Amnesty Hearings

CHAIRPERSON: It is the 9th of March 1998, we are continuing with applications of Lotz, Snyman, Mogoai, van Zyl, Beeslaar, du Plessis, Nieuwoudt and Koole. We start from where we left off in November last year. Mr Brink?

MR BRINK: Mr Chairman, Mr Mamasela is here to give evidence but I understand Mr Lamey has a certain favour to ask which he'd like to put to put before the Committee, possibly that should be done at this stage and then I'll leave the evidence to Mr Mamasela.

MR LAMEY: Thank you Mr Chairman, yes I confirm what Mr Brink has said. Mr Chairman I beg leave to hand up to the Committee, these documents have been distributed to the legal representatives of the other parties. It's a bundle of photos which I have obtained from the investigating team of the Attorney General regarding certain pointings-out at the place Post Chalmers. Mr Chairman you will see that there are in fact two bundles, I would suggest that they be marked, first bundle as Exhibit P and then the second bundle as Exhibit Q. Mr Chairman we need not deal at this point in time with the details of the documentation, it can stand over until after Mr Mamasela's evidence, I'm in your hands in this regard.

CHAIRPERSON: Which one is to be P and which one is to be Q?

MR LAMEY: Mr Chairman the document which has got the emblem of the South African Police service on, I suggest that that be marked Exhibit P, and the other one Exhibit Q. Mr Chairman may I just point out that Exhibit Q, I think Mr de Jager has got the original photographs in his bundle and then Your Lordship as well as Adv Sandi has got photo colour copies of those photographs.

CHAIRPERSON: Well as you say we're not getting into them now.

MR LAMEY: It can stand over after Mr Mamasela's evidence, as it pleases you.

CHAIRPERSON: What is everybody else's attitude towards this? I don't know what points Mr Lamey is seeking to make with these photographs, he hasn't elaborated. What is other people's attitudes towards this?

MR BOOYENS: Mr Chairman we were handed the photographs this morning, so we'll have to obviously take instructions as far as that is concerned but at this stage I would suggest the practical suggestion then, let the photographs go in in the meantime, then we can argue about them later.

CHAIRPERSON: From my right?

MR NYOKA: Same here Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: Very well then we will proceed with Mr Mamasela.

JOSEPH SEPHO MAMASELA: (sworn states)

CROSS-EXAMINATION BY MR BRINK: Mr Mamasela is it correct that in December 1996 you gave evidence to the investigation unit of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in terms of a Section 29 subpoena served upon you?

MR MAMASELA: That is correct.

CHAIRPERSON: Give us your full names before we proceed.

MR MAMASELA: I am Joseph Sepho Mamasela.

MR BRINK: And you have been called here today to testify of events which occurred and events within your knowledge which took place on the 8th and 9th of May 1985 which led to the deaths of Qaqawule Godolozi, Trasile Galela and Sipho Hashe.

MR MAMASELA: That is absolutely correct.

MR BRINK: Now Mr Mamasela, can you tell the Committee in brief how it came about that you met these three men, the deceased?

MR MAMASELA: It started in Pretoria whilst I was serving as an askari at Vlakplaas Security Police. We were called aside, myself, Koole and Piet Mogoai by Col Venter who told us that we had a special operation to perform in Port Elizabeth. He elaborated that they were activists who were busy making the townships of Port Elizabeth ungovernable and that they had to be dealt with severely and we should help to eliminate these people. After the briefing we were then told that we should proceed to Port Elizabeth and we did so by using a state kombi.

MR BRINK: Just to interrupt, when you say we, who do you mean.

MR MAMASELA: I mean myself, Koole, Piet Mogoai and other ascaris who did not know about the plan.

MR BRINK: Koole and Mogoai being the two applicants in respect of this matter?

MR MAMASELA: That is so.

MR BRINK: Yes carry on, you came to Port Elizabeth?

MR MAMASELA: And we came to Port Elizabeth and just about a day or two when we were here we were called aside by Col Venter, Myself, Koole and Piet Mogoai that there is a certain activist held in Port Elizabeth Security Branch by the name of Toto Sithole who seemed to be giving the security police of Port Elizabeth a bit of a rough time by refusing to cooperate with them and that we should go and help with interrogation.

MR BRINK: I wonder if you can just confine yourself Mr Mamasela to the three gentlemen whom I've named, Godolozi, Galela and Hashe.

MR MAMASELA: Yes and it is only when we reached the police station, we were helping with the interrogation of this Toto that the head of the Port Elizabeth Security Branch came to us and he informed us about this PEBCO 3 that they did succeed to intercept their telephonic conversation with Kazimile Botha who promised to send someone British Ambassador or something to come and give them money and they made an appointment for Wednesday, that was on the 8th of May 1985, to be at the airport and we were then duly told that we should be at the airport, six o'clock because these people are supposed to be at the airport for 7 Pm. It is then that we were told that we should go immediately back to our bases to prepare ourselves for night operations. In other words we should wear dark clothing, put on some hand gloves and balaclavas to go and abduct these people when they arrive at the airport.

MR DE JAGER: Who told you this, who gave you this instruction?

MR MAMASELA: It was Col Roelf Venter and the head of the security branch of Port Elizabeth.

MR DE JAGER: Who was he?

MR MAMASELA: At this stage I was not aware of him and I later came to know him as Herman du Plessis.

MR BRINK: Did you arrive at the airport?

MR MAMASELA: Yes Mr Chairman we did arrive at the airport and we arrived an hour earlier as I pointed out.

MR BRINK: How did you, what vehicle did you use.

MR MAMASELA: We were using a kombi with tinted dark windows, I think it was ...(indistinct) a blue kombi.

MR BRINK: Yes carry on please.

MR MAMASELA: And we parked at a special entrance where no other cars should park, just near the automatic doors of the airport itself, strategically because that is where the people were going to go in.

CHAIRPERSON: Sorry I didn't hear that, come again, what about the doors?

MR MAMASELA: It was a special parking where no other cars should park in and then it was on the entrance of the airport with automatic sliding doors, we parked near there. That was the main entrance that the suspects were going to use.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Mamasela would you mind if we can ask you to speak a bit slowly, we're taking notes as you are speaking.

MR MAMASELA: Okay thank you Mr Chairman I will do so.

MR BRINK: Having parked, what was your next step?

MR MAMASELA: We parked and we monitored the routes these people were taking because there were other surveillance teams surveying these people who were giving us radio information as to the whereabouts of these people. We knew that Sipho Hashe took the car and even the registration of the car, we knew it, it was CB12436. He took this yellow Toyota Hilux bakkie and then he went to fetch Godolozi and we also knew that Godolozi was in and they proceeded to fetch Champion Galela. It was a very efficient surveillance, it was as if we were just watching television the way it was so efficient and even when their bakkie entered the entrance to the airport we knew it was there.

MR BRINK: When the bakkie entered, what did you observe?

MR MAMASELA: We observed there were three people festooned in the front seat of the car, there were three, the driver and two passengers and they stopped on the pedestrian crossing level and two of these people climbed off. It was the tall heavily built chap with big Afro hair and he was followed by a short, light in complexion young man, very tiny in the body and the driver of the bakkie proceeded forward to look for a parking space. And these two they crossed over and just when they were about to reach the entrance of the airport they were duly intercepted by Col Venter and myself. We quickly introduced ourselves as police officers and we immediately bundled them into our Kombi.

MR BRINK: Were they handcuffed?

MR MAMASELA: In the kombi they were handcuffed form backward, their hands backward.

MR BRINK: Were their heads uncovered or covered?

MR MAMASELA: No they were forced to sleep on the floor, there was no covering of their heads, they were forced to sleep with their faces on the floor, facing down and the guns were pointed in their heads, they mustn't move.

MR BRINK: Who was in that vehicle apart from the two men you referred, the two and the PEBCO 3?

MR MAMASELA: It was WO Koole, Piet Mogoai, WO Beeslaar, myself, Roelf Venter and I think there two or three Port Elizabeth policemen that I don't know of.

MR BRINK: And what happened to the driver of the bakkie, you told us he was looking for a parking place?

MR MAMASELA: Yes as the driver of the bakkie was looking for a parking place I quickly searched the suspects and I found a long knife, home-made knife from Godolozi.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Brink, I would suggest that seeing there's a lot of dispute about what happened at the airport, I would suggest if you don't mind, that we ask the witness to tell us what happened. After you intercepted these people, as they're about to get into the airport, you said you and Venter introduced yourselves.

MR MAMASELA: Yes Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: I think, take it from there and tell us what happened.

MR MAMASELA: Yes sir. After myself and Col Venter apprehended these people we immediately took them into the kombi where they were thrown onto the floor of the kombi with their heads facing downwards and Piet Mogoai, WO Koole and the other two members of the Port Elizabeth Security Police held them up with their guns, pointed in their heads, they mustn't move. I quickly searched the suspects and from Mr Godolozi I found a long knife, home-made knife and Champion Galela had nothing on him, now weapon, nothing. At this stage Col Roelf Venter suggested that me and him go and intercept the driver of the bakkie. We quickly proceeded by foot towards the direction of the bakkie. We arrived timeously when the bakkie had already found a parking place. In my view it was evident that the driver of the bakkie was an old man and when he opened the door we pounced on him, we produced our police certificates. At that time WO Beeslaar drove our kombi towards us and as soon as he stopped next to us, we did the same with the old man, we bundled him also into our kombi and then I was given instructions by Col Venter to take this yellow bakkie and to drive it to follow a white motorcar that belonged to a member of the Port Elizabeth Security Police. I did as I was told. Plus minus 1 to 2km from the airport we stopped at a certain house where I was ordered to leave the bakkie inside the yard. I noticed inside the yard that the yard was full of old boats.

MR DE JAGER: Will you try to go a bit slower, like my colleague requested you to do.

MR MAMASELA: Thanks Mr Chairman. In the yard I saw that the yard was full of old boats, that some of the boats were broken and one could see they were being repaired in that yard. A tall white man emerged from the house, he had a slight bald head, then he asked for the bakkie's key from me; I handed them over to him and he had a quick chat with the man who was escorting me to his place and that is where I left the bakkie and I climbed into the white car which was driven by the same man who was escorting me and he took me back to our minibus.

MR DE JAGER: And where was the minibus at that stage?

MR MAMASELA: The minibus was almost, it was far from the airport but towards the road leading to Cradock and the minibus was parked under a tree next to the road. So I climbed into the minibus and next to the minibus there was another brownish car, I think it was a toyota motor car and in it I saw the head of the Port Elizabeth Security with two white security policemen with him and the white car proceeded and then the brown car followed and our kombi also followed, I was not familiar with the place. We passed a town called Cradock, I saw Cradock written on the wall and as we passed, plus/minus 20 minutes from that point we arrived at our destination and we stopped and the people opened the gates for us. MR BRINK: Mr Mamasela can you name the destination?

MR MAMASELA: Yes sir. Inside this destination I saw an old board written, 'Cradock Police Station' but the whole building in my opinion was dilapidated. It became obvious to me that the building was in no use for quite a long time and one of the white security policemen opened something like a shed which looked like a double garage.

MR BRINK: Can you remember what time it was that you arrived at this disused building?

MR MAMASELA: In my opinion it was around about half past ten, eleven in the evening. The three suspects at that stage we briefly interrogated but not a single one of them was assaulted at that particular stage because it was dark and it was late, we were given orders, myself, WO Koole and Piet Mogoai to handcuff these peoples legs inside to that shed and to hold observation, to guard them over night.

MR BRINK: Now I want you to have a look at certain photographs. I'm referring to Annexure 17 to the application of Mr Nieuwoudt, the one which has the map on the front cover, if you'd look at these photographs Mr Mamasela and just indicate, reference to photo 1 or photo 2 or 3 or 4, whatever, if you can, whereabouts these three were placed?

MR MAMASELA: The farm is in photograph 2 but the exact place is clear in - in these photos it does not show well, the exact location where they were put in - like I described in my chief in evidence that it was shed of a sort of a double-like garage, they were locked in that shed.

MR DE JAGER: Did you have a look at photograph 5?

MR MAMASELA: Yes I had a look at it, that building resembles this but I'm not hundred percent sure, I don't want to commit myself.

CHAIRPERSON: Are you saying photograph 5 could be the building you're talking about but you're not sure?

MR MAMASELA: Yes Sir.

CHAIRPERSON: Show him the set of photographs which were given to us this morning. Allow him to go through them and let him tell us whether he find ...(indistinct)

MR BRINK: Would you have a look then at Exhibit P Mr Mamasela which contains again certain photographs, photographs 1 and photographs 2 are geared to depict an areal view of the complex.

MR MAMASELA: Yes I see photograph 3 in Exhibit P document, the whole scenario there, this areal photograph depicts the whole scenario of the destination where we were in, it's exactly the right spot and I will, in my opinion I think...(intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: Sorry Mr Mamasela, because you see the reality is that nobody has consulted with you over these photographs that are before you. I think the best thing is for you to page through that entire album, move over to the next one as well and then come back and then come back, just page through everything first.

MR MAMASELA: Yes yes.

CHAIRPERSON: Because we don't want you later to come back to the other one and give your evidence in a disjointed fashion. Page through that album.

MR MAMASELA: Yes Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: Look at even every photo without saying anything to anybody, just have a look at that one and thereafter look at Exhibit O as well, have a look at it and then you can come back to whatever photo you want to come back to of to such photo as Mr Brink may direct you to.

MR MAMASELA: Thank you Mr Chairman.

Mr Chairman I think I have managed to identify the exact spot where the people were locked in some of the other photos and I have marked them, I have indicated them with 1, I think Mr Brink will be able to inform the Commission.

CHAIRPERSON: You can refer us to a particular photo and then tell us what it is all about.

MR BRINK: You've referred me to photograph 3 in Exhibit Q and you've made a mark immediately to the top left hand side of what appears to be a red gate in the background, do you have that Mr Chairman? And you have also referred me to photograph 4 in Exhibit Q which appears to show the same gate which you have marked above the red gate shown there.

MR DE JAGER: Mr Brink I can't see a red gate or a white gate or a black gate on my photograph at all, it's a...

MR BRINK: Exhibit Q.

MR DE JAGER: The gate you're referring to is a garage door.

MR BRINK: Oh sorry did I say gate, I beg your pardon, my mistake, I meant to refer to door. I wonder if I can have my photographs back?

And again in Exhibit Q, photograph 5 there appears to be a smallish building, again with the red door, is that correct?

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BRINK: You've also referred me to Exhibit P photograph 3 which is an areal view or appears to be an areal view of the site with a white building on the right hand side and immediately to the left of the trees. Is that the same building?

MR MAMASELA: Yes in my opinion.

MR BRINK: In your opinion.

MR MAMASELA: Yes sir.

ADV DU PLESSIS: Could we perhaps just get clarity about this one on the aerial photograph Mr Chairman, perhaps if we could just request that the witness mark it in some way because I'm not...(intervention)

MR BRINK: I have it marked.

Mr Chairman if one looks at the trees, just look at the trees on your photograph, and immediately to the left of the trees you will see a building, a white building with what appears to be a door in the centre. Do you have it.

MR DU PLESSIS: I'll check it with my learned friend afterwards, I think I know which one is the correct one.

MR BRINK: Now Mr Mamasela you've identified to the best of your knowledge you say the structure concerned, would you then proceed with your evidence?

MR MAMASELA: Yes sir. Like I said the first evening, it was very late, it was dark and it was very late we were all tired. These people were just briefly interrogated, they were never assaulted and they were left over for us to guard for the night and the following day at plus/minus 7:30 am, that is on the 9th of May 1985, Col Venter, Roelf Venter, WO Beeslaar, then Lt Nieuwoudt and hordes of other white security policemen that I don't know of that came arrived.

MR BRINK: When you say a host can you give us an approximate number?

MR MAMASELA: Plus/minus 10 to 12. And as they came in they brought us some food, myself, Piet Mogoai and WO Koole and I was ordered by Col Venter to make some fire for braaivleis and I knew that the interrogation was going to begin because always our interrogation started with a big braaivleis and I was ordered, myself and Piet Mogoai, to go and fetch Mr Hashe from the garage. We fetched Mr Hashe, and as the braaivleis was proceeding his interrogation started with some ridiculous statements to humiliate him by Lt Nieuwoudt at that time. He started by confronting Mr Hashe by asking him: "Where do you get the money from because ever since I knew you never worked." and in reply Mr Hashe said he's a vegetable vendor and he also runs a shebeen at his home. And Lt Nieuwoudt at that time referred to Mr Hashe in a...(intervention)

MR DE JAGER: What language did they speak?

MR MAMASELA: They were speaking English. He said to Mr Hashe: "You are a capitalist, a blatant capitalist, I had always thought you are a communist".

CHAIRPERSON: Who said that?

MR MAMASELA: Mr Nieuwoudt, Lt Nieuwoudt at the time. And he asked Mr Hashe: "Where are your daughters?" The old man replied that one daughter was married to an ANC chap in Lesotho and the other daughter was married to Popo Molefe who is now the premier of North West. And the ridiculous attack on Mr Hashe's integrity continued to an effect that he loves money so much that he even sold his daughters to the ANC. And the interrogation turned into why did Mr Hashe and his organisation chase black policemen away from the townships. To that Mr Hashe replied that it is a good thing that the black policemen we chased from the townships so now they can pack up their tents in town and he said heaven didn't follow with black policemen when black policemen moved to town and he said that is what the ANC stood for, for non-racial democratic society. This reply more than anything else seemed to infuriate Lt Nieuwoudt so much that he just grabbed an iron pipe and beat the poor old man several times on his head, and as he did so all the people joined in. Now the position of the old man at the time was such that he was in no position to defend himself.

MR BRINK: Mr Mamasela can you indicate who the others were who took part in the assault upon Mr Hashe after you say Mr Nieuwoudt hit him on the head a number of times.

MR MAMASELA: Ja it was WO Koole, myself, Piet Mogoai, Col Venter, Nieuwoudt himself, Beeslaar and other whites that I did not know of. And the position was that his hands were handcuffed from behind making it extremely impossible for him to can move his hands or do anything to ward off the blows. And the only thing he could help himself was just to scream out loud. I was then ordered by Lt Nieuwoudt to stifle his screams, to put my hands in his mouth and hold it hard so that his screams mustn't attract the neighbouring farmers. Myself and Piet Mogoai, we struggled to stifle the old man's screams while all the others that I've named waded into the old man with kicks, punches, fists, sticks and as Lt Nieuwoudt was beating the old man several times on the head with the iron pipe, I noticed that the blood was oozing from the old man's nostrils and ears as well as the mouth and I saw the old man's eyes turning into whit pupils, they were turning, it was as if he was fainting or just about to die. This more than anything jolted me, scared me and I jumped to one side and Piet followed me. The beatings went on and on until I saw the old man lying prostrate on the ground with blood all over his head and face, but when I came closer I noticed that he was also slightly having difficulty with breathing but he was breathing. I quickly rushed to fetch some water and I just poured the water over him. This seemed to revive him but he was in pain, he couldn't sit properly, he couldn't even stand up and then I just braked him, and I braked him and I balanced him on the wall and one could see that he was now slightly confused. He began to talk and he said he had about 17 AK47's hidden at his sister's place. He described his sister's place to us, he said in the dining room of his sister's place when you walk in there are wooden planks and on top they are covered with a carpet. He said in these wooden floors there was a trap door leads to these AK47's. But I could see he was not telling the truth, he was merely trying to save himself and WO Koole asked him some questions. I can't recall the nature of the question at the moment which was perceived by the old man as a very stupid question. This extremely angered WO Koole because he instinctively and brutally delivered a mule-like kick on the jaws of the old man. I could see his lower jaw twisted to one side as if it was broken and at that stage I saw white foam falling from the mouth of the old man and he slowly collapsed. As he hit the floor WO Koole went berserk. He put his knees on top of the old man's chest and he's quite a heavy and hefty guy, this WO Koole. So the old man couldn't breath, he couldn't move and he systematically started strangling him. And as he strangled him, the others that I previously named waded in, beating the old man with sticks and beating him with iron bars and Koole kept on just holding on like a vicious bull terrier on the old man's neck, he never let loose. After some time when he left the old man, he was the last to leave the old man and when he left him the old man lay there dead still, he did not move, he could not even breathe, he could not do anything . His eyes were just rolled up and it became evident to me that he was dead and when I looked at WO Koole, he was bloodied all over, his clothing, his face and even his shoes were bloodied. If one looked at him at that stage one will have sincerely believed that he was the one who was being assaulted and he walked away leaving the old man there. I tried to revive the old man but I could see there was nothing I could, he was lifeless, his body was listless.

