Amnesty Hearings — Cape Town — 2000-09-28

FERDINAND BARNARD: I would say the silencer was approximately 25 centimetres in length and the firearm would also be somewhat shorter than 25 centimetres.
	The other problem which I experienced would be that I would be there at approximately dusk, observing the house and people would become restless, they would pass the vehicle, look into the vehicle.  Upon one or two occasions I asked people for directions, I obtained the names of certain surrounding streets from a map that I bought at the CNA, I would ask them "where is this street" or "where is that street" and then they would give me directions and then I would park the vehicle in a different place.
	But I also had the problem in that I could not abandon the vehicle, because if I disembarked from the vehicle, I would stand out even more as a white person in this area.  It was a nightmare with regard to these details, and I reported this to Mr van Zyl.   I left Cape Town with unfinished business because I had not had a visual observation of Mr Omar and I had experienced all these problems.  I told Mr van Zyl that the CCB should pin-point information specifically oriented information regarding where Mr Omar would be attending a meeting for example, or making a speech. 
	If he would be going somewhere, where he would have to leave home after the regular working hours, in other words, when it was already dark.  He undertook to see what he could do in this regard, because I was told that there was a system of persons who could provide information about Mr Omar's movements and so forth.  That is why I made the request to him.
	It didn't happen that way.  I returned to Johannesburg.  We had a few more meetings there, but I cannot recall them specifically.  Mr van Zyl contacted me upon a second occasion, it was in August 1989 and he told me that there was serious pressure from very high levels for the project to be executed.   There were also discussions, but I cannot recall specifically when,  and I made enquiries as to why he was such a big problem.  I knew who Adv Omar was, and I would imagine that at a certain stage while I was in the Cape, the Tony Yengeni trial was underway and I read in the papers that Adv Omar was involved in it in some or other way.
	But I was told that documents had been obtained by means of a burglary and that in these documents, there was evidence or information which indicated that Adv Omar would be involved in underground structures, and that he was also involved in some or other bombing campaign which was waged in Cape Town.  Those were the reasons that they provided.  But there was tremendous pressure, and it was decided that I would undertake two excursions to Cape Town, which I did.  I came to Cape Town for a second time.  Once again I booked into the Inn on the Square, I regained the weapon, the vehicle was exactly where I had left it.  I had also left the firearm here and managed to get the firearm again.  I repeated the same process and experienced even more problems than before with regard to remaining inert and being observed.
	I could not conduct the operation in such a way.  For a number of days I did not have a visual observation of Mr Omar, I expressed my frustration and said that to continue working like this, would be like taking a game of Russian Roulette with a vehicle because there was always the chance that someone would phone the police.
	I would be sitting in front of the house, and they would send someone out to come and check the post-box at nine o'clock at night.  I didn't belong there.  People could easily see that there was a problem.  The SAP could apprehend me for possession of the stolen firearm and a stolen vehicle.  These were the problems that I had, and I expressed these problems to Mr van Zyl.  He tried all the time to get different information, but the information that I had all the time was that Adv Omar was very active, that he moved around a lot and that he was at home.
	This didn't really help me much, because it would still mean that I would have to hang around there to see when he would be there, and I couldn't do this in the day, I had to do it in the night when it was dark. 
	Once again I returned with unfinished business to Johannesburg.  I was very frustrated. 
	Then there was a third excursion which was planned for August 1989.  It was September, September 1989.    I flew down for the third time to Cape Town and once again, I met with Mr van Zyl.  It was again conveyed to me that this project had reached a critical stage and that everything in our power had to be done to kill Mr Omar.
	Once again I obtained the vehicle and the firearm which amazingly had remained in the same place.  I began to act in the same manner as before.  At a certain stage, it was the last evening or time, but I didn't know it at that point, I had a visual observation of Mr Omar, only once throughout this entire time, and I will refer to it now.
