Amnesty Hearings — Durban — 1999-10-18

MR LAX: Because he says that you phoned him but he also goes on to say that - at paragraph 34, page 16, just for the record
"I had previously been advised that explosives were going to be used."

JOHAN MARTIN VAN ZYL: I read this.  I can only think that he meant that that was during my telephone conversation which is previous to reporting to Mbazwaan Police Station or Pongola, as I have it, and I definitely did not discuss the incident with him before the time because there was no time for that, Mr Chairman.

MR LAX: Precisely.  No-one else could have advised him of that either, because nobody else knew besides you and Visser at this point in time, that this operation was going to happen.

JOHAN MARTIN VAN ZYL: That's correct.

MR LAX: You don't know how many times you shot this man.

JOHAN MARTIN VAN ZYL: No, Mr Chairman, I cannot remember.  It was once or twice, it could have been twice.

MR LAX: But you definitely hit him once in the head that you know of?

JOHAN MARTIN VAN ZYL: Yes, Mr Chairman.

MR LAX: You don't know whether you hit him anywhere else in his body at this stage?

JOHAN MARTIN VAN ZYL: No.

MR LAX: And Carr, as far as you recall, only fired one shot.

JOHAN MARTIN VAN ZYL: That's correct.  He said to me afterwards that he had a stoppage.  I never inspected the weapon to see whether he had a stoppage or not, he fired one shot.

MR LAX: Of course Carr's version of the incident is different, and you've already had that put to you.

JOHAN MARTIN VAN ZYL: Yes, Mr Chairman, that is why I am so convinced of the distances that I thought that his typist made a mistake or something, because I recall him being much closer to the person than he seems to state.

MR LAX: Okay.  And also on Carr's version, there's no indication that the person even got up or attacked you at all.

JOHAN MARTIN VAN ZYL: It was put to me already.  I have a very vivid recollection that he did actually jump up, Mr Chairman.

MR LAX: Ja.  I mean your recollection is such that he charged at you.

JOHAN MARTIN VAN ZYL: That was the idea that I got, yes.  He was not necessarily charging at me, he was charging in my direction, he was moving in my direction, Mr Chairman.

MR LAX: Precisely.  If you'll just bear with me a moment, Chair, I just want to check something here.
	In the time that you were in the area of Pongola and during the time that Mr Gold was present, Mr Gold mentions this person being called by another name, he talks about Ruben, he talks about Roland, he talks about another name as well, but the name Rue stuck in his head.  You didn't hear this person called by the same name?

JOHAN MARTIN VAN ZYL: No, and as I said I would have liked to have been able to identify him more clearly, but I cannot remember that, Mr Chairman.

MR LAX: It's just that you would have been in the same place and the same name would have been mentioned.  If Gold heard it, there's a strong likelihood you would have heard it.

JOHAN MARTIN VAN ZYL: Not only that, I spent much more time with him than Mr Gold did and I still do not remember that.

MR LAX: It's patently clear that the person who was most familiar with him was Col Visser.

JOHAN MARTIN VAN ZYL: That's correct, Mr Chair.

MR LAX: And just for the record, my own note does indicate that you spoke of this person and you spoke of the relationship between this person and Visser, as being one of informant and handler.

JOHAN MARTIN VAN ZYL: That's correct.

MR LAX: You didn't say he was his handler, but you said their relationship was the same as, and they were comfortable in each other's presence as if ...(intervention)

JOHAN MARTIN VAN ZYL: They definitely met each other before, yes, but I cannot recall if Mr Visser ever called him by a name, Mr Chairman.

MR LAX: Yes.  It's highly unlikely that he wouldn't have.

JOHAN MARTIN VAN ZYL: That is correct.

MR LAX: I mean you were in each other's company for something like 12 hours at least.

JOHAN MARTIN VAN ZYL: Ja.

MR LAX: And he certainly didn't call him Scorpion in your presence.

JOHAN MARTIN VAN ZYL: No.

MR LAX: So he must have called him some other name.

JOHAN MARTIN VAN ZYL: That is correct.

MR LAX: This is not really a question for you, but it is for you in the sense that you formed your own independent justification for this, according to what you've told us.  How could Security Headquarters be in mortal danger by one agent turning?  How is that even remotely feasible?

JOHAN MARTIN VAN ZYL: I never said that Security Branch Headquarters was in danger, what I said was that individual members who handled him, or the member that handled him as well as other members that may have been known to him, could have been led into an ambush.  Mr Chairman, I personally handled agents in Swaziland and every time I handled that agent I had to meet him at a prearranged place.  I had to trust that agent, that agent could have led me into an ambush every time if he had turned, and that goes for every policeman that ever handled agents.
	That is what I was speaking about, that this person, if his loyalties had indeed changed, that the person who handled him or those Security Branch members, were in fact in physical danger.

MR LAX: We've heard mountains of testimony during the course of the last four years about agents and handlers and informants and handlers and it's very rare to find that an agent ever comes into contact, an informant, certainly of this nature, with more than two or three handlers at any one time of any description.

JOHAN MARTIN VAN ZYL: This person had been infiltrated from abroad as a trained MK cadre, Mr Chairman, he was therefore - for him to change his ideological mind-set, he had to be spoken to by various people in the Security Branch who had various interests from the different desks.  He had been interrogation for sure, by different people from Security Branch Headquarters and then later by Soweto as well.  That was just the norm at the time, he had to know more than one person.  Maybe he was handled later by Mr Martin van Niekerk, but before that he must have, during this phase in which he was turned, he must have met more people than only Mr van Niekerk, Sir.

CHAIRPERSON: I think it's van Rooyen, not van Niekerk, so don't implicate somebody that ...(intervention)

JOHAN MARTIN VAN ZYL: I'm sorry, I was confused.  Sorry, Mr Chairman.

MR LAX: The point is a simple one, with respect, the people who turn somebody don't end up being his handlers.  The people who do the turning are generally people who move from instance to instance, they're highly skilled at that and in our experience there weren't a lot of them who were excellent at that job, and they went around and they created what came to be called askaris, by using psychological tactics to achieve that purpose.  They didn't handle the individuals in the informant capacity, it had very little to do with them.  Isn't that so?

JOHAN MARTIN VAN ZYL: It doesn't change the fact that he knew him, Mr Chairman, and that he knew where they might have been or where they might have moved around.  Even though they didn't handle him afterwards he could identify them at any time.

MR LAX: I'll leave it, it's really an academic point and I'm wasting our time here.

JOHAN MARTIN VAN ZYL: But in hindsight it is also easy to be clever now, Mr Chairman, saying it, with respect from my side.  At that time this was the position that stared us in the face and that is the way we reasoned at that time.  I'm not trying to justify this action, I've never tried to justify our actions, I'm just trying to explain what the conditions were and how we thought and how our minds worked at that time.  They might have been totally wrong, and in hindsight, they have been wrong.  And those are the facts.

MR LAX: No, no, I realise that and I see that from the way you've been answering the questions.  Thank you, Chairperson.

CHAIRPERSON: Can he be excused?