We were then brutally asked, harshly asked by Col Venter to go and pick up Godolozi. So myself and Piet Mogoai we went to fetch Godolozi. When he came out, Godolozi, when he saw what he saw, the portrait of an old man bleeding and dead on the floor, this more than anything shocked Godolozi because he immediately went on his knees begging for his life and he actually promised that he can do anything for these people as long as they can save his life. And as Lt Nieuwoudt then wanted to attack him with an iron pipe he pleaded with him saying no listen I work together with NIS, National Intelligence Service. In my opinion I thought it was just a ruse for him to avoid being assaulted the way the old man was killed. I did not believe Godolozi was working for the police so did Lt Nieuwoudt not believe also. But the other policemen intervened and said it might be possible, so it was then ordered that Godolozi must be taken back so that the Security Police can confirm with NIS authorities.

At this stage Champion Galela was ordered out and when Champion Galela came out, I noticed that there was something wrong with his, I think right eye, if I'm not mistaken. It appeared as though it was an artificial eye. He was short, light in the body, not stout and he was light in complexion. They started interrogating him. It became evident that Champion Galela knew not much, he had not much knowledge about the ANC. He only talked about kangaroo courts where policemen were sentenced to death and stuff like that and he was subjected to the same brutal treatment that the old man was subjected to. Because of his weak physical body, it was not long before he lay dead. I think his interrogation went on for three to four hours and then he was dead.

We were then ordered that myself, Koole, and Piet Mogoai should remove these corpses and threw them back into the shed. And there was some horses fodder where WO Koole took that old man and just threw him carelessly into that fodder; and also Champion Galela was thrown next to the old man. I saw Godolozi sitting in a corner, at the far corner, he was a pathetic figure. He just stood there shivering as if he knew that his fate was just going to come. And the people were braaing, they were drinking, Koole and Piet Mogoai joined on a drinking spree and they were discussing as if they were discussing about a movie, as if what happened was nothing.

MR DE JAGER: Did you join them with the braai and the drinking?

MR MAMASELA: Mr Chairman it is a well known fact that I don't drink, I don't smoke, I'm a teetotaller and total abstainer.

MR BRINK: Are you able to tell us Mr Mamasela what sort of liquor was being drunk firstly and secondly who was drinking?

MR MAMASELA: They were mixing this rum, they love this rum, I think it's brandy and rum, they were mixing it with coke and the most of the white policemen, Piet Mogoai and Koole, they were drinking, it was a heavy drinking session. And I may just add Mr Chairman, before these people were killed, when we were given food in that morning I took some of my food, I wanted to give to these people to the detainees and I was told by Lt Nieuwoudt in a very cute manner that, "Don't give them food because they're going to die anyway". I then knew that indeed they were going to die.

And after this session we were again ordered to guard now Godolozi overnight, myself, Piet Mogoai and WO Koole. But before I come to that let me come to the incident of the watch. As Mr Sipho Hashe was assaulted severely his silver watch fell off and I'm the one who picked it up and I saw that it is not one of these common names that is well known, it was like the name of a person, Zephyr or something like that. Because it was the standard procedure at Vlakplaas for ascaris who we described as non-commissioned commissioners, not to take thing and to write police dockets and whatever, our duty was take evidence and to hand it over to the so-called commissioned commissioners who was then WO Koole, and WO Beeslaar. I took this watch and I handed it over to WO Beeslaar hoping and thinking that he will put it in the SAP 13, lost and found docket but two months later at Vlakplaas WO Beeslaar from the parade he gave me R50. I became shocked, I thought maybe he wanted me to buy him something, I asked him what is this for. Then he systematically showed me in his hand the watch and then I recognised that watch immediately because I am the one who had that watch close to me. It was the same watch that belonged to Mr Hashe that a police officer, WO Beeslaar had it in his hand and he gave me R50 for it, and I kept quiet.

MR BRINK: Could you just go back now to the area where the assaults you say took place and continue with what happened to Mr Godolozi.

MR MAMASELA: Yes Mr Godolozi was guarded overnight by us, that is myself, Koole and Piet Mogoai, he slept with those corpses, those brutalised savaged corpses there. So the following morning the first group came in, that is Col Venter A O Beeslaar, Lt Nieuwoudt and other people and they were waiting for the commander of NIS at the time. At about half past eight in the morning the commander came, he was a middle aged man, 54/56, short and well-built, he had a business brown striped suit with a white shirt and a tie and he was wearing thick spectacles and to me he appeared completely like a gentleman, like a gentleman that you can meet every time on Sunday in church and then he started discussing first with Lt Nieuwoudt and Col Venter, they started talking among themselves but I overheard him saying, "No it doesn't matter we're not going we're not going to miss him because he was giving us selective information that was useless". So I was asked to ask Piet to help me to bring Godolozi out by Col Venter and Lt Nieuwoudt. So I did precisely that, we came with Godolozi and this NIS master spoke to him for just about ten minutes and then he left, and the assaults began. I must add the Godolozi, my opinion was that the was the strongest, he was physically fit and very powerful. The assault took almost six to seven hours before he could succumb. It was the same fashion. During the assault of Champion Galela, something brutal happened, let me just go back because WO Beeslaar took out the testicles of Champion Galela and squeezed them very hard until they became the size of almost golf balls and then with his right hand he punched them severely very hard. I saw the man changing the colour of his face becoming pale and blueish and there was some yellowish liquid that spattered out from his genitals and that was the most brutal thing I've ever witnessed in all my life of hell in Vlakplaas. I stayed for a long time in this Devils Baily, I know how it looks like but I've never seen anything like this in all my life as a prisoner of war of these people. I've never seen anything like that, it was dehumanising experience of my life. Even today I keep on seeing the flashes of these people that I was supposed to kill, the very same people that I set myself up to liberate and I was sold by my own commanders to these people and today I'm sitting here as a perpetrator.

MR BRINK: Now Mr Mamasela can we then go back to Mr Godolozi?

MR MAMASELA: Yes Mr Godolozi, as I said, he was brutalised, he was savaged.

MR BRINK: Are you able to say who did what to him?

MR MAMASELA: WO Beeslaar took his stick and beat him up severely and Lt Nieuwoudt beat him with his iron pipe as usually, he savaged his head to smithereens. Koole was kicking and he was jumping and do you know they were jumping on top of his face several times and we were helping to stifle his mouth, myself an Piet Mogoai, we were keeping him under control so he mustn't scream and ultimately after almost six/seven hours he gave in and he was to the best of my knowledge and in my opinion dead.

MR BRINK: Now after his death where was his body taken?

MR MAMASELA: It was also taken by us, myself Koole and Piet Mogoai and thrown on top of the other bodies.

MR BRINK: And what time of day was that, can you remember?

MR MAMASELA: It was almost late in the afternoon, between half past five and six o'clock, somewhere there, it was becoming dark.

MR BRINK: And what was happening at the braaivleis? Was that continuing or had it finished?

MR MAMASELA: No the braai continued and we were ordered immediately to clean and hausepipe the blood, the bloodstains on the walls and everywhere and to remove all the evidence around of any ...(indistinct) and after we did that I saw a brown kombi of a hilux model, something like that coming towards the door of the shed and I saw these corpses being loaded into that brownish kombi and at that stage we were immediately ordered, myself, WO Koole and Piet Mogoai, we were ordered to leave and go back to our bench. I left the bodies being loaded into this car and I left all the police officers there.

MR BRINK: And you then returned to your base.

MR MAMASELA: We then duly returned to our base where we were ordered to come back as soon as possible to Pretoria because we were afraid we might be possibly identified.

MR BRINK: Yes.

CHAIRPERSON: In fact it appropriate stage to adjourn until half past eleven.

MR BRINK: Yes in fact I was just going to indicate I have no further questions for this witness anyway.

CHAIRPERSON: Okay.

NO FURTHER QUESTIONS BY MR BRINK

COMMITTEE ADJOURNS

ON RESUMPTION

MR BRINK: Mr Chairman, I did indicate that I had no further questions but I wonder if I may be permitted just to clear up one aspect relating to Mr Galela if I may.

Mr Mamasela, in regard to Mr Galela, can you indicate to the Committee who took part and who did what to him immediately prior to his death?

MR MAMASELA: Okay thank you Mr Chairman. With Mr Galela like I indicated, he was treated more or less the same way as Mr Sipho Hashe, he was brutally savaged and assaulted. WO Beeslaar took out the man's testes and he squeezed them and he hit them hard and at the same time he took a long stick and strangled him with the stick sitting on top of his chest and WO Koole jumped several times on the head of Mr Champion Galela, and myself and Piet Mogoai we were busy stifling him from screaming, trying to stifle him, and the rest of the group they started raining punches and all assortment of kicks on him.

MR BRINK: And could you just finally tell the Committee if you can, the size of this stick, how long was it, how thick was it?

MR MAMASELA: It was almost this thick.

MR BRINK: Your forefinger and your thumbs joined together and you make a circle with them, and it was almost half a metre long.

MR BRINK: And can you describe the iron pipe which you say Lt Nieuwoudt used?

MR MAMASELA: The iron pipe was almost half the size of the stick but it was very short but it was almost 30 to 40cm long.

MR BRINK: Was it a hollow pipe?

MR MAMASELA: No it was, you know a thick pipe, it was heavy.

MR BRINK: Thank you.

CHAIRPERSON: This stick and the pipe, where did they come from?

MR MAMASELA: Lt Nieuwoudt came with his from his car and WO Beeslaar just looked around from the nearby trees, there were trees there and then some of the wood was on the floor, he just picked up a nice piece for himself.

CHAIRPERSON: Have you told us everything that happened to Mr Galela?

MR MAMASELA: To Mr.. yes I think, to the best of my recollection I think that is all.

CHAIRPERSON: Are you finished Mr Brink?

MR BRINK: Thank you Mr Chairman.

NO FURTHER QUESTIONS BY MR BRINK

CHAIRPERSON: We'll start with Mr Booyens.

MR BOOYENS: Thank you Mr Chairman.

MR DE JAGER: ...Mr Booyens. This pipe you said was about 30, 40cm long or thick?

MR MAMASELA: I think it was it was this long.

MR DE JAGER: But that's more than.

MR MAMASELA: Yes it's more than, it's about 50, 60cm.

CHAIRPERSON: Can you just for the record again, just to refresh the records memory, the people that you are appearing for.

MR BOOYENS: Yes Mr Chairman, J A Booyens, I appear on behalf of Nieuwoudt, van Zyl, Lotz, Snyman, and du Plessis.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you.

CROSS-EXAMINATION BY MR BOOYENS: Now Mr Mamasela let us just get all the sizes and descriptions clearly on record. This iron pipe that you say Lt Nieuwoudt had, sorry the size, how thick it was, was not placed on record. Can you just indicate and perhaps one of my learned friends on the other side can just give us an indication how thick it was.

MR MAMASELA: I've already indicated Mr Chairman that ...(intervention)

MR BOOYENS: It wasn't placed on record, Mr...(intervention)

MR MAMASELA: No I'm doing it, I'm placing it on record now okay. I said it was almost this size, I said the stick was this size and it was almost half the size of the stick. It was like this.

MR BOOYENS: I can't see that far, what size is it?

MR MAMASELA: I can't help you further than that.

MR BRINK: Possibly in relation to the size of the microphone extension you might get some idea.

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: That would be about 12mm Mr Chairman? And then the stick would be about 25mm.

MR MAMASELA: Approximately.

MR BOOYENS: And Mr Mamasela, the names, you have mentioned some names here, you've mentioned the name of Herman du Plessis. Is it correct you got to know Mr Herman du Plessis, his name at a later stage when he was at Security Police Headquarters in Pretoria, where you also were, is that right?

MR MAMASELA: That is right, that is why I did not put him in my initial statement.

MR BOOYENS: Yes so that's only a name that you remembered later?

MR MAMASELA: I remembered later when I talked to him and we spoke about these events.

MR BOOYENS: Oh did Mr du Plessis actually discuss it with you?

MR MAMASELA: Definitely.

MR BOOYENS: I see. Also something that you didn't put in any of your statements. No we discussed it at head office.

MR MAMASELA: No we discussed it at Head Office.

MR BOOYENS: When?

MR MAMASELA: At the Head Office when they were serving a sweeper for the Harms Commission, himself and General Nick van Rensburg; and then he said to me: "You remember in Port Elizabeth I was the station commander", then I realized he was the station commander by then, I didn't know it before then.

MR BOOYENS: Well the Harms Commission, if I recall correctly, was in the 1990's.

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: No that was appointed by...(intervention)

MR MAMASELA: It was in 1990, yes, you're right.

MR BOOYENS: Okay. So since 1990 you've known the identity of Herman du Plessis?

MR MAMASELA: Very much.

MR BOOYENS: You gave evidence at the Section 29 hearing in December of '96?

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: You didn't mention his name.

MR MAMASELA: No I could not mention it because I did not mention it in my statement because I, like I said, when I made my statement, I did not even know that he was a station commander. Then they said just refrain yourself, contain yourself to the facts that you know. Anything that you had from and whatever, we don't want it in your statement. This is what I do, I just mention it now because it's in a hearing session.

MR BOOYENS: Which statement Mr Mamasela?

MR MAMASELA: I made a statement.

MR BOOYENS: Which one?

MR MAMASELA: To the Attorney General which was then given to me to come and read to the last hearing in the TRC in closed session of the TRC. The one that we are referring to that I made.

MR BOOYENS: Yes that's the one that you read on to the record.

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: But can you remember when this statement was taken by the Attorney General's office?

MR MAMASELA: It was on the 21st of November 1995.

MR BOOYENS: But by then you'd known Herman du Plessis, you got to know his name, why didn't you mention his name?

MR MAMASELA: No I didn't mention his name because I said, the station commander of Port Elizabeth, and he said to me, you still remember I was there, and it was hearsay evidence from him, I couldn't just implicate a man on what he says to me; I implicate a man on what I've seen when he was there.

MR BOOYENS: No Mr Mamasela that's not the point. In 1990 Herman du Plessis was acting as what you call a sweeper for the for the Harms Commission.

MR MAMASELA: Which is true.

MR BOOYENS: You got to know him as Herman du Plessis in 1990.

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: You make a statement in 1995 to the Attorney

General.

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: By then you know that the man who was the so-called station commander has got a name.

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: Why didn't you mention it.

MR MAMASELA: I said to the Attorney General, I'm not sure of his identity but I am sure of his rank, he was the station commander of Port Elizabeth Security Police and it's written in my statement that the Security Station Commander, whether that station commander is Mr du Plessis or not, I stick to the fact that he was the station commander and I'm talking about the station commander. I was not sure, I could not put something that I speculate about in my statement that I make under oath.

MR BOOYENS: Okay let me make sure that I understand you. Are you now saying that you are not sure whether the man that was the station commander was in fact du Plessis?

MR MAMASELA: I said at that time, I was not sure about the man's identity when I was in Port Elizabeth, even in my statement I told the Attorney General that I think it's Herman du Plessis who was the station commander but I'm not sure. Then he said, if you're not sure don't put that persons name please if you're not sure and that is precisely what I did.

MR BOOYENS: So this man identified as the station commander, you are not sure that that is indeed Herman du Plessis?

MR MAMASELA: I'm not hundred percent sure. If I'm hundred percent sure I will put his name in.

MR BOOYENS: Ja. So you are not sure that Herman du Plessis was at Post Chalmers?

MR MAMASELA: No I'm not sure that he was at Post Chalmers that's why in most of my evidence, even in my chief evidence I never mentioned him.

MR BOOYENS: Yes, and so we can accept that your reference to Herman du Plessis in this Commission is inaccurate.

MR MAMASELA: No that's your fertile imagination. I made it clear in my statement, in my chief evidence here in this Commission, I made it clear that the station commander of Port Elizabeth was travelling in a brown car like a toyota motor car, he's the one who led the entourage and when we went there he was there but I didn't mention Herman du Plessis because I'm not sure he's Herman du Plessis but I am sure he was the station commander.

MR BOOYENS: Yes, no I understand that.

MR MAMASELA: So there's no confusion about it.

MR BOOYENS: No the confusion is that we do not know if Herman du Plessis, you saw Herman du Plessis at Post Chalmers, that is your evidence today.

MR MAMASELA: But we do know that I saw the station commander of Port Elizabeth Security Police there.

MR BOOYENS: But you don't know who the station commander of Port Elizabeth was, you haven't necessarily got a name for him.

MR MAMASELA: The records can show who was the station commander then.

MR BOOYENS: Yes and they do so.

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: Herman du Plessis was never the station commander of the Security Police in Port Elizabeth, Harold Snyman was.

MR MAMASELA: Okay if that is the case then it's okay because I just said the Station Commander of there was there.

MR BOOYENS: Okay so are you now saying that the station commander was there, so Harold Snyman must have been at Post Chalmers?

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: Right. So now we've got another name, in other words, the people that you've - I'm not going to deal with your Vlakplaas colleagues because I accept that you know them.

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: We can then accept that the policeman from P E that you can us names of, that were there at Post Chalmers, are Mr Nieuwoudt...(intervention)

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: ..and Mr Harold Snyman because he was the commanding officer of the Security Branch in those days..

MR MAMASELA: Most probably.

MR BOOYENS: ..yes. We do not in other words know if Herman du Plessis was there or not there?

MR MAMASELA: I don't want to confuse myself, I don't know the people in the Security Police or Port Elizabeth by then, even today, I don't know them.

MR BOOYENS: Yes. You are adamant that it was Nieuwoudt?

MR MAMASELA: Yes I know this man. We talked a lot with him. He's the man who quoted the bible with his head, A up to Z and this is the man who told me that in 1977 he was operating in Botswana and I told him that I was also operating in Botswana, he's the man who told me he infiltrated the ANC with Craig Williamson, he's the man who told me that he helped Mrs Masondo to escape, jump over the border fence. He's the man that identified the defects on Mrs Masondo that she had an artificial leg that got stuck when she jumped over the fence; so I know this man and he knows me, and that is a fact, you can ask him.

MR BOOYENS: Mr Chairman it's difficult enough to concentrate in these circumstances. If this occasion is going to turn into a political meeting with speeches and people hand clapping I'm going to ask for a change of venue because I cannot adequately look after my client's interest if this is what's going to happen.

CHAIRPERSON: Would you please try to control yourselves and your emotions and the way you feel? Let us listen to the evidence and hear what happened.

MR BOOYENS: You were already told in Pretoria that you were supposed to come down to Port Elizabeth specifically for this operation.

MR MAMASELA: That was the usual norm. Whenever there was a special mission the people who were going to get involved in that special mission were called aside and they were briefed before they could leave to expect their mission wherever they were going to.

MR BOOYENS: I'm not asking you about the usual procedure, I'm talking about this. Were you told in Pretoria by Mr Venter that you would have to travel down to Port Elizabeth with the specific purpose of getting involved with the three deceased in this matter?

MR MAMASELA: That is the usual procedure, I was told by him then.

MR BOOYENS: Were the names mentioned?

MR MAMASELA: No the names were not mentioned, it was just activists, political activists are making the townships there in Port Elizabeth ungovernable, so we must go and help to eliminate those people.

MR BOOYENS: Did he tell you how many had to be eliminated?

MR MAMASELA: No he didn't speak about the number, he said Political activist leaders, political leaders.

MR BOOYENS: Did he say in what way they were going to be eliminated?

MR MAMASELA: No he said we must try to think of a plan, devise a plan to lure them out of the township into the ambush where they can be killed.

MR BOOYENS: And so when you arrived in Port Elizabeth Mr Mamasela, tell me how much you knew about your forthcoming mission. Perhaps I can help you, did you know that you were coming to Port Elizabeth to kill activists who were making the township ungovernable and that you had to lure them out of the township one way or the other, is that as much as you knew about the mission then?

MR MAMASELA: That is correct.

MR BOOYENS: You didn't know about the mission then that how they would be lured out, or anything of that nature, is that right?

