Amnesty Hearings — Pretoria — UNKNOWN

MR VISSER: I'll repeat the question, why can't you remember how you assaulted him?

CHARLES ALFRED ZEELIE: Does it matter to describe in detail the assaults?,

MR VISSER: Well the word assault can mean a lot.   What does it mean according to you?

CHARLES ALFRED ZEELIE: There are many ways of assaulting.

MR VISSER: How did you assault George Martin?

CHARLES ALFRED ZEELIE: It wasn't only me, he could possibly have been hit.

MR VISSER: Did you hit him?

CHARLES ALFRED ZEELIE: It is possible, yes.

MR VISSER: I am asking you, did you?

CHARLES ALFRED ZEELIE: I say it is possible, yes.

MR VISSER: Mr Zeelie, I don't understand your testimony.  You have just said that you want to give an example of George Martin who was assaulted in the presence of Du Toit by you and others?

CHARLES ALFRED ZEELIE: That is correct.  I am admitting to this.

MR VISSER: Now I'm asking you a very simple question, how did you assault him?

CHARLES ALFRED ZEELIE: I have already answered that.

MR VISSER: No, you have not.   I have not finished.   Did you hit him with the fist, did you kick him, what did you do with him?   It's a very simple question how you assault someone?

CHARLES ALFRED ZEELIE: I'm here to talk the truth, I can't tell you whether he was kicked or hit at that stage.

MR VISSER: Was he shocked with an electrical device?

CHARLES ALFRED ZEELIE: That's why I say I can't tell you at this stage precisely how he was assaulted, but I am now making the confession that he was assaulted.

ADV DE JAGER: Sorry, Mr Zeelie, can you remember how long ago that example was, the George Martins, in what year would that have been, more or less?

CHARLES ALFRED ZEELIE: That is also a long time ago.   It should also have been in the eighties.

MR VISSER: I think Commissioner De Jager has not finished yet, Mr Chairman.

MR VISSER: Thank you, chairperson.   Did any of these people, from the commissioner, whom you don't want to say who it was, or the security head, or Erasmus or Du Toit, did they ever give you approval to shock people, any person, people that you were interrogating?

CHARLES ALFRED ZEELIE: I have already answered that it wasn't specifically said that you may shock a person, but they knew of it and they tacitly accepted.

MR VISSER: Mr Zeelie, anyone who thinks that people were not assaulted during interrogation in the South African Police, or in any other police force in the world, should surely be stupid.   This is not what this is all about.  You specifically testified that there was approval given, this is what this is all about, and I want to put it to you that General Van der Merwe, as well as General Erasmus, as well as General Du Toit, will tell this committee that you are not telling the truth when you say this.   I am now giving you the opportunity to respond.

CHARLES ALFRED ZEELIE: I maintain what I say.   If the committee want to subpoena George Martin to testify, then he will confirm what I have said.   I maintain what I have said that tacit approval was given to us and that is why I also referred to other amnesty applications, whether it be explosions or with people who were hit or kicked, that is assault.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Visser, I just want clarity about something.   If I know that a person was shocked to death and I do not prosecute, or I do not see to it that they are prosecuted, those are now the people who have administered the shock, well let's just leave it with that, I don't do anything about it, am I not then condoning it?

MR VISSER: It would be our submission that that does not necessarily imply that it's condoned.   The testimony will be that these three people were confronted by a situation which was a problem, they had to address  the problem, and the addressing of the problem is not condonation, not even directly, this wasn't about covering a certain practice, this was all about a situation which happened in a specific political situation a few days before the Soweto Day on the 16th of June within a specific political climate where there could have been a lot of embarrassment for the South African government should this have been made known.

CHAIRPERSON: I understand that there could be certain circumstances which could be presented as justification, but the fact of the matter is, here's a crime committed, I'm aware of it, I'm a policeman, I'm the head of a department, and I do nothing to prosecute.   In fact it goes further, I help them to cover it up.

MR VISSER: That will depend, chairperson, whether you will accept what the witnesses will tell you, Erasmus and Du Toit, about how they read the political situation and subjectively understood it at that stage, and whether, based on that insight, and that that would then enable them to get amnesty.   The only point that's made now, with respect, in answer to your question, is that the fact that they acted in such a way does not necessarily mean that there was condonation, because, if I may just add, there could not have been prosecution, because prosecution would in fact have jeopardised the mock escape, it would have taken that away, the whole mock situation, so it is a fact then that these people would not have been prosecuted from on top.

CHAIRPERSON: In your argument we will then handle that.

MR VISSER: Could I perhaps just say that the witness has already mentioned that and I'm leaving that for argument?  I want to ask you a last thing, Mr Zeelie, have you never heard of it that if any policeman, regardless, detective, security, whatever, when they assaulted a person and that there was a charge, that a specific procedure would be followed to investigate such charges?

CHARLES ALFRED ZEELIE: Which procedures are you referring to?

MR VISSER: In the case of a policeman, the case would have been investigated and would have been submitted to the attorney-general, which is not necessarily the case in other incidents of crime.

CHARLES ALFRED ZEELIE: That is correct.

MR VISSER: In other words, the attorney-general would learn of each and every assault, alleged assault, by a policeman, do you agree with that?

CHARLES ALFRED ZEELIE: Yes.

MR VISSER: And to colour the approval of the high officers, and they would then also have to be able to say something and some influence with the attorney-general, isn't that so?

CHARLES ALFRED ZEELIE: It is now referred to a situation where there is a specific charge, and then I don't think that they would actually now intercede.

MR VISSER: But isn't it logical where a person is now assaulted and that later on when he's released, that he would go and complain?

CHARLES ALFRED ZEELIE: Many of those cases aren't taken that far that such a case then is submitted to the attorney-general.

MR VISSER: I want to put it to you in this way, if you and your co-accused or witnesses would be, that your testimony would be that there was a general condoned practice at the Security Branch that people could have been tortured, then there would have been pandemonium in this country?

CHARLES ALFRED ZEELIE: In which sense?

MR VISSER: Because everyone who would have been assaulted in practice would have complained about it and there would have been hundreds more cases than had appeared, many more cases would have been made known.  There are hundreds of cases which came to the fore, but we confine ourselves now to this shock technique that you refer to.    Now I understand that whilst you were in the Security Branch you only used it once.

CHARLES ALFRED ZEELIE: No, I never gave that testimony, sir, it was the previous witness.

MR VISSER: Did you ever use it?

CHARLES ALFRED ZEELIE: Yes, I was involved with a few cases.

MR VISSER: A few instances?

CHARLES ALFRED ZEELIE: Yes.   I can perhaps mention even when I entered the Security Branch in '76 in December, when the former premier of Gauteng was arrested, there I started to come to know about the shock device.