Amnesty Hearings — Durban — UNKNOWN

MR DE JAGER: to Swaziland.  There was no a question of further interrogation or assaults at all, but only a question of healing of his wounds and then get him back to Swaziland.

MR DE JAGER: Now, Mr Coetzee, besides the assault on him by Taylor and Fourie in Pretoria, as you have indicated, the other five days when he was not in your custody, did you know that he was being assaulted there as well?

WITNESS:   At Lothair Police Station?

MR DE JAGER: Yes.

WITNESS:   Not at all.  I wasn't present.  I would not know.

MR DE JAGER: Did you ever get a report as to what was done to him whilst in their custody?

WITNESS:   He was cared for in a very good way, they say, to win his friendship back and for his wounds to heal, and then they took him to Swaziland.  But he was not at all further interrogated or assaulted according to the reports that I received.

MR DE JAGER: I see.   Did you believe in those reports?

WITNESS:   Well, I would if one think that at what level international outcry that caused, and the senior people involved in sorting the problem out with the Swazi authorities, and the agreement made there afterwards.  So I think it was a question to get this row over as quickly and as quietly possible without inflicting any further injuries to the already badly beaten up Mr Pillay.

MR DE JAGER: Mr Coetzee, if evidence can be led that Mr Pillay at once stage was further assaulted, in that his pants were ripped open and his private parts were squeezed, what would your response be to that?

WITNESS:   Where did this happen?  Not in my presence, Mr Chairman.

MR DE JAGER: Yes, that is precisely why I am coming with this, because you have said to me now that you believed the

MR DE JAGER: /reports,

MR DE JAGER: reports, and especially that there was that outcry, international outcry, so you believed that no further assaults took place on him.

WITNESS:   That's correct.

MR DE JAGER: What would your response be now to what I've said to you.

WITNESS:   I would not be able to argue with that because if it happened whilst he was in Lothair I would accept his word for that, but I don't know about it, and it was never conveyed to me in such a manner.

MR DE JAGER: And if it is further stated that he was tied with a rope around the neck and the chest and pierced with a pin right through in the police station, and assaulted, what would your response be to that one as well?

WITNESS:   In Pretoria?

MR DE JAGER: No, when he was not in your custody.

WITNESS:   I mean I can't go against it, I haven't been present, I haven't seen it, but it'll be very, very strange, because as I say the orders came from right from the top after the international outcry, and I would very much doubt if any policeman will then still try to pull rank and convert to such atrocities.  But I can't deny it because, as I say, I wasn't present.

MR DE JAGER: Yes.  Mr Coetzee, I am saying this because I have in my possession a letter, or rather a statement which I am going to ask permission of the Committee to read into the record, written by ... (intervention)

WILSON J: Sir, you said evidence, if evidence was led.  Are you going to lead evidence?

MR MSHE: Mr Chairman, I am not going to lead evidence, I am going to ... (intervention)

WILSON J: Well, why put to the witness, "If evidence was led," if you are not going to do that?
/MR NGOEPE

BERNARD MAKGABO NGOEPE: I think the correct thing to do - I just assumed that you were picking up those things from the letter, but the correct way of dealing with it would have been to read paragraph by paragraph from the letter and put it to the witness and then invite his comment.  That would have been a better way of dealing with it.

MR MSHE: Thank you, Mr Chairman.  That is what I intended doing right now when the question was asked my learned friend - ag, by the member of the Committee, that I am going to read the contents of the statement to him and invite his comments, and what I have said is actually from the statement itself.  Thank you.  With the Court's permission I want to hand over the part of the documents.  That will be Exhibit D, Mr Chairman.
LETTER AND STATEMENT OF MR PILLAY HANDED IN AS EXHIBIT D

MR MSHE: Mr Chairman, I just want to inform the Committee that the statement is preceded by a letter, where Joe Pillay himself explains certain things, but I am going to start reading from page 5, where it is stated, "In the matter of the judicial inquiry in South Africa."  Mr Chairman, may I propose that I read the whole statement first into the record, and thereafter go back to the salient parts of the statement, if that is ... (intervention)

MR DE JAGER: Yes, but if you're handing it in as an exhibit, or as a document, official document, I don't know why my learned Brothers want it to be read in also.  It forms part of the record already when handed in.

CHAIRPERSON: No point is served in your reading the entire statement, Mr Mshe.  We have it before us and it forms part of the record.  If there are passages which you wish
	/to highlight,
to highlight, and on which you wish to put questions to the witness, you might as well give him sight of the statement.  (Pause)

MR MSHE: Mr Coetzee, as - are you reading?  Am I disturbing you?  Did you want to read something?

WITNESS:   No, no, I'm - Mr Chairman, I just see this place where he mentioned that his genitals were squeezed and his pants were torn open.  That was after the askaris abducted him, whilst he was still in Swaziland, and he's describing what happened in the car whilst they were driving towards the border.

MR MSHE: Well, you wouldn't know, you were not there.

WITNESS:  No, no, I wouldn't know, but I mean the incident Mr Mshe has - Advocate Mshe has referred to I see is on page 2, paragraph 9.

WILSON J: Look at page 4, paragraph 26.

INTERPRETER: The speaker's mike was not on.

MR MSHE: Once you finish reading paragraph 26 tell me.  I would like to put a question to you.

WITNESS:   Right.  (Pause)  Ja, he's - this specific page 26 he's referring to did not happen where his pants were torn open, and the thing that was attached to his temples - is that in the middle of the arm, or - must have been the truth serum that they administered at that stage.

MR MSHE: As I read through this paragraph, this statement, I get the impression that he was not - he doesn't know exactly as to where he was taken to.  He doesn't know the particular places where he was taken to.

WITNESS:   That's correct.

MR MSHE: Was he blindfolded as he was being moved from one place to the other?

WITNESS:   He was brought to Oshoek in

MR MSHE: /the boot

MR MSHE: the boot - ag, to Vlakplaas from Oshoek in the boot of a car, and if I remember correctly he was blindfolded taken to the observatory, Mr Chairman.

MR MSHE: And did he remain blindfolded during the interrogation?

WITNESS:   Most of the time, yes.  I think, if I remember correctly, Mr Chairman.

MR MSHE: So he wouldn't know exactly at which place it was where his trousers were ripped open and where he was assaulted in all the various ways that he describes on page 4, which you have just read.

WITNESS:   Absolutely not, except whilst in the car from Swaziland.  Otherwise I don't think he would have known the exact place.

MR MSHE: But the interrogation in Pretoria, bearing in mind that he spent only two days in Pretoria, the interrogation must have all the time surely taken place in your presence.

WITNESS:   Yes, it was.  That afternoon let - especially it was later afternoon, towards evening, in that bunker at the observatory, the Military Intelligence base.  That's correct.