUDGE WILSON: Where again you said no comment?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: But he kept telling me that the attorney was coming, needless to say the attorney never arrived.
MR BIZOS: ...[inaudible] from what appears on page 395 to 397, will you please tell us what pressure - if any, Mr Deetleffs placed on you?
CHAIRPERSON: I think she said that one of the things that he did - which she regarded as pressure, was he told her that she was going to be detained under Section 29 - she said that as one of the factors.
MR BIZOS: Is there anything else other than the factors that you mentioned?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, as I said, when I first got there he put a lot of pressure on me and I became very afraid and then I asked for my attorney and then he wrote this out in the - 8 o’clock or something, and I said: "Well, I can’t sign anything until - he said: "Don’t worry, your attorney will come.
MR BIZOS: Did you know for how long your detention under Section 29 was to last as a maximum?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I had no idea.
MR BIZOS: Well, I am going to put to you that you knew that this Section 29 was not the Section 29 that you knew from the days of the ‘60’s and ‘70’s and ‘80s, it had been sanitised to a very great extent in 1993, did you know that?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, as you put it, human rights friendly - no, I didn’t know that and I had no idea the time, I didn’t know. He said to me: "I can keep you as long as I want" - they were his words, so if he said that I believed him.
MR BIZOS: Well, I’m going to put to you that you must have known and you were probably told and as a journalist you knew that one of the first things that was done when the 1991 speech was made, that there was a call for the repeal of the draconian provisions of Section 29.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, that’s not true - Mr Bizos, they were still using torture in November 1993, the police.
MR BIZOS: Didn’t you and Mr Deetleffs discuss Section 29 or your detention?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I discussed it with Mr de Waal because I found Mr Deetleffs virtually impossible to talk to in terms of my legal right but when I got to Mr de Waal, I asked him what were my rights and what would happen to me and in my statement I said that, that I was trying to get from somebody where I placed myself legally. I didn’t understand the legal process, I didn’t know anything about courts.
MR BIZOS: Let us hear what you are saying, do you say there were no words exchanged between you and Mr Deetleffs in relation to Section 29 or detention or it’s duration or the necessity for having it or anything else?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I don’t remember.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I don’t remember.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I don’t remember him giving me any advice whatsoever on my rights and one of those was how long I was supposed to be in detention - it’s possible he did but I was in a very bad emotional state.
MR PRINSLOO: Mr Chairman with respect, there are people in the audience who keeps on calling the witness a liar.
CHAIRPERSON: I would not like you to go around making comments, this is not a performance, please. This is a serious matter and please everybody an opportunity to give their evidence fairly and reserve your comments until - when you’ve finished and you’ve walked out.
MR BIZOS: Did you ask him how long you could be detained under Section 29?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, I said: ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: And what did he say to you?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I said: "How long are you going to keep me"? and he said: "I can keep you here as long as I want" - I didn’t say: "How many days and what is the Law and what are the clauses in Section 29 of Act number 65 whatever", he just told me that: "I can keep you here as long as I want".
They were his words, he told me that when I got to his office in the morning of the 21st of April, I will never forget that and he set the pattern after that with those words.
MR BIZOS: Was the number of days mentioned?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I don’t recall - no, he said: "I can keep you here as long as I want"- only Mr de Waal told me that by the 30th of April they would make application to keep me another 10 days if I didn’t - quote: "co-operate" - unquote, and then I realised that the 10 days were up. They kept telling me to hurry up because they wanted to finalise everything before the 30th - but that was Mr de Waal.
MR BIZOS: When were you told that after 10 days they could only hold you if the court sanctioned your detention?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: You mean by Mr de Waal?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, I think it was the middle of the week, a few days before the end of the detention period - 25th or 6th or something. You see, he had - he interrogated me or was with me in the Edenvale Police Station, I was no longer in the Benoni cell.
MR BIZOS: Are you saying that there was never any discussion between you and Mr Deetleffs about Section 29 or the detention laws or the period or anything like that?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I don’t recall at all.
MR BIZOS: Did you ever say to anyone: "I tell you this Section 29 is a brilliant Act"?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, but I meant that facetiously, I saw that on the tape ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: In other words, it’s a very clever Act because you are virtually a mental cripple and a prisoner there. I remember saying something - I saw it on the tape, and I followed it with some kind of facetious remark about: "You’ve got it all tied up - you people, with Section 29" or words to that effect.
MR BIZOS: Yes, yes. And you say that nobody has access to anything, least of all to a lawyer - this was a complaint of yours, that you wanted to see a lawyer?
MR BIZOS: Yes. Did you then not continue with a discussion about the necessity of it and didn’t you continue with a discussion that in it’s present form it’s no different to the British Detention Laws, do you recall that?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, I think so, I can’t recall exactly but I think somebody - yes, I think Mr Bizos said: "It happens in England as well" or something like that - sorry, Mr Deetleffs - "It happened in England as well".
MR BIZOS: You’re not putting me in the interrogation room at the police station?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I beg your pardon?
MR BIZOS: Yes, it was Mr Deetleffs who said ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Sorry, could you repeat what you said, I didn’t hear you?
MR BIZOS: It was Mr Deetleffs who said that?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, I’m not sure, either himself or - I don’t remember.
MR BIZOS: Well, do you remember discussing that the detention law at the time was no different to that that the British had, do you remember that?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, I think we talked about that.
MR BIZOS: And who said that, you or Mr Deetleffs or Mr de Waal ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I don’t remember, I don’t recall - I saw it on the video when I looked at the video but I don’t now recall who said it or who brought it up.
MR BIZOS: As a high profile journalist, had you not concerned yourself about the draconian provisions of detention without trial during the apartheid era?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, I have quite a lot of files on that.
MR BIZOS: Yes. So that - that there was a change, must have been of the utmost importance to you?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, no there was no change as far as I was concerned, I was in a state of great fear and I’ve never felt like that in my whole life - whether it was 10 days or three months - well, I won’t make any gratuitous comments about ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: Did you ever compliment the South African Police whilst you were in detention?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, I said something - if you can - you’ve probably got it written down there, I recall that: "I take my hat off to you", I said.
MR BIZOS: Well let’s - you’re quite right, I do have it down and we’re going to show the Committee how comfortable you looked on video whilst you say that you were in such difficult circumstances. Did you say this: "All I know is that this has been quite a sobering experience for me. I have never had anything to do with the SAP but I want to tell you I take my hat off to you and I’d love to join the SAP. I’m a bit old now and an emphatic yes I will tell you.
And if those guys from United Nations or Scotland Yard come to see me then I’m going to tell them to take a running jump, I am not going to co-operate with them"
Now, are these the words that you used?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I remember the first part, I don’t remember the second part but if I may explain - that was after the ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: Will you please just - one moment please. The question was: "Did you use these words"? and you say that - what was your answer?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I was in the process of answering.
CHAIRPERSON: She says she remembers the first part but does not remember ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: Which is the first part?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: The first part was: "I take my hat off to you" and then I made some joke about: "I’d like to join the SAP but at my age I couldn’t" or something and this was about the third or the fourth day - I think it was the 24th of the fourth, when I had already become quite passive and ready to do just about anything that Mr Deetleffs would have told me to do.
In the first that I was there and the second day I was aggressive and resistant and belligerent and then on the fourth day - on the 24th, I started to feel that I could do nothing against him and I was actually scared of him. And I think it was a light moment - I said: "I take my hat off to you", in other words: "You’ve got people in your power and you can do with them what you want, this is really quite a system".
I certainly wasn’t complementing Mr Deetleffs in a personal way, I didn’t like him, I was afraid of him but I do have a sense of humour - I was trying to break the tension within myself.
MR BIZOS: Finished? Do you want to add anything?
MR BIZOS: "And if those guys from United Nations or Scotland Yard come to see me then I’m going to tell them to take a running jump, I’m not going to co-operate with them", did you say that?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I don’t recall saying that.
MR BIZOS: Well, we’ll ask the Committee to see you on video.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, if you say that I said that, then I said that but I don’t recall the significance of saying that.
MR BIZOS: Yes. Now, tell me this, assuming that you said it ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: Aren’t you really contrasting your attitude in relation to co-operation between what you were prepared to tell the SAP and what you were not prepared to tell these foreigners?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, exactly, when I was under the SAP I had no choice, I had to sit there and talk and do whatever they told me.
MR BIZOS: So that ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: So that the people - the so-called foreign observers who never visited me in any event - I don’t quite know quite why I made that comment, maybe he said something about them but they didn’t come to visit me at all. And in any event, would they have come to visit me under Section 29? - I don’t know.
CHAIRPERSON: Did you mean what you said?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I don’t recall saying it.
CHAIRPERSON: No, but if you did say it - my questions was: "Did you mean ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Oh probably, probably said in - yes, in the tone that it was said.
MR BIZOS: You told us that by the 24th when you are recorded to have made this statement, you had felt in a position to tell jokes?
MR BIZOS: I think you used the word, didn’t you?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I was trying to break the tension - I was in a very bad state, my heart was hurting. I went to the doctor because I had heart problems and I’m trying to break the tension, I’m trying to do something to make oneself human again.
MR BIZOS: Just bear with me. Mr Chairman, I have notes but I think that I will leave it until the video is put into position Mr Chairman, during the adjournment rather than speculating as to what the witness said or did not say.
CHAIRPERSON: How long is that likely to take Mr Bizos - the viewing of the video?
MR BIZOS: It’s in another room.
MR BIZOS: It’s in another room.
MR BIZOS: And - I’m sorry, I am now informed that the one that was brought is not working.
CHAIRPERSON: We’ll take the short adjournment now ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: Shall we take the ...[intervention]
CHAIRPERSON: So that you can sort it out.
MR BIZOS: Shall we take the 11H15 adjournment now Mr Chairman ...[intervention]
CHAIRPERSON: Yes, we’ll take the short adjournment now.
MR BIZOS: In order to try and ...[intervention]
CHAIRPERSON: You can sort things out in the meanwhile.
MR BIZOS: Sort these things out - in order to show the witness precisely what has been said.
CHAIRPERSON: The Committee will now adjourn for 15 minutes.
MR BIZOS: The A(c) - this is the affidavit of Mr de Waal, have you read it?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, Mr Chairman.
MR BIZOS: Is it correct or incorrect?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, it is incorrect insofar as he keeps saying
"She doesn’t have not complaints"
That wasn’t the case, I wasn’t feeling well but it is correct, yes.
MR BIZOS: Now, could you please draw our attention to what portions of this affidavit do you say are incorrect?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I said it was incorrect insofar as the various remarks that he made about
"No complaints"
but that is a technical point.
MR BIZOS: So, the only things that are wrong in the statement are where he says
"No complaints"
Is that what you are saying to the Committee?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, yes, I have to read through it again carefully but on the face of it, yes.
MR BIZOS: When you read it, did any glaring untruths come to your mind in relation to what Mr de Waal said - other than
"No complaints"
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I think it’s a fair reflection of what went on.
MR BIZOS: So, you agree then that what he says here is correct?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I’m just reading the third page, sorry. Oh no, sorry there are - yes, I’m sorry, at the bottom of page two of his statement he says
"I said to her that I cannot understand that the list was in the possession of the murderer at the time of his arrest"
MR BIZOS: Just tell us which paragraph you’re reading from please.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: At the bottom of page two - there’s no number on the paragraph.
CHAIRPERSON: Is it that the last paragraph on page two?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: The last paragraph on page two.
CHAIRPERSON: The last two lines?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: The second last line
"I state to her that I cannot understand that the list was in the possession of the murderer at the time of his arrest and how he had obtained the list". To this question she asked me whether Mr Kemp was still in detention, I replied in the negative and she said to me that she had not spoken the truth regarding the list and she hadn’t written the truth either"
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: That is not correct.
MR BIZOS: Just tell us what is incorrect ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, it’s not correct.
MR BIZOS: Read everything that you say is incorrect.
"I say no, and she said to me that she had neither spoken nor written the truth regarding the list"
That is not correct, I did not say to him that I didn’t tell the truth about the list.
"Because she did not want to cause trouble for Arthur Kemp unnecessarily because he had not known why she wanted the addresses"
MR BIZOS: Just tell us the portions that are incorrect and we will mark them and then we will ask you questions about it.
"She said that she now wished to write the truth regarding the list and asked also to amend that portion. She continued writing her statement and changed the portion regarding the list"
MR BIZOS: Do you say that that is incorrect?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, and page four, the third last paragraph from the bottom
"Colonel van Niekerk requested me - today, 1993.4.29 at 09H00, to go and speak to Mrs Derby-Lewis and show her the "hit-list" found in Cuba’s possession at the time of his arrest - after the murder Mr Chris Hani, and ask her whether she was prepared to state whether it was the list which she had compiled in co-operation with Mr Arthur Kemp"
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: ...[inaudible] Arthur Kemp drew it up himself. And then page five, the first paragraph - I don’t recall him saying this to me
"I explained to her that the pointing out of the so-called "hit-list" which contained inter alias Mr Hani’s name can be used as evidence against her in a possible trial should she be prosecuted. Mrs Derby-Lewis gave me the assurance that she had no problem with that, she had no problem looking at the list with the names and addresses and stated that she had already pointed this out voluntarily to Captain Deetleffs as the "hit-list" which her husband had handed over to Cuba"
That’s incorrect. No, I can’t on the face of it see anything else.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I’m sorry Mr Bizos, at the bottom of page two after the first sentence
"On Monday, 26th of April, interrogation was temporarily stopped and I asked Mrs Derby-Lewis with regard to lack of clarity and contradiction in her statement which does not agree with that of her husband in his version during Captain Deetleffs’s interrogation. She will state that she had never been shown her file by her husband whereas her husband - during his interrogation, had stated that he had indeed shown her a firearm.
