Amnesty Hearings — Cape Town — 1997-03-11

HASSAN MALL: Yes Mr Mpshe.

MOKOTEDI MPSHE: Thank you Mr Chairman.   Chairman today is the 11th of March '97 sitting here in Cape Town, a continuation in the Van Vuuren et al application.  Mr Chairman as per schedule we were supposed to hear the matters on the date of 28 February 1997, but as already explained to the Chair in Chambers, we will go to matters that follow thereafter under the date, 3rd March 1997, and I will hand over everything in the hands of my learned friend. Thank you Mr Chairman.

HASSAN MALL: Yes Mr du Plessis?

ADV DU PLESSIS: Thank you Mr Chairman.  Mr Chairman we intend to call Brigadier Cronje first this morning.  We intend to call him in respect of two matters, the first matter you will find on page 156 of his bundle of applications.

HASSAN MALL: Can you just hold on.  Yes?

ADV DU PLESSIS: Mr Chairman that is a matter that deals with the bomb blast in Gaberone.  Now in the Schedule it is set out, it refers to the death of Mackenzie, Mackenzie didn't die, so that is wrong, it doesn't refer or doesn't deal with the death of Mackenzie, it deals with the bomb blast in Gaberone. May I be permitted to call Brigadier Cronje?

HASSAN MALL: Yes please do.
CAPE TOWN HEARING	AMNESTY/W CAPE
ADV DU PLESSIS	2	BRIG CRONJE

ADV DU PLESSIS: Thank you Mr Chairman.

UNKNOWN: (sworn states)

ADV DU PLESSIS: Mr Chairman if you will just bear with me for one moment, I just want to sort something out with Mr Mpshe, before I go ahead.
	Brigadier Cronje on page 156 you said that the incident happened, could you please start reading from your application from the first paragraph?

UNKNOWN: Johannes Mnisi was a former askari at Vlakplaas and he decided to rejoin the ANC.  He then went into exile in Botswana and from there he launched and planned a variety of terrorist activities, he was one of the main planners of, for instance, the Church Street Bomb. According to information he also planned other landmine explosions and other acts of terror.  Some of these acts caused the deaths of innocent people, according to our information at that time.

ADV DU PLESSIS: Now Brigadier can you remember, relating to the Church Street bomb, were innocent people killed?

UNKNOWN: Yes.

ADV DU PLESSIS: Could you continue, next paragraph?

UNKNOWN: There was an informer, a certain Mackenzie who was a member of my department's informers and he infiltrated Mnisi's organisation. Brigadier Wikus Loots, the commander of the Security Police in the Western Transvaal approached me about this matter.

ADV DU PLESSIS: Before you continue, let us stop with Mackenzie. You say that he infiltrated Mnisi's organisation, what exactly did he do for the Security Branch?

UNKNOWN: He smuggled weapons out of Gaberone and brought back weapons for the ANC back to the Republic and he CAPE TOWN HEARING	AMNESTY/W CAPE
ADV DU PLESSIS	3	BRIG CRONJE
then established certain bodies and reported back about the nature of these bodies.

ADV DU PLESSIS: What are these bodies?

UNKNOWN: Arms caches.

ADV DU PLESSIS: Could you continue with the third paragraph?

JUDGE WILSON: He was largely an operative of yours.

UNKNOWN: Yes he was.

ADV DU PLESSIS: Third paragraph Brigadier?

UNKNOWN: Brigadier Wikus Loots, the head of the Security Branch in Western Transvaal, approached me about this matter.  He told me that  - that must be the "elimination" of Mnisi, not neutralising. And this was discussed with General van der Merwe and that he received instructions to continue. He contacted me and asked me to assist him.

ADV DU PLESSIS: Brigadier, any other persons, were they mentioned apart from Mnisi, can you remember?

UNKNOWN: Yes two.  Pulu and Demakudu.

ADV DU PLESSIS: Could you continue on page 158?

UNKNOWN: Loots knew Mackenzie and suggested to me that Mackenzie must be sent through with a vehicle.  Mackenzie's vehicle was then taken to Special Forces after I could mention, after we'd had meeting with Commandant Charl Naude of Special Forces. Charl Naude then planted a bomb into the vehicle and this was controlled by remote control and also by means of a light sensor.

ADV DU PLESSIS: Brigadier I would like you to explain to the Committee, you say there was a remote control device here which could operate the bomb and then a light sensor as well. Could you briefly describe the difference between the
CAPE TOWN HEARING	AMNESTY/W CAPE
ADV DU PLESSIS	4	BRIG CRONJE
two mechanisms?

UNKNOWN: The remote control would have been handled by one of Naude's people physically, he would have observed the combi and he would then activate the bomb by means of remote control.  The light sensor was built into a secret compartment or panel which Mackenzie and the ANC used to use to conceal explosives and in so doing cross the border with these explosives in the car.  Now the light sensors would have immediately become operative once the compartments were opened and the bomb would then explode and it would only be somebody who actually knew where the compartment was, who would then activate the light sensor.

ADV DU PLESSIS: Brigadier, please stop there for a moment. The tracing of this particular compartment, would that have been done by an expert?

UNKNOWN: Yes. It would have to be a person who knew where that compartment was.

ADV DU PLESSIS: Continue please, third paragraph.

UNKNOWN: I had talks with Brigadier Loots as well as  with Commandant Charl Naude's Special Forces to plan the operation. Charl Naude told us that he had agents in Botswana and that he would arrange for one of those agents  to pass on the information when Mnisi was in the vehicle and Mackenzie not being in the vehicle at the time, so that the bomb could be activated by means of remote control. What happened there was that Mackenzie booked into a motel on the outskirts of Gaberone and one of these Paulo Demakudu or Mnisi would have fetched the combi from him, inserted the explosive and handed it back to Mackenzie.

ADV DU PLESSIS: Was that the planning?

UNKNOWN: Yes the planning was and that is what would
CAPE TOWN HEARING	AMNESTY/W CAPE
ADV DU PLESSIS	5	BRIG CRONJE
normally happen.

ADV DU PLESSIS: I just want to correct this. You said what happened. Is your evidence that what normally happened, was that Mackenzie would book into the hotel?

UNKNOWN: Yes.

ADV DU PLESSIS: Correct, continue please.

UNKNOWN: So that the bomb could be exploded by remote control as soon as Mnisi entered the vehicle,  the agent would ensure that Mackenzie was not in the vehicle at the time.  The plan was put into operation and Mackenzie was sent with the motor bomb to Gaberone.

ADV DU PLESSIS: Brigadier could you please tell the Committee what the chances would have been that this motor car bomb with Mackenzie in the car would have exploded in the process of the driving of the vehicle from here across the border?

UNKNOWN: No such chance, absolutely no such chance without the bomb being activated by means of the light sensor or remote control.

ADV DU PLESSIS: So please continue with the sentence, "I later learnt that....?"

UNKNOWN: I later learnt that, from Mackenzie himself exactly what had happened to him.  He told me that he left the combi at a place unknown to him, weapons were loaded into the combi to smuggle back into the Republic, however  ...(intervention)

JUDGE WILSON: Was it 'unbeknown to him or unbeknown to me'?

UNKNOWN: I don't understand.

JUDGE WILSON: Your answer was interpreted as, 'he left the combi at place unbeknown to him'?
CAPE TOWN HEARING	AMNESTY/W CAPE
ADV DU PLESSIS	6	BRIG CRONJE