Special Hearings — Chemical And Biological Warfare Hearings — 1998-06-08

MR VALLY: Did you feel free to leave your job at RRL, or did you feel threatened that you'd be killed if you left?

MIKE ODENDAL: At the time we left, it was rather a tumultuous time because a month after I left, the whole company collapsed and I think everything collapsed, and it was liquidated a short while after that and no, I didn't - by that time another Managing Director had taken over for the previous 18 months.

MR VALLY: Did you feel in fear of your life if you felt like leaving before that?

MIKE ODENDAL: No.

MR VALLY: My very last question, did Dr Immelman ever indicate to you what he did with these substances, who he gave them to?

MIKE ODENDAL: No, he didn't.  He only identified them as operatives, agents ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: And what did you understand by that?

MIKE ODENDAL: Well, I understood covert operations.

MR VALLY: Did you know specifically which branch?

MIKE ODENDAL: No.

MR VALLY: You saw them as state agents?

MIKE ODENDAL: Yes.

MR VALLY: And that's all you knew about it?

MIKE ODENDAL: Yes.

MR VALLY: Did he mention CCB?

MIKE ODENDAL: No.

MR VALLY: Did he mention Special Forces?

MIKE ODENDAL: No.

MR VALLY: Thank you, Dr Odendal.

CHAIRPERSON: Dr Wendy Orr?

WENDY ORR: Dr Odendal, when you were asked to contaminate five cigarettes with Anthrax and told that they were going to be used to test filters which Dr Jan Lourens was making, did you honestly believe that?

MIKE ODENDAL: You must remember at that stage, you know, it was sometimes difficult to believe what you were told, so - and we were also in a situation at that stage that I was brought to the understanding that they were to be used across the borders to disrupt, let's say an army camp, or whatever the case is, or to remove some people in neighbouring countries.  You know, I sort of realised that could have been the possibility, or the alternative possibility.

WENDY ORR: I imagine if you were asked to contaminate one cigarette in a packet in five different packets, it was hardly for mass use in a camp, it sounds more to me as if was for use against particular individuals who were going to be given those cigarettes.  Would you accept that?

MIKE ODENDAL: Yes.

CHAIRPERSON: Dr Randera?

DR RANDERA: Dr Odendal, I just want to first of all perhaps rapport when you spoke about some of the bacteria and the effects, the impression I got was that when you spoke about gastro enteritis for example, that it was just a fairly mild condition, I think we need to be aware that two million child die in our continent every year from gastro, and also as far as I'm aware still, it's the major cause of mortality, infant mortality in South Africa to this day.  When we talk about gastro, it's not just some mild condition, it can responsible for severe immobility as well as mortality.  I hope you agree with that.

MIKE ODENDAL: Yes, no, certainly.

DR RANDERA: Dr, you know, in the last two days we've been trying, I suppose part of our responsibility is to understand what the responsibility of scientists is, where does it begin, where does it stop.  In your - in this particular case, I just want to ask, clearly what I'm understanding from you is that this differentiation between defensive and offensive was purely academic really.  On the one side perhaps you were developing this bacteria to understand what treatment modalities can come out of it in a war situation, but on the other side, you were handing over cultures with toxins that could kill to, in this situation, to Dr Immelman, and you really don't know to this day what actually happened to those cultures?  Earlier on when you were asked that question, you said that when the freeze-dry bacteria, that they can survive from a few days to several years.  So am I right in assuming, given that you don't know, you know that you put it into a bar-fridge into Dr Immelmann's safe at one stage, but beyond that you don't know what happened to these cultures?

MIKE ODENDAL: Well, perhaps I can latch on to what Dr Schalk van Rensburg said, I know at some stage when there was a scare that someone was going to come and inspect the place, a lot of specimens were destroyed, but I had no control over that, and I think the only person that would be able to answer you correctly on this matter would be Dr Immelman himself.

DR RANDERA: But it comes back to my original point, was is the responsibility of scientists like yourself, I mean in retrospect now, what would you recommend so that these situations don't arise again?

MIKE ODENDAL: I think in retrospect many things could be decided on, and I think this is something that I will certainly apply to myself and I think that hopefully such a situation will never prevail again in this country that it would be necessary for any scientist to do the same sort of work that has been done.  I don't think - I think your ideas change over the time, and as you get a bit older, I think you get a bit wiser, and I think even my ideas have changed of the number of years.  So I would agree with you that I think one can certainly look into that and change your ideas.  But I think you must remember one thing, and this - we did not - the majority of our time we spent on more productive projects, and I think that a lot of good work came from our efforts at this laboratory.  We were responsible for a Bovine vaccine, which  has been registered at Onderstepoort.  We've done a lot of, let's say defensive type of work as well, you know I would say in our case, I think Dr Schalk van Rensburg quoted 66% were toxic, by that was for the toxicology people.  In our case it was just the complete opposite.   I can show you my project lists where at least a third of the projects we did were so-called hard projects, and the other projects were soft projects and commercial, with a commercial implication.  So I think to a certain extent we were not satisfied with the type of management at Roodeplaat.  We did, I've got documents to state my point, that we did not like the way we were being managed, and we did make efforts to rectify the matter, but that wasn't really to any avail.  But nevertheless, I think more good eventually on the whole more good came out of the whole venture that the bad things.  Bad things were wrong, I will not, I will agree to that and for that I am very sorry and I think I will, if this is the reason for this Commission then I would, that's why I'm here to - because I wouldn't like to see this happen again.

DR RANDERA: Well, unfortunately it's the duty of this Commission to look into the bad things that were done, but I'm sure UNESCO would look at the other things, the good things that were done, you might even be considered for an award, but our duty is to the little that was done, even if it was 10% of the whole work that was done, it ought not to have been done.  We'd have been pleased if 100% of your time had been spent on good things, because the 10% of the time that was spent on these sort of things, you know, blots entirely even the good work that was done.  I'm sure you appreciate that.

CHAIRPERSON: That seems to bring us to the end of our questions today.  We shall adjourn until, well Hanif has some ideas, could you meet at 08h30 and we start at 09h00.

MR VALLY: 08h30 or 09h00 is fine by us, Mr Chair.  08h30 would suite us.  I just want to ask that if we could just ask the attorneys to remain behind, legal representatives rather, once we adjourn, just to arrange the rest of the programme in view of potential court challenges, so we understand when the challenges will be brought, and as well as arranging our schedule accordingly.  By this I mean we can tell people to be on standby so that we don't waste any time.

CHAIRPERSON: And of course you'll remember that one of the arrangements that you should possible be looking at is how much time each witness is going to be given.

MR VALLY: Certainly.