CHAIRPERSON: This morning we were to hear an application in connection with the death of Mr Dion Cele. According to the documents placed before us there were seven applicants and one of whom has since passed away. Counsel for four of the applicants, is it Mr Visser? Are you appearing for four applicants? Five. For five of the applicants ...(intervention)
MR VISSER: I'm sorry, Chairperson, Cele is three applicants.
CHAIRPERSON: Counsel for three of the applicants and the Leader of Evidence of the TRC and Mr Christo Nel, who appears for the other applicants, came to see us in chambers. We are informed that the dependants and the family of the deceased would like a little more time. They have not had legal representation, but they'll only be consulting with their legal representative during the course of the day and that it may not be proper for us to proceed.
Mr Visser also indicated that he would like to prepare a document to be handed in and if he is allowed time to do so, in the long run we may save some time and we might finish these proceedings more quickly if he's allowed to prepare that document and hand it in.
Mr Nel appears and is ready to proceed in respect of one of his clients, but indicated that he would be quite pleased if he is allowed time to prepare adequately and consult with his other client. Before walking in here I was handed a fax which is addressed to me from a firm of attorneys, Strydom Britz, on behalf of one of the applicants, Mr Frans Hendrik Labuschagne. It appears from this document that he is at present having some difficulties with receiving adequate instructions from the South African Police Services, and that because of that he is not available to represent his client, Mr Labuschagne, at today's hearing and he asks that the application should be postponed until his problems are sorted out.
Requests for postponements causes a great deal of inconvenience to all those who are ready and available to proceed, apart from the fact that financial considerations are also involved in that the resources of the TRC are not unlimited and we are mindful of this situation and where possible we would like to begin with and finish these applications as soon as we can.
However, in the light of the representations that have been made to me and to my fellow Members of my Committee, we have agreed that we will not proceed with these applications today and that we will make a beginning at half past nine tomorrow morning.
Now I do not know whether the victims, the dependants can follow what I have said, but I trust that our Leader of Evidence will take the necessary steps to convey this to them and also to ensure that whatever consultations they are requiring with their counsel takes place today and is not delayed and held tomorrow morning, because we are going to make a beginning at half past nine tomorrow and if they haven't had enough time to consult with their clients, they will have to do that during the course of the day, but we are definitely going to make a beginning.
Insofar as the letter which I have received from Strydom Britz, we will communicate with him and if his client is not available we can't hold up these proceedings until his client becomes available and we are going to proceed with the remainder of the applicants, who are entitled to have their matter heard and disposed of as expeditiously as possible.
Accordingly, I have decided that we are now going to adjourn these proceedings and we'll begin at half past nine tomorrow morning.
MS THABETHE: As the Committee pleases.
MR VISSER: May it please you, Mr Chairman. Perhaps I might ask an indulgence to take up a little bit more of your time today, which will then be saved in dealing with certain matters tomorrow. They're mostly housekeeping matters which may appropriately be dealt with now, unless you want to adjourn immediately.
CHAIRPERSON: Well, please proceed. If we can sort out problems at this stage we'd like to do that.
MR VISSER: Yes, we thought so, Mr Chairperson, with respect. Chairperson, we appear in the matters which have now - which are going to be heard by you for eight applicants in the various matters. We will place ourselves on record later - perhaps I should do it now ...(intervention)
CHAIRPERSON: Are you talking about tomorrow's matter?
MR VISSER: No, I'm talking about all the matters, Chairperson.
CHAIRPERSON: I beg your pardon.
MR VISSER: Because I'm going to deal with some issues which are going to effect all the matters before you. Would you need some paper to write on, Chairperson. I've got a writing pad here which you're welcome to borrow, Chairperson.
CHAIRPERSON: Yes, just a piece of paper will do for the time being, thank you.
MR VISSER ADDRESSES: Mr Chairman, the matter starts with some applications which were heard by your brother, Wilson, Mr Malan and Ms Sandi Sigodi some time ago. I believe it was November last year. At that hearing, on the request of Judge Wilson, we led one witness, Col Botha, to deal with the various
aspects of the violence in Natal. That evidence, Chairperson, was transcribed and it now resides in a record in the hearing of the death of Portia Ndwandwe, N-D-W-A-N-D-W-E, MK name Zandile, from page 516, Chairperson, to page 819. Some 303 pages. The idea at the time, Mr Chairman, was that that very same Committee would be hearing all the incidents which took place in Natal. Now for obvious reasons that has not happened, but we only heard about that last Thursday.
