Amnesty Hearings — Pretoria — 1997-02-24

<UNKNOWN>: will at that time have been discredited.  And this is a danger with respect which I want to submit, you must 
at all times keep in mind.  
	The crucial question which we must ask here is whether it is really necessary for Captain van 
Jaarsveld to be called.	Mr Brian Currin wanted to ask General van der Merwe with regard to the State 
Security Council and now, suddenly out of the blue, this key witness must be called to bring testimony in 
this regard.
	Again, this is premature and when at the end of the day you as a Committee might have a 
difficulty, then the Prosecution would have always been willing to give any help or cooperation that might 
be necessary.  The statement that the attitude of the Attorney General is strange, or that he is trying to hide 
the truth from the general public and anyone else, this with respect, cannot be held.  This is a very 
important prosecution which the State is taking care of and we do not want to keep anything from the 
Committee.  If there were any detailed or particular problems, then the Attorney General's office would at 
all times have been available to bring you assistance.  We allowed our learned friends to consult with the 
witness this morning and I cannot understand how they can make such a claim in view of this.
	With respect, it is my submission that during the consultation this morning, when the prosecution 
was present, other names were given and a true effort was made with regard to representatives of the 
Defence Force or other
members of the Police Force and until this time, surely there has not been enough time to make an attempt 
to contact these persons and therefore this application must be 
PRETORIA HEARING	AMNESTY/

DR PRETORIUS: 44

<UNKNOWN>: premature.
	When and if General van der Merwe brings testimony, and if he agrees with any of the claims of 
my learned friends, then it will be available to you.  The other names made available by Captain van 
Jaarsveld to them give them adequate opportunity, if granted sufficient time, to contact these persons.  And 
even if these witnesses are not very willing to bring testimony, they can none-the-less the brought before 
you and it is therefore not necessary that it must be this State witness who brings this testimony.	This 
is the applicants' application and it must not be made necessary to bring a State witness before this 
Committee when other witnesses can in fact give this testimony.
	None-the-less the Prosecution is not in any way attempting to keep information from the public 
and even less so from this Committee.  If the Committee would like to clear up any particular matter from 
the side of the Prosecution, the Prosecution will make every attempt to support this Committee in this 
regard, but this, however, is a spur of the moment application, no effort has been made to bring other 
witnesses in this regard and if General van der Merwe is cross-questioned with regard to the State Security 
Council, then the information made available to my learned friends during the consultation, can be stated to 
him and in that way the entire matter will be possibly dealt with.
I thank you.

JUDGE WILSON: ... Captain van Jaarsveld that it is so important?

DR PRETORIUS: Firstly he would be giving evidence My Lord when his application for amnesty will be 
heard by this Committee.
PRETORIA HEARING	AMNESTY/

DR PRETORIUS: 44

JUDGE WILSON: You are talking about a State witness, when is he giving evidence for the State?

DR PRETORIUS: The State has to wait until the amnesty applications of most of the applicants has been 
finalised by this Committee.  The State's charge sheets have already been drawn up and he is a very 
important witness in one of those possible prosecutions, but we wait for the decision of the Amnesty 
Committee on these matters. So we are dependent on this Committee to make its decision either to the one 
way or to the other and in that prosecutions, he would be a key witness.

ADV DE JAGER: ;	And if we are not able to give a decision before we've heard him?

DR PRETORIUS: I don't understand the question.

ADV DE JAGER: If we are not able to make a decision with regard to these applications if we have not 
heard this particular witness, because we might believe that he is an important witness, what do we have 
then, that then is checkmate situation.

DR PRETORIUS: Mr Chairman, should this application take so long and should his amnesty application 
come before you in the mean time, then in the course of events he will have to bring complete testimony 
before you with regard to his background and his personal knowledge and then it will of course crucially 
involve the case that it is his amnesty application at that time.

ADV DE JAGER: ;	When we returned to the previous application, we were then asked not to allow Mr 
Mamasela to bring testimony or to call him to bring testimony.	In the meantime he allows television 
interviews, he tells the whole world what he is going to say and where he differs.  Now you are 
PRETORIA HEARING	AMNESTY/

DR PRETORIUS: 45

<UNKNOWN>: asking us not to call him because he is a State witness, but this witness is allowed to speak anywhere else 
except before this Committee.

DR PRETORIUS: Allow me to sketch you some background in this regard.  Mr Mamasela, because of the 
unique history of South Africa takes care that he has guarantees.  He is indeed a State witness and he had 
some initial doubts with regard to the State.  Mr Mamasela's name is mentioned time and again in the press 
and sometimes unjustly so.
	When or if Mr Mamasela will bring testimony in a court case it will be statutory.  Mr Mamasela 
you had heard that you are entirely innocently accused of this or that, that for instance you killed someone 
in Botswana, that you held this person.  Mr Mamasela's version is something entirely different.  It is 
necessary for him to defend himself, he must be given the opportunity to defend himself, so that should he 
be in a position where he is prosecuted at a later time, he must be allowed to say in cross-questioning Mr 
Mamasela, you were falsely accused, why did you do nothing about it?  Now Mr Mamasela can say that in 
every event where he was falsely accused, he had in fact gone to the media, to the press.  In that way we 
have some cheques and balances 
with regard to the office of the Attorney  General.
	Mr Mamasela indeed, on occasion has a good relationship with the Press.  He does that.. (tape 
ends) .....

ADV DE JAGER: Mr Pretorius is it not important for us to know whether the persons who accuse him, for 
instance with regard to the example given by you, to determine whether it is true or not.  Should Mr 
Mamasela then not rather come to us than to the media to state his differences?

DR PRETORIUS: This is a sensitive situation.  Mr Mamasela 
PRETORIA HEARING	AMNESTY/

DR PRETORIUS: 46

<UNKNOWN>: has given his full cooperation and his own version of that particular event. The way in which it must be 
approached, I cannot give a final answer in that regard.  An additional question?

ADV DE JAGER: ;	You heard with regard to what Captain van Jaarsveld must give testimony.  It has to do 
with the process of the counter-revolutionary plan and the membership of the State Security Council, do 
you have particular objections to him giving testimony in that regard?

DR PRETORIUS: These two kinds of testimony are related.  Should he claim for instance that the counter-
revolutionary planning included particular executive directives and so that the secretariat became involved 
in specific cases where they gave direct commands with regard to the execution of these policy decisions, 
then it would be very difficult to distinguish between the kinds of testimony.  These two kinds of testimony 
will be woven so closely together that it would be impossible to distinguish between these kinds of 
testimony.