Vlakplaas

... crucial aspects such as who was the man who pulled the trigger. Van Rensburg, Du Plessis, Erasmus and Roth all insist that it was a Sgt Roy Otto of Vlakplaas. Dirk Coetzee denies this and Sgt Otto has since committed suicide. The former Vlakplaas boss says the murder was committed in November, ...

... of the whore.’ These were the words security policeman Dirk Coetzee used exactly seven years ago to describe his role as the commander of the Vlakplaas death squad. And this week Coetzee and two of his colleagues told their horror stories to the nation. They were in the heart of the whore. ...

the ANC underground in Botswana. But the SADF raid was by no means as surgical as the SADF claimed. In his recent court case the former commander of Vlakplaas, Eugene de Kock testified that the commandoes involved in the raid were not able to bring back any evidence that those they killed had in ...

... Sowetan. And this one is by Peter Marshe and appeared in Beeld. We translated the words from Afrikaans. So they say they didn”t know much. Former Vlakplaas commanders Dirk Coetzee and Eugene de Kock are already on record saying they had no doubt that Vlok knew exactly what Vlakplaas did. The ...

... who reluctantly admitted that the suspected ANC cell had been infiltrated. Then, he even more reluctantly agreed that the infiltrators were Vlakplaas askaris. The infiltrators had informed them of the planned attack. The police and the Vlakplaas operatives then planned their strategy for ...

PW Botha knew about Vlakplaas and its evil mission. Cabinet ministers Louis le Grange and Adriaan Vlok knew. Police commissioners Johan Coetzee and Johan van der Merwe knew, in fact it was their idea. The last National Party president, FW de Klerk says he did not know. When he appeared before the ...

So much has been said about Vlakplaas, so much has been written about the place and this is the very first thing that a tangible thing that we can say we have discovered on Vlakplaas, Brian Ngqulunga’s remains, which were exhumed today.

The existence of Vlakplaas was exposed by Dirk Coetzee and Almond Nofemela in a Vrye Weekblad interview in November 1989. It was met with flat denials from generals and police officers. These lies were repeated under oath to the Harms Commission of Inquiry into state death squads. Vlakplaas was ...

The Truth Commission can, according to the Act of Parliament that governs them, investigate the gross human rights violations perpetrated by Vlakplaas, but there are other apartheid practices that did even more damage to generations of our people that cannot be narrowly defined as individual human ...

... in 1989. One wonders if we would have had a Truth Commission now if it hadn’t been for the ball that he started rolling. Coetzee and two of his Vlakplaas colleagues, David Tshikalanga and Almond Nofemela will start retelling their stories in Durban this coming week when their applications for ...

... criminal responsibility and I think one could actually question that. The whole concept of vicarious liability, the putting into place things like Vlakplaas, the CCB, where you must have a sense that things can go horribly wrong. Now I think that’s what we would like to get an answer on. // I ...

... and soldiers like assassinations, torture and massacres? And, did they know of these violations committed by the security police and units such as Vlakplaas and the CCB? So far, politicians and generals, including former state president FW de Klerk have said they never ordered anything illegal ...

... the five amnesty applicants did get the chance to give evidence about some of their other actions. In 1983 Brigadier Jack Cronje led an attack of Vlakplaas men into Swaziland. They executed the ANC military commander in Natal, Zweli Nyanda and an ANC soldier, Keith MacFadden. Nyanda was the ...

... questions and we offer some explanations. We also go to Paarl where the NG Kerk made an emotional confession and we talk to a former commander of Vlakplaas. But we start in Pietermaritzburg. ...

... bad. // During the first sitting of the Truth Commission in East London last month he was already implicated in torture. In the same week, former Vlakplaas assassin Joe Mamasela confessed on this programme his complicity in the kidnapping, torture and murder of three Eastern Cape activists in ...

General JJ Viktor is a much decorated South African policeman with 45 years of service behind him. Amongst other achievements he founded the base at Vlakplaas in 1979. In September 1992 he was head of the Ciskei Police Force. // My men and I don’t reflect on the CDF. I was not their commander. My ...

Wouter Mentz cries easily. He was the one applicant who showed signs of emotional distress while testifying. After being part of the murder of fellow Vlakplaas policeman, Brian Ngqulunga he was ordered to attend the funeral. I simply couldn’t bring myself to attend the funeral, it was too much ...

... story of the brutal execution of nine people and the elaborate lies fabricated by the state. A story of the men who never took prisoners, the Vlakplaas death squad. Last week in Durban a mother asked the Truth Commission why was my child mowed down in a hay of bullets on that night in June ...

... the last time the embattled nationalist government used the strategy of cross-border raids. The forthcoming amnesty hearings, especially those of Vlakplaas policemen, may give us a clearer picture of who did what, where despite the fact that the Truth Commission can’t indemnify people for ...

... with a pistol. I looked away because I could not handle it. I cannot remember exactly how it happened, but it was arranged that he’d be buried at Vlakplaas and his entire family was there and De Kock gave instruction that everyone was to attend the funeral. I simply couldn’t bring myself to ...