MR MAMASELA: No that is right, we were told to think about it among ourselves.

MR BOOYENS: And so only in Port Elizabeth did you hear about the scheme at the airport?

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: Was an explanation given to you at the airport why the people from Vlakplaas were used to affect the 'arrest'? Now I'm deliberately putting the arrest in quotation marks because we know it wasn't one but what purported to be and arrest? That was carried out by you, say two of your members from Vlakplaas, you and Mr Venter. is that correct?

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: Was a reason given to you why you had to do it and not the local SB.

MR MAMASELA: Yes the reason was given at the Port Elizabeth Police Station Security Police. It was said that most policemen operating in Port Elizabeth, especially white policemen, are well known by the black activists, especially Mr Nieuwoudt, he was well known, he was the one who was serving notices on them, banning them, banishing them and doing all this.

MR BOOYENS: And so the reason really was that they were wanting to use people that were not known.

MR MAMASELA: Not known in that vicinity yes.

MR BOOYENS: I see.

MR BOOYENS: You were sitting there listening to this running commentary and you knew, you were accepting three people, is that correct?

MR MAMASELA: That is absolutely correct.

MR BOOYENS: And only two of you, that is you and Venter actually did the apprehending of these people?

MR MAMASELA: That is absolutely correct.

MR BOOYENS: Why didn't your other Vlakplaas colleagues, I'm specifically talking about Koole, Mogoai not assist you in that regard?

MR MAMASELA: It's not like they were not assisting us, they were a back-up team. We did not want to arouse unnecessary attention at the airport.

MR BOOYENS: I see.

MR MAMASELA: So the thing was planned with military precision that we just pounce and we get the people in the car, but should there be any scuffles these people are going to help us.

MR BOOYENS: Okay so are you saying that your two Vlakplaas colleagues knew full well that if your initial effort of making this a sort of peaceful come-along failed and they start putting up resistance, they must jump out and come and assist you.

MR MAMASELA: It goes without saying, they knew ...(intervention).

MR BOOYENS: No it doesn't, were they told that?

MR MAMASELA: It does go without saying that in every operation where the police are 5, 6, 7, they help each other. You are the only one who does not know that because you are not a policeman.

MR BOOYENS: But Mr Mamasela the whole idea was to hide the identity of the police from Port Elizabeth.

MR MAMASELA: Yes if Koole and Piet Mogoai come and help us, who will identify them, nobody will.

MR BOOYENS: No quite.

MR MAMASELA: So their role was a back-up role. So in case something happens there they will come in, fortunately nothing happened.

MR BOOYENS: Yes.

MR MAMASELA: They did not come in, so you can not blame me for them not coming in.

MR BOOYENS: No I fully understand that.

MR MAMASELA: Thank you very much.

MR BOOYENS: But what I want to know Mr Mamasela is simply the question, were they also briefed with the fact that Port Elizabeth S B cannot be involved that is why you people must be involved, so they knew that the other policemen who were not going to help, the P E policeman were not going to help, they would have to help if something goes wrong.

MR MAMASELA: They knew, we were briefed together with them.

MR BOOYENS: Okay.

MR MAMASELA: Thank you.

MR BOOYENS: Now while you a were at...(intervention)

MR DE JAGER: Sorry Mr Booyens, while you're on that, how many policemen were in the kombi at the airport waiting for the victims to arrive?

MR MAMASELA: Thank you Mr Chairman, it was myself, WO Koole, Piet Mogoai, WO Beeslaar, Col Venter, about two other Port Elizabeth police, we were about seven in the kombi, and there were other private cars also belonging to Port Elizabeth security on standby.

MR BOOYENS: And were these people immediately forced down in the car and had guns pointed at their heads when they got into the kombi?

MR MAMASELA: That is true.

MR BOOYENS: There was no necessity to handcuff the them at that stage or were they handcuffed?

MR MAMASELA: No whilst they were forced at gun point, the people they were shocked, they did not know what was happening to them, they were trying to resist, then they were submerged and then we quickly searched them, I got the knife and we left these, Koole and Piet Mogoai and others to take care of them, so I proceeded with.. and when I came...(intervention)

MR BOOYENS: To go and get the driver?

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: And you were saying, when you came back? What did you want to tell me there, were they handcuffed then?

MR MAMASELA: No I didn't see their handcuffs at that stage, I saw the handcuffs when I came back with the white car, when the bus was waiting for us far away from Port Elizabeth airport, it was then that I saw them they were submersed and they were already handcuffed, so Koole and Piet Mogoai can tell you about the handcuffs, not me, I was not there when these people were handcuffed but I saw them handcuffed at a later stage.

MR BOOYENS: So do I understand you correctly, you joined the kombi, that's now the Vlakplaas kombi with the three deceased in it, only somewhere on the highway towards Cradock were you were already outside PE?

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: So you were not within the precincts of the city anymore, it was somewhere in the country?

MR MAMASELA: Yes and how did you get from the airport to where the kombi was, who did you travel with?

MR MAMASELA: Like I already explained in my chief evidence, I was instructed at the airport to take the old man's bakkie and to follow a white vehicle that was driven by an unknown white security policeman from Port Elizabeth. I followed him at about two kilometres to another destination where they were fixing the ships, then we left the car there, I came back with him in the white car, he's the one who knew the destination of our kombi and then he dropped me there.

MR BOOYENS: But this wasn't Nieuwoudt?

MR MAMASELA: This wasn't Nieuwoudt yes.

MR BOOYENS: Okay, you joined the kombi outside the precincts of Port Elizabeth, the kombi was then driven by who?

MR MAMASELA: At this stage it was driven by Beeslaar.

MR BOOYENS: Did he drive all the way to Cradock?

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: And from that point, that is now the point where you joined the kombi, it was you three people from Vlakplaas - I'm talking in the kombi - three people from Vlakplaas, the three deceased, Beeslaar and who else?

MR MAMASELA: And those two white policemen, I don't know them.

MR MAMASELA: The other two P E policemen?

MR BOOYENS: And was that the sum total of you people that were in the kombi?

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: Did you see Nieuwoudt at the airport that night?

MR MAMASELA: No I didn't see him.

MR BOOYENS: When was the last time?

MR MAMASELA: I didn't even know him, even if I saw him I couldn't know him because I didn't know him.

MR BOOYENS: Oh so you didn't know Mr Nieuwoudt either?

MR MAMASELA: No, yes at that time.

MR BOOYENS: You also subsequently found out he's identity?

MR MAMASELA: Yes when he attested...(intervention)

MR BOOYENS: Yes you told me the whole story. Was Nieuwoudt identified to you at Post Chalmers at any stage as Nieuwoudt?

MR MAMASELA: No he's the one who introduced himself to us as Nieuwoudt yes.

MR BOOYENS: At Post Chalmers?

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: None of the others introduced themselves?

MR MAMASELA: They introduced themselves but I couldn't remember them. I remember him because he had a lengthy chat with me and we had a common political consensus.

MR BOOYENS: I see

MR MAMASELA: We both operated from Western Transvaal, in Botswana, both of us.

MR BOOYENS: But you two obviously never came across each earlier on during your adventures?

MR MAMASELA: No we never.

MR BOOYENS: You see it's the first time that it's mentioned that Nieuwoudt operated from Western Transvaal. I've been informed that he was never stationed in the Western Transvaal.

MR MAMASELA: Not stationed, he is the one who claimed that he and Craig Williamson infiltrated the ANC in Botswana, not he was stationed there in the ANC, they will have long killed him if they knew he was a policeman.

MR BOOYENS: Oh so he actually told you that he infiltrated the ANC in Botswana in an undercover capacity?

MR MAMASELA: Yes with Craig Williamson, that's what he said and the way he described Mrs Masonda; Mrs Masondo is my neighbour in Mofola South in Soweto, he gave the exact description, that's what made me to believe him.

MR BOOYENS: Now Mr Mamasela the, let us just get to the, I just want to get the full detail, that night at Post Chalmers, after you arrived there with the activists, was Nieuwoudt there or don't you know?

MR MAMASELA: I don't know, it was about 11 o'clock in the evening, it was dark, these people we never knew them, they didn't even know us, we were there and the people we briefly interrogated and everybody was tired, then they said we must look after these people and the white officers, they left.

MR BOOYENS: Did they leave by car?

MR MAMASELA: They left by cars yes.

MR BOOYENS: I see.

MR MAMASELA: They came by cars, they left by cars.

MR BOOYENS: Yes okay so that night after this brief interrogation where nobody was assaulted, who were left there after the white policemen left by car, was it only you three Vlakplaas men, that's now yourself, Koole and Mogoai and the three activists?

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: So there was nobody else there?

MR MAMASELA: Nobody else.

MR BOOYENS: And the next morning they arrived again?

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: You say it was quite a number of them?

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: From which security branches?

MR MAMASELA: In my opinion only it was a massive operation, it involved the Cape Security, Port Elizabeth, NIS in my opinion and even Cradock Security Police to a certain extent.

MR BOOYENS: Okay.

MR MAMASELA: I should think so.

MR BOOYENS: What made you think Cape Security was interested?

MR MAMASELA: Various cars that were coming in, a lot of cars, that's what made me think it's a massive operation because NIS was called, everybody was called, it was a lot of people there.

MR BOOYENS: How many cars?

MR MAMASELA: It was many cars.

MR BOOYENS: Twenty, thirty?

MR MAMASELA: About 14, 15.

MR BOOYENS: About 14, 15 motorcars?

MR MAMASELA: I'm not sure...(intervention)

MR BOOYENS: Ja no roughly of course Mr Mamasela.

MR MAMASELA: Yes yes.

MR BOOYENS: But we are not talking about four or five motor cars.

MR MAMASELA: No we are talking about many cars.

MR BOOYENS: We are talking about many cars and I presume out of each one of these 14 or 15 motorcars a few Security Policemen jumped out?

MR MAMASELA: I don't know about a few Security Policemen, it was a whole hordes, that's why I described them as hordes of Security Police.

MR BOOYENS: Yes.

MR MAMASELA: A horde can not be few.

MR BOOYENS: No I...(intervention)

MR MAMASELA: A whole number.

MR BOOYENS: I fully appreciate that. Would you venture a guess as to the number of this horde of policemen, we know there were about 14 to 15 motorcars? So there were in all probability even more than 14 or 15 security policemen?

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: Would you like to venture a guess?

MR MAMASELA: No I wouldn't, I don't like to commit myself. You said twenty policemen were there and how come now you talk about five, I can't commit myself.

MR BOOYENS: No no no, there couldn't be five policemen only because there were 14 to 15 motor cars.

MR MAMASELA: Yes yes yes.

MR BOOYENS: Would you say there were policemen than cars?

MR MAMASELA: I will say my guess is just as good as yours.

MR BOOYENS: No you were there Mr Mamasela, you say, so can you help us?

MR MAMASELA: I didn't count the number of the people in this car.

MR MAMASELA: But you're an intelligent man, you could estimate that.

MR MAMASELA: I don't think I'm as intelligent as yourself, you're and advocate and I'm nobody.

MR DE JAGER: Mr Mamasela you've been able to estimate the number of cars.

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR DE JAGER: Each car would have a driver so there must have been at least 14 or 15 people because a car can't come there on its own.

MR MAMASELA: Mr Chairman with due respect, let us not excite here, let us not be biased. I said in my chief in evidence that those people there, there were about 16 security policemen, now he keeps on badgering me what must I do?

MR DE JAGER: No we're only asking you were there - in some of the cars arriving, were there more than one policeman or can't you remember?

MR MAMASELA: I can't remember, that's what I'm saying and that's not to say I remember. (indistinct cacophony of voices) Thank you Mr Chairman.

MR BOOYENS: Now 14/15 cars arrive and that gave you the impression that the Cape Security Branch, if we talk about Cape do we talk about Cape Town?

MR MAMASELA: We talk about Cape, whether it's Cape Town or it's Cape north or south, to me Cape Town is Cape Town, I don't know the area, I'm a stranger here.

MR BOOYENS: No but you said PE, Cradock and Cape.

MR MAMASELA: Let us not try and beat about the bush, let us come to the fact, the cars were there, in my opinion involved a max operation of forces at Cape Town and Cradock, in my opinion. I was not there, I don't know, I never took facts about it, I'm giving my opinion, my honest opinion, so what must I do?

MR BOOYENS: Yes you have now just mentioned the name Cape Town.

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: Right so in your opinion Cape Town was there.

MR MAMASELA: In my opinion yes.

MR BOOYENS: Why did you form that opinion?

MR MAMASELA: Because there were policemen talking about their security branches and some of them just said this one comes from Cape Town, I don't know them.

MR BOOYENS: Oh I see so now it's getting better. So in fact some of them were introduced as coming from Cape Town?

MR MAMASELA: Yes from Cape Town, some from Port Elizabeth, some from Cradock, that's why I formed the opinion that this was a massive operation involving all these ...[indistinct], forces out of Cape Town and Cradock.

MR BOOYENS: Can you remember anybody from Cradock's name.

MR MAMASELA: I told you I don't know these people, I can't even remember their names, the only person I remember his name because he had a one to one talk with me, was Lt Nieuwoudt, yes.

MR BRINK: You can't remember a single name from Cradock, not a single name?

MR MAMASELA: I don't want to lie.

CHAIRPERSON: I'm sorry Mr Booyens, if I can just ask a question of this. You say these people Mr Mamasela were introduced. Who was doing the introducing?

MR MAMASELA: No most of them they just came with their seniors and their senior would introduce himself and this is so and so, that is so and so, I was not interested in that, I was making the fire, I was doing a lot of things, we were doing some work there so it was just an informal introduction, that is why I didn't take most of them into my head.

CHAIRPERSON: Were they being introduced to you or someone else?

MR MAMASELA: No they, sometimes they would introduce themselves to Venter and whatever and I'm nearby, so I will just hear that he comes from Cape Town or this one comes from - not specifically myself.

MR BOOYENS: And then let's deal with the contents of this interrogation as you call it. On what you've described, let us take the first one, I think you said Mr Hashe was...(indistinct) first not so? That's the next morning.

CHAIRPERSON: Can I just interrupt you there, before you get onto that one. Mr Mamasela I get the impression that occasionally you tend to engage in some argument with counsel - if you can just keep quiet until I've finished what I want to say to you - sometimes witnesses give a very poor impression of themselves, not necessarily because they are lying but because of the way they testify and because of the way they allow emotions to take a better control of themselves and I must indicate to you that we would appreciate, you would help us a great deal if you could concentrate on just answering the questions and state the facts and if you can help it not become unduly emotional and argumentative with counsel.

MR MAMASELA: Yes Your Worship.

CHAIRPERSON: I am sure you've ...(indistinct) can give a better narration of events and help us better if you were to do that.

MR MAMASELA: That is so Your Worship.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Booyens.

MR BOOYENS: Thank you Mr Chairman. Now on what you've described to us but I want you to go over it again, there was a sort of an insulting discussion that Mr Nieuwoudt had with Mr Hashe about him being a capitalist and so on and then he was accused, did I understand you correctly, of being involved in the driving of the policemen out of the black townships, is that correct?

MR MAMASELA: Ja that is correct except that the so-called insult, it was an insult, it was not a ...(indistinct).

MR BOOYENS: And then when he said something about the ANC standing for the interest of the people, that provoked this viscous assault upon him? Is that correct.

MR MAMASELA: I think you're quoting me out of context because I said Mr Hashe said the ANC stands for the democratisation of all the people, not just black people, just all the people.

MR BOOYENS: No fine.

MR MAMASELA: And said heaven did not follow when black policemen put tents in town and stayed with whites and then that seemed to have infuriated Mr Nieuwoudt and others.

MR BOOYENS: So the assault was provoked by a remark from Mr Hashe? It wasn't provoked due to a failure of his to answer questions? That's all I want to get at here?

MR MAMASELA: No in my opinion, whether he answered questions or not he was going to be assaulted, he was still going to be killed, it was just a way to start off, to spark off the assault.

MR BOOYENS: No.

MR MAMASELA: In my opinion.

MR BOOYENS: It's far simpler than that. What you say you were there, you heard what happened?

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: Now the assault on Mr Hashe started off because of the remark he made. That's when the assault started, is that correct. So Mr Hashe at no stage refused to cooperate with them up to that stage or anything of that nature? I mean they were just talking nonsense up to then.

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: And the few questions that they did ask him about his daughters and so on he answered quite happily, is that correct?

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: So that relatively innocent remark sparked this extremely vicious assault?

MR MAMASELA: In my opinion yes.

MR BOOYENS: Right and would you say this whole number of policemen took part in this assault? We know there were at least 14, 15 plus three of you from Vlakplaas and so on, all of you took part?

MR MAMASELA: They took part most of them. Most of them yes.

MR BOOYENS: As far as instruments are concerned. We know on your evidence that Mr Nieuwoudt had an iron pipe and we know Mr Beeslaar had a stick, apart from that were any other instruments used?

MR MAMASELA: No.

MR BOOYENS: It was just kicks and jumping on the man..?

MR MAMASELA: And fists yes and stranglings.

MR BOOYENS: Stranglings.

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: Now who strangled him at that stage?

MR MAMASELA: At which stage?

MR BOOYENS: At the stage when the assault started? Did you strangle him in order to get him to keep quiet?

MR MAMASELA: No we just stifled his mouth and we put his head down.

MR BOOYENS: Oh I see.

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: Now did somebody strangle him at that stage?

MR MAMASELA: No.

MR BOOYENS: So at that stage he was not being strangled, he was just being kicked and being beaten and so on?

MR MAMASELA: Yes yes.

MR BOOYENS: Until he was, you said his eyes turned over, they turned white.

MR MAMASELA: I said he was dizzy yes.

MR BOOYENS: No well in fact what you witnessed was even at that stage, gave you such a shock that you jumped to one side. That was your evidence.

MR MAMASELA: Yes when the blood splattered out of his mouth and nostrils I got a fright and Piet followed me.

MR BOOYENS: Why did you get a fright?

MR BOOYENS: No I was afraid, I've never seen anything like that, a man gargling with blood coming out of his nostrils and ears and he was a figure of bloody mess, so naturally I'm human, I had to get a fright.

MR BOOYENS: So you got a fright because of the vicious assault that you were...(intervention)?

MR MAMASELA: Yes and Piet followed me.

MR BOOYENS: Pardon?

MR MAMASELA: Piet Mogoai followed me in my fright.

MR BOOYENS: Yes, Mr Mamasela when did you go to Vlakplaas?

MR MAMASELA: When did I go to Vlakplaas, when did I start working there?

MR BOOYENS: Mm.

MR MAMASELA: In 1981, June.

MR BOOYENS: And was this the first time that you noticed something as vicious as this?

MR MAMASELA: No.

MR BOOYENS: So why did you get a fright?

MR MAMASELA: I got a fright naturally because once you see people with blood coming out and oozing out of humans and you are human, it's just naturally human for you to get a fright.

MR BOOYENS: Are you saying you felt compassion for Mr Hashe?

MR MAMASELA: I won't say compassion, I say fright. If you want to call fright compassion it's up to you...(intervention)

MR MAMASELA: No I'm not calling fright compassion, I'm asking you whether you felt compassion for Mr Hashe, yes or no?

MR MAMASELA: I felt frightened that's all I can say. MR BOOYENS: You didn't feel sorry for him?

MR MAMASELA: I don't know, maybe it's a mixture of both but I'm trying to be realistic here and say I got a fright and I jumped to one side and Piet followed me.

MR BOOYENS: And the other SB men carried on with this assault?

MR MAMASELA: Others carried on.

MR BOOYENS: How long would you say that this first assault on Mr Hashe lasted? Roughly.

MR MAMASELA: Plus/minus two to three hours.

MR BOOYENS: And how long did it continue after you jumped to one side?

MR MAMASELA: That is all inclusive, and I jumped to one side after a short while, after about twenty minutes, thirty minutes, he was unconscious. That's when I came with a bucket of water and I threw it over him and he revived.

MR BOOYENS: So when he had the blood oozing out of his ears and his nose he was still conscious when you jumped to one side?

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: So he was still conscious when you jumped to one side?

MR MAMASELA: So it is as a result of the continued assault upon him that he lost consciousness?

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: And you then revived him, out of your own or were you instructed to do so?

MR MAMASELA: No I just rushed for the water because everybody jumped aside and looked at him and nobody was doing anything. And out of my own compassion I went to fetch water and just threw it on him.

