TRC Final Report

Volume 3

Chapter 5

Subsection 26

The Trojan Horse and other ambush tactics

167 During late 1985 and early 1986, security force members sometimes adopted ambush tactics against street protestors and others by concealing themselves either in a moving vehicle or at the scene. In each instance, police opened fire without warning, causing deaths and injuries. Those killed or injured were frequently merely curious bystanders. In at least two of the cases quoted below, the victims were youth and women only. The best known of these cases is the ‘Trojan Horse’ shooting. However, other cases came to light through the work of the Commission.¹⁴

168 In the Athlone ‘Trojan Horse’ incident on 15 October 1985, police hiding in large wooden crates on the back of a railway truck fired directly into a crowd of about a hundred people who had gathered around a Thornton Road intersection, killing Michael Cheslyn Miranda (11) [CT00478, CT00472], Shaun Magmoed (16) [CT00472] and Mr Jonathan Claasen (21) [CT00475] and injuring several others, eight of whom submitted statements to the Commission.

169 The event attracted extensive media coverage since several members of the print and electronic media were at the scene and the shooting was captured on video. This placed the actions of the police under intense scrutiny of the local and international media.

170 This operation was repeated the following day when security force personnel drove down a road opposite Crossroads in the same truck. They shot and killed Mr Goodman Mengxane Mali (19) [CT00723] and Mr Mabhoti Alfred Vetman (20). Two toddlers were also injured in the shooting.

171 The Athlone Trojan Horse shooting highlights the role of the Western Province Joint Management Centre in the region, and its sub-JMC which covered the Peninsula. These structures had established a JOC which met daily at the Manenberg Police station to co-ordinate the activities of the security forces in areas identified as unrest ‘flashpoints’. It brought together the command structures of the SAP, the SARP, the SADF and various other agencies. Information was collected by the Joint Intelligence Committee (JIC) and the Security Committee (SECCOM) of the Joint Management Centre.

172 A memorandum sent to the JMCs directly concerned with planning action against the unrest gives specific plans for security force actions against ‘agitators’. The document states that “the fight against unrest can only be won if problems are foreseen and stopped through pro-active actions”. It calls for creative ways and methods to mislead or confuse “agitators” or to lay waste to their plans before they begin.

173 Colonel Pieter Janse van Rensberg (Head of Western Province Riot Squad), Major Christian Loedolff (SARP) and Commandant Salmon Pienaar (SADF) were amongst those who decided on and tasked the ten members of the SARP task force (under Lieutenant Douw Vermeulen) to obtain a railway vehicle and conduct the first Trojan Horse operation.

THE COMMISSION HAS CONSIDERED THE FOLLOWING:

THE FACT THAT THIS ACTION WAS PREMEDITATED AND WAS THE RESULT OF ORDERS HANDED DOWN FROM LIEUTENANT VERMEULEN’S IMMEDIATE COMMANDING OFFICER IN THE MANENBERG JOINT OPERATIONAL CENTRE, THE THEN MAJOR LOEDOLFF;

THAT ALL THE WEAPONS USED IN THE OPERATION WERE LOADED WITH SHARP AMMUNITION, IN VIOLATION OF ESTABLISHED PROCEDURES;

THAT THERE WAS AN EFFECTIVE COMMUNICATION SET UP BETWEEN THE PERSONS IN THE FRONT OF THE TRUCK AND THE BACK AND THAT THERE WAS COMMUNICATION WITH THE JOC;

THE PREPONDERANCE OF CHILDREN, YOUTH AND WOMEN AMONGST THOSE SHOT.

THE COMMISSION FINDS THAT THE THIRTEEN SENIOR AND JUNIOR MEMBERS OF THE SAP, SADF AND SARP, IN CONJUNCTION WITH THE RELEVANT STRUCTURES OF THE JMCS, PLANNED AND EXECUTED AN ACTION IN ATHLONE WHICH RESULTED IN SEVERAL GROSS VIOLATIONS OF HUMAN RIGHTS.

174 Six months after the Athlone incident, on 26 March 1986, security forces concealed in a railway truck shot dead three people near Crossroads, namely Mr Lennox Thabang Maphalane [CT00706], Mr Eric Heynes [CT00824] and Mr Goodman Bongani Dastile.¹⁵ Several others were injured. The inquest listed some of the same individuals involved in the Athlone shooting.

175 In a similar incident in February 1986 in Khayelitsha, members of the security forces disguised as ordinary workers in a bakkie fired on members of the public with birdshot according to the statement by Mr Thanduxolo Cingo [CT00739].

176 On 29 August 1985, Riot Unit members Constable E Villet and Warrant Officer P Kruger hid in the garden of a Bellville South house on the orders of Captain Ockert van Schalkwyk. They later leapt out from this ‘observation point’ and fired at a group of people. Ms Sarah van Wyk [CT03201] was killed and at least four other women wounded. Ms Monica Daniels [CT00151] had to have her arm amputated as a result of the shooting.