Amnesty Hearings — Durban — 1999-08-23

MS POSWA: You were certain it would never come out?

J A STEYN: Not at that stage.

MS POSWA: If the Chairperson will bear with me.  Mr Steyn, what was Charles's registration number as an informer?

J A STEYN: No, I would never be able to remember that.

MS POSWA: Did he earn a salary as an informer?

J A STEYN: I cannot remember what amounts were paid out to him by Botha.

MS POSWA: Would there be no proof, is there proof of that available?

J A STEYN: I don't believe that there is today and I believe that the inquiries that we had done to clear up certain situations about the informers and we were told that everything has been destroyed and that no documentation existed.

MS POSWA: So you don't know how much Botha paid him?

J A STEYN: No.

MS POSWA: Mr Steyn, I must say it is very, very difficult for anyone to believe this set of events as set out by yourselves because there is no supporting evidence, there is a whole change of story from one point to the next.  I really must put it to you that this whole thing is just concocted and I wonder at your seriousness in applying for amnesty.  You have come here and you have totally misled the Committee as to the actual facts that took place and I really don't think at this stage that there has been a full disclosure.

J A STEYN: Chairperson...(intervention).

MR VISSER: Is that a question or a judgment, Chairperson?

CHAIRPERSON: Is that all?

MS POSWA: That is all thank you, Mr Chair.
NO FURTHER QUESTIONS BY MS POSWA

CHAIRPERSON: Any re-examination, Mr Visser?

MR VISSER: One or two points with your leave, Mr Chairman.

MR WILLS: Sorry, Mr Chairperson, sorry to disturb my learned friend.  There is one little tiny detail that I forgot to task, if I could just ask that, it will take one minute.  Thank you

MR WILLS: Mr Steyn, are you aware of the way the Security Branch organised the numbers of informers?  The alphabetical letters used.  Is there an alphabetical prefix or, in respect of each informer number?

J A STEYN: That is correct, Chairperson.

MR WILLS: And what is that?

J A STEYN: There were different types of informers, Chairperson.  When you met an informer for the first time then he is handled as an occasional informer and this means that some time would lapse during which he will be tested and the nature of the information he provides will then be inspected and then also the words G.  If he should develop then he would become a full informer.   And in those years, in the early years in Natal it would be a P N, Port Natal, with a number.  This would then be assigned to him.

MR WILLS: And if he was a policeman under cover, what would have been his number then?

J A STEYN: Then there were different numbers.

MR WILLS: And do you know what the prefix was like this PN in front of an experienced informer?  Can you remember what the alphabetical prefix would be for a policeman working under cover.

J A STEYN: More or less on the same basis.  I think it was, at that time it was called RS Informers.  That's correct, RS instead of PN in the case of Natal.

MR WILLS: And can you remember if there was an alphabetical prefix in respect of the files that you were keeping on all of the ANC people that you were interested in investigating?   You kept files on people?

J A STEYN: Yes, we kept files on thousands of people.

MR WILLS: Now did those files have a consistent alphabetical prefix?

J A STEYN: In the old days there was a card system according to which people worked, by means of an index system and the particulars of the suspects on which you had files could then be kept up.  The card would then refer to a specific file with a number.

MR LAX: Yes, you're being asked whether there were specific alphabetical prefixes in the same way that related to those cards or files as the case may be.

J A STEYN: The suspect files  were loose from the informer files, Chairperson.

MR WILLS: So just in short then, if we had documentation relating to Ndaba, emanating from your department at that time, it would, his name would be referred to with an alphabetical prefix PN, is that correct?

J A STEYN: If that was the case, I don't know what he was registered as Chairperson.

CHAIRPERSON: Was it an alphabetical prefix to his name or would he then have a number?

J A STEYN: He would have had a number Chairperson, that is correct.

MR WILLS: Yes, thank you Mr Chairperson.  So if he was an informer he would have had the PN on the prefix to his number.  Thank you, Mr Chairperson.
NOR FURTHER QUESTIONS BY MR WILLS

CHAIRPERSON: ...(indistinct - mike not on)

MR VISSER: Thank you Mr Chairman, I will be brief.

MR VISSER: Gen Steyn, the majority of the questions that have been posed to you actually handled about the knowledge of Mr Botha.  You were not personally there during any interrogations of Mr Ndaba, is this correct?

J A STEYN: No, Chairperson.

MR VISSER: You did not speak to him yourself?

J A STEYN: Never, Chairperson.

MR VISSER: You did not know what the circumstances wee under which the members of C20 had spoken to Mr Ndaba?

J A STEYN: No, I was not there, I cannot say, Chairperson.

MR VISSER: I will just repeat, you did not know what the circumstances were under which the members of C20 had spoken to Mr Ndaba or Shabalala?

J A STEYN: No, Chairperson, it was only hearsay evidence that I'd given.

MR VISSER: And in effect you are then speculating when you are giving answers about the situation at the safe-house at Verulam?

J A STEYN: That is correct.

MR VISSER: You refer to the  fact that there was a suspicion that there had already been a mole and the person who had infiltrated into the Security Branch in Port Natal, is that correct?

J A STEYN: That is correct.

MR VISSER: Was that confirmed later?

J A STEYN: Yes, Chairperson.

MR VISSER: I do not expect of you to go in on this any further.  Would there have been any sense to inform Mr de Beer or Headquarters that you had unlawfully detained Nyanda or Shabalala?

MR LAX: You said Nyanda.

MR VISSER: I'm sorry, Ndaba and Shabalala.  Thank you, Mr Commissioner.  Would there have been any sense in conveying this information?

J A STEYN: No Chairperson.

MR VISSER: Just to correct it and especially for the information concerning the Chairperson you had been asked why Ndaba was given more time to get his head in order, Botha gave evidence here that the Saturday afternoon after he had spoken to you, you went to speak to Mr Ndaba again and you in this conversation, you said that he was not interested to co-operate any further as an informer, that he refused to undergo plastic surgery to change his appearance, that he had been offered R50 000 to relocate himself and this he turned down and that he was not interested to give evidence against any of the people of Vula who had been arrested.

J A STEYN: That's correct, Chairperson.

MR VISSER: Is this information that Botha had given to you?

J A STEYN: That is correct Chairperson.

MR VISSER: But this is not information that you have any personal knowledge of?

J A STEYN: No.

MR LAX: General, just one small question and you may not be in a position to answer this, I don't know.  To the extent that it would have been "usual", Ndaba's shooting by Botha himself, Botha being his handler, strikes one as particularly cold-blooded.  Here you are, this is your informer, you've handled him for a number of years.

J A STEYN: That's correct.

MR LAX: Doesn't one, I mean if he really was his informer as he says he was and as you have been told he was, it just seems to me that he would have got someone else to do that.

J A STEYN: Chairperson, I do not know what Botha's thoughts were at that stage.

MR LAX: You know it might be argued later that the fact that he did it himself, implies that this wasn't necessarily his informer.