Vlakplaas

... On Friday Mamasela dropped a bombshell in an interview with a weekly paper ‘New Nation.’ He said five senior ANC ministers were on the Vlakplaas payroll between 1981 and 1993. He was their pay master and they were even flown in by military helicopters to Vlakplaas to be paid and ...

We were instructed to make it look like a robbery. // Who instructed you? // Brigadier van der Hofen. A hunting knife was brought down from Vlakplaas, I can’t recall whether we bought the other okapi knives in Durban or whether that also came from Vlakplaas. I got a report back from him that ...

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 ...

... 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, ...

... 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 ...

Eugene de Kock rejected it. I was actually living on Vlakplaas. Williamson didn’t know I was living on Vlakplaas at that time. As soon as he left, Eugene called me and said the guy has just been here and asked me to kill you. And he told him that if he wanted to kill me he should do it. But ...

... the man who was called ‘Prime Evil’ by his own colleagues. During his seven year reign of terror as commander of the police death squad at Vlakplaas, Eugene Alexander de Kock killed, bombed and tortured with conviction and enthusiasm. He has already been convicted for multiple murder and ...

... both particularly in the South African expatriate community – you know we have information about hoteliers who gave free accommodation to Vlakplaas, we have information on restauranteurs who would give free meals to Vlakplaas operatives. It’s not an entirely one sided story, it’s a ...

... are disappointing to say the least. Venter has not furnished this Committee with any information in addition to the revelations made by the Vlakplaas operatives outside of this Commission. In fact he has not even associated himself with the allegations made by these operatives. ...

Joe Mamasela. Joe Tsele’s sister was not the first witness before the Truth Commission to ask about this man who has admitted to being part of the killing of more than 30 activists. Mamasela was one of the black policemen at Vlakplaas called askaris. So was Brian Ngqulunga.

... 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 ...

What difference does it make when a perpetrator does seem to be genuinely remorseful? In the 1980s Eugene de Kock was the commander at the notorious Vlakplaas and one of the security police’s most powerful and efficient operatives. He is now serving life plus 212 years in Pretoria Central Prison. ...

... and he landed on his head. The brain injury he suffered could not be explained away. Colonel Nick van Rensburg called in the expertise of the then Vlakplaas commander, Dirk ...

... Fourie would like to see him explain his government’s education policy to the TRC. // We’re trying to bring Vlok forward or Malan forward about Vlakplaas and about a range of different specific killings. But one of the most dampening/damning effects of education was the apartheid regime, PW ...

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 ...

... know De Kock, he’s a big guy with a big torso. He jumped several times in the face of Ngqulunga. Ngqulunga told him that he wanted to get out of Vlakplaas, he wanted to go and work at Fortis, at the head office and he didn’t want people to run away from him. Brian was a family friend; he was ...

... around the Bisho massacre where Oupa Gqozo at last gave evidence and the Truth Commissioners clashed publicly and emotionally with the former Vlakplaas policemen. // Your callousness, your coldness and insensitivity shows us the kind of leaders that the South African government chose. // No ...

Swaziland was perhaps the country that suffered most in the 1980s when Vlakplaas and other security police units raided it year after year.

Vlok used to come there, Commissioner van der Merwe used to come there, Kriel used to come there, Hernus Kriel used to come there at Vlakplaas, a lot of ministers used to come there.

Schoon told the TRC that he’d never been disciplined for authorizing actions of an illegal nature and said that former Commissioners and Ministers of police such as Louis Le Grange, Adriaan Vlok, Johan van der Merwe and Johan Coetzee had all visited Vlakplaas.