Amnesty Hearings — Johannesburg — 1998-10-15

MR PRINSLOO: I respectfully submit Mr Chairman, that it was not the decision of the applicant in the first instance, to destroy the weapon.  It was somebody else's decision.  It cannot be placed before the applicant, but in as far as someone else's decision is concerned, in order to destroy that weapon, the circumstances dictated to what to be done.
	Their decision was to get rid of it unless to be detected, because the applicant had to go to hospital.  Surely if you end up in hospital, it would come out that you had been shot.  It would be the duty of the Doctor to report it and that is what happened.  He was then detected.
	Will you then retain that?  There is no evidence with respect Mr Chairman, exactly when this weapon was thrown away.  There is no direct evidence as to who the decision was taken by.  It appears to be by Van Rensburg or somebody, or Van Schalkwyk, and it was then carried out by Van Zyl.

CHAIRPERSON: Flippie Maree is the one  that advised the third applicant to dispose of this thing.

MR PRINSLOO: So it was taken by someone else, that decision.  How can that then be placed before the door of the applicants, if they get instructions from somebody high up and say look, this weapon you must destroy, get rid of it.
	We are going to be arrested, and in doing that, obviously the organisation will be found out in that way, isn't that a reasonable decision taken?  That is something with respect Mr Chairman, that cannot be placed before the door of the applicant that I represent.  That is my submission in that regard.

CHAIRPERSON: Have you any other submissions Mr Prinsloo?

MR PRINSLOO: In so far as the question as to why it is not mentioned or recognised that a deed was committed, should that aspect arise, I would like to refer you to the judgment of the Amy Biehl case where nobody at all, accepted accountability.  In the case of the St James church, I would like to refer you to that specific judgment on page 2 of the judgment.
	It was contended by the objectors that the attack on St James was not an APLA or PAC operation as it was denied by APLA's Director of Information, Majosi - at a time inferred that Barney Desaai of the PAC had at that time, accused the Third Force of mischievously connecting the attack to a PAC military wing in order to derail negotiations which were then under way and to which the PAC was a participant.
	In considering this contention, we had to be mindful of the fact that many political parties on the liberation movements, might have denied any involvement in any incident, because they might have considered it strategically important and politically wise and expedient to do so and that accordingly the alleged utterances must be viewed against the political background that existed at the time.
	In our view, it was of cardinal importance in the fact that both the PAC and APLA have acknowledged in their submissions to the TRC in 1996 and 1997 respectively, that the St James attacks was one of the authorised operations carried out by APLA.
	With respect, the issue is that at the time of the committing of this deed at the St James church, there was no - this is also apparent in the Amy Biehl case.  In the current case, the applicant has stated that there were methods and what prevented him from doing anything, was the fact that he was hospitalised, and furthermore that it was conveyed to Gen Van Rensburg, who took this up with his command structure, the person in command of the structure, Andrew Ford and that they took over the situation.
	It is clear that this action was approved by the organisation.

CHAIRPERSON: And I think that your client said that he was arrested within a couple of days.

MR PRINSLOO: With respect, it is my argument that the applicant has complied with all the prerequisites of the Act and as I have argued that the applicant under these circumstances, should be granted amnesty.  It is my wish that the Committee would exercise its discretion in that regard.
	If there is anything else, I will be willing to address you on these matters.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you Mr Prinsloo.  Mr Coetzee?

MR COETZEE: Thank you Chairperson.  I don't know until what time the Committee will be in session.  I think that I will need about 20 minutes for my address.

CHAIRPERSON: Unless there is a definite problem, I would like to conclude the arguments.  I wouldn't like to incur another day's expenses.