She informed me that she couldn’t remember but that she now remembered the black pistol with the silencer which her husband had shown her in their home"
MR BIZOS: Let’s start on what appears on page five, did Mr de Waal speak to you after you had told Captain Louw that you were not prepared to go and point anything out?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, I think he said: "Well, that’s all right then"
MR BIZOS: It’s all right with him?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: It was all right with him.
MR BIZOS: Yes. So, the circumstances that prevailed on the 30th of April ‘93, were such that you could refuse a request from Captain de Waal without fearing any consequences?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, Captain de Waal gave me the gap - so to speak, by taking me to Mr Louw who wasn’t part of the security police and Mr Louw informed me that I had a choice.
MR BIZOS: The question was: "You felt that you could act against the will of Mr de Waal without fearing any consequences in relation to the investigation of the case"?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, because Mr Louw gave me my rights in that particular instance. Mr ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: Your answer is: "Yes".
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I’m answering the question - and Mr de Waal said: "All right, that’s okay", he didn’t make any objection.
MR BIZOS: Yes. So that - just listen to the question please, when Mr de Waal - or rather, let’s start at the beginning, when Mr Louw asked you to go and point something out and gave you an option whether you had - you would do it or not, you were not afraid that you would upset Mr de Waal by refusing to do what he had asked you to do?
MR BIZOS: Is that because you were not afraid that he would do anything to you even though you did not obey his request or command?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, not at all, Mr de Waal told me that I would be a witness, he told me that anything that I wrote could not be used in court, he told me to hurry up so that everything could be taken to the Attorney General so that they could decide on what they would do with me before the 30th of April and I complied.
MR BIZOS: Do you remember what the question was? You did not fear any consequences from Mr de Waal by disobeying his request or command?
MR BIZOS: You had nothing to fear from Mr de Waal at that stage and you could defy his will?
MR BIZOS: What do these: "No’s" mean?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Because I was - well, if you’ll let me explain, I was out of his will, I was now moved in to ordinary life up on the first floor of Edenvale Police Station where he was not present and Mr Louw said to me: "Do you realise that you have a choice"? I didn’t voluntarily seek to irritate him, Mr Louw gave me a choice and I said: "Well, I’ll take that choice" and when I came downstairs to see Mr de Waal, I told him that I have a choice and is it possible that I say: "No", and he said: "Yes, that’s all right".
MR BIZOS: Did you expect Mr Louw to report to Mr de Waal that you had chosen not to accommodate Mr de Waal’s wishes?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I informed him myself, I’m not sure if Mr Louw didn’t come down with me - I was always in the company of somebody, maybe he came down with me and explained it.
MR BIZOS: Can we get a straight answer?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: That is a straight answer as I see it - I’m sitting here trying to be honest to you.
MR BIZOS: Can we please have a ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I’m sorry, it is a straight answer.
MR BIZOS: Can we please have a straight answer to the question, did you or did you not fear that any consequences would follow as a result of your disobeying the wishes of Mr de Waal.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Mr Bizos, for the fourth time, no.
MR PRINSLOO: With respect Mr Chairman, the witness did answer the question.
MR BIZOS: ...[inaudible] it was muddled up with other things, I wanted a clear answer and I’m pleased to have it. Now, let ...[intervention]
JUDGE WILSON: You have gone on Mr Bizos, suggesting that it was Mr de Waal’s wishes, he’d ordered her to do things, that does not appear from his statement, have you other evidence to that effect?
MR BIZOS: He requested her to go and point out and what I am putting ...[intervention]
JUDGE WILSON: He asked her if she was prepared to point certain things out.
MR BIZOS: ...[inaudible] she agreed and then changed her mind. I think ...[intervention]
JUDGE WILSON: You have put it far more strongly than that Mr Bizos.
CHAIRPERSON: Anyway ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: Was your relationship with Mr de Waal that he - did he request you to do things or did he order you to do things?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Mr de Waal was a reasonably nice man.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I say that in all openness, he didn’t terrorise me the way Mr Deetleffs did but he had his rules and he told me: "You will sit here until you finish" and so on and so forth, so ...[intervention]
CHAIRPERSON: You’ve got the answer to your question.
MR BIZOS: Thank you Mr Chairman.
Is it correct that whilst you were with Mr de Waal, there was a female constable with him all the time?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: With him or with me?
MR BIZOS: With - when he interrogated you, was there a female constable present?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, most of the time.
MR BIZOS: Were there times that you were alone with a female constable?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I can’t - you mean Sergeant Strydom?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Was the female constable - I can’t recall, maybe yes.
MR BIZOS: Did Mr de Waal perform or cause to be performed personal services in order to make your life easier whilst you were in detention?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, Mr de Waal helped me - I bought some night-wear and I gave some money to my son and various other - yes, they were quite conciliatory.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: The people at the Edenvale Police Station, I don’t know whether they were part of the security police or whether they were the Edenvale Police Station.
MR BIZOS: Yes. And whenever you asked for anything, did you respond positively?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I asked to send some money out and I asked to buy some night-wear and that was about all I asked, the rest of my questions were about the legal process.
MR BIZOS: Did you choose - when it was suggested to you that you would take your statement, did you choose to write your own statement out?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, he asked me to start writing out my life story - I wrote many statements, I can’t remember how many pages I wrote.
MR BIZOS: Did you start writing on Saturday the 24th?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I’m not sure, I think so - he says that I did, it was that week-end that I was ill, I can’t remember. If he says that is correct then - he says on 537 that I started to write.
MR BIZOS: And did you - on Monday the 26th, say that you were prepared to continue writing your statement?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I beg your pardon Mr Bizos?
MR BIZOS: Did you - on the 26th of April, say that you were prepared to continue writing your own statement?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I wrote all my own statements in my own handwriting.
MR BIZOS: And did Mr de Waal cause members of the police force to take things to your home - like washing and pay out money and ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, I’ve already said that.
MR BIZOS: Yes. Was the female constable Strydom, asked to type your statement?
MR BIZOS: And did you say that you would prefer to type your own statement?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, because her English wasn’t very good and she was battling a bit, so I took over from her.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I said I could do it quicker.
MR BIZOS: And you typed your statements?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I typed on her behalf because she was battling with the typewriter and I typed them.
MR BIZOS: Yes. And are the photostatic copies of the statements that you typed during this period your typing?
MR BIZOS: And would you agree with me that they are typed accurately and neatly?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, on the face of it, I can’t remember every paragraph.
MR BIZOS: Well, we’ve read them and they are typing of high quality if I may say so.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, thank you.
MR BIZOS: And properly paragraphed, is that correct?
MR BIZOS: And the paragraphs are not running at random, each paragraph contains a section - a proper section, as a good writer like yourself is expected to write - there is no confusion in the statements?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, there is, there are a lot of paragraphs that are out of context.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: There are paragraphs that are out of context in terms of a chronological progression of events.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I’m sorry. Sorry, ...[intervention]
CHAIRPERSON: Is there anything that you wish to add?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I was just going to give examples but I ...[intervention]
CHAIRPERSON: Well, you haven’t ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: For example, I mentioned that paragraph 65 seemed - and 66 seemed out of order - it was when I was reading them, they seemed to be not the sort of progression that you would do if you were writing it normally.
MR BIZOS: But there may a paragraph or two but do you agree that these statements were typed out by a person who seemed to be able to do the job she had undertaken to do?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Mr Bizos, I wasn’t crawling around the floor and I wasn’t being beaten up.
CHAIRPERSON: I think Mr Bizos, you’ve asked that question in different ways and she said that she typed her statement - it was reasonably well done, you paid a compliment to her.
CHAIRPERSON: So now, let’s move from there Mr Bizos.
MR BIZOS: Yes, thank you Mr Chairman.
When the doctors came, what was the purpose of the visit?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I had asked the police to get me a doctor and they said: "Which doctor" and the first doctor that I thought of was my doctor in Krugersdorp, so I gave the name of Doctor van der Mesht and asked her to come and see me but it was a long way from Krugersdorp and when she came I was so upset and tired and disorientated that I passed her in the passage - I didn’t recognise her, so she went back to Krugersdorp.
And then they asked me if: "Do you still want to see a doctor"? and I said: "Well, yes, what happened to Doctor van der Mesht"? and they said ...[End of tape 2, Day 5 - no follow on sound]
MR BIZOS: ...[inaudible] of the examination?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Because my heart was playing up.
MR BIZOS: Yes. Is that as a result of you having been arrested or is this a - was there a pre-existent condition or was this a ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, no, I had chest pains and my heart was hurting and thumping and I couldn’t sleep and I told Mr de Waal or somebody there that I wanted to see a doctor because I couldn’t contain the thumping.
MR BIZOS: Do you remember that I asked you whether there were any untruths in this statement and originally you couldn’t remember any except the
"No complaints"
MR BIZOS: Hadn’t you studied - let me finish my question please, hadn’t you studied this document carefully before?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, yes, but I’m now reading it again, I don’t remember every paragraph.
MR BIZOS: Well, you didn’t remember that Mr de Waal had recorded that you had made damaging admissions.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I did remember, I read them to you.
MR BIZOS: When I first asked you I meant. When had you last read this document before today?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, but I recalling now reading through it, I can’t remember reading every paragraph immediately.
MR BIZOS: The question was: "When you read this document before - last read this document before today"?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I don’t know, two or three days ago maybe.
MR BIZOS: And you had forgotten the blatant untruths you now say Mr de Waal recorded?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, that’s not true, I opened it now and I’m looking at it and I had to read through it in order to refresh my memory, I hadn’t forgotten anything.
JUDGE NGOEPE: Well, Mr Bizos, isn’t that the problem which usually arises when council puts a pregnant - a typical pregnant question to a witness in respect of a statement which contains several pages and just says: "Well, what is untrue"?
MR BIZOS: I accept that, I accept that she has a right to read it, I’m testing her credibility as to - if there were blatant untruths, why she didn’t remember them if she had read it two or three days ago - for whatever that is worth.
CHAIRPERSON: Let’s move on Mr Bizos.
Now the portion that you say is incorrect ...[inaudible]
INTERPRETER: Mr Bizos’s microphone.
MR BIZOS: In the last paragraph on page two
"She will state that her husband had never shown a firearm to her"
"She would state that her husband had never shown her a firearm while her husband - during interrogation, had stated that he had shown a firearm to her"
Yes, yes, Mr Beetge kept coming up - backwards and forwards all the time and saying to me: "You husband said he showed you the weapon" and I said: "Well that’s not true" and then he said: "Well, your husband said he put it in the brown suitcase in the bedroom and I said we don’t have any brown suitcases" and then he just left it.
MR BIZOS: And you never said that you had forgotten about it?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Forgotten about what?
MR BIZOS: As to whether the gun had been shown to you or not? Did you ever say to Mr de Waal or to Mr Beetge or to anyone else that you did not remember whether or not your husband had shown you a gun?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I don’t recall saying that, I was quite adamant about the fact that my husband didn’t show me a gun, I don’t recall if I said it in the interrogation but I remember being - emphasising to Mr Deetleffs on the tape, that I did not see a weapon, I think I emphasised it to such an extent that I said it about six times.
MR BIZOS: Whilst in detention, were you concerned about Mr Kemp being in detention?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Of course, yes.
MR BIZOS: Did you ask Mr de Waal as to whether Mr Kemp was still in detention?
MR BIZOS: Why did you ask him that?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Because I was worried about him.
MR BIZOS: Was it whilst you were being asked questions about the list, that you asked them about whether Mr Kemp was still in detention?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I asked whether he was still in detention when I was being asked questions about everything.
MR BIZOS: The question was ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I don’t recall whether it was when he asked me questions about the list or about anything, I asked him what had happened to Arthur Kemp.
MR BIZOS: Are you able to admit or deny that your question about Mr Kemp was at the time that you were being asked questions about the list?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I deny that, I asked him many times about Mr Kemp at various stages when we were sitting together in Edenvale, it wasn’t at any specific time - I can’t even remember when I asked about Mr Kemp.
MR BIZOS: A moment ago you said that you were asked questions about that list at various times and if I understood your answer correctly, you couldn’t remember whether it was during the interrogation about the list or not.
MR PRINSLOO: With respect Mr Chairman ...[intervention]
CHAIRPERSON: I think she said that: "She said on several occasions - on many occasions, she asked about Mr Kemp.
MR BIZOS: Why was not one of those occasions - thank you Mr Chairman - why was that not one of those occasions when you were being interrogated about the list?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, now that’s speculation, I don’t know - I’ve already said ...[intervention]
CHAIRPERSON: Mr Bizos, don’t’ ...[inaudible] during a lengthy taking of statement things are said and you are asking her: "Why didn’t you say this at such and such a stage", now what is the purpose of a question like that?
MR BIZOS: Now, as to where - no, the purpose is clear Mr Chairman, as to whether the statement by Mr de Waal - at the top of page 3, is probable or not because she was only prepared to speak the truth about the list if she was satisfied that Mr de Waal had been released.
CHAIRPERSON: Put that to her in that form I think.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, not at all.
MR BIZOS: Well, were you not prepared to be more forthright about the list if you knew that Mr Kemp had been released from detention?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, that’s absolutely untrue, I was asking about Mr Kemp in a personal capacity. I was worried about him because he had nothing to do with this, he had a wife and three children and he was being held at the police station, it had nothing to do with the timing of any other questions which Mr de Waal was asking me. It wasn’t a consentry - a - I can’t even think of the word, I can’t understand the reasoning behind this.
I was asking about Mr Kemp in a personal capacity and I had no - I never mentioned anything to Mr de Waal about: "You will do this and then I will do something else", I just gave him my statement. And in the video’s that were taken when I was under interrogation with Mr Deetleffs, there was never any question of changing my story about the list. In fact, what you see in Mr Deetleffs’s statement of the 24th and what you see here, there are crucial points that have been changed in those three or four days.
