Amnesty Hearings — Port Elizabeth — 1997-10-01

ADV POTGIETER: Thank you.

ADV DE JAGER: But Van Rensburg knew the people so weren't
these names mentioned to him?

EUGENE ALEXANDER DE KOCK: No, no names or incidents were mentioned at Van Rensburg's house.

ADV DE JAGER: But were these members that had to be eliminated, were those names mentioned?

EUGENE ALEXANDER DE KOCK: I think Van Rensburg would have known those names, but not me.

ADV DE JAGER: My question is, were those names mentioned there?

EUGENE ALEXANDER DE KOCK: No, I have no recollection of any names being mentioned.
CROSS-EXAMINATION BY MR BOOYENS
	Thank you, Mr Chairman, I have got questions, on behalf of the applicants Van Rensburg, Nieuwoudt and Lotz.  Mr De Kock, on page 7 of your application, you say the following.

EUGENE ALEXANDER DE KOCK: Just one moment, please.

MR BOOYENS: Certainly.  Do you have the page?

EUGENE ALEXANDER DE KOCK: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: You say you have been involved in many incidents and operations - that was in the second paragraph from the bottom.  And, important that it was physically impossible to remember every incident, especially, even if I took some care.   You say this is still the position?

EUGENE ALEXANDER DE KOCK: That is correct.

MR BOOYENS: Regarding your evidence, I draw the inference that one of the considerations why you decided to give evidence against the people in the Motherwell trial, that the catalyst was Van Rensburg applied for a court interdict that his name should not be mentioned.  Is that correct?

EUGENE ALEXANDER DE KOCK: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: You associate that with the fact that it was the generals who were busy to run away.

EUGENE ALEXANDER DE KOCK: Not that they were seen in that environment, not whether they were running, they did run.

MR BOOYENS: Figuratively speaking?

EUGENE ALEXANDER DE KOCK: No, literally.

MR BOOYENS: They were running away from something for which they should assume responsibility.

EUGENE ALEXANDER DE KOCK: That is correct.

MR BOOYENS: I draw the inference that from your whole application and you can correct me, that you are bitter against the general staff and politicians.  You feel that you are in the position you are in now, because these people sold you out.

EUGENE ALEXANDER DE KOCK: Yes, it is correct to a certain degree. I am also disillusioned.

MR BOOYENS: What is it correct to a certain degree; that you are embittered and that you are disillusioned?

EUGENE ALEXANDER DE KOCK: One would have expected they would have had the integrity and the backbone to stand up and take responsibility.  Instead of that, they went along, adopted a bizarre attitude and places the blame on the deceased. Here it seems that it is only the deceased giving the orders.

MR BOOYENS: Was that regarding the generals?

EUGENE ALEXANDER DE KOCK: Could you just repeat please?

MR BOOYENS: Was that the assumption that the generals said that the deceased gave the orders?

EUGENE ALEXANDER DE KOCK: While I was listening to the evidence given here and listening on the radio to the Biko case, it seemed that reference is made to officers who are already deceased, and that they should take the blame.

MR BOOYENS: You want to attach a sinister connotation to this, Mr De Kock?  In both cases were these deceased officers the commanding officers of the security branches. Wouldn't you expect these orders to have come from them?

EUGENE ALEXANDER DE KOCK: It should have been discussed with them.  There could have been co-responsibility, for example.

MR BOOYENS: So in other words, what is so sinister about the fact that they are dead?

EUGENE ALEXANDER DE KOCK: It is just bizarre, this is what I feel.

MR BOOYENS: I will leave it to the Committee to form their opinion this regard.
	Let us come back to the question that I have posed.   Your relationship to the members of the general staff and specifically Mr Van Rensburg, he is one of the generals you are referring to.

EUGENE ALEXANDER DE KOCK: Now at last we have a general here.

MR BOOYSEN: Who is doing what?

EUGENE ALEXANDER DE KOCK: Who now admits that he was involved and that he had given orders.

MR BOOYSEN: When you decided to come evidence in the Motherwell trial, was your attitude still that at that stage you did not know who was going to admit it, and your attitude was that he was one of the generals who was absconding their responsibility?

EUGENE ALEXANDER DE KOCK: He was one of the generals of which I want to say that in December 1994 - December 1994, while I was in solitary confinement, I received a message from one of my previous members from Vlakplaas.  And this message was from a certain general, and saying that these generals had distanced and disassociated themselves from me. I did everything on myself, only I knew about everything, and they said they didn't know anything.

MR BOOYENS: At that stage that should have made you very bitter?  You are still bitter?

EUGENE ALEXANDER DE KOCK: No,  not bitter, it made me nauseous.

MR BOOYENS: We shouldn't play with words.

EUGENE ALEXANDER DE KOCK: I am not playing with words, I mean what I say, I can speak Afrikaans.  (Applause).

MR BOOYENS: I am glad to see that your language is appreciated.  Whether this had made you bitter or nauseous, you know that it has been used in the figurative sense.  You were not there to observe all this.  But let us talk to your psychological attitude regarding this.  What was your psychological attitude when the generals sold you out?

EUGENE ALEXANDER DE KOCK: It was complete treason.

MR BOOYENS: And when somebody betrays you, you would be bitter?

EUGENE ALEXANDER DE KOCK: Yes, sometimes, people do not have the courage to try to understand that. I understand that.

MR BOOYENS: You understand that, but you put the blame on them because they have sold you out?

EUGENE ALEXANDER DE KOCK: I won't put the blame on them, because they detained me.

MR BOOYENS: Not the detention, but the fact that they didn't want to have anything to do with them.  You realised that you were all alone in this aspect, and you can expect no assistance from any of the senior officers in that regard, is that correct?

EUGENE ALEXANDER DE KOCK: Not at that stage.  And as they have put it, not even in future.

MR BOOYENS: And these senior officers or some of them, are people who were responsible for that that you, Mr De Kock, committed these deeds for which you were brought to trial or for most of them.

EUGENE ALEXANDER DE KOCK: Yes, for most of them.

MR BOOYENS: And one of these generals was Nick van Rensburg.  Is that correct?  According to your perception. I don't know whether the names were mentioned to you, but I think you believed that Van Rensburg was one of them.

EUGENE ALEXANDER DE KOCK: I saw the generals as a group, not as individuals.  And I wasn't angry at any individual.  Genl Nick van Rensburg and myself did not part on a bad footing.

MR BOOYENS: Mr De Kock, in your application, you said that there was a discussion at Van Rensburg's home in which you and Nieuwoudt took part. How long did it last?

EUGENE ALEXANDER DE KOCK: About 10 to 15 minutes.

MR BOOYENS: And all that was discussed in this 15 to 20 minutes was that some people had committed fraud in Port Elizabeth and they should be taken out or whatever the code language was, that was used, and that you had to help the PE people?

EUGENE ALEXANDER DE KOCK: It wasn't only that they had committed fraud ...

MR BOOYENS: What Mr De Kock?

EUGENE ALEXANDER DE KOCK: The fact was that these people had used certain moneys for their own purposes, it wasn't just this fact of fraud.

MR BOOYENS: Yes, and what else?

EUGENE ALEXANDER DE KOCK: There was nothing else that was discussed regarding any other cases such as for instance Goniwe.

MR BOOYENS: And did that take 15 to 20 minutes?  What was discussed?