Now we refer you to the record, Chairperson, not to intimidate you, but to mention to you that it would not be a fruitful exercise in our respectful submission to just place this before you and require you to read it. There may be questions which may arise in your minds, which did not arise in the minds of the other Committee Members and by far and away, the more appropriate way of dealing with it is to make a brief summary for you, which we intend to do today and which you've already referred to.
But Chairperson, as far as the housekeeping matters are concerned which I referred to, may I refer you to a meeting which was held on the 5th of February in Pretoria, chaired by Justice Wilson where Mr Malan was also present, where ways and means were discussed of how to possibly accelerate the amnesty process.
Having undertaken to do what we can in that regard we went away, Chairperson, and we drew a document. Now it is not too far in the distant past for you to remember what the original amnesty applications which we brought before you looked like. I mean it was piles and piles and piles of a welter of documents. We went and drafted a summary, Chairperson. The summary was intended to cover most instances of amnesty applications which would come before any of the Amnesty Committees. We forwarded last week to the TRC, a copy for your benefit of this particular document. We called the document "General Background to Amnesty Applications". This is with apologies to Commissioner Lax who has come across this exercise once before, but he will allow me to just fill you in.
Chairperson, we are told that that document has been reproduced by the TRC and was supposed to have been forwarded to you. We are also informed that it is not before you. What we can do in the meantime, with your leave, is to hand to you copies which we have made so that at least it is before you in the meantime so that the day might be fruitfully occupied by having a brief glance at that, but I do intend to take you very briefly through that document just to speak to the document and give you a feeling of what we're about. May we hand that up to you, Chairperson?
CHAIRPERSON: Yes, please do.
MR VISSER: And may we also request that the document be marked Exhibit A, because you may or may not have seen some of the statements of evidence which we have prepared for the witness as we are used to do. They all refer to an Exhibit A that the witnesses are referring to in their statements is this particular Exhibit A. So there's that reason for it as well to be marked Exhibit A.
CHAIRPERSON: This document will then go in, the document headed "Algeme Agtergrond tot Amnesty Aansoek" will go in as Exhibit A.
MR VISSER: May it please you, Mr Chairman. Mr Chairman, may I very briefly, within a minute or two, just take you through the document, just to give you some feeling of the summary which we made. If you turn to page 1, Chairperson, you will observe there references were made to what you have become accustomed to, Chairperson. You will recall that in February 1997, when we first appeared before you, we handed in certain exhibits which we marked Exhibit P45, P46 and P47. Well the applicants will simply refer to those without repeating the contents, because by this time everybody in this process must know those documents by heart surely. And then the evidence of Gen van der Merwe on the dates upon which we have stipulated that, Chairperson, and that of Mr Adriaan Vlok. Then one can immediately go to page 2 where we deal with the background and dimensions of the conflict of the past. And basically what we have done, Chairperson is we have given, and we rely on the judgments which the original Amnesty Committee have given, which we specified in paragraph 6 at that page, and we deal very briefly, Chairperson, with first of all an extract from that decision in the Cronje case, at page 2 and we deal for as far as it was necessary, with certain aspects which had not been dealt with by the Amnesty Committee. They really speak for themselves, Chairperson, and I don't intend to deal with that in any detail.
It does refer to some evidence by Vlok and van der Merwe, which you'll find up to page 10 and then - actually 11, and then going on to page 12, Chairperson. We deal in particular with some of the issues arising from the conflict of the past, more particularly the strategies and tactics of the ANC/SACP alliance, at page 13, which you've heard before. And at page 14 we give the - if we may say so with respect, the accurate summary given by the original Amnesty Committee at the foot of page 14 over the page to page 15, Chairperson. And then at page 16 we simply deal with the general position of applicants, which was also dealt with by the original Amnesty Committee.
So Chairperson very briefly, you would have recognised from what I have addressed to you now, that this is nothing new, it really is only a very, very brief summary of all the welter of evidence which had been placed before the Amnesty Committee before. And we did this because of a decision of the Amnesty Committee, who said that it might be helpful if in future reference is made to those issues without having to repeat them.