MR BIZOS: Yes. Well, one of the changes Mr de Waal give a reason for - and I will read it to you
"To the question she asked me whether Mr Kemp was still in detention, I replied in the negative and she told me that she had not spoken the truth or written the truth regarding the list because she did not want to cause unnecessary trouble for Arthur Kemp because she did not know - she had not - he had not known why she wanted the addresses"
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, one doesn’t tie up with the other in my mind, it’s - my questions about Mr Kemp - whether he was released or whether he was not released would never have changed my story about the list, why would it? You’re implying that if I said this then Mr Kemp would be released and if I said something else he would be kept in detention.
MR BIZOS: Did you not have a feeling of - even on your own version or particularly on your own version, of protecting Mr Kemp from any involvement?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Mr Kemp wasn’t involved and there was no need to protect him.
MR BIZOS: Did the police speak freely - during the course of the interrogation, about the "moord lys" or "hit-list"?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Which police, Mr de Waal or Mr Deetleffs?
MR BIZOS: Either the one or the other or both.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I don’t recall, I think they did - I’ve got notes here of video, I’d have to go through them. I think Mr Deetleffs talked about a "hit-list" at one stage
"It was not" - Gay: "It was not originally intended as a "hit-list".
Mr Deetleffs: "When does it become a "hit-list"?
"When it has been used as a "hit-list".
"Who is Eugene Taylor"?
And there were various remarks made like that.
MR BIZOS: Yes. Tell me, the word: "enemy", did you use the word: "enemy" in your writings in The Patriot?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I suppose so, yes.
MR BIZOS: And who were you referring to as: "the enemy"?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: The other side I presume - I don’t know, I can’t unequivocally say that without checking The Patriot.
MR BIZOS: Which is the other side?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: The ANC and the SACP, they were the: "enemies" of the Conservative Party, they weren’t my personal enemies.
MR BIZOS: Were all the people on - all the 19 people on your list, the enemies of the Conservative Party?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, that list was drawn up by Mr Kemp, I’d have to - what are the names again ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: No, I’m talking about the 19 persons that you drew up, were they all enemies of the Conservative Party?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I think they consisted of three or four journalists, I wouldn’t have termed them enemies, I would term them antagonists to the Party - Enemies, what - an enemy is something that occurs in a war.
MR BIZOS: Were some of them enemies and some antagonists?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: If you want to put it that way, yes.
MR BIZOS: And would Mr Mandela, Mr Hani, Mr Slovo, be the enemies?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, of the Conservative Party, yes. But it was interesting that it was Mr Deetleffs that introduced the word: "enemies" in the interrogation.
CHAIRPERSON: Well, I think the question right now is that you yourself have freely used the word: "enemy" in your writing.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, yes, yes.
MR BIZOS: Did Mr de Waal ever tell you that you were not obliged to give - to make any admissions against yourself?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, if he had told me, I wouldn’t have said another word - he didn’t tell me anything, he told me: "Hurry up and write the statements, I have to go to the Attorney General - it’s coming up for the 30th and if you don’t hurry up we will have to apply for another 10 days".
MR BIZOS: Will you please look at page one, the middle of the third paragraph
"I told her that should she be prosecuted any statements made by her to us or anything which was put in writing now and at a later stage, could be used as evidence against her at a trial which may result" ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, that is absolutely incorrect, first of all he told me that I would be a witness, secondly he said that anything I wrote wouldn’t be used in the court, so it’s a complete falsity to say that. He did not warn me that anything that I wrote down could be used in a court, he told me exactly the opposite, he said anything that I wrote down wouldn’t be used in a court.
MR BIZOS: How come that you didn’t pick up this alleged untruth when you read this document - firstly two or three days ago, secondly ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Actually Mr ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: Secondly, during the course of your examination?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Actually Mr Bizos, I have marked it myself quite some time ago as false but I didn’t rule it through with a colour, so that’s why I missed it now. If you would like to see the document you can see that I had already written false on it some time ago - if you’d like to see it.
MR BIZOS: No, if it’s there - I don’t know when it was written ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I just didn’t rule through with a colour.
MR BIZOS: Yes, we hear what you say Mrs Derby-Lewis, but what I want to say to you about you being called as a witness, who were you going to be a witness against?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I don’t know, I knew nothing about the court cases - you will - I knew nothing about the judicial process, absolutely nothing and during my interrogation with Mr Deetleffs and with Mr de Waal, you will see the record shows I continually asked: "What’s going to happen to me, what about the Attorney General, can I see a lawyer"? - my questions were directed at the legal process, I had no idea what was going to happen to me.
If he said to me: "You will be a witness", I believed him. I wasn’t even aware then that a husband and a wife couldn’t testify against each other, that was - as I said at the beginning, I believe the reason why I was charged.
MR BIZOS: An experienced journalists such as yourself ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I’m not experience at all in court processes or the law.
MR BIZOS: Or the reading of literature?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, I read literature but I don’t know anything about the details of the law.
MR BIZOS: You never came across that you could not give evidence against your husband?
MR BIZOS: You never came across - in all your readings, that you couldn’t be called to give evidence against your husband?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, no, I only find out later.
MR BIZOS: Now, you were taken through a number of the statements that are attributed to you during the course of your evidence in chief by your counsel, will you please turn to page 398? Sorry, it’s R4 continued.
MR BIZOS: 398. Have you got it?
MR BIZOS: As far as we remember, your counsel didn’t take you through this document.
CHAIRPERSON: What is the question?
MR BIZOS: Well, were you taken through this document by your counsel?
MR PRINSLOO: Is Mr - he wants to refer to this document Mr Chairman.
MR BIZOS: Are the contents of this document correct or incorrect?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: There are some parts that I queried - yes, this is the summary by Mr Deetleffs of his interrogation of me. In essence it is correct, in essence.
MR BIZOS: In essence it is correct.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: In essence there are some points that I queried, particularly paragraph 52 and 54 and paragraph 60.
"I asked Clive about the gun but he said he couldn’t tell me where he had got it from"
I mean, clearly in the tapes it shows - on numerous occasions, I denied having anything to do with the gun, so there were a few errors but generally speaking it is a reasonable summary of the interrogation. It’s quite short, there were a lot of other things spoken about as well but there were some paragraphs that I noticed were not correct.
MR BIZOS: And you mention the paragraphs as paragraphs ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Paragraph 52.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, it would seem so - oh, paragraph 24 - sorry, paragraph 24 is an innocuous sort of statement that ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: So if it’s innocuous you admit it?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, if - it says
"We never had any discussions"
The discussions - well, it’s like saying:
"I do remember that they went into political discussions"
Well, everybody was into political discussions, it’s a broad statement which is in essence correct.
MR BIZOS: In essence it is correct, so you know it’s right? Did or did your husband not say - on the 10th, 11th - on the 10th, that he didn’t think that Cuba would do such a thing at all, did he say that?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, when we came back in the afternoon the phone rang and somebody spoke to my husband and said it was somebody from polish decent and we discussed the polish people that we knew but I don’t recall him saying to me that he didn’t Cuba would do something like that.
We didn’t know it was Cuba, I didn’t know it was Cuba until the following morning when I saw The Rapport newspaper.
MR BIZOS: Did you husband or did your husband not say ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I do not recall him saying that.
MR BIZOS: You do not recall him, so you can’t deny it?
CHAIRPERSON: Anyway, you’ve got to leave it at that, she said she can’t recall and that is relating to the 10th only.
MR BIZOS: Or at any other time?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, on the 11th - the following day, we saw his face in The Rapport newspaper.
MR BIZOS: Did he then say that he thought that Cuba would not do such a thing at all?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, he didn’t say that, he didn’t talk about anything specific. He talked about the fact that it was - Cuba had done something like that and how could he have got involved in something like that - a sort of general discussion, he never ever told me that he was involved with Cuba in this.
MR BIZOS: Now, did he ever say that he couldn’t understand why Cuba had been so stupid to drive around so obvious
"Cuba was supposed to change the number plates. He did admit to me however, that they had discussed it"
Did he ever say anything like that?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I said in my - during my interrogation, that I don’t recall him ever talking to me about number plates.
MR BIZOS: Did your husband ever say that
"It looked like a set-up seeing Cuba was caught so quickly"
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, I think we talked about that on the Sunday, there was much speculation, we had a lot of phone calls, people were phoning and asking what had happened and I don’t - I really don’t 100% recall whether he said that but I cannot deny that - he may have said that.
MR BIZOS: Was there ever any talk about APLA at any stage, as the organisation that may have been responsible for Hani’s death?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I don’t - maybe it was a general discussion amongst the populists or amongst the conservatives but there was no reason to think that APLA was involved.
"Clive thought that either APLA, the Government or someone was behind it as it didn’t sound like Cuba who would go into a situation head-on"
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I didn’t know Cuba well enough to know whether he would go into a situation like that or not.
"I asked Clive about the gun but he said he couldn’t tell me where he had got the gun from"
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I never asked Clive about the gun, I never spoke to Clive about a weapon and I never saw a weapon.
MR BIZOS: Right. Do you agree that this interrogation which is said to have taken place on the 24th, shows that there was no pressure on you to admit anything that you did not want to admit?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I wasn’t going to admit to anything that I didn’t admit to in any event, it was only towards the end - when Mr de Waal informed that anything I wrote down couldn’t be used in Parliament - couldn’t be used in court, that I decided then - as my notes said yesterday
"I’ll write anything to get out"
That was what I wrote in those original notes that I wrote in the cell:
"I will write anything to get out"
And he said: "Well, you can’t use it in court anyway", so I wrote it but at this stage I didn’t know that, I didn’t know that I was possibly going to get out on the 30th of April.
MR BIZOS: When did Mr Deetleffs fall out of the picture and Mr de Waal take over?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: About the - I think it was the 25th.
MR BIZOS: Did he - did Mr Deetleffs interrogate you after the 24th?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I don’t think so.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I don’t think so, I don’t recall, no.
MR BIZOS: I want to - I may say Mr Chairman, that we have not been able to locate Mr de Waal, we will have to take instructions from him and further cross-examination on the issue may have to be directed to the witness once he becomes available.
CHAIRPERSON: If he becomes available.
CHAIRPERSON: If he becomes available.
MR BIZOS: If he becomes available.
I want to return to the question of the Conservative Party’s attitude to violence. You were in court whilst your husband was being questioned, were you not - before this Committee?
MR BIZOS: I don’t want to have to go through it again unless I have to but do you recall that a number of public statements were read into the record from newspaper reports from leaders of the Conservative Party dissociating the Conservative Party from violence?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, who read them into the record, was it your side who read them into the record?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I remember we made a submission which was an exhibit - I haven’t got it in front of me so I’m not sure what we did and what you did ...[intervention]
CHAIRPERSON: Anyway, the fact of the matter is that ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: It exists or whatever.
CHAIRPERSON: Statements made by certain political parties was read into the record.
MR BIZOS: Now, you as the information officer of the Conservative Party, are you able to confirm that those were the public statements that were made at the time by the persons who were mentioned?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well first of all, I’m not the information officer of the Party and secondly, I was in jail at the time so I really can’t confirm whether they were correct or not.
MR BIZOS: Were you in jail during the week of the - from the 11th to the 18th?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: 11th to the 18th of what?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I was taken on the 21st of April.
MR BIZOS: Yes ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Sorry, are you talking about immediately afterwards?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes. No, I remember that the Party was supportive of me and I don’t recall the various statements made in the press.
MR BIZOS: We’ll come to the supportive of you, please listen to the questions.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I’m listening to the question.
MR BIZOS: Shortly after the event and particularly during the week of the 11th to the 18th, did you become aware that various leaders of the Conservative Party dissociated the Conservative Party from the - from violence?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I didn’t take any particular notice of that, it was when perhaps you brought it to the court that I noticed it. I remember on the day of the 10th of April, Doctor Peter Mulder phoned and asked would we issue a statement - because I wasn’t empowered to issued the statement but I was empowered to type it up and send it out, and I said to him: "Well what are we going to do"? and he said: "Well, we’ll have to ask Doctor Treurnicht" but he didn’t say to me: "Oh heavens, isn’t this dreadful, we must immediately distance ourselves", he said: "I think we must be circumspect here because the Party’s position on this is ambiguous". On the one hand the ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: Yes, I didn’t ask you about - Madam, I didn’t ask you about the conversations with Doctor Mulder.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, but I think that is relevant to ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: I asked you about ...[intervention]
CHAIRPERSON: Please just try and answer the question, your counsel will come to your assistance when he re-examines you.
MR BIZOS: Were you aware of public statements made by leading members of the Conservative Party dissociating the Conservative Party from violence?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Not particularly aware, no.
MR BIZOS: No? Mr Chairman, I must place on record that we asked whether the statements in R3 are going to be admitted as having been made, we were told in August last year - this year - in August, that they would revert but we have heard nothing Mr Chairman and it may be necessary for me to put these documents again to the witness in order to - I hope that it is not - are we going to have an answer some five months later or are we not Mr Chairman because it effects the examination that I have to direct to the witness?
MR PRINSLOO: Mr Chairman, those documents were presented to the Commission by Mr Bizos and we did undertake to inspect some of those documents and to speak to certain of the persons - we were only able to speak to certain people and we intend at some stage to call evidence in this regard but at this stage I can’t elaborate any further on that.
CHAIRPERSON: Well, are you able to say which statements are admitted by you?
MR PRINSLOO: No, Mr Chairman, I’m unable to say at this stage.
CHAIRPERSON: Well now, shouldn’t that be done because you had ample time to do that?
MR PRINSLOO: Well, Mr Chairman with respect, in view of the fact that people’s names are mentioned, it would not be our duty to consult with those people as Mr Bizos placed those statements before the Commission.
CHAIRPERSON: I think that’s an artificial attitude you’re adopting here because this concerns the stand of a Party represented by your clients.
