Special Hearings — Chemical And Biological Warfare Hearings — 1998-06-08

DR KNOBEL: No Sir.  The samples were taken by, according to his evidence, by Dr de Bruin.  But Dr Randera you must also be reasonable.  Suspicion at the time was considered by General Liebenberg to be of no significance.  As I testified the other day he assured me that the d'Oliviera Commission would be looking into it.  I had just received the letter from the OSEO, the very one that we discussed a few minutes ago.  After the briefing to the Minister I have informed the Minister about the letter that I received from OSEO, and in fact I gave him a copy of the letter and my reply.
 So, yes, there was sufficient suspicion in my mind, or uncertainty in my mind that I wanted to bring this to the attention of the Minister.  But on those grounds to now say under no circumstances will this officer be involved in any further activity of this project, that's a different matter altogether.

DR RANDERA: Sorry I did actually pose this question to you last time.

DR KNOBEL: Yes I know you did.

DR RANDERA: But this is the President of the country has decided that this man needs to be dismissed, so we are not talking about somebody who is not in an executive position.  I mean the highest executive in the country has decided.  Now I know, I've looked at some of the documents that have come from the Steyn report, and you can tell me it was based on suspicion, but nonetheless there were question marks being posed.  Suspicions yes, but the President of the country has decided.  Now are you implying or saying to us that perhaps there's another grouping in the Army that really were not taking the President's word into consideration, but were saying, well no, no we'll continue because this is still suspicion and although you've dismissed him, you've brought him back in another capacity you still put him in charge in doing things that are of a very important and serious nature.

DR KNOBEL: Dr Randera, certainly with the wisdom of hindsight I might agree with you, but let me just try and explain to you what the position was at the time.
 I confronted Dr Basson directly about the dismissal as a result of the so-called Steyn Report.  I was assured by him that there was no foundation, that he had not been charged with anything, he was not even given the opportunity to reply to any questions.  I had not seen the contents of the Steyn report as I testified to you the other day.  I did in fact not see that staff paper until '97 ...(intervention)

DR RANDERA: General let me just ask you another question.  Do you have any information - Brig Basson was not the only person dismissed at the time from the army.

DR KNOBEL: Yes.

DR RANDERA: Many, very many generals were, were ...(intervention)

DR KNOBEL: 23.

DR RANDERA: ...were dismissed.

DR KNOBEL: 23 senior officers.

DR RANDERA: Now were any of those generals re-employed in very important positions?  And General you know you can tell me in retrospect and with hindsight you can be wise, but were there any other generals, was there any other general brought back to a position of responsibility?  I mean you're not - we are listening here not only about the destruction of - alleged destruction of a 1000 kgs of ecstasy and mandrax.  We've heard early on about how the contract to put all the information on disk by Dr Mijburgh's company is also given by Brig Basson to Dr Mijburgh, and that's also after he's been dismissed.

DR KNOBEL: And furthermore the present President of the country ...(intervention)

DR RANDERA: No, no, no, no, no, sorry let's leave the present President out of the debate and discussion, General I am posing the question to you, not to ...(intervention)

COUNSEL FOR KNOBEL: Doctor I object, let my client please finish answering the question.  Thank you.

DR KNOBEL: Dr Randera I think you are a bit unfair.  I explained to you that I had some misgivings.  I even tried to see the President personally.  I wanted to clarify the position about the identity of the Basson that was dismissed because there was a lot of uncertainty in my mind as to whether ...(intervention)

WENDY ORR: I don't mean to interrupt your answer, but you are not answering the question ...(intervention)

DR KNOBEL: No, but I am about ...(intervention)

WENDY ORR: ...he asked if any other senior officers were given positions of such responsibility after they had been dismissed.  The answer is yes or no.

DR KNOBEL: No I am sorry Madam Acting Chair, if you are not going to allow me to explain the circumstances then I will not answer the question.  I am not aware of anybody else that had been reappointed.  I do know that some of those other officers successfully took action, legal action against the State for dismissing them unfairly.  But if you are not going to allow me to answer the question then by all means say so and then I will only say yes or no.

WENDY ORR: Well you have answered the question and you have answered that no other senior officers were so-appointed.

DR KNOBEL: I am not aware of whether any other officers were re-employed.  But certainly this one was re-employed and also with the approval of the present State President.

WENDY ORR: Ms Sooka.

YASMINE SOOKA: General, I have just been reading through that document and I wonder if you received an explanation from Mr de Bruin about how this process was actually done.  Because just reading it through, and some of it is quite faint, it seems that samples were taken from these drums and it looks like they were handed back to Brig Basson and he then I think later did some tests on them and that was given back to Mr de Bruin.  So you know it seems like all the kind of proof that one needs that this was the actual substance that was destroyed all the testing seems to be done by Brig Basson.  Now can you help me out a little bit with that ...(intervention)

DR KNOBEL: No, no, the testing wasn't done by - you mean  the actual sampling?

YASMINE SOOKA: Yes.

DR KNOBEL: No that's not as I understood it.  The report that were given here was that it was taken by Commandant de Bruin, and if you read that paragraph further you will see that the Chief of the Defence Force indicated that Chief of Staff, or Chief Director Counter Intelligence should retain those samples until after the destruction was confirmed to the Minister, and if the Minister had no further reasons to keep those samples they could then be destroyed.  That was the information that we had.

YASMINE SOOKA: If you read the handwriting in pen it says ...(intervention)

DR KNOBEL: Oh you mean in the destruction report as such?

YASMINE SOOKA: Yes, yes, yes.

DR KNOBEL: Yes.

YASMINE SOOKA: It says
"The three samples were later handed to Commandant de Bruin after they were....."
and I can't actually read, ja...
"The samples were taken on the day of the destruction....."
and that is signed by Brig Basson.  So it's a little confusing about how this process actually took place.

DR KNOBEL: If you read the main document Ms Sooka, if you look at paragraph 3, this document was drawn up by Commandant de Bruin, it is signed by Commandant de Bruin, at the top of page 4
"The samples were taken from four of the drums and are currently in my possession.  On the 30 March Brig Basson handed over three further samples to me and those are also currently in my position".
The reason that was done was that all three of those substances were dangerous substances and had to be deactivated and this is what Basson writes at the bottom here.  He says -
"The three samples were later handed over after they were deactivated".
I agree with you that that seems a strange way of doing it.  I would have personally been happier if that had not taken place.

YASMINE SOOKA: So I just want to get it right.  The samples were taken on the day but he then keeps those samples until they are deactivated and then he gives them over.