MR BOOYENS: I don't want to misunderstand your evidence. Did they all of a sudden just all stop and jump to one side, the assaulters?

MR MAMASELA: No, some beat him and some left and some joined in and some left until he lay still, and as he lay there still gargling and there was no assault on him, the moment they stopped assaulting him it was then that I just fetched water and poured it over him and I could see that he was still breathing and I braked him one side on the wall and I placed him on the wall.

MR BOOYENS: Now was Mr Nieuwoudt quite active with his iron pipe?

MR MAMASELA: Extremely.

MR BOOYENS: Now this was an assault lasting some three hours, is that right.

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: An assault which was apparently did not have of it's purpose any form of interrogation but just a plain vicious assault, is that right?

MR MAMASELA: No I said to you he was being interrogated throughout.

MR BOOYENS: Throughout this.

MR MAMASELA: The assault. I even said to you when after I revived him, he started blurting out some information, I even said he said he had 17 AK47's stashed at his place yes, ...(intervention)

MR BOOYENS: I know.

MR MAMASELA: That was interrogation.

MR BOOYENS: Well that's debateable whether that was your evidence in chief that it was a result of interrogation, but let's leave that. What was the nature of the interrogation that lasted this three hours?

MR MAMASELA: It was brutal assault, kickings, beating with a pipe, beatings, chokings and stranglings, the strangling was not there at that stage, it was just kickings and beatings and beating with an iron pipe.

MR BOOYENS: What questions was he asked if any?

MR MAMASELA: He was asked a lot of questions.

MR BOOYENS: About what?

MR MAMASELA: About his ANC activities, DLB's, you know his cell members who are trained MK soldiers who are trained inside the country and stuff like that, the normal security interrogation.

MR BOOYENS: And who were asking most of the questions?

MR MAMASELA: It was Lt Nieuwoudt, he knew him very well.

MR BOOYENS: Did any of the others ask any questions?

MR MAMASELA: Yes occasionally some would ask and my duty with Piet Mogoai was to identify the names of the ANC suspects that he was going to say, and he never said anything.

MR BOOYENS: So he never mentioned names, he supplied no information in other words?

MR MAMASELA: I wouldn't say so because he talked about 17 AK47's...(intervention)

MR BOOYENS: Okay apart from the 17...(intervention)

MR MAMASELA: That is information.

MR BOOYENS: Apart from the 17 AK47's, he supplied no other information?

MR MAMASELA: No.

MR BOOYENS: So notwithstanding that brutal assault upon him he supplied no other information?

MR MAMASELA: No he was very stubborn, I can tell you that he was very stubborn.

MR BOOYENS: And at what stage did he start bleeding?

MR MAMASELA: No as they were assaulting him with iron pipes and whatever, he was bleeding, like I said he had blood all over his face, but the brutal assault came after I revived him when WO Koole asked him a question which the old man perceived as very stupid, it is then that A O Koole was incensed and he started kicking him, and as he tumbled over he sat on top of him and he strangled him and

others joined again viciously, more vicious than the first assault.

MR BOOYENS: Now I'm interested in this, I'll get to the second assault. I'm interested in this first assault. At what stage, how long into this three hour long assault did he start bleeding?

MR MAMASELA: I didn't have a stop watch.

MR BOOYENS: An estimate.

MR MAMASELA: It's difficult, I cannot estimate. But he did bleed in the process, his assault yes.

MR BOOYENS: And you say Mr Nieuwoudt was quite active with his iron pipe.

MR MAMASELA: Very much so.

MR BOOYENS: Hitting him where?

MR MAMASELA: All over the body and the head.

MR BOOYENS: I've noted twice that you've talked about iron pipes...(intervention)

MR MAMASELA: Iron pipe.

MR BOOYENS: So was that just a slip of the tongue when I heard iron pipes?

MR MAMASELA: You are now starting to badger me again and when I answer ...(intervention)

MR BOOYENS: I'm not badgering...(intervention)

MR MAMASELA: I explained to you, you said in your interrogation, you said to me, Mr Mamasela how many weapons were used? I explained clearly that it was one iron and a stick. You repeated and I said it, now you want to change, I said pipes, why didn't you say I said pipes at that stage?

MR BOOYENS: It's not so long ago but let's leave that alone, it may have been a slip of the tongue...(intervention)

MR MAMASELA: Thank you very much.

MR BOOYENS: I'm happy accept that.

MR MAMASELA: Okay thank you very much.

MR BOOYENS: You, but in any case he was assaulted into a state of unconsciousness?

MR MAMASELA: That is absolutely correct.

MR BOOYENS: And once revived he - this stupid question that Koole asked him, what was that?

MR MAMASELA: I've said it in my chief in evidence, I couldn't make sense out of it because it was very stupid.

MR BOOYENS: You can't remember what it was?

MR MAMASELA: Ja except that it was very stupid, even in my own opinion.

MR BOOYENS: He was in a confused state when he mentioned the 17 AK47's?

MR MAMASELA: Yes he was assaulted and slightly dizzy.

MR BOOYENS: And just this reply to an answer, in an answer to Koole, caused this very vicious assault to start, is that right?

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: And was this assault coupled with an interrogation or was it just a clear plain beating?

MR MAMASELA: No that one was sheer brutal, it was just savage, it was, there were no questions asked, it was just a heavy bout of assault.

MR BOOYENS: So they were literally beating him to death at that at that stage?

MR MAMASELA: I should think so.

MR BOOYENS: Now on this occasion give us an indication, I know you can't mention names, but this chief of security of PE, was he there?

MR MAMASELA: I should think he was there because most of the people that were there the previous night, they were there the following day.

MR BOOYENS: And was he taking part in the assaults?

MR MAMASELA: No I didn't see him actively taking part, I don't want to lie.

MR BOOYENS: At any stage?

MR MAMASELA: No I don't want to lie, I didn't see him taking part.

MR BOOYENS: You didn't see him taking part at any stage.

MR BOOYENS: The two that you seem to say that you saw actively taking part are Beeslaar and Nieuwoudt, is that right.

MR MAMASELA: Nieuwoudt, myself and...(intervention)

MR BOOYENS: No no, okay, Piet Mogoai yes.

MR MAMASELA: Venter...(intervention)

MR BOOYENS: Venter also took an active part?

MR MAMASELA: Yes yes.

MR BOOYENS: Are you able to state whether any of the other security policemen and how many of them took an active part in the assault apart from the people that you mentioned now?

MR MAMASELA: Yes about five to eight of them, periodically they will come in and beat, maybe two, three will come in and help and beat and then they will withdraw and the others will come in and beat, so I couldn't check who was beating more and who was not beating more and I didn't know them as a matter of fact.

MR BOOYENS: But although you say that the head of the security police in PE wasn't, you don't know whether he wasn't taking part, he was there?

MR MAMASELA: Yes he was there.

MR BOOYENS: And apart from policemen were there anybody else, for example people from military intelligence?

MR MAMASELA: No I didn't see them.

MR BOOYENS: Koevoet?

MR MAMASELA: No I wouldn't know because some, most of them are policemen in the security forces, they came from Koevoet, like de Kock himself.

MR MAMASELA: There's a newspaper report here that seems to emanate from the Evening Post on the 5th of December relying on City Press. Now you told your story to City Press at some stage, not so?

MR MAMASELA: I didn't tell them my story.

CHAIRPERSON: Sorry before you get there, can I just correct something. You put it to the witness that he said the head of the security branch in PE was there, he did not say that. You asked him whether the head of the security branch in PE was there and he said, I should think he was there. He did not say he was there.

MR BOOYENS: Is it possible that the head of security branch in PE in other words was not there on the second day, that morning when the assaults took place?

MR MAMASELA: It is possible.

MR MAMASELA: Is it possible that he was never there again? Not that day or the next day.

MR MAMASELA: No I can not recall but I think it's possible because I never saw him feature in any way in the assault.

MR BOOYENS: Okay, no that's not the question, the question is was he at Post Chalmers?

MR MAMASELA: That evening he was there.

MR BOOYENS: The evening, the next day you don't know?

MR MAMASELA: No I don't know.

MR BOOYENS: And the day after you don't know?

MR MAMASELA: I don't know.

MR BOOYENS: I just want to put to you something, I know Mr Mamasela I attach about as much value to newspaper reports as most other people do, where they say that you said that - you were then known in those days as Mr X when you were giving all these interviews on TV and so on, they didn't call him by your name, you remember that?

MR MAMASELA: No in the TV everybody knew I was WO Joe Mamasela, it was on the screen, everybody knows that.

MR BOOYENS: But you were at one stage known as Sergeant X, not so?

MR MAMASELA: In the press in 1994 when I first came out I came under the nom de plume Sgt X because I feared

for my life.

MR BOOYENS: Yes and that it is said here that you were part of a hit squad compromising policemen from Pretoria Special Branch, ascaris, members of military intelligence and a member of Koevoet. Did you ever say something like that?

MR MAMASELA: No before, let me clarify, let me help you before you go further and waste the Commission's time. That report I gave the journalist who wrote that report, I gave him my synopsis, not the story, the synopsis because I wanted him to help me to get protection from the Department of Justice. That is alias Maluleke whom he did report, and then out of that synopsis, it was not a story, he formulated his own pieces of flesh and put it there; that is why I went to my attorneys and we reprimanded City Press to stop immediately. They stopped, they never published again that nonsense.

MR BOOYENS: They misquoted you in other words.

MR MAMASELA: No it's not misquoting, it's nonsense what he wrote because he said people were shot in the head and there was this - he was talking a lot of nonsense. That's why I went to my attorneys, if you want a reference I can refer you to my attorneys, then show the letter that they wrote at the time to City Press telling them to stop.

MR BOOYENS: Mr Mamasela you recall that we also met on a previous occasion in Durban, you remember that?

MR MAMASELA: I remember very well that.

MR BOOYENS: And you remember that on that occasion we talked a bit about the evidence or the statements you made to the Independent Board of Inquiry, you remember the Dirk Coetzee story and that, do you still remember that?

MR MAMASELA: I can't recall...(indistinct)

MR BOOYENS: No well let me assist you...(intervention)

MR MAMASELA: There are lots of stories that Dirk Coetzee said.

MR BOOYENS: No no no I'm talking about your stories Mr Mamasela, not Dirk Coetzee's stories.

MR MAMASELA: Yes my stories I mean.

MR BOOYENS: You remember that there was that Independent Board of Inquiry when you went to the Independent Board of Inquiry and you told them that Joe Nxanxla was Crappies Engelbrecht's informer, that's what I'm talking about?

MR MAMASELA: You see you come with hearsay allegations that were made by Dirk Coetzee, you put them to me, I was never called to come and talk about Joe Nxanxla here.

MR BOOYENS: And you remember that you confirmed in the Supreme Court in Durban that you said Dirk Coetzee put you up to saying it but that you in fact told the Independent Board of Inquiry that story at the request of Dirk Coetzee. Do you remember that.

MR MAMASELA: Yes that I remember. That is why I say it's Dirk Coetzee's allegation that you bring them to me, I clarified that thing in the court of law in Durban, so you want to retrial me.

MR BOOYENS: Now did you also speak to the IBI about the PEBCO 3?

MR MAMASELA: I can't recall those things. Like I said in court in Durban, it's on record, I said there was no formal meeting where Mamasela was interrogated, it just a general discussion with Dirk Coetzee making him put everybody fear of the TRC, the pony hair guy, he was also there giving his inputs, so it was not a Mamasela story and this is what I put in dispute in Durban and you insist it was your scene like for instance still now.

MR BOOYENS: I'm not going to go through that, you admitted that you did tell a few lies to that IBI...(intervention)

MR BOOYENS: I didn't say I did tell a few lies, I said yes there a few discrepancies in the statement, not lies. I never admitted to lying under oath.

MR BOOYENS: We've got the record here Mr Mamasela, it will speak for itself. In any case what is quoted in the minutes of that meeting is you said the following about the Pepco Three

According to Mamasela the PEBCO 3 received a telephone call from Thozamila Botha informing them to meet a British funder at H F Verwoerd Airport in Port Elizabeth.

That is correct, not so.

MR MAMASELA: Yes that is correct.

MR BOOYENS: This call was intercepted by the Security Police and they sent an English-speaking security policeman to meet the three.

MR MAMASELA: That is true.

MR BOOYENS: Is that true?

MR MAMASELA: That is true.

MR BOOYENS: At the airport the three were abducted and taken to Cradock Police station.

Not really I think that's a mistake,

a police station near Cradock

or did you think it was Cradock police station?

MR MAMASELA: It was written 'old Cradock Police Station'.

MR BOOYENS: Okay fine, thank you for correcting me Mr Mamasela, I appreciate that.

At the airport the three were abducted and taken to Cradock police station

is that correct?

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Booyens where are you reading from?

MR BOOYENS: From the - let's say it's a minute, it's a summary of what Mr Mamasela told this IBI meeting Mr Chairman but because of my previous experience with this document I first want to know whether the witness confirms it then I'll make copies available to you.

'Abducted to Cradock Police Station', so that is still correct. Right,

they were interrogated and badly beaten particularly by a policeman known as Roelf Venter.

MR MAMASELA: No let me clarify you with that document I gave. That is some of the information that I gave the records here. On that particular day Dirk Coetzee made all those statements because he wanted to be in the police force, he wanted the position of commissioner of the police. That's what he made up, he wanted. And that's for all Dirk Coetzee's saying and I admit that I did tell him some of the information because it is correct, it tells you what I know.

MR BOOYENS: Yes.

MR MAMASELA: But the rest, most of the rest is balderdash.

MR BOOYENS: No.

MR MAMASELA: I told the court that.

MR BOOYENS: No that wasn't the court. Oh the ...(indistinct) court.

MR MAMASELA: Yes I told the court.

MR BOOYENS: No I know you said that there was a lot of nonsense in this that's why I want to make sure what is correct here. Then there's a statement, there's now a Brigadier Venter based in the PWV, was that said?

MR MAMASELA: No.

MR BOOYENS: By Dirk Coetzee perhaps?

MR MAMASELA: Yes it should be Dirk Coetzee's.

MR BOOYENS: Were you present when you...(intervention)

MR MAMASELA: I was present, I couldn't claim everything that was said, 1990 in an informal meeting.

MR BOOYENS: Okay.

MR MAMASELA: Where notes were not taken.

MR BOOYENS: No but if Dirk Coetzee said something inaccurate you would surely have corrected him.

MR MAMASELA: You can't correct Dirk Coetzee if you know Dirk Coetzee, he's nature, you can't correct him.

MR BOOYENS: Yes his a very garrulous man, I know that. And it's quoted here that you said that Venter beat the three about the head with an iron bar.

MR MAMASELA: No I cannot say Venter and say Nieuwoudt here, that's absolute balderdash.

MR BOOYENS: So that is a wrong quote.

MR MAMASELA: Ja especially if in the paper, if you read the paper they said Mamasela said this Koole shot in the head, that's why I told my attorney to reprimand those papers, if you read the paper well you will see at the end, so it's people making their own stories and putting flesh and flavour there which cannot be attributed to Mamasela.

MR BOOYENS: Ja I know but let's not confuse this with a newspaper report. This is the minutes of the Independent Board of Inquiry.

MR MAMASELA: Yes I say that thing was obtained in an informal way just like the newspaper report you are reporting about now. It was quoted out of context and that thing was quoted completely out of context, so I cannot be held responsible for things that were quoted out of context using my name.

MR BOOYENS: Mr Mamasela, one thing here that bothers me, it states, 'Mamasela was here along with Eric Winter'?

MR MAMASELA: I don't know Eric Winter, I've never seen Eric Winter.

MR BOOYENS: 'Nieuwoudt and several senior security policemen from the Eastern Cape', that's correct.

MR MAMASELA: Had I known Eric Winter I could have stated it to the Attorney General, I have worked with the Attorney General for the past three years, I've taken an oath and I think I'm satisfied with what I told that Attorney General and I stand by that statement which is true; not allegations which were purported to be said by Mamasela.

MR BOOYENS: Mr Mamasela but the following statement is correct in this minute, 'Nieuwoudt and several senior security policemen from the Eastern Cape. Mamasela was present with Eric Winter', that's incorrect, 'Nieuwoudt and several senior security policemen from the Eastern Cape', the only thing that's wrong in that sentence is the reference to Eric Winter, not so?

MR MAMASELA: No even 'Eastern Cape', I didn't talk about Eastern Cape.

CHAIRPERSON: I don't understand this, what if one of the people that Mr Mamasela doesn't know, his name was Eric Winter, in what respect would that sentence be wrong?

MR BOOYENS: No Mr Chairman because you would recall when I started this was saying, 'according to Mamasela', in other words this is in fact reciting what Mr Mamasela said, I'm still quoting from the IBI meeting.

CHAIRPERSON: ...(indistinct) the person who wrote the minutes, having heard Mamasela describe the people he was, that person who ...(indistinct) that statement then ascribed a name to a person.

MR BOOYENS: Yes of course this meeting was in Johannesburg, it wasn't here. The IBI meeting Mr Mamasela...(intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: What I'm saying to you is that the statement that Mamasela was is Winter maybe correct, it maybe that a Winter was there.

MR BOOYENS: Yes of course...(intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: That's the difficulty with those minutes.

MR BOOYENS: Yes, now but they couldn't have got that information from Mr Mamasela because he says he doesn't know Winter.

MR MAMASELA: Mr Chairman...(intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: Can you just keep quiet Mr Mamasela ...(indistinct). He's not reporting to have got the name from Mr Mamasela.

MR BOOYENS: Well I don't know, the sentence starts off by stating, 'according to Mamasela Mr Chairman'.

CHAIRPERSON: Did you want to say something Mr Mamasela, sorry I was a little bit impatient.

MR MAMASELA: I wanted to clarify this issue Mr Chairman with due respect, I am sorry I was a little bit impatient. Mr Chairman you are right that little paper here, Len Venter's, it comes from the Independent Board of Inquiry of the ANC who was busily involving himself by investigating the very same nature of transactions we have here. So they are the ones that said the things that I said to Dirk Coetzee and the things that they were actually investigating, they had the names and they put them on, they said 'according to Mamasela this is what he said, I think Mr Chairman you are absolutely right by that. It's an Independent Board of Inquiry document written by them for them, not for me.

CHAIRPERSON: Anyway we hear you say you didn't know Winter's name and that could not have come from you, let's leave it open, Mr Booyens can proceed and put questions.

MR BOOYENS: This is also quoted as saying that it was like a convention of Eastern Cape Security Police at Cradock when the three were brought in. Maybe not your words but the correct description with this enormous operation that you describe?

MR MAMASELA: When the three brought in where?

MR BOOYENS: At Cradock, it says so.

MR MAMASELA: I don't want to waste the Commission's time with that thing, please.

MR BOOYENS: Then in the very last sentence the following statement is attributed to you; let me just read it to you.

Mamasela says Hashe and Champion were beaten to death and the third person alleged that he was working for NIS.

That is in fact correct, not so?

MR MAMASELA: That is what I told the ...(indistinct) court. The third person, if it was my statement, I will have said 'Godolozi', I wouldn't have said the third person, you can see it's not my statement.

MR BOOYENS: Very well but Dirk Coetzee then repeated this obviously.

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: In your presence?

MR MAMASELA: Probably I was there.

MR BOOYENS: I see,

The policeman present then called the NIS agent and he arrived and said that the information, the latter had provided was useless and he was then also killed.

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: That is then also correct, not so.

MR MAMASELA: That is what I told Dirk Coetzee.

MR BOOYENS: And what you told this Commission.

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: Then it contains the statement,

The bodies were removed and burned until no trace was left.

MR MAMASELA: No.

MR BOOYENS: That didn't come from you?

MR MAMASELA: That's the famous Rhodesian method of killing that Dirk Coetzee - we saw when known about it on the television scene. You can see that that is the mind of Dirk Coetzee there.

MR BOOYENS: Mr Mamasela ...(intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: I don't understand this. So what you are reading there is supposed to have come from Mr Mamasela, I don't understand how Coetzee comes in now.

MR BOOYENS: Mr Chairman perhaps I should clear this up. I'll just have to go back to something that I mentioned early on. This Independent Board of Inquiry you said was set up by the ANC to investigate various political offences, it wasn't an official thing, it wasn't a state thing, it was an unofficial thing. Is that right?