Now Chairperson, the real point about this document starts at ...(intervention)
CHAIRPERSON: May I just interrupt. This document Exhibit A, is that going to be dealt with and referred to in the other matters in which you are concerned as well, apart from the matters that are set down for today?
MR VISSER: Yes, Chairperson, that's the point.
CHAIRPERSON: So this has a bearing on the other applications as well.
MR VISSER: This is a basis for all applications.
CHAIRPERSON: I see. Thank you, very much.
MR VISSER: And what you will hear the applicants do is they will either confirm the whole of that document or they will exclude some parts which they can't confirm. But each of the applicants will be asked when he starts with his evidence, whether he's seen that document or whether he confirms the contents.
CHAIRPERSON: Yes.
MR VISSER: So that would form the basis and we need not then, Chairperson, subject to your rulings and subject to particular issues which may arise, we do not have to belabour the point of the conflict of the past and the political background and the background of applicants any longer.
CHAIRPERSON: Quite right.
MR VISSER: Now Chairperson, going on from page 18, what we also did was to give a very brief summary in regard to specific topics. At page 18 you will find the role of the neighbouring States, and we deal at page 18 with Botswana, which will not be relevant to you here. We deal at page 20 with Swaziland, which will be relevant in these proceedings, Chairperson. You will of course notice that it's very, very brief indeed. And then page 21 we deal with Lesotho. And then at page 22, because it has come up from time to time, we deal with informers very briefly, and it will also again become relevant here. This does not pretend to be a full argument or anything of the nature, it simply deals with the issues.
Chairperson, what we had in mind was to go back now, after you kindly allowed the postponement, and in the time available for the rest of the day, if possible, to draw a similar chapter which we will add at the back of page 23 of Exhibit A, dealing with the conflict and the nature of the violence in Natal. Hopefully we will be able to draft a sensible document with which no fault can be found to the extent that we can then thereafter in each incident, when it is called, simply go on with the facts. And if that pleases you, Mr Chairman, that is the reason why we have dealt with the matter in that sense.
Where the bundles that the TRC have forwarded to both yourselves and us find themselves now, we don't know, but what we will attempt to do with the co-operation of Ms Thabethe, the Evidence Leader, we're hoping that she will be able to render us assistance, is to print in each of the applicants for each of the applicants for whom we appear, a summary of his evidence, which he can place before you to save you from writing down things that they are saying. There's an additional reason, Chairperson, that in some of the incidents the applicants were so vague at the time that they could not remember the particular facts of that incident and where they in fact said "I can't remember anything", but later at the amnesty application I will provide such facts and circumstances and evidence as I may be able at that stage to do.
So what we have done is we have amplified that and it's on paper. We will print it out this afternoon, there are quite a large number as you can well imagine, and we will then reproduce those so that the proceedings may proceed smoothly the moment we get going, Chairperson, which is hopefully tomorrow morning at half past nine, as you indicated.
CHAIRPERSON: Yes.
MR VISSER: There's one last issue which we wish to place before you. Chairperson, it does appear to us, with respect, and we may be wrong, that the incidents which we're going to deal with, particularly those we're going to deal with initially, are going to be brief incidents. It's not going to take up a lot of your time, not with the experience which the Amnesty Committee has gained through the last two years. What we do foresee as a possibility is that some time might go into the Kubeka incident and the Quarry Road incident and the incident concerning Mr Ndaba and Shabalala.
Now those matters have been placed towards the end of your roll. We do foresee a possibility, and I put it no higher than that, that we might find ourselves with time on our hands, finishing rapidly with the brief applications and then perhaps towards the end might be painted into a corner because the longer ones have been placed during the latter part of the hearing before you. And what we would submit, Chairperson, is that all efforts perhaps be made - what we want to suggest is either one of two alternatives. Either to move, perhaps everything, forward a week. If that's not possible, at least to take one of the longer ones and move that forward to a convenient place earlier during the hearing. But I leave that entirely in your capable hands, Chairperson, and the hands of Ms Thabethe.