MR PRINSLOO: Mr Chairman, we intend calling a witness which will elaborate on those statements when he’s called.
CHAIRPERSON: On all those statements?
MR PRINSLOO: On most of those statements.
MR BIZOS: Sorry, I didn’t hear that.
CHAIRPERSON: They’re calling a witness who’s going to elaborate on all those statements - on most of those statements.
MR BIZOS: Well, could we know which the witnesses are going to be and what the elaboration is going to be - they are statements of public record and they were not denied afterwards. If this is going to be a never ending process, let it be Mr Chairman, but we must know what it is that we have to do.
CHAIRPERSON: I think Mr Bizos, at an appropriate stage you and counsel on the other side must engage yourselves into an exercise like a Rule 37 conference on this issue, there might be some agreement between you two so that we can avoid a repetition.
MR BIZOS: Yes, well let me leave the question at least until after the adjournment.
CHAIRPERSON: Yes, you must endeavour to see that we can’t allow this thing to drag on and on, try and see if you can arrive at some kind of an agreement as to whether these statements are admissible or not from your side, do you understand?
MR PRINSLOO: Mr Chairman with respect, we intend calling a witness, we can then explain as to the content of those statements.
CHAIRPERSON: No, I’m talking about the evidence of your witness, you know what your witness is going to say but I’m saying you’ll have to look at these statements to find out what is the attitude towards these statements.
MR PRINSLOO: As you please Mr Chairman.
JUDGE NGOEPE: Mr Prinsloo, I think the question really here is with regard to the authenticity of the statements, you see newspapers do attribute certain statements to certain people and surely we would hope that we are not going to have to call every such person as a witness to come and find out from that person whether in fact what he’s reported to have said in the newspaper, he did say.
One would have thought that counsel would come together and agree whether or not - after due consultation with the respective constituencies, whether or not it is being admitted or not being admitted that so and so did in fact say so, so and so was correctly reported in the newspaper. Are we going to have to call every one such person or are counsel going to come together and try to eliminate that, I think that’s what Mr Chairman is proposing.?
JUDGE NGOEPE: Not - sorry, not the witness who’s coming to explain the purpose behind the statements and the like, that’s not our problem, our problem is proving the authenticity of those statements.
MR PRINSLOO: I understand the position of the Committee, we’ll attend to that Mr Chairman.
MR BIZOS: You said you were not the information officer of the Conservative Party, what were you in relation to the - what were you in the Conservative Party, did you have anything to do with the information or the press or what was it, how would you describe yourself?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, I issued statements on behalf of the members of Parliament and the Caucus and the leader, I never issued a statement from myself and I was a parliamentary reporter and a journalist for The Patriot.
MR BIZOS: Yes, so you were involved with the dissemination of information from the Conservative Party?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, from the English side.
MR BIZOS: Yes. Now, Mr Peter Mulder, did he phone you on the 10th?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, I believe he spoke to my husband, I’m not sure who he spoke to but he asked us to - "What should we do, should we issue a statement"? and I said: "Well, I think you must speak to Doctor Treurnicht and if I recall, a statement was issued eventually by Mr Jeug Prinsloo who was the MP for Roodepoort and the spokesman on Justice and I typed that and sent it out from the house myself on his behalf.
MR BIZOS: Did Mr Mulder speak to you or not?
CHAIRPERSON: The answer is: "Yes", Mr Bizos.
MR BIZOS: No, she said: "either I or my husband" Mr Chairman, I want certainty as to whether it was the witness or her husband Mr Chairman.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I don’t recall, it may have been me, I don’t remember. All I know is I was ...[intervention]
CHAIRPERSON: You remember talking to him by telling him that ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, I think my husband answered the phone and called me - anyway the point was that I became involved in the discussion with him, so it must have - yes.
MR BIZOS: You became involved in a discussion with who?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: With Doctor Peter Mulder, as to what we should do in terms of the press.
MR BIZOS: Right. Did you make any suggestions to Doctor Mulder as to what should be said?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I had no right to make any suggestions to the Members of Parliament as to what should be said.
MR BIZOS: And do you recall anything that you said to Doctor Mulder?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I think he said something about: "We must get hold of Doctor Treurnicht" and then eventually he came back and he said that Mr Prinsloo would phone me and I think Mr Prinsloo phoned about 10 or 15 minutes later and he issued a statement of two or three lines which I typed.
MR BIZOS: Did you suggest to him that it should be said that there should be a commitment about violence not being the answer?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I’m not in a position to suggest anything to the Conservative Party’s hierarchy in terms of policy.
MR BIZOS: And if anyone suggests that that is what you said, is that incorrect?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: That’s incorrect.
MR BIZOS: Did you suggest as to whether any sadness should be expressed about the death of Mr Hani?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I think Doctor Mulder said: "We are not crying" or I remember Doctor Treurnicht said something about: "He who lives by the sword, dies by the sword" or - a couple of days after that, but the Conservative Party obviously would appeared highly hypocritical if they had gone into a fit of weeping - I mean, clearly the Conservative Party was viewing it as an act of war and part of the violence in the country - I’m just saying that off the top of my head.
Doctor Treurnicht did say something in The Patriot - I think a week later, something about: "He who lives by the sword, dies by the sword" or words to that effect. There was certainly nothing insulting said, it was simply a political statement on the fact.
MR BIZOS: Did you or did you not say to Doctor Mulder that: "We can’t say that we are sad because we are not sad", did you say that?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, I possibly did - I think he said that to me, I can’t remember who said it first.
MR BIZOS: Yes. Now, do you recall the Member of Parliament, Mr Koos Botha who was charged with an offence arising out of a sabotage of a school in Pretoria?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, I knew him, I remember that instance.
MR BIZOS: Yes. Do you remember that he complained that the Conservative Party did not support him and he was alone in Court K at the Pretoria Regional Court with no-one coming there to support him, do you recall that?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, there was an article in The Patriot about that.
MR BIZOS: And do you recall that Mr Koos Botha’s statement was responded to in Parliament?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I remember it because you brought it up when you were questioning Mr Derby-Lewis but until then I hadn’t recalled it.
MR BIZOS: But you being a person involved with the affairs of the Conservative Party, couldn’t have failed to notice that Mr Koos Botha’s reason for expecting help was said by him to be Doctor Treurnicht’s speech at Voortrekkerhoogte and the Resolution passed and the Kimberly Congress?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I think the Kimberly Congress happened after the Koos Botha bomb thing, I’m not - when did the Koos Botha bomb thing - I’m not sure of the dates.
MR BIZOS: No, it’s right - we checked the dates, it was after the Kimberly Conference and Mr Koos Botha relied on it, do you recall that?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I recall from what you have said so far.
MR BIZOS: Yes. Now you see, you were the parliamentary person concerned with the parliamentary affairs of the Conservative Party, the repudiation of Mr Koos Botha and his reasons for relying on the monument speech and the Kimberly Conference ...[End of side B, tape 3 - no follow on] Parliament as a result of a caucus decision or not?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I have no idea, I wasn’t the parliamentary correspondent. There were two people down there, I was one of them and I only went to Parliament during the session of the President’s Council, I wasn’t a permanent member down there, so I missed a lot of parliamentary speeches and so forth. And the Koos Botha issue for me, was irrelevant until it was brought up by yourself during this hearing.
MR BIZOS: Irrelevant to what Madam?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, it was irrelevant to me, he had been kicked out of the Party and anything that had occurred in Parliament - from what I’ve read and from what you’ve presented, was a bit of a spat between himself and Mr du Plessis, as I perceived it. I wouldn’t say that it was a heavy political and policy problem.
MR BIZOS: Did you consider it an irrelevant fact or set of facts in order to determine what the attitude of the Conservative Party was to violence at the end of 1992 and the beginning of 1993?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I see it as a completely irrelevant incident in terms of Conservative Party policy, it was a spat between somebody who had been suspended or removed from the Party and somebody who was having a bit of a go at him in Parliament - I think that was how the whole Conservative Party saw that incident.
MR BIZOS: Is it your judgement that statements saying that: "There were 30.000 people at the monument and you Koos Botha was the only one to understand that there’s an incitement to violence", an irrelevant statement made by the senior member of the Conservative Party in Parliament?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, I think it was a flippant statement meant to be flippant, I don’t think it was a heavy period of debate, it was Koos Botha feeling a bit bitter and Mr Daan du Plessis having a go at him.
MR BIZOS: It was during a serious debate on the Indemnity Act on which presumably the Conservative Party - after a caucus meeting, was opposing.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I don’t recall the context in which the spat occurred.
MR BIZOS: But surely you as such a high profile Conservative Party person, couldn’t have ignored that evidence in formulating your attitude as to what your Party’s police was in relation to violence?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I’m not a high profile Conservative Party person, I’m simply a member and an employee of the Party and it was of no consequence to me.
JUDGE NGOEPE: Sorry, sorry, Mr Bizos, can I interrupt you just on this point, the response to Mr Botha’s conduct which refers to 300 people or so at the Voortrekker monument - 3.000 people - that kind of response, did you not think that it constituted an important criteria to determine the possible direction of the policy of the CP with regard to the question of violence?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: It just never occurred to me to think of Mr Botha’s response as anything other than a personal disappointment in his attitude to the Party, it never occurred to me that it would constitute any or have any relevant or influence on policy.
CHAIRPERSON: But whatever Mr Daan du Plessis in Parliament - to your knowledge, was that inconsistent with your understanding of the Conservative Party policy?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I don’t think so, I think he was having a personal go at Mr Botha.
CHAIRPERSON: No, my question is not that, my question is whether - to your knowledge, that statement of Daan du Plessis was consistent with your understanding of the Conservative Party policy.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I don’t know, I feel incapable of assessing Mr Daan du Plessis’s remarks in terms of myself, I can’t make any judgement on what he says.
MR BIZOS: Was the widest possible publicity given to Mr Koos Botha’s claims and the Conservative Party’s response, both in the newspapers and on television and on the radio?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I don’t recall much publicity given, there was something in The Patriot and I think that was where I read about it. I don’t even think Mr Daan du Plessis’s remarks were even reported in the press, the only place that I’ve read about his remarks is in the Hansard which you presented to Parliament - to the Committee. I can’t recall Mr du Plessis’s remarks even in The Patriot, although it may have appeared but I didn’t see any significant publicity.
MR BIZOS: Yes. Well, we produced the Hansard for the case of completeness and accuracy but words to that effect, did you not see any of it in any newspapers?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I don’t recall.
CHAIRPERSON: Perhaps this might be a convenient stage to take the adjournment.
MR BIZOS: May I just round this off?
MR BIZOS: That in R3 of - R3(f) Mr Chairman
"Stop blaming our Party - CP tells Bomber Koos - Citizen, 22.10.92"
CHAIRPERSON: What is the question?
"Koos recounts why he bombed school"
And also whilst we are - well, I’ll bring it up in another context in relation to the other cuttings.
CHAIRPERSON: We’ll adjourn now and resume at 2 o’clock.
MR PRINSLOO: ...[inaudible] leg-irons in order to handcuff - to put leg-irons onto the two applicants when they are taken to prison. Up till now - as from the time of the trial and during all these proceedings, they’ve never been put in leg-irons and we fail to see for what reason.
No-one could advance any reasons to us as to why they would put them in leg-irons, there’s no information that they would attempt to escape or had misbehaved or anything like that, on the contrary Mr Chairman, they were well treated by the prison authorities till now and suddenly this has arised.
Our information is that there’s some political interference as far as this is concerned. We would like to ask the Committee just to ask the prison authorities as to why they want to put these people into leg-irons.
CHAIRPERSON: Do you know anything about it Mr Bizos?
MR BIZOS: No, we don’t concern ourselves ...[inaudible] brought before the court.
CHAIRPERSON: I would like to see the prison authorities in my chambers now.
MR PRINSLOO: As it pleases you Mr Chairman.
CHAIRPERSON: Mr Prinsloo, I have discussed - my Committee has discussed or raised this matter with the representatives of the police authorities who have come here and we regret that somebody set in motion, steps to have chains and handcuffs put on the applicants before us - it is a pity that that has been done.
In the past we have had had hearings where people who had been serving long terms of imprisonment have appeared before the Amnesty Committee in support of their application and on no occasion was anybody brought to us in chains. Once again my Committee regrets that this has happened.
I think it is quite clear that such steps can only be taken if there is an assessment made by the authorities that the prisoners - or there is a threat, that the prisoners might escape or behave in some irregular way in which case it would be necessary to restrain them and only in those circumstances should the prison authorities consider taking steps as they were proposing to do here.
I think that this matter has now ended - I’ve been given an undertaking that nothing will be done in connection with chaining and putting leg-irons on the applicants, once again I’m sorry that it has happened. May we proceed?
MR PRINSLOO: Thank you Mr Chairman, I’m indebted to you Mr Chairman and members of the Committee.
MR BIZOS: In the video machine there is a video which we were asked should be handed in as an exhibit and as it not a documentary exhibit, may we give it a numerical number as Exhibit 1 - I don’t remember having had any other non-documentary exhibit, so Exhibit 1.
We are going to show portions of it and I understand that later my learned friend Mr Grant, will show other portions of it during his examination of Mrs Derby-Lewis but we will give the time reference number on the video and I will ask the operator to stop it and ask questions and then show the next portion and ask questions so there is some continuity on it. May we proceed on that basis Mr Chairman?
CHAIRPERSON: Yes, you may do so.
JUDGE WILSON: Have you watched the video - situated as it is now, from here? Why I’m asking this is I’m wondering how much those two lamps are going to interfere with our ability to see the video clearly and whether it would be possible to either turn them or turn them off - turn them away from us or turn them off.
CHAIRPERSON: Is it possible to turn these lights off? - if you can, please do so.
MR BIZOS: I am told by those who have watched it that it’s probably in order Mr Chairman.