	I climbed out of the vehicle, it was after hours, I went to the premises.  I waited near Adv Omar's vehicle.  I entered the premises for the second time, and I saw Adv Omar approaching.  I had spent approximately an hour and a quarter on the premises, I had a balaclava on my head and I had the firearm in my hand.  It was cocked and ready to fire.
	Adv Omar came out and approached the vehicle, but he was accompanied by a female person, so I didn't shoot him.  The order to me was to make it appear like a crime, it had to look like a robbery.  If I shot him, I would have to clean out his pockets, if he had a wallet, or a watch or any such items, I should take them, it should look like a robbery.  That was the instruction from the beginning.
	There was a woman with Adv Omar and I decided, based upon that, to withdraw.  I climbed out of the vehicle.   They climbed out of the vehicle as I saw them, I am sorry, I was confused because Brenda's evidence was different.  In effect they disembarked from the vehicle and entered the house.  I did not shoot them, I withdrew, I was not seen by them.
	That very same evening I made the telephonic report to Slang van Zyl that I had a visual of Adv Omar, but that  - I didn't give him any details over the phone, I decided that we would rendezvous the following day.  He asked me why I didn't shoot Adv Omar and I explained that the circumstances were not favourable and that I would tell him all about it the following day.
	I think he was in Cape Town on leave.  At that stage I was staying in the Woodstock Holiday Inn.  If I recall correctly, it was at the same time that Adv Anton Lubowski was shot dead because I had the number of a holiday flat where I contacted Slang van Zyl.  I phoned him early that morning because throughout the night, I had visited night-clubs and I walked in, switched on the TV and on the six o'clock news I saw that Anton Lubowski had been assassinated in South-West Africa.  I phoned Slang van Zyl and told him to switch on his television and I told him that Lubowski had fallen in South-West.
	He undertook to come and see me later that morning, which he did.  I think it was approximately ten or eleven o'clock.  During the course of the morning, he came to my hotel to speak to me.  We discussed the Lubowski incident and speculated on who had been involved in it.
	Upon this occasion Mr van Zyl discussed the Cape Town bomb with me.  He asked me about the other matters as well, but he first discussed the bomb attack.   He told me that the bomb which had gone off in Athlone, had been his project and that the project was aimed at killing those who would have been responsible for a bomb campaign in Cape  Town.  It was aimed at killing those who had been in the meeting, that he had attached four kilograms of nails to the bomb with masking tape so as to product a greater shrapnel effect, that the project had not been correctly executed, because the remote control mechanism was faulty.  He explained upon my questions that it didn't want to detonate, and that he had tried to fix it and that eventually when everybody had left the meeting, the bomb did explode and that some people sustained light injuries, but that it was their lucky day, because all of them should have sailed, which meant that all of them should actually have died.
	I discussed the matter with him, and directly afterwards we discussed Adv Omar.  I explained to van Zyl that Adv Omar had arrived home, but that there were unforeseen circumstances, that he was accompanied by a female person.  I decided not to shoot him.  He nearly went mad.  He wanted to know why I hadn't shot him.  He said that I had lost my chance.  I told him that he had wanted it to look like a robbery, upon which he retorted that I should have killed the woman as well.  I told him that I wasn't prepared to do this, and I was upset.  After having shot Dr Webster and having seen that there was a lady with him at that time, I cannot say that I wouldn't have shot him, because there was pressure on me to perform the operation, but I was upset about it afterwards.
	I knew that if I had shot Adv Omar there and if I hadn't shot the woman, I would have been observed upon my escape, I wouldn't have reached the highway before being apprehended.
	I told him that I wasn't prepared to do things like this, and that I wouldn't do things like this, based upon which we had an altercation and he told me that he wasn't very satisfied with it, and I told him that I wasn't prepared to continue on this basis and to execute the project as such, unless there was precise pin-point information regarding Adv Omar's whereabouts, be it a UWC meeting or anything else.  That is when I withdrew myself from the Omar incident.