Amnesty Hearings — Cape Town — UNKNOWN

MR BOOYENS: Now, this chief that you met is Mr Myengeni?  Is that correct?

JIMMY MBANE: It's Yamile.

MR BOOYENS: Did you know Myangeni at all?  Or Myengeni?

JIMMY MBANE: I said I know Yamile.

MR BOOYENS: The question is do you know Mr Myengeni. Mr Mbane, please listen to my questions and try to answer them.

JIMMY MBANE: No, there is no such person.

MR BOOYENS: But, not only does that appear in paragraph 25 of your Johannesburg statement, but I distinctly recall that I asked you whether you met Chief Myengeni during cross examination and you confirmed it.  Now you say that you don't know somebody like that.  What is the position?

JIMMY MBANE: I am talking about Chief Yamile, not Chief Myengeni.  I told you once before that there are wrong names used in this statement.  Instead of Yamile, they wrote Myengeni.

MR BOOYENS: Yes, I accept that.  But I used the wrong name Myangeni during cross examination and I asked whether that was the Chief that you met, and you said yes.

JIMMY MBANE: I know Yamile.  I don't know Myengeni.  Those names are wrongly spelled and that's one of the mistakes done.

MR BOOYENS: Now, let us deal - what made you pick these four youngsters.  Why them?  You had their photographs and so on, but they were obviously not activists.  Why did you carry on with them?

JIMMY MBANE: I was following orders.

MR BOOYENS: Very well.	What was the purpose of training these people?

JIMMY MBANE: For ammunition purposes, military purposes.

MR BOOYENS: Yes, but...no, they received military training, but what were they supposed to do?  Why were the police wanting to train people that knew nothing?

JIMMY MBANE: They are the right persons to answer that question, I was just following orders.  They would be the ones to tell you, the police.

MR BOOYENS: Because, obviously if I understand you correctly, the intention to attack the police vehicle only came from within the group, after you had finished training them.  Is that right?

JIMMY MBANE: Yes, that's correct.

MR BOOYENS: So, for no apparent reason the police wanted you to train a number of completely untrained people and make them far more dangerous than they were before.  Is that what you are saying?

JIMMY MBANE: What I am saying is that I was following orders.  Instructions.  I was instructed to train these people and when I reported that these people are untrained and harmless and there's only one who is locally trained.
	But because this person is trained then you rather take over the training and assist him in training them, and that's exactly what I did.

MR BOOYENS: And you took over the complete training?
	In fact you expanded the group to nine.  Is that right?

JIMMY MBANE: That's correct.

MR BOOYENS: On whose instructions did you enlarge the group?

JIMMY MBANE: I started with four and the fifth one was Rasta, and Rasta brought his own people and these boys also had their own friends that they brought in to join.  I didn't have anything against that.

MR BOOYENS: Did you inform your superiors that you were even training more people now that could attach the police?  You were now having eight completely untrained ones that you were going to turn into fairly lethal enemies. 	You informed Bellingan and Liebenberg of that.

JIMMY MBANE: Yes, I told them.

MR BOOYENS: And they were happy about that?

JIMMY MBANE: I don't know whether that made them happy or not.

MR BOOYENS: Well, they didn't try to stop you, did they?

JIMMY MBANE: They never did.

MR BOOYENS: Now...you then did say in one of your statements that you eventually - Mr de Kock came down and you reported to him that you had nine trained people.  Is that right?

JIMMY MBANE: Yes, he knew.

MR BOOYENS: And, did you tell Mr de Kock that you had trained these people, that they knew nothing from the beginning your trained a bunch of complete rookies?

JIMMY MBANE: I told him that there are people that I have trained and that they are nine in numbers.  And they smoke dagga, and therefore I must buy them food and he gave me a box of dagga and money to give to them.

MR BOOYENS: Yes, that strangely enough is correct in your statement in Johannesburg.  That you made in Johannesburg.  That statement that you made just now.  They didn't make a mistake there.  Is that right?

JIMMY MBANE: That's correct.

MR BOOYENS: So is the information about the informers that you killed, is correct in your Johannesburg statement?

JIMMY MBANE: That's correct.

MR BOOYENS: So is the information in your Johannesburg statement correct about the fact that you met the man who might have recognised you and that you killed him?

JIMMY MBANE: That's correct.

MR BOOYENS: The information contained in your statement about - I'm just very briefly dealing with it, without going into detail.  You also give detail in your Johannesburg statement of you joining Paul van Wyk's statement and of operations in Swaziland.  Is that information contained in the Johannesburg statement therein correct?

JIMMY MBANE: They sent me papers to come to the Cape Town seven, so I am not sure whether I will be able to answer your question.

MR BOOYENS: Have you gone through your full statement that you made in Johannesburg before you came into this Commission?

JIMMY MBANE: I saw this statement in Cape Town. They sent me papers regarding the Guguletu 7 issue, and I didn't read the rest of the things, other things.

MR BOOYENS: So to this moment, you don't know whether these statements, the other stories in here are correct. Is that correct?

JIMMY MBANE: That I am not aware of yet.  As I have already said, what I am here for is the Guguletu 7 issue, and the papers that I received in order to appear in front of this Commission was to address specifically the Guguletu 7 issue, not everything that appears on that statement.

MR BOOYENS: When did you receive the papers in connection with the Guguletu 7 issue?

JIMMY MBANE: I received them somewhere in 1997.

MR BOOYENS: Before last time when you came down to Cape Town?  That was in November.

JIMMY MBANE: I cannot recall, but sometime last year, because I had just come back from Zimbabwe and I found them at home.

MR BOOYENS: Well did you have the Guguletu papers with you when you came down to Cape Town last year, for the hearing that was postponed.

JIMMY MBANE: I don't remember whether I had them or not.

MR BOOYENS: Who was the first person that you mentioned to that the Johannesburg statement about the Guguletu 7 was incorrect?

JIMMY MBANE: If it was not Fanie, it was Pule, but I just cannot recall all of them.

MR BOOYENS: Fanie and Pule are Johannesburg people.

JIMMY MBANE: I don't know whether they are from Gauteng, but they are the ones who picked me up from my house and took me to Gauteng.

MR BOOYENS: Yes.  Who in Cape Town was the first person that you mentioned to that your Johannesburg statement was incorrect?

JIMMY MBANE: The first person I told about this statement.  It was Khoisan.

MR BOOYENS: I see.  And was that after you read your statement and realised there was something wrong with it?

JIMMY MBANE: That's correct.

MR BOOYENS: Did you read it yourself?

JIMMY MBANE: Yes, I read it.

MR BOOYENS: So you had no problems reading English?

JIMMY MBANE: I don't have a problem with English.

MR BOOYENS: And why did you go to Mr Khoisan?  Why not to my learned colleague, Ms Patel?  She was the evidence leader.

JIMMY MBANE: Khoisan is the one who came where I am staying and delivered the papers that were instructing me to appear here.  I did not know Ms Patel.  The person who delivered the papers was Khoisan.	Nothing stated that I should contact Ms Patel.

MR BOOYENS: But how did you know it was Mr Khoisan.  I thought you were in Zimbabwe.

JIMMY MBANE: It was written at the back, because I got papers from my daughter and the note said that I must go and meet Mr Khoisan.  Ms Patel's name did not appear on those papers, only Mr Khoisan.