MR BIZOS: May we commence ...[inaudible] this video was made on the 24th of April ‘93 and the reference is 10:12:30, could we please have a look at that?
COMMITTEE WATCHES VIDEO: ...(sound indistinct)
INTERPRETER: The speaker’s microphone is off.
MR PRINSLOO: Mr Chairman, I’m unable to see from here as the lady obscures my view, if she could just sit a little back please.
INTERPRETER: And if you could please switch on the microphone.
...[inaudible] there Mrs Derby-Lewis, although the sound may not have been very clear, did you say there:
"Looks like they all slept, so did I. I did a bit of exercise and then I"
"Then I must have slept for about 12 hours"
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I couldn’t hear very well but if that is - that sounds like what it was, yes.
MR BIZOS: Yes. And do you accept that this was on the 24th of April ‘93?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, I can’t see the date properly but ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: Yes. And were you telling the truth when you said that you had slept for 12 hours or about 12 hours?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, I suppose so, yes.
MR BIZOS: So that whatever you may have said on the 24th could not have been as a result of sleep depravation?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, sleeping for 12 hours after not sleeping for a long time hardly allows you to catch up - sleep depravation was just one problem.
MR BIZOS: We’ll deal with one problem at a time. If you’ve slept for 12 hours, can we exclude that sleep depravation did not play an important role in your answers during the 24th?
MR BIZOS: Thank you. Can we now please go to 10:25:52?
COMMITTEE WATCHES VIDEO: ...[sound indistinct]
Video sound: "So then we used to see Cuba on and off. I didn’t see Cuba much - I never had really much to say to him, I found him a bit slow and when we used to have functions or anything, we used to ask him to come ...[indistinct] alone in his political fields and they wanted to get him involved.
And in December we had"...[inaudible]
MR BIZOS: Okay, thank you. The sentence that I want to place on record there is
"I never had much to say to Cuba, I found him a bit slow"
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, the word: "slow" I meant in terms of his English and his communication skills.
MR BIZOS: Please don’t anticipate the questions.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I’m sorry, you asked me what did I mean by that.
MR BIZOS: I didn’t ask you I just asked you ...[intervention]
CHAIRPERSON: But Mr Bizos, the witness has been under cross-examination for a long time, a minor transgression like that shouldn’t raise a quarrel at this stage please.
"I found him a bit slow"
MR BIZOS: Now, did you mean in his movements or in his mental capacity?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I didn’t mean either, I explained to you that it was in terms of his communication skills.
MR BIZOS: Oh, communication skills.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: And his English.
MR BIZOS: I see, yes. You didn’t regard him as unintelligent or uncommitted to your cause?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: On the contrary, he’s highly intelligent and a very committed person.
MR BIZOS: And a person with a mind of his own?
MR BIZOS: And a person with a mind of his own?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: And a person with a mind of his own.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: In most matters, yes.
MR BIZOS: I’m sorry, I didn’t hear that.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: In most matters - I didn’t know him very closely, I wasn’t intimate with his innermost thoughts.
MR BIZOS: Can we please go to 10:40:58?
COMMITTEE WATCHES VIDEO: ...[sound indistinct]
MR BIZOS: Yes, can we stop there please?
"I tell you this Section 29 is a brilliant Act because nobody has any access to anything, least of all the lawyer. I think that it is a terrible problem in the Law, people cannot have access to a lawyer"
MR BIZOS: And then Mr Deetleffs takes over and do you agree that there was a discussion about that sort of detention being practised elsewhere and particularly by the British?
MR BIZOS: And in fairness to you, were you cleaning your glasses or were you upset - on what we see there?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, my eyes were hurting - I was tired, so I think I just took them off to wipe them.
Could we please go to 10:47:43?
COMMITTEE WATCHES VIDEO: ...[sound indistinct]
"There was some or other planning as well, they were talking about - I didn’t know what they were talking about"
And there’s something in this ...[indistinct]
"They didn’t tell you"? - "No, I didn’t ask because I wasn’t really interested in what Cuba had to say actually - look they talked heavy politics"
Is that a correct ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, that is what I said, yes.
MR BIZOS: Yes. Now, does this not show that on the 24th you appeared to feel completely free to answer questions put you in a completely non-culpable manner?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, no, it may look like that but I was very afraid and it was after that that I became ill and asked to see the doctor.
MR BIZOS: Well, ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I was trying to please Mr Deetleffs, he started off that tape - if I may comment
"Now, let’s take sensible notes, where do we start"? and I said: "You mean this is what you said we must do the other night - that is from the beginning to the end"?
In other words, I was complying with him now as opposed to being belligerent and aggressive in the beginning.
MR BIZOS: Would Mr Deetleffs not have been more pleased if you being compliant?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Correct, I was trying to please him.
MR BIZOS: Listen to my question please - that you had been more compliant if you said what the case was - that your husband and Walus had detailed discussions as to how to assassinate Mr Hani ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I didn’t ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: Isn’t that what he would have been - listen please ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: Listen please, isn’t that what he would have wanted from you if he was going to get you to inculpate your husband, Mr Walus and yourself?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, you know there’s a limit to what you’re prepared to say if it’s not the truth.
MR BIZOS: I don’t know what you mean by that but let’s proceed.
COMMITTEE WATCHES VIDEO: ...[sound indistinct]
"You asked me why I didn’t sit down and say this at the beginning"
and Mr Deetleffs’s response is:
"It would have been much easier"
"But you - hang on, you have never been brought into Section 29 and you work in an environment where you are familiar with the police and how things work, a stranger is brought in and feels - my personal feeling is that you must have access to Law"
MR BIZOS: Now, you appear to have felt comfortable to argue with Mr Deetleffs.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I wasn’t arguing.
MR BIZOS: Or let’s say - to express views different to him and argue in the sense of supporting your point of view as to why you were not co-operating in the beginning.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: My notes here - I complain about Section 29: "Why didn’t I say this - why didn’t I co-operate in the beginning? - I was afraid of the Law, I didn’t know what was happening". Now during ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: What notes are you referring to?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I made notes of the video, if you’d like them you can have them.
MR BIZOS: Yes, well at the end of the day it would be helpful I think, if we could have your notes.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, and my complaints throughout my interrogation - as I mentioned before, was about the lack of access to legal help and it started at the beginning and it went right through to the end of the interrogation, it didn’t change. And when Mr Deetleffs came to my house, he said: "I’m arresting you under Section something or other but he didn’t say to me: "Anything that you will say can be taken down and used against you", he just said: "We’re arresting you under something or other for questioning".
MR BIZOS: Let us just confine ourselves to this at the moment please. Do you agree that he does not sound to be speaking to you in an aggressive voice or being angry with you for not having co-operated with him in the beginning?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, Mr Chairman, on the other tape there’s a whole five or six hours missing from the time that I was taken to Mr Deetleffs’s office until - which was about 6 o’clock in the morning or 5 o’clock, until 13H00 and it was then that he softened me up to become reasonably compliant and conversational as I was there. Frankly - as I said before, I was trying to please him.
MR BIZOS: Now, you remember what the question was: "He does not appear to be angry with you - not to remonstrate with you, it sounds like a civilised question and answer with you participating fully"?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Definitely, definitely.
MR BIZOS: Thank you, yes we can proceed.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: But that wasn’t the way it was in the beginning.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, when he took me in on the 21st.
MR BIZOS: No, this is on the 24th.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, well I’m referring to the 21st when he wasn’t so nice and compliant and ...[intervention]
CHAIRPERSON: Anyway, the question to you was ...[intervention]
CHAIRPERSON: "Studying this here, it is quite clear that your questioner was not aggressive to you in any way?" and your answer is: "Yes".
CHAIRPERSON: On this tape as we are seeing it.
CHAIRPERSON: Well, that’s the answer Mr Bizos.
MR BIZOS: Thank you Mr Chairman.
COMMITTEE WATCHES VIDEO: ...[sound indistinct]
"They said that he was from Polish decent and I thought now, who is this - a little thing working in the back of my mind - how many people of Polish decent are floating around who would do something like that and I said to Clive: "I wonder who that is"? Clive said: "Well, it could be anybody because that was just a story"
Now, we know - is that what you said?
MR BIZOS: We know from the statements or the evidence of your husband and Mr Walus, that they conspired to kill and Mr Walus killed Mr Hani, do you accept that?
CHAIRPERSON: We’ve had enough evidence of all that, I think you should just put your questions Mr Bizos.
How could your husband possibly - in your mind, have had any doubt - if they had conspired to kill Hani and there was a news item of a person with a Polish decent said to have done it, how could he have dismissed it in this way?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I don’t know, that is for him to answer.
MR BIZOS: The relationship between the two of you was one of trust at all times?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, but we didn’t discuss every single thing together.
MR BIZOS: Please let’s go to 11:12:42.
COMMITTEE WATCHES VIDEO: ...[sound indistinct]
MR BIZOS: Do you agree that you appear to be quite buoyant and in good disposition in that picture?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, I was compliant, I wasn’t crawling around or crying.
"Oh yes, Peter Mulder did phone about a press release - oh yes, that’s right because I issued a press release" "What do you think, what should we do"?, so I said: "We can’t say that we are sad because we are not sad, we would probably make a comment about violence not being the answer - which I think the CP ultimately did - some vague, but we certainly did not offer any sympathy but I didn’t issue the press release, somebody else did"
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, that’s correct.
MR BIZOS: Now, was it your - were these your words that you said that
"Make a comment about violence not being the answer"
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I was surmising as to what sort of a general statement the Conservative Party might put out but as it turned out they didn’t say that.
MR BIZOS: The question was: the words
"Make a comment about violence not being the answer"
Were those words and your suggestions to Doctor Mulder:
"should be incorporated into any statement that may be made"
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I’m sorry, could you just repeat that a little further back, not where it starts - exactly where you said, perhaps a few words ...[intervention]
"What should we do"?, so I said: "We can’t say that we are sad because we are not sad, we could probably make a comment about violence not being the answer"
"Which I think the CP ultimately did - some vague indistinct, but we certainly did not offer any sympathy but I didn’t issue the press release, somebody else did"
Now, the question is, were the words:
"Make a comment about violence not being the answer"
your words as they appear to be in what you are recorded as having said?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, they’re my words.
JUDGE NGOEPE: And were you interpreting the policy of the Conservative Party at that time?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I wasn’t interpreting the policy of the Conservative Party, I was thinking to myself what sort of vague, bland statement should they issue - that was what Peter Mulder phoned to ask me about: "What should we say"? and I said it in the context of being uncontroversial and being a bit bland and vague.
MR BIZOS: Well, ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: And they were the words that I chose to impart to him, what I thought would represent bland and vague.
MR BIZOS: Is one of the ways of avoiding telling the truth by being vague and bland and did you intend that the truth should be told by the Conservative Party or that untruths or half-truths should be told by the Conservative Party in its public statement?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I don’t think that came into the issue at all. It never occurred to me to think about truths or half-truths, I was discussing with Peter Mulder and he himself was going to issue the statement, so it wasn’t a question - in my mind, as to how I should formulate a statement, I wasn’t going to issue one.
MR BIZOS: Did the Conservative Party issue public statements in relation to it’s policy which were not it’s policy? ...[End of Tape 3, side A - Day 5 - no follow on sound}
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: ...[no follow on sound]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Their policy.
MR BIZOS: Their policy. You suggested that they should say that
"Violence not being an answer"
and you were speaking the truth and you intended the truth to be spoken - if your advice was taken, by the Conservative party.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, it wasn’t a policy piece of advice, it was simply a conversation with Doctor Mulder as to what we should say in the meantime - it didn’t have the heavy portense of a policy statement, I’m not a policy maker of the Party.
MR BIZOS: But Doctor Mulder asked you for advice as what to say.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, he said in a conversational tone
"What do you think we should say"
He didn’t say: "Will you tell me what to say".
MR BIZOS: And you suggested to him that he should tell the truth, that the policy of the Conservative Party was that
"Violence is not the answer"
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I never talked about truth or anything to Doctor Mulder, I said to him ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: I’m going to suggest to you that you are not answering the gravement of the question, I will not put it again and we will argue the matter.
Can we please proceed to 11:30:09?
COMMITTEE WATCHES VIDEO: ...[sound indistinct]
Shall I read it out for clarity Mr Chairman, or is it clearly on the record - do you feel?
CHAIRPERSON: Is it quite clear to the witness, if it’s clear to her you needn’t read it out.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Actually I’m not quite sure in which context I referred to those people - what happened before, what was the precipitatory statement that would have ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: I think I must read it out Mr Chairman, because there are questions that I want to ask along the way.
CHAIRPERSON: ...[inaudible] Mr Bizos.
MR BIZOS: You were asked about certain right-wing individuals, do you recall that?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I don’t recall that but ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: Well the, perhaps we should go back from 11:30:09, you were asked about certain right-wing individuals.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, but who were the right-wingers that I was asked about?
MR BIZOS: You refer to it in the passage, do you want to hear before or do you want me to deal with what has been shown up to now?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, but you see, that reference that I make to crackpots doesn’t necessarily refer to everybody in the right-wing, it could have referred to two or three people that Mr Deetleffs may have asked me whether I knew.
MR BIZOS: Well, let’s do it on that basis because you mention the names or some of the names, let’s - for the purpose of my question, let’s take it at that, that is was a few people and not the right-wing as a whole.
"Now let me tell you, we have minimal contact with the right in terms of being involved with them. I personally - and that is not for the record, thought they were crackpots and an embarrassment to our cause. We did everything we did through the CP, we were completely involved with the CP and this took up all our time.