MR MAMASELA: I wouldn't know about it's terms of references, I don't know, I don't want to commit myself about that.

MR BOOYENS: Okay but you and Dirk Coetzee went to the Independent Board of Inquiry at one stage because Dirk Coetzee wanted to organise himself a job as Commissioner of Police.

MR MAMASELA: South Africans.

MR BOOYENS: And Dirk told you so. I'm sorry this is getting a bit long-winded but just to explain it to you Mr Chairman. Dirk Coetzee at that stage was working for National Intelligence, is that right?

MR MAMASELA: No.

MR BOOYENS: When you went to the Independent Board of Inquiry, was he looking for a job with them?

MR MAMASELA: You are mistaken, he was not employed as a near agent at that stage, he was just looking for a better job in the police.

MR BOOYENS: Okay no that may be so.

MR MAMASELA: He was actually targeting the Commissioner of the Police job.

MR BOOYENS: Oh yes. Yes Mr Coetzee is a very ambitious man, we know that and then on that occasion, at the insistence of Dirk you told the Independent Board of Inquiry inter alia, that Joe Mxanxla who is now the deputy chief of the National Intelligence Agency was an informer for Krappies Engelbrecht, is that right?

MR MAMASELA: Not for Krappies Engelbrecht, he was an informer for the South African Police.

MR MAMASELA: That Joe Mxanxla was an informer for the South African police, yes.

MR MAMASELA: Yes that is what Dirk said and I confirm that.

MR BOOYENS: Yes.

MR MAMASELA: It's not what I said.

MR BOOYENS: No.

MR MAMASELA: I confirm what Dirk said.

MR BOOYENS: You confirm what Dirk said.

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: And then but this Board was investigating all sorts of things, it investigated for example something about Jimmy Mbane, you remember that?

MR MAMASELA: I don't remember that, Jimmy Mbane what?

MR BOOYENS: No I'm not going to get the detail, I'm trying to keep this as short as possible. It referred to Brian Nkulunga.

MR MAMASELA: It was not investigating.

MR BOOYENS: Well it gathered information,

MR MAMASELA: It just gathered information, hearsay information and filing them and putting them together. It was insignificant as far as I was concerned.

MR DE JAGER: Mr Booyens, would that document really assist us, it's not a verbatim, what he said, it's a minute prepared by somebody else about what he would have said or what he would have told Coetzee. It's not direct evidence about what he himself said.

MR BOOYENS: Mr Chairman, not direct but certainly very important people went to the gallows on evidence about what they told other people which was also perhaps not verbatim but as long as it contains the gist of what he said, it's not to say it's improper evidence or inadmissible evidence at all.

MR DE JAGER: No it's inadmissible evidence but I don't think, unless there's some proof of that it was correctly minuted or those, the whole chain, and I don't think we'll go into all that, unless it's considered necessary but then we'll have to be convinced that it's necessary.

MR BOOYENS: Let me ask you this Mr Mamasela, remember we did the exercise in Durban where you went through the document and you identified the untruths and the inaccuracies and what was accurate. This very same document.

MR MAMASELA: Yes I can do it now.

MR BOOYENS: If necessary we'll return to it. Mr Mamasela you also had a lengthy video interview with Mr Jacques Paauw, is that correct?

MR MAMASELA: That is correct.

MR BOOYENS: And that happened on the 13th of February 1996, is that correct?

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: And you remember that the video is available, that in the Durban trial you were satisfied that the transcript we had there as an exhibit was in fact correct, you remember that, what you told Jacques Paauw?

MR MAMASELA: No I said something with Jacques Paauw? I said something, I did not say everything was correct what Jacques Paauw said. I even criticised Jacques Paauw in the court of law, you know that.

MR BOOYENS: No.

MR MAMASELA: Mr Booyens don't...(intervention)

MR BOOYENS: Listen to my question, I'm just talking about the correctness of the transcript, in other words that what the transcript says is what is on the video.

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: You agree, that was accepted that the transcript was correct.

MR MAMASELA: Let me see that transcript, I cannot confirm something that I don't have.

MR BOOYENS: Mr Chairman it forms part of the documents that I think I handed to you last time, there's part of the record in the Durban trial as well as this transcript.

CHAIRPERSON: What Mr Booyens is saying in the meantime, Mr Mamasela, is that what he's saying is that the transcript that you saw in Durban, as you saw it then, you agreed that it was a correct transcription of the interview.

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: Do you recognise that document?

MR MAMASELA: Yes I recognise that document. Do you understand His Lordship's question?

MR BOOYENS: And do you agree that that was the correct was the correct transcript of what you said in the Jacques Paauw video?

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: Now there are a number of things that we unfortunately have to deal with. Mr Chairman I trust you've got a copy of this, I seem to recall I handed it out the last time before we adjourned.

MR DE JAGER: What number would it be? Can you perhaps...(intervention)

MR BOOYENS: It won't have a number because I actually handed it to the Commission. There's a fairly thick part of the cross-examination in the ...(intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: Is that the one starting from page 188?

MR BOOYENS: No Mr Chairman, this document as far as I know was never included in your papers. It is the document that has got on - we handed you two documents, we handed you a fairly thick part with excerpts from the Griffiths Mxenge trial in Durban and attached is a document, I've got extra copies here, that have got written 'transcript' on it, I think my colleague Ms Hart at one stage referred to it, I don't know whether it was made an exhibit number there. It could be Exhibit N, I'm not sure whether this..

MR DE JAGER: I haven't got a copy with me, I won't say you didn't hand it in, but it's not among the documents that I've been presented with.

MR BOOYENS: Mr Chairman if you look at the document starting at page 188, that's the excerpt from the trial, not so? It looks like it, it's before Judge Combrink, it's attached to the back of that. You'll see it's a different typewriter. That's what I'm referring to.

MR DE JAGER: ... 13 to 1996.

MR MAMASELA: That's the one Mr Chairman.

MR DE JAGER: ... I could just ask if we identify this, it's starting on page 188 and is that transcript where does it originate?

MR BOOYENS: Mr Chairman that is part of what I thought would be relevant from the trial, you'll see the 188. it doesn't follow, it's just some pages, I've got the full record available here of the trial of the state vs Dirk Coetzee and Four Others which was herd by Mr...(intervention)

MR DE JAGER: Was the Mxenge Trial.

MR BOOYENS: Yes, so what you have got there is part of the Mxenge Trial and it contains part of the evidence that this witness has given in that trial.

MR BRITS(?): Mr Chairman may I perhaps just come in here, I'm not 100% sure, I don't want to confuse the issue, but this transcript of Joe Mamasela attached to the record, doesn't seem to be the full transcript, it goes, my copy that I have, goes to I think page 10, may I just enquire from you to what page your copy geos to?

CHAIRPERSON: It's the same with ours, the copy we have.

MR BOOYENS: I have extra copies, may I please beg leave to hand the full copies up to you just to make it complete because it goes, it should go until page 80.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr du Plessis is this N ours or is the criminal trials exhibit number?

MR BOOYENS: Mr Chairman we're not sure, I was under the impression that this was our number, oh no it's the trials number.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Booyens do you want to deal with this document?

MR BOOYENS: Yes Mr Chairman. Mr Mamasela you've got a copy in front of you?

MR MAMASELA: Yes I think so. Now ...(intervention)

MR DE JAGER: Could we just identify this document now, I think we had P and Q now this morning, so this one would be R? And are we only dealing with the transcript of Mamasela Paauw as Exhibit R?

MR BOOYENS: Yes Mr Chairman. Mr Mamasela in Durban started off in this document by basically giving to Jacques Paauw a history as to how it happened that you started working for the security police, not so.

MR MAMASELA: Ja very briefly.

MR BOOYENS: Well you gave a more full description eventually, we'll refer to at a later stage if necessary. Would I be correct if I say that you claim to have been working involuntary for the security police and started to work with them under duress?

MR MAMASELA: I don't understand your question.

MR BOOYENS: You never wanted to join the security police or to become an askari, you were forced by them, would that be correct?

MR MAMASELA: That is absolutely correct.

MR MAMASELA: Your real loyalties were never with the security police but because of the duress and the fear that you would be killed you stayed on at Vlakplaas?

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: Not wanting actually to want anything to do with that terrible system that made you into what you became at Vlakplaas, is that correct.

MR MAMASELA: Yes I had no alternative.

MR BOOYENS: You had no alternative, and would I also be correct if I say that those things that you did inter alia getting involved in the murder of the PEBCO 3 was because you were this reluctant policeman acting under duress - not policeman, you know what I mean, this reluctant askari having been forced into this situation to work at Vlakplaas and you could never get out, and that's how you got involved in the murder of the PEBCO 3, is that right?

MR MAMASELA: That is the position with most ascaris including myself.

MR BOOYENS: Yes you left the security police when?

MR MAMASELA: In 1993 on the 30th of April.

MR BOOYENS: You resigned from them?

MR MAMASELA: I didn't resign, we were rationalised.

MR BOOYENS: Oh yes that's right, that's when you were rationalised out.

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: And when did you speak to anybody and informed anybody for the first time about your involvement in these hideous crimes?

MR MAMASELA: Informed my family?

MR BOOYENS: No I'm talking about somebody official.

MR MAMASELA: No you didn't say so.

MR BOOYENS: Oh...(intervention)

MR MAMASELA: You qualified it now. I don't know what you mean by somebody official.

MR BOOYENS: Attorney General, police, TRC.

MR MAMASELA: I first went to the IBI Independent Board of Inquiry, the then chairman was Dr Alex Boraine and one of his ...(indistinct) there was the Honourable Bishop Desmond Tutu. I gave them my debriefing and everything and until this time am still awaiting a letter of acknowledgement and I have received nothing from them. It is then that I then decided to go to the press top ask the press to help me so that I can get some form of security because I feared mostly for the innocent members of my family and then the press decided to contact the Department of Justice, Dr Ian de Oliveira. It is then that he came into the picture, that was some time late in 1994.

MR BOOYENS: And so just to revert briefly, so in fact the IBI that you went to with Dirk Coetzee, that document that we talk about, that board meeting, was in fact your first official contact with an institution of some authority with Bishop Tutu and Mr Boraine and so on. That is when the IBI Board meeting emanated, that we've been talking about earlier on, not so.

MR MAMASELA: Ja but not that document we're talking about. There are three documents there, you only got one.

MR BOOYENS: Oh are there more minutes?

MR MAMASELA: There are more minutes, there are three, the one that I personally requested help from them is there and then you don't have it, that's why you are quoting me out of context, I'm not surprised.

MR BOOYENS: And did you in any of the other two documents mention your involvement with the PEBCO 3?

MR MAMASELA: It's well a sort of synopsis attached to the whole thing. Yes I think because the synopsis did touch them briefly and all other acts.

MR BOOYENS: I see. Mr Chairman I see it's one o'clock. May this be an appropriate time.

CHAIRPERSON: We'll adjourn until 2 o'clock.

COMMITTEE ADJOURNS

ON RESUMPTION

CROSS-EXAMINATION BY MR BOOYENS (CONTINUED): Thank you Mr Chairman.

Mr Mamasela just before the short adjournment you told the Commission that the reason why you became and askari and stayed an askari was because of duress, you were forced to become that, that's correct, not so?

MR MAMASELA: Absolutely correct.

MR BOOYENS: And that was the only reason why you became an Askari and stayed an Askari.

MR MAMASELA: That is true.

MR BOOYENS: Now if you would be so kind as to return to Exhibit R, that is the transcript of you and Jacques Paauw, the very first page thereof you, I'm going to read from the second JP, just to place it on the record, it's just these two paragraphs, 'How were you tortured?'- JP is Jacques Paauw just to make it clear, and JM is Joe Mamasela, is that correct?

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: 'JM - It was terrible Jacques, my whole clothing was taken off, they poured some ice cold water all over me, they put some electrodes all over my body, in my you know, testicles, private parts, my anus, ears, it was terrible, I was bleeding profusely, I don't know how many times I lost consciousness, I lost consciousness for several times; the last I fell into a deep deep coma.'

You said that to Paauw?

MR MAMASELA: That's absolutely correct.

MR BOOYENS: And is it true what you said to Paauw?

MR MAMASELA: Hundred percent true.

MR BOOYENS: And why did you start working for them?

'JM', your answer, 'There was no way I could salvage my life other than to work for them because this is what they emphasised. You know they kept on boasting how they killed my uncle Ernest Mamasela, Chief Ernest Mamasela, they killed him in 1977 and they arrested me in 1979, and they kept the same people who killed him, kept on boasting that about it and I knew I had no alternative but to cooperate with the system.'

So what you said to Jacques Paauw here is correct?

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: At your Section 29 enquiry you, I'm just going to, that was when you gave evidence in terms of Section 29 before the Truth Commission. You basically told the same story. Mr Chairman may I enquire, has the Committee got page 8 of the Section 29 enquiry? The first pages of it, it's typed page 8 on top of it. That was part of a supplementary bundle, I've got the full record here.

CHAIRPERSON: Did you say page?

MR MAMASELA: Typewritten page 8 of Mr Mamasela's Section 29, or does yours only start Mr Chairman at..?

CHAIRPERSON: Ours starts on typed page 21.

MR BOOYENS: I see, Mr Chairman I'll take steps to make that available to you. But in any case, in your Section 29 enquiry, you told, under oath, you told the Truth Commission or the investigative unit of the Truth Commission essentially the same that it was as a result of this terrible torture upon you that you started working for the Security Police. Is that right.

MR MAMASELA: Yes that is right.

MR BOOYENS: You also said at one stage in the Durban trial that the reason why you worked for the Security Police was duress. Is that right?

MR MAMASELA: That is right.

MR BOOYENS: Mr Mamasela, let's just deal very briefly with the history, I'm not going to deal with it as fully as at the trial, you were caught in a house in Johannesburg and the police that were busy investigating some house breakings and some theft of goods started torturing you when they caught you in that house; do you remember that?

MR MAMASELA: I remember that incident but it's no as you put it.

MR BOOYENS: Okay how was it, how did it then happen, if you say it's not so how I put it.

MR MAMASELA: Initially my Transvaal commander in chief by the name of Sipho Makopo whose brother was the national commandment organiser of the ANC in Botswana, he was my commander, he's the man who gave me instructions to the effect that I must go and sleep at Mr Andrew Masondo's house. Mr Andrew Masondo was then the national political commissar of the African National Congress in Angola, and then I pointed it out that I was an underground operative. It was a foolhardy exercise for an underground operative to go and sleep in a well known political leader like Mr Masondo, it was against all the rules of conspiracy but he insisted as a commander that I should go and sleep there, and he gave me the reasons and the reasons were there are policemen who are looking for him and he was using me as a guinea pig to determine whether these policemen come from the Security Branch or the CID, so that's why I went to sleep in that house.

MR BOOYENS: But Mr Mamasela if you just listen to my question, because that's exactly, I told you I don't want to keep it as long as we did in the trial in Durban if possible. The police burst in that night, they arrested you and inter alia, a certain Captain Viljoen, they tortured you about stolen goods and so on and you cooperated with them in that regard, do you remember that?

MR MAMASELA: They didn't torture me about stolen goods.

MR BOOYENS: Okay.

MR MAMASELA: When they came they came with the false accusation that goods were stolen and I know about these goods. I said no what I had was, I had people who were selling some goods and that was that. That was not what they wanted, they didn't concentrate on that, they then went on political things like the killing of Sgt Chabe because I was literally accused of killing Sgt Chabe in that police station.

MR BOOYENS: Yes but be that as it may, after you were terribly tortured you were transferred to the Krugersdorp prison, is that correct?

MR MAMASELA: No that is not correct.

MR BOOYENS: Which prison were you transferred to?

MR MAMASELA: I was transferred because I was bruised, I was swollen, I was injured, I was sent to Randfontein Police Station where medicine was administered on me to let me regain myself and it's only then that when I regained my senses that the Krugersdorp Police came to fetch me out and take me to Krugersdorp Prison.

MR BOOYENS: Yes. That's where I'm trying to get.

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: And then a Lt Kruger of the Krugersdorp Security Police approached you and asked you whether you would like to work for them and he left you with a telephone number.

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: This whole issue, this case that you were charged with, the robbery case and so was resolved, you were released in any case, is that right?

MR MAMASELA: There was no trial, nobody was...(intervention)

MR BOOYENS: Ja you were released.

MR MAMASELA: Nobody was arrested, it was just a trumped-up charge.

MR BOOYENS: Yes and then after that you returned to Botswana, is that correct?

MR MAMASELA: That is correct yes.

MR BOOYENS: And then after you returned to Botswana, in other words, this assault by the police, this terrible assault is now something of the past, you are a free man again.

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: So free that you crossed the border. Right?

MR MAMASELA: With a clear police instruction.

MR BOOYENS: Uhuh that's not the way you told it.

MR MAMASELA: No no no you are quoting me completely out of context.

MR BOOYENS: Okay Kruger came to you and asked you whether you are prepared to work for them, you concede that much, it's in the record Mamasela.

MR MAMASELA: No.

MR BOOYENS: You say you were tortured to work for them. MR MAMASELA: Where?

MR BOOYENS: In the Transvaal somewhere?

MR MAMASELA: Ja let me explain that because you don't know, because you are putting words into my mouth that do not belong to me.

MR BOOYENS: Okay carry on.

MR MAMASELA: Yes, I said I was arrested by the Brakpan police, I did not know whether they were members of the Security Police or that they were in plain clothing, they came with several cars and when they came to the house they said they wanted information about stolen goods but as we came to the police station I could detect that it was just a trumped-up charge, there was nothing like that. Then they started asking me about my own political activities and they talked about things that I knew only my commander knew because they started interrogating me about my involvement in the African National Congress in 1979 and I joined the ANC in 1977. That is the point you are missing and I think the Nation must get it clear and everybody must get it clear and then that after several beatings and whatever I was forced by Captain P Viljoen to work with the Security Police. He even told me that he will arrange with the Krugersdorp Security Police to come and pick me up.

MR BOOYENS: Yes I know you said that.

MR MAMASELA: So yes but now you say it's not...(indistinct)

MR BOOYENS: But all that Kruger did is Kruger came to you and he gave you a telephone number. Yes in fact you used the words, 'he used a soft approach'.

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: And after you came out you in fact went back across the border into Botswana and you told your commander in Botswana that the police had approached you to work for them.

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: And he said. 'fine, work for them, maybe you can us some information as well', not so?

MR MAMASELA: That is true.

MR BOOYENS: So you were not really turned by the police by that torture because you were a double agent.

MR MAMASELA: I was turned by the police initially, that's why I had to go to Botswana to report to my immediate commander that the police are recruiting and I'm afraid because they threatened to kill me if I don't work for them. It is then that my external commander said to me, 'no fine you can work with them but try to siphon as much information from them as possible'.

MR BOOYENS: Yes and then after some problems in Botswana, you came back to South Africa and you made contact with Kruger and said that you will now work with them.

MR MAMASELA: Yes after I obtained the permission from my commander, external commander in the ANC, I did that.

MR BOOYENS: So if the duress was the reason which caused you to work for the police, why not just stay in Botswana and say to your commander, these people will kill me if I go back to South Africa?

MR MAMASELA: No I made it clear in all my statements that I had a duty to my parents, were parents were ailing and ageing and sick, I had the duty to feed them, I put myself in a so-called business to maintain my family, that's what I said throughout all my evidence. I had a duty, it was not for me to abdicate my duty.

MR BOOYENS: My Lord may I refer the Commission to the partial record that you've got of the trial and more specifically the one with 395 on top. I think we better give this part the record an Exhibit number, Exhibit S. Now I asked you the following question at line 20, 'So by the time you had contacted Kruger you had no pressure from the police on you, you did it on your own? That was the question I asked you and your answer was, 'Yes My Lord'.

MR MAMASELA: In Durban?

MR BOOYENS: In Durban.

MR MAMASELA: You asked me specifically about Kruger, whether I had pressure from Kruger, I said no, yes My Lord I do not have pressure from Kruger, but I had pressure from Piet, who's that Piet what was of Brakpan Police Station, the ones who beat me up.

