Amnesty Hearings — Mmabatho — 1998-09-21

UNKNOWN: The evidence you have given in chief, all that evidence, did you also give that to the lawyers of human rights?

ONTLAMETSE BERNSTEIN MENYATSOE: May you please repeat your question, Sir.

CHAIRPERSON: Perhaps if you could just explain what evidence in chief is to the witness when you put him the question, Mr Van Der Berg.  He might not understand the term.

UNKNOWN: Mr Menyatsoe, when you initially gave your evidence before any cross-questioning actually took place, all that information which you have given to the Commission, before the cross-questioning started.  All that information, did you also give that to the lawyers of human rights?

ONTLAMETSE BERNSTEIN MENYATSOE: That is correct.

UNKNOWN: You also took an oath at the Tebbutt Commission on 6th May 1997, is that correct?

ONTLAMETSE BERNSTEIN MENYATSOE: I did not take an oath.

UNKNOWN: Sir, do you remember that proceedings took place on the 10th May in front of the Tebbutt Commission, you were there, were you not?

ONTLAMETSE BERNSTEIN MENYATSOE: Will you please repeat your question?  There are those I remember, there are those I do not remember.

UNKNOWN: Mr Menyatsoe, you took an oath and gave an affidavit to the Tebbutt Commission with regards to exactly what happened on the day of the 10th May when you shot these people, is that correct.

MOKOTEDI MPSHE: Mr Chairman, perhaps to assist my learned friend, the applicant did not testify before the Tebbutt Commission.  They only tabled an affidavit which was read into the record.  He was never subjected to any cross-examination, nor testimony.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes I see from page 26 of the papers that you've been speaking about, an affidavit, but here it talks about a statement being read, I don't know if it was ...(intervention)

MOKOTEDI MPSHE: It is the statement.

CHAIRPERSON: Is it an affidavit?

MOKOTEDI MPSHE: It was a statement, Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes but affidavits are also statements, but was it a sworn statement or not?

UNKNOWN: Mr Chairman, this was not a sworn statement.  This was not an affidavit, it is a statement that was handed in to the Commission.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you Mr Hendrickse.

UNKNOWN: Mr Menyatsoe, the statement which you then made to the Tebbutt Commission, was that the truth or was it not the truth?

ONTLAMETSE BERNSTEIN MENYATSOE: That is the truth.

UNKNOWN: So in the information contained in there is the truth, is that correct?

ONTLAMETSE BERNSTEIN MENYATSOE: I have explained that it is the truth.

UNKNOWN: Did you also explain to the Tebbutt Commission precisely what you have still explained to the Commission today before the cross-questioning today started, that means, your evidence in chief.  Did you also say exactly the same to the Tebbutt Commission?

ONTLAMETSE BERNSTEIN MENYATSOE: Can you shorten your questions so that I will be able to understand what you want from that question.

UNKNOWN: Mr Menyatsoe, everything you said today in your evidence in chief, did you convey it in the same way in that statement you made to the Tebbutt Commission?

ONTLAMETSE BERNSTEIN MENYATSOE: I have explained that.

UNKNOWN: My question is very simple, all the information you have given today, did you give them the same information, the Tebbutt Commission that is?  Did you give them the same information?

UNKNOWN: Mr Chairman, maybe my learned friend can just say that this was a statement that was handed in and the applicant did not testify personally before the Tebbutt Commission.  He should not confuse the two issues.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes, perhaps you can make it clear then.  I think the question that you putting, Mr Van Der Berg is, the contents of that statement which was handed in to the Tebbutt Commission, is that the same as your evidence in chief that you have given today?  Is that the question you are asking?

UNKNOWN: That is correct.

ONTLAMETSE BERNSTEIN MENYATSOE: I have already explained that.

CHAIRPERSON: What, what, could you just explain again.  Was it the same or did it differ?

ONTLAMETSE BERNSTEIN MENYATSOE: They are the same.

UNKNOWN: So you agree that since the incident took place on the 11th March 1994, when the first admission on the 6th May of 1997, was already finished, is that correct?

ONTLAMETSE BERNSTEIN MENYATSOE: Can you please repeat your question.  Can you please repeat your question, Sir.

UNKNOWN: Sir, it is easy, on the 6th of May, you made a statement in which you said that you shot at three AWB members, is that correct?  And it is in  that statement was made on the 6th May, 1997, is that correct?  And that is in front of the Tebbutt Commission.  That is the first time you have said in public that you shot the AWB people.

ONTLAMETSE BERNSTEIN MENYATSOE: Yes.

UNKNOWN: But since the incident took place, up until the time you actually came to the front, that is three years, because the incident took place in March 1994 and only in May 1997 did you come and say that you have done it.

ONTLAMETSE BERNSTEIN MENYATSOE: What is your question?

UNKNOWN: Why did it take such a long time, why did three years lapse before you came to apply for amnesty?  Why did it take you so long to admit to what you have done?

ONTLAMETSE BERNSTEIN MENYATSOE: I have explained firstly that I told you that a person does what he likes at his own time.  Secondly, my feelings at that, my feelings came at that time that I should reveal my responsibility to the incident.

UNKNOWN: But in the mean time you were aware of the fact that Sergeant Nare was falsely accused of murder and you sat back for three years with out you came forward with the truth.

ONTLAMETSE BERNSTEIN MENYATSOE: That mistake which happened to Sergeant Nare, according to the investigations which were done, he was identified at the identification parade.  That is not my mistake that he was falsely accused for these murders.  He was identified there in my absence.  I did not know even know the place of the identification parade.  That is not my responsibility that he was found guilty.  That problem lies with that person who identified him, not me.  That is not my problem.  I did not identify him.  The person responsible is the one who identified him at the identification parade.

UNKNOWN: You see, Mr Menyatsoe, the problem I have got today is that in your evidence in chief you said that you have absolute regret about the fact that Nare was prosecuted falsely but this doesn't work because you took three years before you applied for amnesty.  So you did not have any regret when he was falsely prosecuted and accused.

ADV SIGODI: Mr Van Der Berg, excuse me.  You know for the purposes of this Committee, does it really matter when the applicant lodged his application, as long as it was before the cut-off date?  Does it, what is the relevance of it if he didn't apply earlier, if it took him three years to apply, more than three years?  Because all we want to know is whether the act was an act associated with a political objective and if he has made a full disclosure in regard to this act.  If we could just confine our questions to those two aspects as laid down by the act.  That he didn't apply maybe something you could deal with in another forum, not in this forum.

ADV MOTATA: And again, Mr Van Der Berg, if I may come in here.  It wouldn't be entirely correct to say it took him three years because the act which has brought us here was in 1995 and he applied in 1997, so it is not entirely correct that it took him three years to apply.