There were times when we would go to a function and there would be AWB people there but I found them to be - not that I was ashamed of militancy, but I just found them to be on the wrong track. You know, I said to them: "You talk about shooting but who are you going to shoot, you are going to go out and shoot six Blacks but while you shoot six Blacks another six are born at Baragwanath Hospital". "That Strydom bloke and the "Wit Wolwe" and all of them I think they are all nuts but I don’t want to discredit them - that is not for the record, so we don’t know any of these people"
MR BIZOS: Now, let us just say this, in the application for amnesty there is a statement and some evidence given by your husband, that he acted on behalf of the broad right-wing, who is the broad right-wing?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: The broad right-wing consists of all of the right-wing organisations.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I don’t know who the "Wit Wolwe" are, I’ve never met anybody from the "Wit Wolwe".
MR BIZOS: Yes. And what other organisations fall into the broad right-wing that your husband may have thought of acting on behalf of when he conspired to kill Mr Hani?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: The HNP and the ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: Did you say the AWB?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: The HNP, the Oranje Werkers, the - oh, there’s dozens of them.
MR BIZOS: There’s dozens of them?
MR BIZOS: Of which you appear to have a poor opinion?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Absolutely not Mr Bizos, you are completely twisting what I said, I talked about the crackpots that ran out and shot people in the street, I wasn’t talking about the right-wing in general.
MR BIZOS: Well, ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I was talking about people who just go and shoot in the street.
MR BIZOS: Which other people in the right-wing shot at people not in their - on the streets, but in their driveways for instance?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: That was - as far as I’m concerned, a political act and that is why we’re sitting here, it’s not a senseless shooting of Black people.
MR BIZOS: Which of those right-wing organisations had ever publicly said or identified themselves with a policy of violence?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I don’t know the constitution of all of them but there was a mobilisation campaign formed by the CP, which included many of those organisations in the right.
MR BIZOS: Which organisations called for the use of violence in order to achieve political objectives?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I don’t think any of them do officially.
MR BIZOS: Well, are you suggesting that the right-wing has an official policy and an unofficial policy that they give out one thing publicly but it is a lie and they surreptitiously go about killing people, is that your evidence?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Mr Chairman, the right-wing consists of a formal structure and it consists of leaders and followers, people on the ground and many people on the ground - and not only in the right-wing but in many organisation, interpreted combat and the war their own right and they did it on behalf of their organisations - as you know, with the AWB and so forth. No political party on the right had murder as it’s official policy, not one.
MR BIZOS: Yes. We have some evidence that was put by Mr Mpshe to your husband about racist statements that he made about Blacks wanting to have babies, is that near - sort of, an allied statement to the one you made, that if it would kill six Hani’s, six would be born in Baragwanath at the same time?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, my attitude was, what is the point of shooting people, for what reason? People are born and die every minute, it’s not meant to be racist but of course racist today is the lexicon, anything to do with anything is racist today.
MR BIZOS: Now, can we please go 12:07:12?
COMMITTEE WATCHES VIDEO: ...[sound indistinct]
"So, what do you know of false registrations or whatever"?
"No, nothing about that, only what Clive told me and he said it must have been a set-up. He didn’t go into what he had planned, if he had I would have told you but I am not a logistics person. Oh yes, oh yes, hang on, he said he was meant to change the number plates or something and he didn’t or something - something"
MR BIZOS: Now, when you say he didn’t go into what he had planned, who is the he that you’re referring to?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I’d like to refer to the previous period of interrogation where Mr Deetleffs asked me various questions and in those questions he talked to me about number plates and so forth and there was something that you said just before that, where I said
"Oh yes, and I remember now"
and something to do with the number plates, in other words I’m recalling what we had spoken about before and I’m writing what I believe he would like me to write because I knew nothing about number plates and I knew nothing about planning. And my husband never ever discussed the planning with me and it never appeared in anybody’s evidence.
MR BIZOS: I’ll ask the question again
"He didn’t go into what he had planned"
Who is the he that you were referring to?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Who is the key?
MR BIZOS: Who is the he - h-e.
MR BIZOS: That you were referring to when you said
"He didn’t go into what he had planned"
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I presume it’s Mr Walus, he was the only one who planned something - by the look of it.
"Only what Clive told me and he said it must have been a set-up, he didn’t go into what he had planned"
How could that refer to Walus?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, my husband never told me that he planned anything.
MR BIZOS: That’s what you tell us but I am asking you.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, that’s what I’m telling you.
MR BIZOS: No, I’m asking you: "What did you say there"?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: That’s what I said there and you asked me: "Who was the he"?
MR BIZOS: And I am asking you - in the sentence
"He said it must have a set-up, he didn’t go into what he had planned"
Who is the person that you are referring to as having planned?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Mr Walus I presume.
MR BIZOS: How can that possibly be?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, Mr Walus committed the crime.
MR BIZOS: Let’s examine your last answer, you say that you meant Walus?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, I think so. Don’t forget Mr Bizos, - may I talk about - there was a softening up process that is not on that machine ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: No, we’re talking about your words ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I’m sorry, it’s very relevant to this. I’m now in a compliant mood and I’m trying to give Mr Deetleffs what he wants and he may have suggested that to me. He brought in the word: "enemies", he talked about many, many things in that 48 hours before this tape started.
MR BIZOS: Madam, the question was
"So, what do you know of false registrations or whatever"?
It seems to be an ordinary enquiring question that any reasonable detective would ask.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, Mr Deetleffs wasn’t a reasonable detective when he took me in, he was a member of the security branch with a long history of softening up people.
MR BIZOS: Did you know that at the time of your arrest?
MR BIZOS: So, it couldn’t have had any effect on your thinking?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, his behaviour certainly did have an effect on my thinking.
MR BIZOS: No, his previous record of - whatever it may or may not have been, did not play any role in your thinking because that is what you learnt afterwards.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, it played a role in his professionalism in terms of being able to soften up people, he knew what he was doing.
MR BIZOS: You did not know anything about Mr Deetleffs’s previous history at the time when he was questioning you?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Absolutely not.
MR BIZOS: Thank you. Now, he asks a simple question
"So, what do you know of false registrations or whatever"? - "No, nothing about that, only what Clive told me and he said it must have been a set-up, he didn’t go into what he had planned"
Isn’t that a clear admission that your husband had told you that he and Walus were party to a plan to kill Hani before your arrest?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Definitely not.
MR BIZOS: Right then, what did it mean?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I wasn’t very cogent in most of that - I don’t know what it means Mr Bizos, it means that maybe he talked to me about Mr Walus’s plan, I don’t know - I don’t know who he is.
MR BIZOS: Well, I’m going to suggest to you that you were being both cogent and coherent at the time that you spoke on the tape.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I was very compliant and I wanted to give Mr Deetleffs what he wanted, I remember distinctly - I made that note on my notes, I was afraid of him.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: And he suggested the changing of the number plates, I knew nothing about number plates, nothing at all.
CHAIRPERSON: Now, may I ask you a question? If you say that you were compliant - the question that is being asked of you: "Who was the he that you were referring to"?
CHAIRPERSON: Now, because you were compliant, was it not possible that the he that you mentioned was your husband?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, because my husband never told me that he had planned anything, it wouldn’t have made any sense to say that.
CHAIRPERSON: So then, all this business about you having been very compliant, has nothing to do with the answer, as far as you were concerned the he meant Walus?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, on the face of it yes, I was particularly referring to the number plates when I said that.
JUDGE NGOEPE: Sorry, are you saying that applying ordinary basic rules of grammar, on the face of it in that sentence the he in question refers to Walus? Is that what you’re saying?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, I think so, yes.
JUDGE NGOEPE: It doesn’t like ...[inaudible]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, what does it look like?
JUDGE NGOEPE: Well, Mr Bizos, read the sentence to her so that she can see what it looks like.
MR BIZOS: I’m sorry Mr Chairman, we didn’t hear ...[intervention]
JUDGE NGOEPE: That ...[intervention]
JUDGE WILSON: Read the sentence to her.
MR BIZOS: Thank you, thank you. May I read the question for the sake of clarity as well?
"So, what do you know of false registrations or whatever"? - "No, nothing about that, only what Clive told me and he said it must have been a set-up, he didn’t go into what he had planned"
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, yes, on the face of it, it looks like a follow-up from the first he which referred to my husband, to the second he but I state unequivocally that my husband never discussed planning a murder with me, that’s all I can say.
MR BIZOS: Thank you. Please let’s have a look at 12:21:25.
COMMITTEE WATCHES VIDEO: ...[sound indistinct]
MR BIZOS: Thank you, I’ll just read that
"One thing I don’t want to think, is that I’m shying away from the political aspects of this thing, I am sure that it will be used in court"
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I’m sorry, I don’t know what that means. I presume that - I think he said something to me before that about
"Are you going to let them take the rap"
"Are you going to let them take the rap"
That is what Mr Deetleffs ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Take the rap.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: And I said: "No, I don’t want to shy away from them, I don’t want to distance myself from them, I sympathise with them - that was the notes that I made myself, that was the way I said that.
MR BIZOS: Well, we can leave your notes out for a moment until you’ve had the opportunity of looking at the copy which you will be good enough to offer us at the end of the proceedings of the day. The portion that I’m particularly interested in and I’m sure the Committee may be interested in, is your statement
"I am sure it is going to be used in court"
What was going to be used in court?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I really don’t know.
MR BIZOS: Well, they’re your words.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, but they’re my words under Section 29, I wasn’t having a tea party at the Carlton Court.
CHAIRPERSON: I think Section 29 or no Section 29, doesn’t really have anything to do with the answer as to what you meant by those words.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I don’t know what I meant by those words.
MR BIZOS: Are you trying to suggest that although you appeared to be responding comfortably to questions and you were well kept and well dressed and responsive to questions, are you saying that these words were not intended to have any meaning whatsoever?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I don’t know what the meaning is, I don’t know what it means.
MR BIZOS: Let’s just take the simple English meaning, it’s a simple English words
"That it will be used in court"
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I don’t know.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I don’t know, he ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: What else might it be referring to whilst you are being used, whilst you are being busy interrogated about a serious murder and you say
"One thing, I don’t want you to think - that is I’m shying away from the political aspects of this thing, I am sure that it will be used in court"
What could it be other than your statement?
JUDGE WILSON: The political aspects of this thing Mr Bizos, isn’t it equally capable of meaning that she’s not shying away from the political aspects because she knows the political aspects will be used in court.
MR BIZOS: ...[inaudible] examine this possible interpretation with you Madam. If you did not - if you were not guilty and if your husband was not guilty, the propaganda that was unleashed on your arrest - that you were being victimised by the police and the Nationalist Party Government, would have been successful political propaganda?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I don’t know what you’re talking about, about propaganda being unleashed by the National Party after my arrest, I have no idea what you’re saying and I’m sorry, I don’t understand the background ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: Well, perhaps you were not listening, I didn’t say National Party propaganda, I said ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, you said National Party, you said National Party.
MR BIZOS: No, against the police and the National Party I said, your propaganda against the police and the National Party by accusing them of hounding innocent Conservative Party people, wasn’t that the propaganda that was unleashed after your husband’s arrest?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I know nothing about that, about - the Conservative Party may have issued some statements about that if I recall but I certainly didn’t, it wasn’t my view.
MR BIZOS: Yes, well, ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I think there were remarks made ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: I’m going to put to you that you were not given any undertaking that your statement will not be used in court and that you’ve said so - you expected it to be used and that is what it means.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, that’s not true at all.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Mr Deetleffs and Mr de Waal both told me that what I said and what I wrote was Section 29 and it could not be used in court, they both unequivocally told me that.
MR BIZOS: Can we please go 12:22:11 ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: First of all he said I wasn’t going to get bail and he - they were talking to be about witnesses, I wasn’t sure where I stood in the legal process, so I didn’t know what was going to happen to me and throughout my interrogation I kept asking: "What is going to happen to me", so I wasn’t sure whether I would appear in court as an accused, as a witness or not at all.
MR BIZOS: Well, if that bit of answer is correct, then the possible interpretation which was mentioned by Judge Wilson couldn’t have been meant by you because you didn’t know whether you would go to court at all, either as an accused or as a witness or anything else.
MR PRINSLOO: Mr Chairman with respect, Mr Bizos ought to also put to witness that nowhere on this tape of the 24th of April, does it anywhere appear that Captain Deetleffs warned this witness in terms of Judges Rules as it appears at page 398, the introduction to his statement.
MR BIZOS: ...[inaudible] time for that, my counsel can argue the matter Mr Chairman, can we go to 12:22:11?
COMMITTEE WATCHES VIDEO: ...[sound indistinct]
MR BIZOS: I’ve read this portion to you earlier, do you remember your answer?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, I think I said that
"I take my hat off to you"
was correct, I didn’t deny that and that I was passive and compliant and I don’t recall the talk about the United Nations, I think that was my answer - whoever they were.
MR BIZOS: Do you recall what your answer was when asked: "Why did you say this and why were you prepared to take your cap off to the police"?, what was your answer, do you remember?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I don’t recall.
MR BIZOS: Well, do you agree that you looked quite serious and articulate and cogent - to use your word, and quite comfortable whilst you were saying this?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, Mr Chairman, that’s ridiculous, I was unhappy and ill, I went to hospital for the next two days and it was coming to the end of the evening - it was 12H20 and I wanted to go back, I wanted to go back to the cell, I was very, very tired and I was trying to please him. It’s a piece of conversation
"I take my hat off to you"
What else - trying to break the tension, it doesn’t mean I want to join the police or I agree with their tactics, I didn’t agree with their tactics and I said that right throughout the interrogation. I complained about Section 29 and he was instituting Section 29 against me, he wasn’t just the broad police force.
MR BIZOS: This morning you said you were joking when you said it?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, I was trying to break the tension, that was the word - they were the words I used this morning.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: It was late and I was tired.
MR BIZOS: So, you say that: "To say that I was joking" which you said this morning and the serious complaints that you had against him and Section 29, are the same thing?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I didn’t say that at all.
MR BIZOS: Let us go on please.