And with that, unless my attorney feels I should say anything else. Yes, well if we're going to use the bundles, Chairperson, which I really - I haven't gone through them, but there doesn't seem to be anything in it. Some of it is already the reproduction of Exhibit A which you have before you and the statements of three of the applicants, which we'll hand to you anyway. But if Ms Thabethe wants these to be used, then obviously they're going to have to be reproduced again. I'm not sure whether she can do that by tomorrow morning, but I leave that entirely in her hands.
CHAIRPERSON: Yes, I trust that you'll sort that out with her.
MR VISSER: Yes. Thank you, Mr Chairman, that's all I have to say to you ...(intervention)
CHAIRPERSON: The last suggestion you made about bringing forward on the agenda of this Committee, matters which are heavier and may take a little more time than the shorter applications, appeals to me and I would certainly see to it that some arrangement is made between the Leader of Evidence and yourselves so that we can bring those applications forward. The only difficulty in the way might be communicating with the dependants and the relatives of the deceased in those matters and giving them adequate time and notice to be here. But if that is at all possible, we will try and do that. Thank you.
MR VISSER: Mr Chairman, may I just add that as far as we are concerned, after this afternoon hopefully, we will be in a position to continue with any of the applications before you at any particular time.
CHAIRPERSON: Alright. Perhaps you might after we have adjourned, indicate to Ms Thabethe which matters you think should be given priority and the order in which it might be convenient, from out point of view as well, for them to be heard.
MR VISSER: They are the three matters I mentioned to you, Chairperson. Kubeka, is one incident of a lady who died in Winkelspruit, the other is the Quarry Road incident, that was a car chase and a shoot-out on the highway. I hope you were sitting safely in Court that day, Chairperson, because apparently it was quite a to-do.
CHAIRPERSON: I see.
MR VISSER: And the other matter is the matter of Ndaba and Shabalala, the two of them being one incident. That's really the Operation Vula one. I neglected to add when I addressed you on the additions to Exhibit A, to say to you that under the heading "Natal" we will obviously include as much of the history as believe is relevant to you about Operation Vula as well.
CHAIRPERSON: Okay, I understand, thank you very much. Mr Nel, just for the purposes of the record, could you mention the names of the clients for whom you appear?
MR NEL: Thank you, Mr Chairperson. Yes, in the Dion Cele matter it is the application of J J Brooks and a Mr A E Verwey. I might add that I applied, or I drew the application of the late Col A R C Taylor, but you have mentioned that he is since passed away.
CHAIRPERSON: So we will not be taking up much time as far as that is concerned.
MR NEL: That is correct, Mr Chairman.
CHAIRPERSON: Yes. So you're now going to deal with Brooks and Verwey.
MR NEL: That's correct, Sir.
CHAIRPERSON: Very well. And as I've said earlier, it would be convenient for you if we did begin tomorrow morning?
MR NEL: That would be absolutely convenient, thank you very much, Mr Chairperson.
CHAIRPERSON: Nine thirty would a appropriate time?
MR NEL: That is suitable.
CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very much.
MR NEL: Thank you, Sir.
CHAIRPERSON: Now you heard the suggestion made by Mr Visser that if it is at all possible, to bring onto the agenda, rearrange the agenda in such a way that the matters that he's mentioned, Kubeka, the Quarry Road incident and Ndwandwe and Shabalala. Will you this afternoon or during the course of today apply your mind to that suggestion and to see whether it is possible for us to deal with those matters at an earlier date than the one suggested at present?
MS THABETHE: Mr Chair, I've already applied my mind and I would like to discuss it with Adv Visser and Mr Wagener, especially considering the fact that it was their suggestion in the first place that we did this roll this way. But we will work out something, Mr Chair.
CHAIRPERSON: Yes, well do that. You'll bear in mind the likelihood and the possibility of being able to contact the dependants ...(intervention)
MS THABETHE: The victims, yes.
CHAIRPERSON: ... of the deceased and the victims, so that they can have notice about the dates on which the matter is going to be heard. And will you make sure that those victims and dependants who are here for today's hearing, will you assist them to make sure that all their consultations take place during the course of the day instead of tomorrow morning?
MS THABETHE: I will do so, Mr Chair.
CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very much. The Committee will now adjourn and resume at nine thirty tomorrow morning.
COMMITTEE ADJOURNS
