Amnesty Hearings — Cape Town — 2000-03-14

GEORGE BIZOS: We'll note that, but now we do have information from others.  The changeover from the Forces to the CCB or the police was for starters an increase of R1000.  Do you agree or disagree with that?

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: If you have it in front of you, I would agree with it.  It is in terms of the financial plan and if the person was qualified for this, then he could receive it.  There might have been reasons why he received it and that is not in front of me.

GEORGE BIZOS: You also got a 13th cheque.  Now when I say you, I mean the person, the recruited person got a 13th cheque, is that correct?

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: Yes, that would have been the case.

GEORGE BIZOS: Plus at least two annual production bonuses of approximately R3 000 each, production bonuses.

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: That was based on what I told you.  That was to get a replacement for allowances that he lost when he was in uniform and we were all seen in the same group and that is why we called it a production bonus.  I have already told you that this was for my allowances and I received this money for that purpose, we only called it a production bonus.

GEORGE BIZOS: He was also to get R30 000 - BMW which cost at least in those days, R30 000.

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: No that is wrong.  The person got a vehicle with the maximum amount of R30 000 attached to it.

GEORGE BIZOS: Oh I see, they could choose what car they get, yes.

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: That is correct.

GEORGE BIZOS: Now they were also to appear as business men, is that correct?

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: No, they had to become that.

GEORGE BIZOS: They had to become business men?

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: That is correct, Mr Chairperson.

GEORGE BIZOS: And did they get an office, the rent of which was paid by the CCB?

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: What happened is that they made a plan which would be acceptable to the organisation and then they would have to present the plan with a budget and if this included an office, then he would receive it.

GEORGE BIZOS: And they were expected to run real businesses in order to appear as if they are business men.

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: That is correct.

GEORGE BIZOS: And if they made profits in their business, to whom did the profits go?

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: Then they would either give a part of this money to us, or they would have to declare this money and re-use it to become independent, so that it would not come from our budget.

GEORGE BIZOS: Did anybody ever pay any money in, to your knowledge, or did they keep the profits?

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: Yes, there were many structures as I can remember it, where the people later would then pay for their own office, for his own petrol and then he would stop receiving it from us.

GEORGE BIZOS: The question was, did any one of them pay any share of the profits to the ...

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: Yes there were.

GEORGE BIZOS: Who?

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: I cannot remember this, it is too long ago Mr Chairperson.

GEORGE BIZOS: Were they allowed to keep a portion of the profits for themselves?

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: For the reasons that I have just given you, to be able to make his business and his office independent and this is in a financial plan that was approved.

GEORGE BIZOS: Do you know what a mercenary is?

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: I know what it is Mr Chairperson.

GEORGE BIZOS: Do you know that, what makes a soldier a mercenary, according to international definition?

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: Yes, I have a reasonable idea, Mr Chairperson.

GEORGE BIZOS: A person who is motivated to take part in acts of violence, essentially by the desire for significant private gain and is promoted by the promise of payment of material compensation.  Would that fit a person into the category of a mercenary?

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: What you have said ...(intervention)

GEORGE BIZOS: In your mind?

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: According to what you said, Mr Chairperson, yes.

GEORGE BIZOS: And also where he receives material compensation substantially in excess of that promised or paid, to combatants of similar rank and functions in the armed forces of that party.  Does that accord with your understanding of...?

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: It could be the case, yes, Mr Chairperson.

GEORGE BIZOS: Well, did it occur to you when you were making these proposals for people to be eliminated, that the proposals may have been made for the motives of mercenaries and that is to get extra few thousand rand at a time, every time there was a successful assassination?

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: Not in the least, I think that this is not in relation at all, because you cannot function in the private sector without money, you do not have the same rights and privileges as a soldier.  We were all people who sacrificed our careers, we were all people who received medals.  You do not have helicopters and submarines and tanks and fancy vehicles that you can drive with to get to the enemy because the enemy chose to move between the criminals.

GEORGE BIZOS: Production bonuses are paid to managers, or workers in factories, for producing peace goods, but you were in the business of killing, Mr Verster.  Did it now occur to you that the giving of these bonuses and these perks and putting up people in businesses which some of them kept as their own after their discharge, to considerable advantage to themselves, may have led them to make proposals for killing, at least partly motivated, by the fact that they were going to get what you euphemistically call a production bonus?  Some may call it blood money.

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: ;   Or you can say that it is qualification allowances.  If you want to call it blood money, I do not agree with you at all.

GEORGE BIZOS: Well what would you call it if a person gets R3 000 bonus for killing somebody, a member and honourable member of your military profession?

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: That depends on who he is and you can say it in that way, but I think the same of your position.

GEORGE BIZOS: I don't know that anybody, any one of us has killed anybody for money, maybe we take too much money for the ...(intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: I think let's ...

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: That's debatable.

GEORGE BIZOS: You are actually making a serious comparison that getting a production bonus for killing someone is the same as the lawyer charging a fee, or was it just a personal insult, which I don't really mind, coming from you.

CHAIRPERSON: I think, gentlemen, if we can just get on with the questioning and stop the personal jibes.

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: You can say what you want to Mr Chairperson, and if you think that I am going to get a fright, what I want to tell you is that I want to answer your question and I will say again that depending on who these people were, we standardised.  There were highly trained Special Forces members.  He, in his uniform, could receive certain allowances and because we moved over to the private sector, we changed this and we called it production money and later on we gave it to other people on the same basis, so that there would not be differences, but on Treasurer level it was authorised and it was something that was authorised outside of my control, so the questions that are put to me at the moment, should be put to the previous Chief of the Army and interdepartmental to the Minister of Finances and the good President de Klerk, who knew nothing about what happened and also P W Botha.

GEORGE BIZOS: The rewards that eventually accrued to some of the people were substantial business which became as known as executive outcomes after the disbandment of the CCB.

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: It sounds to me as if you should ask - you got these questions from National Intelligence.  It has no relation to what we are busy with at the moment.

GEORGE BIZOS: Well, what did Mr Lafras Luitingh do after he ceased being a member of the CCB?