JUDGE WILSON: Sorry, before you do, did I hear you correctly saying: "I was unhappy and ill and went to hospital for the next two days"?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, I went to - well, to hospital, I went to see the doctor.
MR BIZOS: Can we please go to 12:22:47?
COMMITTEE WATCHES VIDEO: ...[sound indistinct]
MR BIZOS: Now, may I suggest Mr Chairman, the last passage that we want to put to this witness is - presently advised that it’s 4 o’clock and that the Committee takes an adjournment until tomorrow and we hope - there’s seems to be some progress though Mr Chairman.
CHAIRPERSON: We will adjourn after this attempt.
MR BIZOS: Yes, if it works then of course we can finish, if it doesn’t then perhaps ...[intervention]
CHAIRPERSON: Yes, very well. ...[inaudible] and we’ll resume at 09H30 tomorrow morning.
ON RESUMPTION - 3 DECEMBER 1997
CHAIRPERSON: Mrs Derby-Lewis, you are reminded you’re are still under oath.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, Mr Chairman.
MR BIZOS: Mrs Derby-Lewis, yesterday you gave us a typed document headed
"Rough Transcript G. Derby-Lewis - Interrogation by Deetleffs"
Could you please tell us when you typed this document?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I think it was Wednesday night - when did we - when we got the tapes.
MR BIZOS: When you got the tape?
MR BIZOS: I see, and where did you view the tape? Where were you when you viewed the ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I viewed the tape at my house.
MR BIZOS: Were tapes one and two handed over to you by your legal representatives?
MR BIZOS: When were they handed over to you?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I think it was Wednesday, I don’t recall.
MR BIZOS: Anyway, you had it on Wednesday of last week?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, last week.
MR BIZOS: Now, did you view them alone or in the company of some other person?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I viewed them alone.
MR BIZOS: You see Mrs Derby-Lewis, my learned friend Mr Brandt who took the tapes last night informs me that the portions of the tape that have the damaging admissions said to have been made by you and recorded on page - R4 continued, page 402, have been wiped off the tape. I would ask the witness to answer the question and not to consult with anyone please Mr Chairman.
JUDGE WILSON: You haven’t yet asked a question, you merely told her something.
MR BIZOS: Do you know who may have wiped those portions out?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I don’t know what you’re talking about, I’m sorry, I have no idea what portions you are talking about. I got two tapes and I ran them off and I gave them to my attorneys.
MR BIZOS: Why did you only make notes in relation to the - up to 12:49?
MR BIZOS: No, 12:49 of the tape, if you look at page four of your document.
"Fell asleep, still asleep when tape closes"
and I just stopped - I just switched off the tape because I figured there was nothing else, I didn’t look any further.
MR BIZOS: I’m informed by Mr Brandt ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Who’s Mr Brandt? May I ask?
MR BIZOS: He’s counsel for the police sitting behind me and who will have the pleasure of cross-examining you soon.
MR BIZOS: That this tape even now goes beyond 12:49 but stops short of where the police evidence is going to be - the admissions that you made in paragraphs 52 to 60 were recorded, do you want to make any comment on it?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Mr Bizos, the last thing that I would - I feel quite insulted frankly, that you would even consider the fact that I would wipe out the tape.
MR BIZOS: Well, ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Maybe it was wiped before it came to me, I simply ran it off. I have no technical knowledge at all of wiping out tapes, I wouldn’t interfere with any evidence that has to do with my husband’s life, it is simply ludicrous to suggest that. And ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: Yes, I hear you say so but please answer the questions that I’m about to put to you.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I have answered the question.
MR BIZOS: These admissions - if in fact they were on the record, would be completely destructive of your credibility.
CHAIRPERSON: Mr Bizos, ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Are you still suggesting that I wiped out tapes?
CHAIRPERSON: Mr Bizos, whether a statement would be destructive of her credibility or so on, is a matter for argument and comment isn’t it?
MR BIZOS: I’ll change the questions.
CHAIRPERSON: Yes, I don’t think you should ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: Can you think who would have the greatest possible interest of wiping these admissions off the tape, if they were in fact wiped off?
MR PRINSLOO: To what is Mr Bizos referring Mr Chairman, what was wiped off?
JUDGE WILSON: As I understand, from paragraph 52 onwards.
JUDGE WILSON: Page 402, he’s already referred to it.
MR PRINSLOO: Mr Chairman, what I saw on the tape ended at the time 11:27 on that particular tape, so if Mr Bizos can indicate to you the time.
MR BIZOS: ...[inaudible] and I’d like the witness to answer it.
CHAIRPERSON: I think you were about to put a question to her. I think you were about to put a question to her: "Who would be ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: Who would have an interest in wiping out paragraphs - the contents of paragraphs 52 to 60 from the tape?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I received two tapes and which I’ve numbered one and two and I typed out and I gave you a copy of what I typed out in good faith - I have a copy for the - a rough assessment - tape one was timed from 2 o’clock in the afternoon - sorry, 2 o’clock in the morning of the 23rd of April and tape two was on the 21st of April - which was the day that I was arrested, and it starts at 1 o’clock in the afternoon, so if there’s any wiping out been done, it would seem that it’s been done before I got it.
And all of that section that I referred to in my notes that I wrote on the 2nd of April in the prison, referred to all of these things that happened during the time that I was arrested until the early morning of the 23rd and there’s no records of that.
CHAIRPERSON: Now, I think the answer to the question is: you don’t know who ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I don’t know who ...[intervention]
CHAIRPERSON: was responsible for wiping out, that’s the answer.
MR BIZOS: Yes. But the gravement of the question of the question that I asked you: "Who would possibly gain - out of the three parties in this Committee, by the deletion of these paragraphs, you, the police or the Hani family"?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I don’t know, I can’t comment, it never occurred to me.
MR BIZOS: You can’t say. Very well, we’ll argue that and we’ll argue the obvious but now ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I don’t know what’s on there, you say that it is in the records but I - it never even occurred to me to think along those lines.
MR BIZOS: Mrs Derby-Lewis, these tapes that were handed to your legal representatives were documents in the possession of the Commission.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I got them from Mr Lubbe, my attorney.
MR BIZOS: I know, Mr Lubbe was given these documents by Mr Mpshe - counsel for the Commission, to the legal representatives. Did he not discuss with you his authority to hand these tapes over to you, one of the persons said to be a conspirator or alleged to be a conspirator in the Hani murder, did your attorney not tell you that these were handed to him and that you were not entitled to have them on your own once you were one of the people involved in this hearing?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, he didn’t.
MR BIZOS: I will leave the rest in relation to the tapes, to my learned friend Mr Brandt who has witnesses to - we will have to lead secondary evidence as to what was on the tape.
Mrs Derby-Lewis, how old was your son in April ‘93?
MR BIZOS: Did you ask him why he had a silencer?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I never knew he had one.
MR BIZOS: But once you found out that he had one, did you ask him what he was doing with a silencer?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I didn’t.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I was taken to Section 29, then I went to jail and it went completely out of my head. I wasn’t interested to ask why he had a silencer, I didn’t find it important.
MR BIZOS: Some four years later you still haven’t asked your son why he had a silencer?
MR BIZOS: Why this wall of silence between you and your son in relation to an unusual object in his possession?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: It’s not a wall of silence at all, I considered it irrelevant and not worth even talking to him about it.
JUDGE WILSON: But you knew that part of the case against your husband was that he had obtained a silencer for the gun which was used to kill, surely when you heard your son was also in possession of a silencer you would know about it?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I wasn’t - I didn’t have any idea that my son was in possession of a silencer until the 17th of April when they started taking the stuff out of my house and I asked one of the policemen: "Would you kindly write that down so that I know" and I said: "What is that"? and he said: "That’s a silencer". I didn’t ...[intervention]
CHAIRPERSON: Sorry, the question was: "You had a long time between then and now to enquire from your son how does it come about that he kept a silencer, didn’t you ask him that"?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, and he’s overseas, he’s been overseas for years.
CHAIRPERSON: No, the question was: "Why didn’t you ask him"?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I didn’t consider it relevant.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: If I may say something Mr Chairman, - I can see the Judges look incredulous, I knew nothing - I beg your pardon, I knew nothing about a silencer from the word go, so why would my son having a silencer have anything to do with tying it up with the case?
CHAIRPERSON: The suggesting is that the silencer figures fairly largely in the killing of Mr Hani.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, but I said in my evidence I had never seen the silencer ...[intervention]
CHAIRPERSON: No, no ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Therefore I brought this evidence to show you that I hadn’t in fact seen one because when it came up - while they were taking it out, I said: "What is that", I brought the evidence to you to show you that I hadn’t seen - ever seen one and the only time that I got that evidence was from the police docket when I went through to Pretoria within the last month, to look through the police docket and I found the inventory. And then I thought maybe this is a good idea to present this to the court.
CHAIRPERSON: I understand that, I understand your answer, you are saying that you did not consider it irrelevant, in other words - you did not consider it relevant surely, in other words as far as you are concerned it seems that ordinary curiosity didn’t compel you to ask him about it? - to ask you son about how ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I’m sorry I didn’t hear that.
CHAIRPERSON: Ordinary curiosity didn’t drive you to ask him about it? You weren’t curious to find out?
CHAIRPERSON: Right Mr Bizos, proceed now.
MR BIZOS: Mrs Derby-Lewis, just one more question on this issue, motherly instinct would surely have led you to ask the question lest your son was mixed up with assassins - the silencer is after all an instrument of great use to assassins, why did you ask him: "What are you involved in, where did you get it from, why did you get it, why did you put it in your draw"?, - all the questions that a mother would ask for the protection of her son.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I didn’t know that silencers were involved in anything to do with assassins, I didn’t even know what a silencer looked like, I didn’t know it’s function.
JUDGE WILSON: You heard the evidence at your trial.
JUDGE WILSON: Where silencers were referred to.
JUDGE WILSON: Thereafter you knew perfectly well what silencers were used for.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, but at the time - are you talking about - since the trial my son has been overseas, I haven’t written to him and asked him why he had a silencer.
MR BIZOS: How long has your son been overseas?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I think he went overseas shortly after - I think it was even before the trial.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: He visited me in prison, yes.
MR BIZOS: Please tell us specifically, when did your son leave South Africa?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I’ll have to check.
MR BIZOS: Has he been back since?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, he lives in Canada.
MR BIZOS: Now, you and your husband were not only man and wife but political colleagues and held important positions in the Conservative Party, both of you?
MR BIZOS: Did your husband ever discuss the moral question with you whether - in the struggle of the Conservative Party, it would have been permissible to kill or morally acceptable to kill, did he ever discuss that question with you?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I don’t think we went into those kinds of specifics, I don’t recall.
MR BIZOS: Did he ever discuss with you the possibility as to whether or not the time had arrived for the contingency plan that was alluded to at the Kimberly Conference, had arrived or not?
MR BIZOS: Despite your husband’s untruthfulness in relation to the matter - before an application was made for amnesty, we know that he and Mr Walus planned the murder, do you accept that?
MR BIZOS: What was it that would have prompted him not to discuss this with you once you were so close?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I don’t know what prompted him not to discuss anything with me, I think that’s for him to answer - with respect.
MR BIZOS: He has made statements and has given evidence - if he is to be believed, that he wrestled with the question as to whether or not murder should be committed, can you give us any reason - what there was in your relationship, that he was not prepared to speak to you about this moral dilemma that he was labouring in?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, that was his moral dilemma and I believe he testified that both he and Cuba said that they wouldn’t involve their women folk.
MR BIZOS: How would he have involved you if he told you he was in a moral dilemma as to whether or not the third option at the Kimberly Conference should be put into operation or not?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: He never discussed it with me.
MR BIZOS: The question was: "How would he have implicated you if he as a fellow politician and as a husband referred to the third option at the Kimberly Conference?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I’m sorry, my husband never discussed it with me.
MR BIZOS: What would have prevented him from discussing any of these things and why would there have been this wall of silence about such an important question that your husband was wrestling with, was there anything in your relationship which would have prevented him from discussing it with you?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I don’t know, that’s his decision and there wasn’t a wall of silence - as you mentioned before, between us.
MR BIZOS: You were sufficiently prominent a member of the Conservative Party that you were selected by the Conservative Party in 1992, to appear in the television programme to debate the question of what was the rule of patriotic South African women to play in relation to the referendum that was about to be held.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, I think the SABC wanted women participants and it was in English so the Conservative Party to participate and I think Mrs Camera was there.
MR BIZOS: And you were sufficiently senior and sufficiently trusted by the Conservative Party to debate it’s policy in public against a senior member of Parliament, Sheila Camera on behalf of the National Party?
MR BIZOS: And the suggestion that there may be in your evidence that you were a mere foot-soldier, is therefore to be looked at critically is it not?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Absolutely not, to go onto a television interview in English where there were not very many women English speakers in the Executive of the Conservative Party, isn’t unusual and it has nothing to do with the other matter that you mentioned in your second part of your sentence - I don’t think one is contingent upon the other.
MR BIZOS: But the Conservative Party that appointed you to this must have felt sufficiently confident that you would represent it’s policy correctly?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, on that point, I think we were debating a referendum.
Mr Chairman, there are other matters which we have to take up with this witness as soon as Mr de Waal becomes available and as soon as the version of the police is put by my learned friend Mr Brandt. I would like to stop the cross-examination here with your leave and I will merely give a notice that I will apply in due course - when further facts emerge, to put them to the witness but for the time being that is the end of the cross-examination.
And I also Mr Chairman, want to place on record that matters that I have not put to her directly in relation to some of the issues, I would also like to reserve the right because one piece of information leads to other questions in relation to others.
CHAIRPERSON: Mr Bizos, you will agree that this is not a particularly satisfactory way of conducting proceedings?
