Amnesty Hearings — Durban — 1999-08-23

J A STEYN: The idea was that these people should deal with it on the basis of confidentiality.  He was in a dilemma at that stage and his thinking at that stage as he later explained it to me was to keep it a secret to, if possible and if circumstances justified it, to place Ndaba back into the system.

CHAIRPERSON: But then when they illegally arrest Shabalala, they take him to the same safe-house as Ndaba.

J A STEYN: That is true.

CHAIRPERSON: Again, it appears to indicate they weren't particularly interested in Ndaba's security, they decided it wasn't of any importance to them, or sorry not they, Botha had decided.

J A STEYN: I don't know how Botha dealt with it at that stage or what his thinking was in this regard, but it's true that they were detained together at the same safe-house.

MR LAX: It wouldn't have been usual to take two people, especially where you're trying to keep the knowledge of one away from the other, to the same place and hold them in the same place and be seen talking to them and so on.

J A STEYN: Yes, under normal circumstances it wouldn't have been correct.

MR VISSER: Mr Chairman, I just want to make one correction.  If you understood that I said that Botha told Ninela about the information status, that is incorrect, Mr Chairman.  He told the other members of the Security Branch, not Ninela.

CHAIRPERSON: What you told us was Taylor and Ninela were upset and withdrew.

MR VISSER: Taylor was upset and he and Ninela withdrew.

CHAIRPERSON: You said Ninela was there.

MR VISSER: No, no, no.

CHAIRPERSON: If he withdrew.

MR VISSER: Well, that's not the evidence Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: Well that's what you said.

MR LAX: Sorry Mr Visser, you did actually say that, because it struck me as something that I might have missed earlier and I made a special note of the fact that Ninela had been informed, in your summary, just to follow it up later.  If you were mistaken in saying that, that's fine.

MR VISSER: Yes, Sir, I'm sorry if I brought you under that impression, but it's paragraph 18 of Botha's evidence, Mr Chairman, it's quite clear that Ninela wasn't part, in fact the other members were taken away from Ndaba and Ninela and told this in a separate office.

MR WILLS: Thank you.  Mr Steyn, I want to return to the meeting of the 13th with you and Mr Botha in Pretoria and my understanding is that you went to that meeting to appraise your superiors and to get, I think you used the word or it was translated to me as orders, as to what to do next.

J A STEYN: That's correct.

MR WILLS: And you also received orders, as I understand it, at that stage to set up a National Investigation Unit to investigate Operation Vula, which it was decided would be to be headed by Col Zen de Beer.

J A STEYN: Yes.

MR WILLS: And then, according to the evidence of Botha, you met with somebody else who told you that the prosecutions were not going to take place.

J A STEYN: Yes.

MR WILLS: Who did you meet with who told you that?

J A STEYN: We gave several briefings.  I remember Gen Beukes and Gen Pruis and I remember members of the Intelligence Unit at Head Office and it was these people that we gave the briefing to.

MR WILLS: Now, you say, I think you use the same word in your affidavit, when you received this information, you were disappointed that no prosecutions were going to take place.

J A STEYN: Yes.

MR WILLS: Why were you disappointed?

J A STEYN: It appeared to us at that stage that there was a massive underground structure which had been revealed and it was as a result of that, it appeared that there would be no prosecutions and it was difficult to think about this and consider it.

MR WILLS: Yes.

J A STEYN: We were told that the negotiating process was under way and it could have an impact if there was to be prosecutions.

MR WILLS: Is it not so that the word you used, disappointing, is basically a euphemism?  Your emotion, you were absolutely shaken to the core by this, you wanted these people to be prosecuted, you wanted them to sit in jail for a long period of time and you wanted to make sure that these terrorists and communists suffered as a result of what they were doing to your beloved country?

J A STEYN: No.  The idea was that this matter should just take its normal course, like any other big case.

MR WILLS: I know what the idea was, I'm asking you about your feelings.  I'm saying that disappointment isn't a strong enough word.

J A STEYN: No, I think I was disappointed.

MR WILLS: Just shrugged it off?  I'm disappointed about that?

J A STEYN: No it wasn't that easy, it wasn't that easy to just say well, just shrug it off.  We were disappointed.

MR WILLS: I'm suggesting that you were more than disappointed, you were very cross about this.

J A STEYN: To what extent I was disappointed, well I can't spell it out.

MR WILLS: Was it a great extent?

J A STEYN: I was disappointed to a reasonable extent.

MR WILLS: Well, I don't understand that, but we'll move on.  Now are you sure that this was communicated to your separately from Botha?

J A STEYN: If I remember correctly, I think that was the case.  I'm not sure.

MR WILLS: And then you travelled back with Botha to Durban.  You travelled back together?

J A STEYN: Chairperson, I cannot remember if we had returned together every time.  I can not remember exactly.

MR WILLS: But you told Botha that no prosecutions would take place, according to his evidence.

J A STEYN: At one stage I had said that to him, yes.

MR WILLS: He says you said that to him on the 13th.  We're not talking about one stage, we're talking about on the 13th.

J A STEYN: Yes.

MR WILLS: He was also disappointed.

J A STEYN: Yes, he was.

MR WILLS: You then get back to Durban.  What did you do, in relation to the situation that you had, i.e. you had two people who might have useful information about Vula, you  have a whole  lot of people in jail and you've got the investigation headed up by de Beer.  What did you do with de Beer?  What information did you give de Beer?

J A STEYN: All information that had been available at that stage, as a result of seizures and so forth, had been given to de Beer with different members to support him and he was told to investigate the matter.

MR WILLS: But you again take a conscious decision not to make Mr de Beer aware of the fact that you have a living suspect, a living informer in your possession that might be able to help out with some information, not so?

J A STEYN: No, I did not tell him that.

MR WILLS: Why not?

J A STEYN: Any information that we could get hold of from anyone, including Mr Shabalala, we could have told this information to the investigating team of Mr de Beer, by saying that we had information of this nature, please investigate it.  It was not necessary that we have a person that we got this information from.

MR WILLS: Surely this operation was of such importance that it might have benefited Mr de Beer to speak to Ndaba himself?

J A STEYN: No, we could, no Botha rather, he could take all the information and he could conveniently have conveyed this information to de Beer, which I believe he did.

CHAIRPERSON: That would mean that Botha would have to know precisely how de Beer's investigations were going, precisely what information he needed, including the identification of a messenger, what sort of car had been used, matters of that nature.

J A STEYN: That is correct.

CHAIRPERSON: Nonsense, Botha wasn't the investigating officer.  He would not have known every little detail that came to de Beer, but for some reason you wouldn't let de Beer have access to the potential witness.

J A STEYN: Chairperson, with all respect, Botha would have at all times, tried to stay briefed with everything that had been done with the investigation team to be able to help.  This is logically the way it would have worked.