MR BOOYENS: Mr Mamasela listen to the question I asked you in Durban and to your answer. The question reads, 'So by the time you contacted Kruger, you had no pressure by the police on you, you did it on your own? Answer, 'Yes My Lord'.

MR MAMASELA: Yes because I considered your question to deal with Kruger, not to deal with Brakpan. If you asked me, did the police coerce you, or beat you up in Brakpan that's what I said, why did the police have to beat me up if it was not to break me? What was the fun of the police to arrest me on trumped-up charges, beat me up just for fun?

MR MAMASELA: You see Mr Mamasela, I'm going to suggest to you what you're really trying to do is you want to have your bread buttered on both sides. You want the public and the families to have the perception that you were never really a loyal member of the South African police or, isn't that what you want them to believe?

MR MAMASELA: With due respect, I don't give much what people perceive me and whilst they don't concern about me, I'm not here to impress the people, I'm here to tell the truth and the truth is in your records, in all the police records, they will tell you that I joined the African National Congress in 1979, that's what they know, my records with the police everywhere in South Africa start with 1979 and today I put it on record that I started joining the ANC 1977, the police never knew about my activities in the ANC 1977 and the reason why I did not tell them about 1977 was simply because I wanted to protect members of my unit which I did, and my political commissar of my unit today is a proud technical advisor of the book that I'm writing at the moment. He's still with me, he still works with me, he still believes in me, so that proves that I was never a loyal member of the South African Police, the records speak for itself.

MR BOOYENS: And all the atrocities you were involved in was under duress.

MR MAMASELA: It was under both duress and under my ability, the training that I had received from the African National Congress, I specialised in intelligence training and my training encompassed syphoning of data, even within the enemy structures and when they arrested me and they were intending me to work for them and when I obtained permission from my external commander, I knew that I had a duty to perform within the security forces and I performed the duty because I started compiling my diary of political activities in 1985, ten years ago and I never knew that there will be the TRC, I never knew that a black president will take over this country and that is a fact.

MR BOOYENS: Mr Mamasela I didn't ask you about, I asked you about the atrocities that you were involved in...(intervention)

MR MAMASELA: And my loyalty to the police ...(indistinct) loyalty

MR BOOYENS: Yes, no I am, yes you said you were never loyal to them, I hear that...(intervention)

MR MAMASELA: Yes and I am proving it, I was never loyal to them because I never told them about my register and some of the activities, I told them about the activities when they arrested me and when they questioned me I could see that the information they got comes from my commander, my internal commander, that's why I never divulged the information of my subordinate, 1977.

MR BOOYENS: If you just listen to the questions and answer them, I think we will go a little bit faster please Mr Mamasela.

MR MAMASELA: Thank you.

MR BOOYENS: The question that I asked you, it's in the days when you were at Vlakplaas and in the days when you were at a different unit of the Security Police, all those atrocities that you were involved in, and I'm going to mention just one because that's water under the bridge. Verpas Mxenge, did you do that because you were under duress?

MR MAMASELA: Yes it was in 1981.

MR BOOYENS: And in 1985 in this matter you got involved because you were acting under duress. Yes if I had not killed these people I was going to be killed, it's a fact. More than ten ascaris were killed for refusing to carry out their duties and the main designations of ascaris was to kill their own black people.

MR BOOYENS: You were with the assistance of your attorneys at the time when Eugene de Kock was commander of Vlakplaas transferred from Vlakplaas.

MR MAMASELA: Yes that's true.

MR BOOYENS: You didn't think that could endanger your life?

MR MAMASELA: No I had by that time established good relations with de Kock's superiors like Brigadier Cronje and Brigadier Lootz, so I didn't car about de Kock at that time because I knew I had superior support; that's why I went to the attorneys and I instructed Martens to write to Col Cronje a letter.

MR BOOYENS: Very well, let us, I just want to try and see if I understood your evidence this morning correctly of the assault on Mr Hashe, remember we dealt only with the first assault. You said that assault, before he was unconscious and before you pulled him to the tap, lasted approximately three hours.

MR MAMASELA: Two to three hours.

MR BOOYENS: Two to three hours yes. And it was during this period when he was interrogated and so on, you've given us the description, after he regained consciousness he spoke about the AK47's.

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: Did he speak about any other things then, did he volunteer anything else?

MR MAMASELA: Not really, he just spoke about the 17 AK47's that were buried at his sister's place and he described that place vividly to us and could see he was saying it just to salvage his life. I really couldn't believe it.

MR BOOYENS: Yes but the question is really Mr Mamasela, apart from the AK's he didn't talk about anything else and then Koole asked him this stupid question and that precipitated the next assault upon him.

MR MAMASELA: Like I said he was confused, he said some things that were incoherent to me but the only things that I understood, that I knew was the 17 AK47's, we were very much interested in the AK47's and the DLB's, so we listened attentively when he talked about that. That's the only thing I can recall at the moment.

MR BOOYENS: You speak Afrikaans very well as well, not so.

MR MAMASELA: I don't know what you mean by really well, I know Afrikaans because I was forced to write some of my statements in the police in Afrikaans because most police, even in my statement, they don't understand English, they just write in Afrikaans. All my statements are written in Afrikaans (interruption, power cut)

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Booyens.

MR BOOYENS: Thank you Mr Chairman. Mr Mamasela I'm not sure how much of what I asked you earlier on has been recorded before the electricity went out so just to make sure you, are reasonably competent in Afrikaans? Is that correct?

MR MAMASELA: I don't think you are correct in that; I am very much competent in English, I received my education with English as the medium of instruction, not Afrikaans.

MR BOOYENS: But be that as it may your statement to the Attorney General was made in Afrikaans, is that correct in connection with this matter?

MR MAMASELA: Yes the policeman explained to me that we have to just do it in Afrikaans because he does not understand English.

MR BOOYENS: Yes.

MR MAMASELA: I said no it's fine.

MR BOOYENS: So you were satisfied that you could understand an Afrikaans statement, not so?

MR MAMASELA: Yes some of the words I do, some I don't. MR BOOYENS: Are you suggesting there are parts in your statement that you don't understand?

MR MAMASELA: Not really, the bottom line is the contents of my statement, I agree totally with it, there is nothing else but the truth.

MR BOOYENS: Yes.

MR MAMASELA: That is the bottom line.

MR BOOYENS: Yes. Okay so we are, and in any event you read this statement out at the Section 29 hearing?

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: And if you found any mistakes in it at that stage, you would have pointed it out to people, not so?

MR MAMASELA: I would have pointed it out to the Attorney General.

MR BOOYENS: Yes and you would also in all preboiled have said at the time that you were reading it out, there's something wrong here and there's something wrong here?

MR MAMASELA: Yes if I did understand there was something wrong.

MR BOOYENS: Yes obviously. Mr Mamasela have you got that part of your Section 29 evidence in front of you? I was told it starts at about page 21, not right at the beginning, but I want you to go to - Mr Chairman that was those supplementary papers that were served on us, the Committee should have it, sorry Mr de Jager, I can't see that far anymore.

MR DE JAGER: It's Volume 2.

MR BOOYENS: Have you got that in front of you now Mr Mamasela.

MR MAMASELA: No I don't have it, I'm still waiting for it.

MR BRINK: Mr Chairman I'm sorry, my copy which I had given to the witness was removed by a member of the appeal used for the TRC press, he promised to let me have it back shortly but he hasn't brought it back yet. That was during lunch.

MR BRINK: No turn to page 51, the typewritten page Mr Mamasela please.

MR MAMASELA: Page 51?

MR BOOYENS: Page 51? Mr Chairman I've got the full record in front of me.

MR DE JAGER: Paginated page 9 I believe.

MR BOOYENS: Mr Chairman I now notice that what was applied to the committee, apparently that was only pages..

CHAIRPERSON: Paginated pages 9 to 17.

MR BOOYENS: No Mr Chairman, what I'm interested in is I've got in my possession a record of proceedings held in Durban on the first and second of December 1996 which purports to have been proceedings in terms of Section 29, that was handed in as an exhibit at the Durban Trial and that contains Mr Mamasela reading his statement to the Attorney General on to the record in those proceedings but apparently you've been supplied with something completely different.

CHAIRPERSON: Well what we have it's from page 21 and, yes page 21 to 29, apparently the proceedings were held in December 1996.

MR BRINK: If I can help my learned friend, the supplementary bundle is a small one and the statements starts as various questioning by a member of the investigation unit, Advocate Potgieter and then at the bottom of typed page 22 which is paginated page 10, the statement commences.

MR BOOYENS: Oh I s.. I'm indebted to my learned friend Mr Chairman. I'll just have to find my place now. Would you go to page 13 of the supplementary statement Mr Mamasela, paginated page 13, typed page 25. Now to make it in context for you, this is an extract of your evidence when you gave evidence in terms of Section 29 of this act and you read this onto the record as your statement, apparently your statement made to the Attorney General. Now let me ask you first, did you read your statement made to the attorney general out during the your Section 29 proceedings?

MR MAMASELA: Yes I read it out.

MR BOOYENS: Very well, now if you got to page 13, line 15, you see the lines on the left hand side opposite 15, 'die drie aangehoudneis'? Have you got the place Mr Mamasela.

MR MAMASELA: Yes I've got the place.

MR BOOYENS: Just read that paragraph to us please?

MR MAMASELA: (Reading if Afrikaans 'The three detainees were interrogated but not assaulted. I together with W O Koole and Piet Mogoai guarded them that night while the whites departed. Only the minibus was left with us. The next day at approximately 7 am Lt Nieuwoudt, Col Venter, WO Beeslaar and other whites arrived at the farm. There were approximately four to five cars, the whites gave us food. I wanted to give some to the detainees when Lt Nieuwoudt told me that I was not allowed to give them food as they were in any case going to die'.

MR BOOYENS: Thank you Mr Mamasela, now this is indeed also identical to the original record of the proceedings so it's been correctly transcribed.

MR MAMASELA: That is true.

MR BOOYENS: And that is what happened.

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: Why didn't you mention the 14 or 15 motor vehicles?

MR MAMASELA: No no you must understand, the first evening the people were just interrogated for a short period of time and then the people left, we were left to guard the people. The following day four to five cars came in and then that's where the interrogation started in earnest and only when Mr Godolozi came in and he made that allegation that he's working with NIS was his torture suspended for the following day but the first day it was about 14, 15 cars that converged there, the second day it was four to five cars.

MR BOOYENS: Oh I see, so it was only the next day when everybody all of a sudden got so interested because a man said he's working for NIS that the 14 and 15 cars arrived.

MR MAMASELA: Yes I think mainly the they were NIS people or whatever, I don't know, but they were the ones who came with that contingent of many cars that came in.

MR BOOYENS: Oh I see. Now Mr Mamasela, let me just find this now on this one, you then continue at approximately line 35 and you say that you deal, 'the discussion went with the police who were being forced out of the black townships, Nieuwoudt and the other whites became angry with the answers that Hashe gave, they started hitting and kicking him. He was handcuffed and could do nothing to protect himself and started shouting. We held his mouth closed, WO Beeslaar took a stick and pushed it against the old man's throat so that he suffocated. At the same time Lt Nieuwoudt hit him over the head with an iron pipe. I saw blood coming out of his mouth and his ears and he became lame. Piet Mogoai and I got a fright and went to stand aside. After a while I saw that he had lost consciousness but was still breathing. I went to fetch water, threw it over him, he regained consciousness and I propped him up against the wall. He then started talking about many things'.

MR BOOYENS: Do you agree that what you convey here about that assault hardly gives a picture of a three hour long assault.

MR MAMASELA: This was just a concentrated version of events, it was not an interrogation like it is now so I had to contain myself to the facts, so here I elaborate.

MR BOOYENS: Well why didn't you say that this assault lasted for about three hours.

MR MAMASELA: I don't think it was necessary for me to say that.

MR BOOYENS: Well you wanted to deal with the gravity of the assault and surely the gravity of an assault is relevant as to how long it went on?

MR MAMASELA: I was restricted by the man taking the statement that I should that I should just keep to the facts and then the rest I will elaborate when I'm asked questions in a court of law and this is precisely what I did.

MR BOOYENS: So did you mention to him that the assault lasted for three hours and he said no that's elaboration, don't worry about it?

MR MAMASELA: Yes he said I mustn't put little small things, I must just make my own context, all the truth must be in and then I will be given time through cross examination to explain in details vividly what happened. That is precisely what I'm doing.

MR BOOYENS: I just want to make sure that you quite clearly understood my previous question Mr Mamasela. Did you mention to the policeman who couldn't speak English, that this first assault lasted for three hours and he said to you don't worry that's detail, we wont put it in at this stage? That is the question, is your answer yes?

MR MAMASELA: Yes that's my answer yes.

MR BOOYENS: Fine. Who was this policeman?

MR MAMASELA: Captain...

MR BOOYENS: De Lange?

MR MAMASELA: De Lange yes.

MR BOOYENS: Oh we'll fortunately have his presence here in any case.

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: Because you see you also use the word here in the fourth line from the bottom, 'after a while I saw that he had lost consciousness but was still breathing'. I mean you are Afrikaans-speaking and I can speak Afrikaans, 'n rukkie' is not three hours.

MR MAMASELA: 'n Rukkie', I'm trying to explain, 'after a while', I'm trying to explain 'after a while', while he was still assaulted or whatever, but after a while, a little while I could see, that is an adjective describing what I saw after a while, not describing the assault itself.

chairperson: Sorry I think we shouldn't, we should be careful here, Mr Booyens you must know that the sentence immediately before that is that he and Mogoai left the deceased, so it may be...(intervention)

MR BOOYENS: Yes it may be a rukkie after that. And you said that was about half an hour I think, not three.

MR MAMASELA: Ja it was about twenty, thirty minutes yes.

MR BOOYENS: So and twenty, thirty minutes you described as 'n rukkie'.

MR MAMASELA: Then I came back, that was 'n rukkie, the rukkie (after a while) is the time limit.

MR BOOYENS: The very last sentence you say, 'he spoke about many things'. Now you told us not so long ago he talked about the AK47's but the rest of the stuff that he talked about was confusing, it didn't make sense.

MR MAMASELA: It was incoherent to me, I could not hear what he was trying to say and I was not interested. I became interested when he spoke about AK47's because as Security Police that was our main interest.

MR BOOYENS: So all you really heard about the second part was him talking about the AK's the rest were incoherent.

MR MAMASELA: To me, in my opinion yes.

MR BOOYENS: And you were also - did anybody else react on that?

MR MAMASELA: I don't know about the reaction of other people, I'm talking about my own reaction because even my reaction was I thought he was seeing a lot of he was saying a lot of things to save himself from further brutal punishment. That's why he was talking a lot of things that I never took into cognisance, but immediately he talked about the AK47's, 17, that were buried at his sister's place, then I became, I concentrated because we wanted to know what was his source, who are his ANC cells and whatever, but the rest of the stuff, it was obvious he was trying to save himself from further punishment.

MR BOOYENS: Did he just volunteer this or he wasn't being questioned at that stage, is that right?

MR MAMASELA: I wouldn't go into really much minute details about that because other people would just come and interrogate him, some would go and some will ask and ask him something, and it was confusing. I won't say he was not interrogated, I won't say he was interrogated, but questions were posed to him. I even asked him some few questions and there were a lot of people asking questions, so he was interrogated.

MR DE JAGER: Could I interrupt. You said you were interested in the AK47's, the rest he said you think only to save himself from further assaults.

MR MAMASELA: That is true Mr Chairman.

MR DE JAGER: And the information that he tendered about the AK47's, wasn't that also tender only to save himself from assaults?

MR MAMASELA: No he was talking about stuff that he heard from other people, how they killed the police, you know I wasn't interested in the hearsay stuff of it. Only when he said 'I had 17 AK47's...(intervention)

MR DE JAGER: Yes but Mr Mamasela you didn't listen to my question. I asked you whether your impression was that the information that he tendered about the AK47's was also information tendered only to save himself from further assaults?

MR MAMASELA: Ja even if it was so, but AK47's to me ringed a bell in my head, we wanted them because people can die out of those AK47's if it turns out to be true, but the rest of the stuff that he said to me was meaningless.

MR DE JAGER: So you thought that the information he gave about the AK47's was true?

MR MAMASELA: It was reasonably true, he may have said it to save himself but was reasonably true. Even if he said it to save himself it was my duty as a security policeman to ensure that it is investigated because he talks about weapons of warfare that can kill the life of people.

MR DE JAGER: Okay now it was your duty as security policemen to have it investigated; did you fulfil your duty, was it investigated?

MR MAMASELA: Yes we asked him questions, we went into details and that's why I was given commission and elaborate detailed elaboration of what he said and then Lt Nieuwoudt took notes and he's the one who knew all his culprits and whatever and he said he'll go and 'bevestig' the whole thing.

MR DE JAGER: And did they go and bevestig.

MR MAMASELA: I think he went, I just left it there because I was satisfied that at least the matter was receiving attention Mr Chairman.

MR BOOYENS: But you don't know what else he mentioned at that stage?

MR MAMASELA: No to the best of my recollection I don't know.

MR BOOYENS: Because you see in the third line at page 14 you say after you talk about the AK47, you say, 'Piet Mogoai and I also had to try and identify names which the old man had mentioned'.

MR MAMASELA: The truth of the matter here is myself and Piet Mogoai, because we were ascaris we knew most of the ANC operatives; our main duty was to listen when the old man mentioned people's names; if they are trained ANC cadres we should help to identify but he never mentioned the names, he never mentioned the ANC cadres names, operatives in exile, he only talked about Pebco people, secretaries and whatever there of his organisation which was of little importance to me.

MR BOOYENS: So there was really no names for you to identify?

MR MAMASELA: For me and Piet Mogoai?

MR BOOYENS: Ja.

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: Now it seems to me if I read this sentence, 'Piet Mogoai and I also had to identify names of the ANC which were mentioned by the old man..'

MR MAMASELA: Ja but that is not the way I understood it, my instructions were with Piet Mogoai, they were clear, you must listen to the old man, he had ANC contacts, if he mentions his ANC contacts names you must be able to identify them as Ascaris. It was our job description, one of our job descriptions and then he muted, he muted firstly a lot of names of people that were in the Pebco organisation, in the Port Elizabeth Civic Organisation and did not make any sense to me or either Piet Mogoai and that is how I understood it.

MR BOOYENS: So was he specifically asked for ANC contacts?

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: And what did he say when he was asked about ANC contacts?

MR MAMASELA: He mentioned local people, some of them belonged to his Pebco organisation and the Port Elizabeth Police said they know who those people were, and I left it at that because they are the ones who identified their suspect.

MR BOOYENS: So are you saying that all the names he mentioned the Port Elizabeth Police knew.

MR MAMASELA: Yes I think so because they were satisfied with the names that he mentioned, even his sister's name, they were satisfied with the place, they were satisfied. Who was I not to be satisfied when the very same people that were responsible for the area were satisfied?

MR BOOYENS: So in reality the Port Elizabeth Police didn't ask you to try and identify a single name that he mentioned?

MR MAMASELA: We tried to identify them but only to find that what he said was outside our jurisdiction, outside the scope of our own jurisdiction were ANC cadres trained in exile, so he was talking mainly about local people, local ANC structures and these people already know their suspects.

MR BOOYENS: But do I understand at least the context of your statement correct that he was beaten until he lost consciousness, he was then revived by pouring water over him, you put him against a wall, he then started talking about AK47's and he started talking about mentioning these names but they were all local ANC people.

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: Okay. So it wasn't a case that he was talking confused as you indicated earlier on,it was just a case that what he was saying was of no importance to you?

MR MAMASELA: No it was both confused and of little importance to me. It's only when he mentioned the AK47's that although there was the reasonable doubt that he might be saying it to save his skin, which I believe turned out to be so, but I was interested nevertheless because he talked DLB's, he talked about AK47's, he talks about weapons of warfare.

MR BOOYENS: Yes. What was confused about him mentioning the names of the people in the local ANC and/or Pebco structures, what was confused...(intervention)?

CHAIRPERSON: Sorry he didn't say the mentioning of the names of local ANC's were confused, he didn't say that. He said a number of things, some of the things were confused but not everything and as I understand his evidence, one of the things that were not a confusion were the mentioning of the names of local ANC people because local members of the security branch in fact knew those people.