MR BIZOS: I agree fully Mr Chairman, but then on the other ...[intervention]
CHAIRPERSON: Now then, that being so, are there not other matters that arise from her evidence in chief that can be dealt with now and reserve to yourself the right to ask questions after your witness has arrived ...[intervention]
MR BIZOS: I will not ask for leave to ask any questions or claim any right to ask any questions that arise out of her evidence in chief, I reserve the right in relation to matters that will emerge as a result of the police evidence and particularly Mr de Waal whom we have not seen and this is what I particularly want to reserve.
And also Mr Chairman, we have given - Mrs Derby-Lewis was good enough to give us a contact number for Mr Edwin Clarke - counsel for the Commission is making arrangements to get him here, it may be that information may emerge from there that we have to put to her.
CHAIRPERSON: Now, at the beginning of this morning’s questioning you referred to some notes that were given to you by Mrs Derby-Lewis, do those form part of the record, have they been handed in yet?
MR BIZOS: Not for my purposes, I merely wanted - I merely referred to them in order to establish that she had sole control of the video at a certain time Mr Chairman.
CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very much.
MR BIZOS: May we call back Mr Chairman, and allow Mr Brandt and his attorney to come forward?
NO FURTHER QUESTIONS BY MR BIZOS
CHAIRPERSON: Yes, please, do proceed.
MR BRANDT: Thank you Mr Chairman.
CHAIRPERSON: I wish you’d get down here quickly with your cameras and equipment please.
CROSS-EXAMINATION BY MR BRANDT: Mrs Derby-Lewis, I will try and be as brief with you as I’ve been with Mr Walus. Let me begin at your arrest, you were arrested - according to what I understand, at 4 o’clock in the morning on the 21st of April 1993, is that correct?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: That’s correct.
MR BRANDT: And you were arrested inter alias by Captain Deetleffs?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: That’s correct.
MR BRANDT: Now, what exactly did he say to you when he arrested you, did he tell you what you were arrested for etc.?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, he said I was arrested under - I think it was - I wrote it down, Section 50 or 60 of some Act - Section 50 and that was only when I asked him, I asked him under what Act - under what Law am I being arrested.
MR BRANDT: Did he tell you what you what you were arrested for?
MR BRANDT: So, he merely came in there and told you: "Mrs Derby-Lewis, I’m so and so, I am arresting you"?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, he said he wanted to take me for questioning.
MR BRANDT: In connection with what
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well obviously, in connection with the Hani matter.
CHAIRPERSON: Not obviously, the question is: "Did he tell you"?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I don’t recall, I assumed it was in connection with the Hani matter, maybe he said: "Yes, I’m arresting in connection with the Hani matter", I don’t recall.
MR BRANDT: Yes, but Madam, he either did tell you or he didn’t tell you.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I don’t recall, I assumed it was in connection with the Hani matter.
MR BRANDT: Well, can you seriously dispute it if I put it to you that Captain Deetleffs informed you that he was arresting you for - in connection with the murder of the late Mr Hani?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I can’t dispute that, I don’t recall that. I remember him saying that he was arresting me under some Section and I wrote down a couple - 10 days later - Section 50, it could have been 60 or 70 or 30, I don’t know.
MR BRANDT: Now, what prompted you to ask him: in terms of which Act or what Act he arrested you?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Because I had a friend staying there, Mr Kevin Ryan who had stayed in the house since my husband was arrested and I wanted him to get hold of Mr Jeug Prinsloo who was our member of Parliament for Florida and who was an advocate, so I wanted to convey some kind of legal terminology to Mr Ryan in order that he get hold of Mr Prinsloo.
MR BRANDT: Madam, you will forgive me if I put it to you that I find that very strange, if a person is arrested in connection with murder surely that suffices?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I don’t recall that he said he was arresting me for murder?
MR BRANDT: Well, in connection with the murder of Mr Hani.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I don’t know, I’ve told you. All I remember was that he said it was a certain Section because I asked him in order to convey this information to Mr Ryan who by then I think, was standing there.
MR BRANDT: Now, let’s move on, you were then taken to the Benoni Police Station, is that correct?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Correct. No, I wasn’t taken there, I was taken to Krugersdorp and they stopped there and went in for some reason - the reason why I recall that was because I said to Mr Deetleffs: "Where are we going, so that the attorneys will know where to go"? and he said: "Krugersdorp", so Mr Ryan phoned Mr Prinsloo and - subsequently, and Mr Prinsloo sent an attorney Anton Wagenaar, to Krugersdorp Police Station thinking that I was there but they - a car went to Krugersdorp - I think there were three men in it and myself, and they dropped off something and then they went to Benoni.
MR BRANDT: Now, at Benoni you were then questioned by Deetleffs?
MR BRANDT: On the 21st of April 1993?
MR BRANDT: Now, Madam, did you know that the whole procedure, this interrogating or questioning was being filmed at that stage?
MR BRANDT: You were unaware of it, quite unaware?
MR PRINSLOO: Mr Chairman, I couldn’t hear what Mr Brandt said.
CHAIRPERSON: The witness seems to have heard and that is that, she was unaware that the questioning was being taped.
MR BRANDT: Now, correct me if I understood it incorrectly Mrs Derby-Lewis, you initial reaction to the questioning was: "I have no comment"?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, it wasn’t questioning, when I got in there he said to me - he made statements, he didn’t question me. He said: "You will stay here for 15 years, your husband will get 15 years" ...[intervention]
MR BRANDT: We’re coming to that ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I’m sorry, this happened before the questioning so ...[intervention]
CHAIRPERSON: No, you will be asked those questions, please just try and answer.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I’m sorry, I’m sorry.
CHAIRPERSON: And try and make your answers pertinent to the point that you’re being asked.
CHAIRPERSON: I know you’ve been here a long time answering questions ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, no, it’s not that, I’m sorry, I do misinterpret the procedure, I apologise.
MR BRANDT: Mrs Derby-Lewis, the point I’m trying to make is, you were not afraid to respond to his statements/questioning by telling him: "I’ve got no comment" or: "I’ve got nothing to say"?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: That’s because he told me that my attorney was on the way and I was confident that I would have some legal advice within an hour or so.
MR BRANDT: May I suggest to you that your response was in line with what Captain Deetleffs will testify, namely that he warned you in terms of Judges Rules, that you weren’t obliged to respond.
MR PRINSLOO: Mr Chairman, in fairness to the witness, could Mr Brandt indicate on this tape whether this appeared that she was warned in terms of Judges Rules?
CHAIRPERSON: You can re-examine her on that point.
MR PRINSLOO: As you please Mr Chairman.
MR BRANDT: Thank you Mr Chairman.
What is your reaction to that Mrs Derby-Lewis?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: I don’t recall being warned in terms of Judges Rules, I recall being threatened.
MR BRANDT: Now, let’s just stand there for a moment, you initially - the portions in any event which I heard, vehemently denied ever having been warned in terms of Judges Rules and now you say you cannot recall having been warned, is it possible that you were warned but because of your state of mind, you now cannot recollect having been warned?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, that’s possible.
MR BRANDT: I put it to you that Captain Deetleffs and others if necessary, will testify - if need be, that you were not only warned at your arrest at home that you were not obliged to answer any questions etc., but also later at Benoni - before the questioning started, you were warned in terms of Judges Rules. You cannot dispute that?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: No, I can’t recall a thing.
MR BRANDT: Mrs Derby-Lewis, I had the displeasure of viewing the two tapes in question last night - the displeasure being because it’s an onerous task, my colleague already put it to you - Mr Bizos, that as regards tape two, some portions of that tape have been deleted and in fact the tape runs up to - Mr Chairman, I made a note and I put it on the tape, I don’t know where the tape is ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Sorry, is tape two - what date is tape two?
MR BRANDT: I made a note on a little piece of paper and I put it on the tape.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Are you referring to the tape ...[intervention]
MR BRANDT: The tape that is tape is numbered number two.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, I don’t know, I’m just looking at the way I numbered them but are you referring to the tape that was ostentatiously made when I was first taken there, in other words the 21st of April?
MR BRANDT: Yes, Madam, that is in fact ...[intervention]
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Yes, well ...[intervention]
MR BRANDT: The tape ends at 12:56 - I think 12 seconds, according to your notes, it’s a bit earlier.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I’ve got here: Time: 21st of April: 13:11:37 GDL sitting in Mr Deetleffs’s office.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: And then it ends: 14:16 - end of tape.
MR BRANDT: No, I’m referring to the tape number two, it stops 12:56:13.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Are you talking about the 21st of April?
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well I’m sorry, I don’t know, this is what I wrote down and I gave it to my attorney and he saw exactly the same thing.
MR BRANDT: Because what perturbs me - and I’m making no allegations or insinuations Madam, is that if regard is had to page 492 ...[intervention]
MR BRANDT: The portions which you allege are incorrect - 402 - namely, paragraphs 52 to 60 - those four paragraphs inter alia, the tape stop just about there and it’s been deleted - cleaned, wiped.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: How do you know that ...[intervention]
MR PRINSLOO: Mr Chairman, may I interrupt at this stage? What’s of reference from page 398 to 402 - which is the section I presume my learned friend is referring to - Mr Brandt, the tape which we viewed on Thursday when it was given back to us ends at the time 12:56:13.
And up to paragraph 60 was included there and thereafter was a lot of information which does not appear on this document, page 402 but it was on the tape on Thursday when it was received from the witness - I want to place that on the record.
MR BRANDT: Well, what ...[intervention]
MR PRINSLOO: And thereafter it was handed back and it was returned to Mr Bizos.
CHAIRPERSON: Put your question to Mrs Derby-Lewis please.
MR BRANDT: As it pleases you Mr Chairman.
The point I’m trying to make Madam is, that I could not view the rest of the tape as it had been deleted from the place where it says 12:56:13.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, if you couldn’t view that, how did you know what was on it?
MR BRANDT: Because Madam, evidence will be led - if need be, that the police made notes of the contents of that tape and I have those notes and those are inter alia what is contained in paragraphs 52, 54, 59 and 60, which you deny.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Are you alleging that I wiped it off?
MR BRANDT: No, Madam, I’m not alleging anything, I’m merely putting the position as it is at present.
MRS DERBY-LEWIS: Well, I denied that I did it.
MR BRANDT: Yes, I take note of that. Now Madam, again returning to your ...[intervention]
JUDGE WILSON: Sorry, before you go on, you said it stops at 12:56:12?
MR BRANDT: 12:56:13 to be precise.
JUDGE WILSON: And is that the position now you say?
MR BRANDT: Mr Chairman, that is the present position.
JUDGE WILSON: But that ...[intervention]
MR BRANDT: I viewed it this morning in this tape and it’s still the position as it is.
JUDGE WILSON: And you say that is at 52?
MR BRANDT: No, Mr Chairman, it’s before 52.
JUDGE WILSON: But as I understand, we have just been told by counsel for the applicant that he saw the tape on Thursday, it went beyond paragraph 60 and stopped at 12:56:13.
MR PRINSLOO: That’s correct Mr Chairman.
JUDGE WILSON: So, paragraph 60 is on the tape before 12:56:13 according to him.
MR BRANDT: Well, I’ll be very much indebted if my learned friend could point it out at some stage because that’s where it ended.
JUDGE WILSON: The tape is available now and we can see whether - before 12:56:13, these passages are on the tape. Did I understand you correctly, you say they were before 12:56:13?
MR PRINSLOO: Mr Chairman, his Lordship Mr Justice Wilson is quite correct, to assist further Mr Chairman, paragraph 60 appears at the time 11:27 - that’s on my notes what I saw, I made notes of important parts of it.
MR PRINSLOO: 11:27 Mr Chairman, and the actual tape ends at the time 12:56:13.
JUDGE WILSON: So that’s an hour and a half before the end of the tape?
MR PRINSLOO: From ...[intervention]
MR PRINSLOO: 11:27 ...[intervention]
MR PRINSLOO: 11:27 up till 12:56 Mr Chairman.
JUDGE WILSON: And hour and a half.
MR PRINSLOO: Correct Mr Chairman.
MR PRINSLOO: And the information beyond 11:27 does not appear on the document R4 continued, page 402 - there was a lot of detail. We made notes - my colleague and I made notes of all this detail.
CHAIRPERSON: Mr Brandt, will you and Mr Prinsloo finalise this matter among yourselves, it may well be that this matter can be resolved? This might be a technical difficulty and it may save a lot of time in further cross-examination and so on?
MR BRANDT: Indeed Mr Chairman.
CHAIRPERSON: And will you call us immediately you are ready? We will adjourn.
MR BRANDT: Thank you Mr Chairman, with regard to the tape, my learned colleague has indicated to me the times where he allegedly found them - if I can refer to page 402, paragraph 52?
MR BRANDT: That portion can be found on that particular tape at the number 11:19:32 on the tape, the paragraph there is correct except for the word: "Hani’s", it does not appear there.
MR BRANDT: Then the rest of the paragraphs, 54, 59, and 60, I could not find on that tape.
MR BRANDT: 54, 59 and 60. It would seem that these notes are not in time sequence or numerical sequence and I will have to view that tape again from the very beginning, so I suggest that I leave that questioning there at that stage.
MR PRINSLOO: Mr Chairman, may I at this stage indicate that we viewed the tape together with my learned friend Mr Brandt and the information which they allege was wiped from this tape is not true, it’s all on the tape - that must be placed on record.
There is no information missing and if Mr Brandt insists on that Mr Chairman, we’d request the Committee to view that complete tape to see that it’s not tampered with.
CHAIRPERSON: We don’t have to look at the entire tape, I suggest that you locate that tape when the time comes and show it to us.
JUDGE WILSON: We have just been told that he could not find paragraph 59 and 60 on the tape.
CHAIRPERSON: No, 54, 59 and 60.
JUDGE WILSON: Yes, 59 and 60 are the relevant ones, that are part of the deleted - where the deletion took place, isn’t it? You say you can’t find them on the tape?