MR BOOYENS: No that's certainly the way I understand his evidence now as well Mr Chairman at this stage, I agree with you because it seems we're now getting a picture of mentioning AK's, mentioning names and some confused stuff that didn't make sense. That is certainly what his evidence is at this stage.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes but I thought in you question you were bringing the mentioning of local ANC names under category 3, under confusion which is not what he says.

MR BOOYENS: No but if my recollection is correct, his earlier evidence was that he mentioned the AK's and the rest what he said was confused and he wasn't interested in it. Now we've got an addition, we've got a third category.

CHAIRPERSON: Well he made it clear that as far as he could remember...(intervention)

MR BOOYENS: Very well Mr Chairman...(intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: .. and he can remember even more and more things as we progress which is quite natural; he told you that as far as I remember.

MR BOOYENS: Very well Mr Chairman. Now this second assault, when Mr Hashe was killed, after Koole kicked him, it seems to me he was immediately unconscious, is that correct?

MR MAMASELA: No no no, that is absolutely not correct.

MR BOOYENS: So after Koole kicked him they carried on interrogating him?

MR MAMASELA: After he k... I've said in my chief in evidence, 'after Koole kicked him I could see that his lower jaw was broken because it hanged to one side loosely and there was white foam coming out of his mouth and his eyes sort of rolled around and then he tumbled over'; that is when WO Koole sat on his chest with both his knees and strangled him and that's when everybody rained blows on him.

MR BOOYENS: The question is, was he questioned at that stage?

MR MAMASELA: No he was now being assaulted.

MR BOOYENS: Just assaulted?

MR MAMASELA: Just assaulted with high ferocity.

MR BOOYENS: Now your evidence is then further that Godolozi just immediately claimed that he was working for NIS, National Intelligence Service, when he saw the dead person.

MR MAMASELA: When he saw the dead person I explained briefly that he was shaking like a leaf, he went down on his knees and he begged for mercy, he begged that his life be safe and he even offered to work with them. It's only when they threatened to assault him with an iron pipe by Lt Nieuwoudt that he said, 'Oh stop please, please, I'm working with NIS people', and he didn't believe him and he wanted to assault him and the other members stopped him and said there is a possibility that this man might be telling the truth.

MR BOOYENS: Now how many people are present there at this stage, that's now excluding the Vlakplaas contingent consisting of the five of you and the three deceased?

MR MAMASELA: Lt Nieuwoudt was there and about five/six of local white securities were there at that stage.

MR BOOYENS: PE security men or don't you know?

MR MAMASELA: I don't know but I will assume it was PE and Cradock because we were operating in Cradock.

MR BOOYENS: Nobody from the Cape Town Security Branch at that stage?

MR MAMASELA: No.

MR BOOYENS: They only arrived the next day?

MR MAMASELA: In my opinion yes.

CHAIRPERSON: What do you mean in your opinion? Either they arrived the following day or not, it's not a question of it being an opinion.

MR MAMASELA: Yes Mr Chairman, the problem is this thing happened on three consecutive days so I cannot really say for sure the Cape Town people came on the third day or the second day, I can not recall...(intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: What you mean is as far as you remember?

MR MAMASELA: Yes as far as I remember Mr Chairman.

MR BOOYENS: Now Galela, how long was he questioned?

MR MAMASELA: In my opinion Galela's interrogation lasted about 2 to 3 hours; maximum it was about three hours and he couldn't resist long, he was a person of a frail body. He didn't last long.

MR BOOYENS: And what was he questioned about?

MR MAMASELA: He was questioned about his ANC contact, what he knows about the ANC and then weapons, DLB's, you know the stuff security interrogated people about and he knew nothing about anything of those things. He only muted something about a policeman who is sentenced to death by the kangaroo courts and he was not there, this is what he heard and so mainly his evidence was regarded as very insignificant by the security forces, that's why he was just beaten up quickly and they got rid of him quickly.

MR BOOYENS: These blows that Mr Nieuwoudt struck with that iron pipe, I don't know whether you want to demonstrate or describe, it's up to you. Were they blows struck with maximum violence, the ones that you saw or what would you say?

MR MAMASELA: No most of them were with maximum, maximum violence, it was maximum violence all over the body, in the heads in the hands, everywhere, because these people, every time you struck them they tried to roll over, they tried to protect themselves, so most of the blows landed on their bodies and shoulders and hands. But some of the blows, really vicious ones landed on the heads, that's where the blood was oozing and all that.

MR BOOYENS: And during these interrogations did Nieuwoudt continuously hit these people, the two that we are dealing with on the first day?

MR MAMASELA: I wouldn't say continuously, he will beat them, beat them and others he will kick then he will go out, have a beer or two and chat with other people and whilst he regains strength he will come back again and beat.

MR BOOYENS: You say Nieuwoudt went to have a beer or two?

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: Nieuwoudt's a teetotaller just like you Mr Mamasela.

MR MAMASELA: I don't know but he was there drinking there with the other people, whether he was drinking a beer or coke, I don't know but he was drinking the stuff, the black stuff that others were drinking. Like I said they were drinking rum and brandy mixed with coco cola, so he was drinking the black stuff, so I thought he was also drinking.

MR BOOYENS: But you said just now he would have a beer or two.

MR MAMASELA: No I said he was drinking, I thought it was a beer or two, I don't know, I don't want to commit myself with that one.

MR BOOYENS: Now then how long was the time lapse between Mr Hashe being killed and you starting the interrogation of Galela? Do you understand what I'm getting at, remember there was Godolozi got taken out but he claimed he was working for NIS, he was taken back, how long approximately was the time lapse between Hashe being killed and Galela being brought out and the assault on him started?

MR MAMASELA: I think the second assault on Mr Hashe started at approximately one o'clock, thirteen hours, he was assaulted until about one, two, three, about four o'clock and then he died, what I saw he died. And then Mr Godolozi, we went to pick him up and then when he came in he also spent some time arguing and begging for his life and all that, then he was taken back, I think at approximately four o'clock, four/half past four,

MR BOOYENS: They started with Galela.

MR MAMASELA: With Mr Galela and at about seven o'clock, seven half past seven he passed away and then the people left.

MR BOOYENS: Now let me just get back to something, that second assault on Mr Hashe, that didn't last very long it seems to me, from the time he received the kick till Beeslaar succeeded in strangling him couldn't have taken very long?

MR MAMASELA: In my opinion it took long, the assault itself took about two hours and then WO Koole sat on his chest and he strangled him for a long time, about 20/30 minutes strangling him with his hands.

MR BOOYENS: With his hands and could you see he was using strength in strangling him.

MR MAMASELA: Yes he was bent over into the man's face, that's why I described his face as bloodied also because others kept on kicking and beating him with that iron pipe and stick and others used to kick and punch him and then he, Mr Koole himself came out bloodied. I even said if one came out at that moment you would have thought it Mr Koole who was being assaulted the way he was bloodied.

MR BOOYENS: Yes I heard you say that, so are you saying that Koole continuously strangled him for a half an hour, approximately.

MR MAMASELA: Approximately so yes.

MR BOOYENS: Had his hands around his throat for a half an hour.

MR MAMASELA: This is what I think happened yes. It was quite a long time, I didn't have a stop watch, I would have been accurate but the approximate thing is between 20 and 30 minutes.

MR BOOYENS: Yes, no I'm happy with that estimate. And the others are busy kicking the man.

MR MAMASELA: The others were kicking ...(intervention)

MR BOOYENS: And jumping on his head.

MR MAMASELA: Lt Nieuwoudt was busy hitting with that iron rod on the head.

MR BOOYENS: During the second assault?

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: Well I may be wrong, my impression was that you say that no instruments were used during the second assault, it was used during the first assault.

MR MAMASELA: No I didn't talk about, it was just, I said it was carried with more ferocity than the first one.

MR BOOYENS: My recollection is that you said Koole was strangling him, they were kicking him and jumping on top of him and so on.

MR MAMASELA: No..

MR BOOYENS: In any case the record will show what was said.

MR MAMASELA: The weapons were used, yes.

MR BOOYENS: During the period, I'm dealing with the second assault on Mr Hashe, during this period, what was Mr Hashe doing? Was he resisting or doing anything?

MR MAMASELA: He was severely injured, you could hear him murmur, he couldn't talk, he couldn't scream, his mouth was broken, his jaws were broken, he was just murmuring and you could see he was gargling as if he couldn't do anything.

MR BOOYENS: Ja but I don't understand how he could even gargle if somebody was busy strangling him.

MR MAMASELA: Let me strangle you and see whether you cannot gargle, you will gargle. Pshew this man, you think strangling a man is just strangling, he dies quickly, it's not as easy as all that.

MR BOOYENS: But, and that went on for twenty minutes?

MR MAMASELA: Yes even a chicken, when you cut it's neck, it can still jump.

MR MAMASELA: Mr Mamasela, why does your statement say, page 14, second paragraph that Koole asked him a question at about 10 o'clock, that was the stupid question, now it seems to us that the second assault now what you say is about one o'clock, two o'clock.

MR MAMASELA: No no the first assault started at about 10 o'clock, I said we started with a braaivleis, I started with making fire, we started with a braaivleis and then at about half past eight, nine o'clock people came in and then I went to fetch the old man and then during the interrogation Koole started with a ridiculous question and all that and that's where the whole thing started, I didn't say he started, Koole started asking him stupid questions at about 10 o'clock.

MR BOOYENS: Why does your statement say that?

MR MAMASELA: Where.

MR BOOYENS: Page 14, second paragraph.

MR MAMASELA: I think there's a...(intervention)

MR BOOYENS: Mistake.

MR MAMASELA: ..there's a mistake with the time, the assault started at 10 o'clock, you can hear even in my chief evidence, I elaborated that we started with a braaivleis first, we started eating breakfast and then I wanted to give them food, and I was told not to give them because they were going to die at any rate, it took time, it's not something that, and I mentioned a time that these people arrived at about half past seven to eight o'clock, so the real assault, the man that was first on, the assault started at about 10 o'clock. It didn't start with a ...(indistinct), this is in my chief in evidence even. I even mentioned that the second assault started at about 1300 hours, that's when the old man said, 'this man is asking me stupid questions'.

MR BOOYENS: You've stated that the 14 to 15 motor cars arrived the next day.

MR MAMASELA: Yes, the third day or the next day.

MR BOOYENS: Ja the third day is the next day after the assault.

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: You were there for only two, twice during daylight.

MR MAMASELA: Twice during daylight but three times during night time.

MR BOOYENS: Were you?

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: You spent three nights there?

MR MAMASELA: We were there on Wednesday night, we were there on Thursday night and we left Friday evening, Friday night.

MR BOOYENS: You see if you look at the bottom of your statement, you describe at approximately line 42 the following. 'We were told to take guard till the next morning so confirmation first had to be obtained that he was working for IS and the next morning between 07H30 and 08H00 more vehicles and the same people who were present at the previous interrogation were once again present. We waited for head of National Intelligence'. So here you basically say it was the same people group of people that were involved the previous day while they were waiting for the man from NIS.

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: You give no indication - well that would mean if it was the same group of people there would be four or five motor cars again as on the previous day.

MR MAMASELA: Yes

MR BOOYENS: And then the chief of NIS arrives apparently with approximately ten motor cars, a whole cavalcade.

MR MAMASELA: Ja that is so.

MR BOOYENS: I see, why didn't you explain it like that earlier on?

MR MAMASELA: No you didn't ask me that way earlier on.

MR BOOYENS: In fact you mention nothing whatsoever of the fact that this whole convoy arrived there with the man from NIS?

MR MAMASELA: No I explained during the examination with you, because in my statement if I had to mention everything, this statement will have been as thick as a bible.

MR BOOYENS: Yes Mr Mamasela. Now this man that you say was with the National Intelligence Service, was he introduced as such?

MR MAMASELA: Yes as the head of National Intelligence, yes.

MR BOOYENS: I presume the PE head of National Intelligence. Or do you mean the big wheel?

MR MAMASELA: I think it's PE, I will settle for PE yes.

MR BOOYENS: Okay was he introduced to all of you?

MR MAMASELA: To all of those who were there because we were anxiously waiting for him.

MR BOOYENS: And the, you say he spoke, this man from National Intelligence, he arrived there with his whole convoy and he spoke to Mr Godolozi.

MR MAMASELA: He first spoke to Col Venter and Nieuwoudt and others aside and then I overheard him say no, ons 'we're not going to miss him if he dies because he only gave us useless information'.

MR BOOYENS: Okay, no no, it's not necessary to repeat all that; and then he left?

MR MAMASELA: No he did not leave, I was requested by Col Venter to go with Piet Mogoai to fetch Godolozi and then we fetched Godolozi and this man from National Intelligence spoke with him for about 15/20 minutes..

MR BOOYENS: And then he left.

MR MAMASELA: And then apparently he left.

MR BOOYENS: And what happened to this 9 motor cars that arrived with him?

MR MAMASELA: Some left with him but a few of them remained behind.

MR BOOYENS: Did you think that they are the people that came with the man from National Intelligence?

MR MAMASELA: Yes yes yes.

MR BOOYENS: Were they introduced to you?

MR MAMASELA: No they were introduced to each other and I didn't even know, I didn't know their, I didn't concern myself so much about them.

MR BOOYENS: Were they NIS people or were they policemen?

MR MAMASELA: I cannot say, I do not recall whether they were NIS or policemen but they were part of the entourage that was there.

MR BOOYENS: Ja that entourage that arrived with the head of NIS.

MR MAMASELA: Yes yes.

MR BOOYENS: So some of his followers left and some of them remained behind?

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: And then the assault started again.

MR MAMASELA: The assault started for the first time, not again, for the first time on Mr Godolozi.

MR BOOYENS: No the assault on Godolozi was the first time but the assault in general, the assaults...(intervention)

MR MAMASELA: Started again in general yes.

MR BOOYENS: And these people that arrived with the head of NIS did they take part in this?

MR MAMASELA: I can't say yes or no, I didn't watch because I was busy helping to stifle the screams of Godolozi, I didn't watch but there were a lot of people beating and kicking and beating.

MR BOOYENS: But even if they didn't take part they were most certainly there.

MR MAMASELA: They were there yes.

MR BOOYENS: So how many people were there more than the previous day?

MR MAMASELA: In the assault? There were about I can say between six and eight people more.

MR BOOYENS: And the previous day, the number that came out of this four/five motor cars, how many were there?

MR MAMASELA: It's difficult to say how many, like I said before it was difficult, I didn't count them but there were just hordes of security policemen like I described, I feel comfortable to say there were quite a whole lot of them there.

MR MAMASELA: Well four of five cars, if you work on four people per vehicle there would have been about twenty of them.

MR MAMASELA: Ja but there were not that much, I couldn't say there were that much, I would simply say probably between 14 and 15, if I have to give a guess.

MR BOOYENS: And now the next morning another 8 get added so there are now 23 of them, between 20 and 25 of them.

MR MAMASELA: As some comes, like I said in my statement, as some comes other's were going in some cars, others were coming, others were going, there was a beehive of activity in the farm, it was not like people were converging all of them in one place as if they were watching a soccer match, no, others were coming, others were going.

MR BOOYENS: This is now while the assaults were going on.

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR MAMASELA: But you were too busy holding the peoples' mouths, how did you see that?

MR MAMASELA: I didn't hold for the whole day. Like I said sometimes I would jump away and stand aside, sometimes I would go and fetch water, then I see what is happening around me. It does not mean if you assault a person you are not aware of your environment area, what is happening.

MR BOOYENS: And you say this assault the next day lasted a very long time?

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: What was Mr Godolozi questioned about?

MR MAMASELA: Generally basically the same way as Mr Godolozi and Mr Galela were questioned about, his political actions, his activities in the ANC, his MK connections, DLB's, you know a lot of things.

MR BOOYENS: Did he give them any information?

MR MAMASELA: Not really because he was mainly concerned about asking for forgiveness and begging and praying that they must leave him.

MR BOOYENS: So not much was forthcoming.

MR MAMASELA: No, not to the best of my knowledge.

MR BOOYENS: But then none the less, if you can give us an estimate Mr Mamasela, how many times would you say, let's take for example Mr Godolozi, how many times would you say Mr Nieuwoudt hit him with that iron pipe?

MR MAMASELA: I did not count really, it was several times.

MR BOOYENS: Many times?

MR MAMASELA: Several times.

MR BOOYENS: Well it was over a period of 8 hours, not so?

MR MAMASELA: It was several times.

MR BOOYENS: And did he also scream?

MR MAMASELA: He screamed that's why I was busy helping to stifle his screams.

MR MAMASELA: And he was also hit by Beeslaar with a stick once again? Is that right?

MR MAMASELA: No, I did not see that one, it's probably the same assortment of weapons were used.

MR BOOYENS: You didn't see Beeslaar assaulting him with a stick.

MR MAMASELA: He might have hit him with a stick.

MR BOOYENS: No the question is you didn't see Beeslaar hitting him with a stick, he might have hit him, you don't know.

MR MAMASELA: No he did have a stick in his hand and he did beat, I would say he assaulted him also with a stick, yes. The stick was used on numerous occasions and for different purposes, yes.

MR BOOYENS: For what other purposes was the stick used?

MR MAMASELA: It was used to choke Mr Hashe by Beeslaar on the throat and it was used to beat up Mr Godolozi, so he used it as he felt. So I couldn't specifically say he did this, he did that but I know he was a stick wielder and then ...(indistinct) and Nieuwoudt was an iron pipe wielder.

MR BOOYENS: This statement that you made you made after you did the pointing out, is that correct?

MR MAMASELA: Pointing out of?

MR BOOYENS: Did you visit the scene and point things out to Lt de Jong?

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: All I want to know, you also pointed something out, was that before or after you made your statement?

MR MAMASELA: I can't recall.

MR BOOYENS: Now Mr Mamasela you are at present under a witness protection programme. Is that correct?

MR MAMASELA: I suppose, yes.

MR BOOYENS: And you are, you have told me on a previous occasion, you haven't applied for amnesty for anything?

MR MAMASELA: Yes that is correct.

MR BOOYENS: So your only hope of staying out of jail is that you give satisfaction to the evidence of the courts and they grant you indemnity against prosecution?

MR MAMASELA: That is not correct. That is absolutely balderdash it is not correct and you know it.

MR BOOYENS: What other possibility ...(intervention)

MR MAMASELA: I was with you in Durban when the judge himself said he can't grant me Section

MR BOOYENS: 204.

MR MAMASELA: 204 yes and I was happy. He said I must come and plead and beg him why he must give me that and I told him let justice be done and I didn't even go there, I didn't even send an attorney to him. So I'm not a man who's afraid of a jail or whatever, my contention is and always will be, let all perpetrators like myself be prosecuted and then and only then the State President must give the indemnity maybe after ten, twenty years as the State President wishes, grant them indemnity but the way the witch-hunting is going on, Dirk Coetzee get's amnesty, Mamasela doesn't it, so that one gets one, that one does not get it, it's witch-hunting and I don't want to be part and parcel of that.

MR BOOYENS: No I heard you say that.

MR BOOYENS: Have you ever given false evidence against anybody which caused the person to go to jail?

MR MAMASELA: The police used us and told us to lie in court, yes we did it and I explained that and I exposed that in a court of law, that I was forced by the police to tell lying statements and make lying statements against innocent people. I've said it, I'm on record of saying it.

MR BOOYENS: Yes you're also on record of first denying it and when it was pointed out to you that you had given evidence against somebody, then when you realised you were in a corner you came out with it, not so?

MR MAMASELA: No no no you are sucking through your thumb.

MR BOOYENS: Okay let's look at the record.

If the court will just bear with me Mr Chairman I should find it just now.

It appears at page 194 of the part of the Durban record. You were asked a question by Judge Combrink. The question was at line 10, 'Were you ever involved in giving such false evidence to implicate an accused falsely?' Your answer was , 'No no I was never involved'. Do you see that Mr Mamasela.

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: And then Mr Jansen asked you the very next question, do you know the name Lidian Kayegile? And then he went on, and then eventually you said that some of the evidence was false, some of it was true.

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: And then at the bottom of the page you say so you did in fact involve yourself in falsely incriminating somebody. So that is 20 lines further down.

MR MAMASELA: Ja that's because you can see for yourself even the person who was transcribing this could tell you that there was some hesitancy in me, I was thinking. You say did you do this, I will say no no wait I'm not sure, but then I say yes yes, it happened. It shows that I was thinking deeply and I did not want to lie to court that's why I had to rectify my statement in a court of law and say yes it did happen. It was not as if I was a cold blooded unblushing liar who said to the court no I didn't do it and I and I start to do my thing. If I can recall that that thing is like that and you give me and refresh my mind as the brilliant lawyer you are, I will admit, I'll say yes it happened.

MR BOOYENS: No this wasn't even my questions.

MR MAMASELA: No it's not your question, I'm giving you and example and an example is better than precepts.

MR BOOYENS: You see Mr Mamasela the point is that you say you hesitated now, why didn't you say well I can't remember, you gave an answer.

MR MAMASELA: No I said no no and then at a stage I said no I can recollect, yes I know Lilian Kelafile, the police told me to tell half lies half truth.

MR DE JAGER: Was that the only time that you gave false evidence or were there other occasions too?

MR MAMASELA: I don't think that was the only time Mr Chairman because the police in the Harms Commission and in the McNally Committee, I'm the one who came out on my own volition during the de Kock trial where I put the record straight.

MR DE JAGER: Was that the only time that you gave false evidence was against Mrs Kayegile?

MR MAMASELA: Mrs Kayegile and in the Harms Commission, we were told to lie and in the McNally Committee ...(intervention)

MR DE JAGER: And against other persons?

MR MAMASELA: Against other persons?

MR DE JAGER: Ja.

MR MAMASELA: It was again when I was helping Dirk Coetzee in the so-called IBA when ...(indistinct) told a lie that his handler, his superior, John...(indistinct), then I said yes I know that.

MR DE JAGER: Why I'm asking, you said it only occurred to you when you were reminded by the mentioning of the name of Mrs Kayegile that you realise that in that case I gave false evidence.

MR MAMASELA: Yes but in other cases I stated it myself Mr Chairman. I pointed it out.

MR DE JAGER: Now why in the beginning did you say no you didn't give false evidence?

MR MAMASELA: Where in the Lilian Kayegile's?

MR DE JAGER: When you were asked here in the Mxenge trial?

MR MAMASELA: No I was recalling, like as you can see the transcript, the man who took out the transcript, I said no no no, I could have said if I was a blatant unblushing liar, I could have just said no and kept quiet, but I said no no no and I recall. Then they said, do you remember Lilian Kayegile, then that refreshed my mind that the police said I must lie in that case, I told half truth and half lies and this is what I pointed out in the court of law, and the court of law never found me to be out to be a lying witness, they could have thrown the case out. That's why Dirk Coetzee was convicted.

MR BOOYENS: Are you saying Dirk Coetzee was convicted because of your evidence?

MR MAMASELA: Yes if I did not give evidence there Dirk Coetzee wouldn't have been charged even today. I've got the page judgement of the judge where he set out my evidence and he set out Dirk Coetzee's evidence and he compared the evidence with my evidence and and he gave judgement, therefore I contributed largely to the Dirk Coetzee's conviction. If there was no witness the judge couldn't crucify Dirk Coetzee with the statement, they had it for seven years, they couldn't charge him. It's only through the participation of this monster called Mamasela that he was convicted.

MR BOOYENS: Yes Mr Mamasela. Mr Chairman I see it's 4 o'clock, may this be an appropriate time, I've unfortunately got some ground to cover still?

CHAIRPERSON: I think let us proceed, we lost about 35 minutes this afternoon, let's go on for some time.

Mr Booyens can I ask one or two questions whilst you're busy trying to get yourself ready?

Mr Mamasela let us talk about the interrogation of these three gentlemen. To start with you were there and you were listening to all the questions that were being posed to them. Did appear to you that those who were asking the questions had concrete information as to the subversive activities they were allegedly involved in or was this just a general interrogation or maybe what one would call a fishing expedition?

MR MAMASELA: Thank you Mr Chairman, I think the appropriate way to use, I'll borrow it from you, it was merely a fishing expedition. As far as I'm concerned, they had no concrete evidence against these people, nothing.

CHAIRPERSON: You mentioned that Mr Galela and Mr Godolozi, I think Mr Hashe as well to a certain extent, I don't quite know what your evidence was precisely on that one, you said they mentioned some local names, names of people who were connected to Pebco, is that correct?

MR MAMASELA: That is absolutely correct My Lord.

CHAIRPERSON: Did it appear to you that these were people who were involved in activities which one could call military activities?

MR MAMASELA: With due respect Mr Chairman, I want to put this matter in it's proper perspective once and for all. There was absolutely nothing that can link even the deceased or let alone the members of the organisation to any military incursions in the country because those people mentioned the people who were mobilising and organising the civic matters with our people, these are civic organisations and that is all and they never mentioned weapons of warfare or whatever, there was nothing like that.

CHAIRPERSON: Is that the reason why you became disinterested in that of information?

MR MAMASELA: Absolutely Mr Chairman because I was trained in the African National Congress, I specialised in weapons of warfare and when somebody talks about school politics or he talks about committee politics, to me they don't interest me at all, I'm a revolutionary.

CHAIRPERSON: In terms of your task as I understand it at that particular time, you were interested in getting information leading to people who were involved in military activities?

MR MAMASELA: Yes Mr Chairman because that was part of my job description, to look for armed insurgents.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you Mr Mamasela. Okay Mr Basin.

MR MAMASELA: Thank you Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: But Mr Mamasela you didn't really know much about these people, for one thing the security branch in PE might have had files on these people which could have contained a lot more information about them.

MR MAMASELA: Yes my understanding was, even when these people were given this information Nieuwoudt himself was ecstatic and he was very angry about, he said they are giving him rubbish information, he does not want to know these people because he has their files, he wants armed ANC cadres, he wants their ANC cell, not local political stuff.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Booyens.

MR BOOYENS: Are you saying that Nieuwoudt wasn't interested in the local political stuff at all.

MR MAMASELA: Not interested, he had like he said himself, he had a lot of these people's files, so they mustn't tell him what he has, he wanted to know specifically the ANC contact at that particular time, he didn't care about the Pebco organisation at that stage, he wanted arms, he wanted DLB's, he wanted the names of MK cells, he was just getting interested in getting ANC cells, not local stuff because he said what they are telling him is what he already has in his office, so their information as far as I'm concerned it was useless, it was worthless because he never wrote. The only time I saw Nieuwoudt writing a statement was when Mr Hashe talked about 17 AK47's that are stashed at his sister's place because he, everybody became interested especially him because he wanted to know exactly where they're stored, how to go to go in there, and then what's happening and how he packed them, in what boxes in whatever shapes, he was very interested in that only and he jotted it down, the rest of the information these people were giving he didn't bother about it, he saw it as pieces of rubbish.

MR BOOYENS: Or he obviously knew the information.

MR MAMASELA: Yes this is what he said, he said they mustn't tell him what he already knows about these people.

MR BOOYENS: So all the information they were giving him, Nieuwoudt knew already?

MR MAMASELA: Most of it except the Ak47's.

MR BOOYENS: Except the AK's.

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: And so it was not the case that they were giving him rubbish information, they were giving him no new information.

MR MAMASELA: In his own opinion this is what he said, 'They are giving me rubbish, I am looking for your ANC contacts'.

MR DE JAGER: You changed now to Afrikaans, did he speak Afrikaans to them?

MR MAMASELA: No I think South Africa is land of 132 official languages, I was just expressing myself in Afrikaans Mr Chairman.

MR DE JAGER: No but you quoted Nieuwoudt as saying 'Moenie dit vir my gee nie ek het dit'.

MR MAMASELA: No he was speaking in English, I said it distinctively in Afrikaans.

MR BOOYENS: Did anybody, I presume you would prefer to go on English, did anybody speak Xhosa to them.

MR MAMASELA: No there was no Xhosa speaking policeman there.

MR BOOYENS: Was there some language difficulties at some stage?

MR MAMASELA: No these people, Nieuwoudt is very fluent in English especially the Bible aspect of it. He was quoting Bible from Alpha to Omega to these people and I was myself impressed by his knowledge of the Bible.

MR MAMASELA: So...(intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Booyens, I'm sorry I have to interrupt you but you know Mr Mamasela you must listen to yourself when you give evidence because I got the impression, when you spoke in Afrikaans, when you quoted Nieuwoudt or when you told us what Nieuwoudt is alleged to have said in Afrikaans, I thought you were quoting him and I actually was under the impression that at that moment Nieuwoudt was speaking Afrikaans because he was telling his colleagues in Afrikaans that these people are just giving me rubbish, they are telling me what I have, so I was definitely under the impression that you are quoting Nieuwoudt, now when a question was put in that regard, you went back to say no, you were not quoting Nieuwoudt, you just instinctively went back to testify in Afrikaans.

MR MAMASELA: Okay, no thanks.

CHAIRPERSON: What evidence are you giving us in this respect?

MR MAMASELA: No it came instinctively to me to speak in Afrikaans because I worked too much with these people for more than 50 years, they just like to talk in that lingua franc, that's why I was trying to express exactly how we talked in difficult system.

CHAIRPERSON: So you were not quoting to us what Nieuwoudt said to his colleagues in Afrikaans.

MR MAMASELA: No sir, my humble apologies Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Booyens.

MR BOOYENS: Thank you Mr Chairman. We've done the exercise now how many security policemen were there on the first day, not the evening, the first day and we arrived at a figure of I think some 12 or 14 you said. When I asked you earlier on and I was quoting from the board meeting, the II meeting, I quoted to you one specific sentence which read Mamasela claims that it was like a convention of Eastern Cape Security Police at Cradock when the three were brought in. And you agreed that that was your impression, you remember that?

MR MAMASELA: No I told you that statement is not mine, it's Dirk Coetzee's version which is put to me. I even told you that there are three of those statements, different statements and you only have one, that's why you quote me out of context. Get the other two and then you can get the whole thing in it's proper perspective.

MR BOOYENS: Mr Mamasela I took it sentence by sentence and that is one of the sentences that you said no that accords with your experience although it wasn't necessarily your words.

MR MAMASELA: No not the first day, that last day, that third day, they converged like that, not the first day.

MR BOOYENS: Well the sentence itself that I quoted to you, 'Mamasela claims that it was like a convention of Eastern Cape Security Police at Cradock when the three were brought in'. That doesn't sound like the second day to me.

MR MAMASELA: No to me it can either be the convention at that time of all these other policemen when they came on the third day, that was Wednesday, Thursday and then Friday when they came in, they converged in many cars, I think that statement is in reference to the time that the Chief of National Intelligence was coming in, thy converged. So that those people not conversant with the situation like yourself, that's why they quoted me out of context and I will never carry the blame for them.

MR BOOYENS: Yes.

CHAIRPERSON: Actually when you read that sentence to the witness my recollection is that Mr Booyens you laid your emphasis on the convention aspect of it and then you asked the witness this idea of convention tallies with your own version that a lot of people came together. You were not contrasting as to whether this was on the first day or the second day, you were speaking with regard to in particular the word convention and you said to him the idea of a convention tallies with yours, you actually put it to him and he tallies with your description that a lot of people came in.

MR MAMASELA: Yes, no I'm aware of that Mr Chairman, I mean...(intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: It's slightly different, I mean it's not exactly as you are putting it now.

MR MAMASELA: No the convention aspect that - but I quoted the entire sentence to him which contained in that sentence was when they were brought in, I read the sentence to him.

CHAIRPERSON: I thought the gist of what you were reading was the convention and not when they were brought in.

MR BOOYENS: Well maybe there was room for a misunderstanding.

CHAIRPERSON: Do you think we can adjourn now until tomorrow morning or is there something you want to tie up?

MR BOOYENS: Can I just tie up one aspect please Mr Chairman that I now started on? So as far as you are concerned you told me that already; on day one only PE and Cradock security policemen, the ten or 12, is that right?

MR MAMASELA: I beg your pardon?

MR BOOYENS: On day one there were only Cradock and PE security policemen in your impression.

MR MAMASELA: Yes not only, I said as far as I can recall.

MR BOOYENS: Yes as far as you can recall?

MR MAMASELA: As far as I can recall yes.

MR DE JAGER: And Vlakplaas.

MR BOOYENS: Yes no but Vlakplaas is sitting there in any case Mr Chairman, that wasn't an effort to mislead the witness. At some stage some people from Cape Town were introduced according to your evidence earlier this morning, some security branch members from Cape Town, that was on day 3.

MR MAMASELA: Yes I don't know whether it was day 3 or day 2, this is what I said in my chief in evidence, I was not sure of the day whether it was day 2 or day 3, it was in between these two days.

MR BOOYENS: Okay. Because quite frankly you didn't mention that group grew on on day 3 in your evidence in chief, but be that as it may. Because you see when you were speaking to Jacques Paauw, Exhibit R, My Lord, have you still got that in front of you Mr Mamasela?

MR MAMASELA: I can recall yes.

MR BOOYENS: Page 9, the first JP that you've got there is the question. 'What happened to the PEBCO 3? The PEBCO 3 were driven to the farm house that was turned into a police station a long time ago. It is no more used and they were driven there, they were put into what we call an animal sheds like a big long garage, put there for the evening but they were interrogated first and the first thing next morning about 9am the Joint security forces of Cape Town came in, that was Cape Town, Port Elizabeth and Cradock. They just came in, they started interrogating these people and the first person to be interrogated was Sipho Hashe'. You had no uncertainty when you were speaking to Jacques Paauw that there very next morning the joint security forces of Cape Town, PE and Cradock came in.

MR MAMASELA: No. You must understand that if you do a documentary for television it gets audited, somehow if he puts it, I don't know how they put it, it's not a straight forward comprehensive statement like I make in the police.

MR BOOYENS: Are you saying this was edited?

MR MAMASELA: Ja, that is my opinion.

MR BOOYENS: The tape we've got is in fact the unedited one.

MR MAMASELA: No I don't know about that, but it might refer about the third day where the convention of all these other groups I was talking about came in.

MR BOOYENS: Well I don't know how you're going to get past, first thing the morning at 9am.

MR MAMASELA: Ja the first thing at 9am, it can also refer to Friday morning, it can also refer to Thursday.

MR BOOYENS: Yes well let's then go back another sentence, 'they were put there for the evening but they were interrogated first and the first thing the morning at about 9am, and you still say you can still be referring to the third day as well'.

MR MAMASELA: There was one person who was still alive Thursday evening, that was Godolozi, he came out the following day, Friday morning and he was interrogated, so I don't what the trick is all about there because I am just telling the truth, I've made a statement under oath and what Jacques Paauw was interested in, he was posing questions like a journalist, not like a lawyer like yourself, not like a policeman will question me.

MR BOOYENS: Ja he just asked a very simple question, what happened and you told him. In any case...(intervention)

MR MAMASELA: Yes he wanted to know ...(indistinct).

MR DE JAGER: Could I just proceed there, you've given an explanation now or tried to give one, but let's proceed with the sentence, 'they were put there for the evening but they were interrogated first and the first thing the morning at about 9am the joint security forces of Cape Town came in, that was Cape Town, Port Elizabeth and Cradock'.

MR MAMASELA: Oh no I think that...(intervention)

MR DE JAGER: Okay Mr Mamasela but now you proceed, your own words. 'They just came in there and they started interrogating these people and the first person to be interrogated was Sipho Hashe',

MR MAMASELA: Yes.

MR DE JAGER: On the third day Hashe was dead.

MR MAMASELA: He was dead on the third day yes.

MR DE JAGER: So that couldn't have been the first day, and the third day, it must have been the second day.

MR MAMASELA: Yes like I said Mr Chairman, I want me to be understood well, if you give evidence or you give a story to journalist, it's not like giving an affidavit to a policeman. A journalist only wants to know what, he does not want to know who was killed first and then who was killed second and he does not want the details, he wants to know what happened, and then quickly you say and then he passes, he comes into another question, what happened. It's just like that so I cannot be held responsible for the constraints of the journalist, he was fighting against the constraints, he did not want to waste time with me, just wants to pose the question and then he got a quick answer, he jumped to another question, it's not like here where I'm given the time to recall, to recollect and to give a proper version of what happened Mr Chairman. I think the whole context of that statement must be seen in that scenario; not that I was lying or I'm lying here.

MR BOOYENS: Or perhaps as you said in the trial, Paauw wanted sensation and I gave him sensation, you remember that?

MR MAMASELA: You see this is what he said, he, the first visual materials he brought them back, he said they were not sensational enough, they were not powerful, he wanted something that will captivate the minds of the audience; this is what he said.

MR BOOYENS: So you were prepared to help Paauw and you lied on National Television.

MR MAMASELA: Not lied.

MR BOOYENS: Exaggerated.

MR MAMASELA: No if you make propaganda, propaganda is not lies, it is, they treat the truth, it is not lies, you just use the truth and that's propaganda.

MR BOOYENS: Well that's an interesting definition of propaganda, thank you.

MR MAMASELA: That's true, you can come with your definition and challenge mine.

MR BOOYENS: Thank you Mr Chairman, I'm sorry I kept you longer.

CHAIRPERSON: I think we should go into this a little bit more and clear it. Mr Booyens I just lost the point here about a group coming in, they joined forces coming in the second or the - what is the point of this?

MR BOOYENS: Well the point is...(intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: I don't want to miss this interesting aspect.

MR MAMASELA: Yes, no the point is that he tells us now he doesn't know about the Cape Town people, the whole group coming in, but he said to Jacques Paauw that the joint security forces came in on this specific day and it's clear from the context of this sentence that he must be speaking about that first morning.

CHAIRPERSON: Which is the second day.

MR MAMASELA: Yes I think we must talk about evenings and mornings, otherwise we're going to get ourselves confused, this is the first morning because it is the morning when Hashe, they arrived the evening ...(intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: No but each day has both morning and evening.

MR MAMASELA: Yes I think I'll get myself into a - it's day two. They came in the previous evening according to this paragraph.

CHAIRPERSON: That's day one.

MR BOOYENS: Very well, day one.

MR BOOYENS: Day two first thing they were put there for evening but they interrogated first and first thing the morning at about 9am, now there's still some room for manoeuvring here to say it's day 3 but not when you read

the last sentence, 'they just came in, they started interrogating these people and the first person to be interrogated was Sipho Hashe', because then it must be day 2 on his evidence.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes and now then comes my problem, is the witness to the extent that you were able to understand him? Is the witness saying that this being of members of security branch from Cape Town whatever, or call them security forces, is this evidence that they came on the third day?

MR BOOYENS: Mr Chairman I understand that...(intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: Because otherwise I wouldn't what the dispute was, what the problem is about?

MR BOOYENS: Yes that's the way I understood him.

CHAIRPERSON: Well I thought many people came together with the

MR MAMASELA: NIS?

CHAIRPERSON: Well alright, let me leave it at that point and ask the witness, let me not give evidence.

Mr Mamasela, when did the many people come, the second day or the third day as far as you can remember?

MR MAMASELA: They converged as far as I can remember on Friday morning which will be

CHAIRPERSON: The third day.

MR MAMASELA: The third day yes.

CHAIRPERSON: Now you were referred to your interview on television, there as far as I can read this it is quite clear that if you are referring to the same incident it happened on the second day.

MR MAMASELA: Yes that is where the mistake comes in because I was talking to Jacques Paauw as a journalist and I said the people came in, they converged in and then it was just misrepresented as though it was the second day, it was the third day.

CHAIRPERSON: Now what I want to know from you clearly and unambiguously, what I want to hear from you is whether, what, you made a mistake here.

MR MAMASELA: I made a mistake there yes Mr Chairmen, that is what I was telling Mr Booyens.

CHAIRPERSON: But I got the impression that you were a bit reluctant to admit that you made a mistake.

MR MAMASELA: No I said that's what I tend to elaborate that I was telling Mr Chairman here, that if you give a story to a journalist, he has time constraints, he has this, he pushes you fast and he jumps on a lot of questions, even if you make a mistake you can't recall it, it is already recorded, that's why I said I missed a genuine mistake.

CHAIRPERSON: Alright now we know that you are saying that you made a mistake here.

MR MAMASELA: Definitely Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: Did you want to clear up something in that regard?

MR BOOYENS: No thank you Mr Chairman, I've heard what the witness said.

CHAIRPERSON: Could we start at 9 o'clock in the morning? 9 o'clock tomorrow morning, thank you.

COMMITTEE ADJOURNS: .