Amnesty Hearings — Boksburg — 1998-06-19

MS VAN DER WALT: Can we just get clarity here.  The evidence that you give now regarding Chris Van den Heever, you talk about a meeting or a gather underneath a tree,  when was this now.  Was that on the same day?

ABRAHAM CHRISTOFFEL FOURIE: Yes it was on the same day.

MS VAN DER WALT: Did you at one stage receive call up instructions?

ABRAHAM CHRISTOFFEL FOURIE: Yes after Brigadier Van den Heever spoke to us we had a meeting with Brigadier Leon Van der Merwe, are you talking about that?

MS VAN DER WALT: No I am asking if you received any call up instructions?

ABRAHAM CHRISTOFFEL FOURIE: Leon Van der Merwe said there that we will be called up.

MS VAN DER WALT: Was that on the same day?

ABRAHAM CHRISTOFFEL FOURIE: Yes it was on the same day.

MS VAN DER WALT: And now these call up instructions, you already gave evidence that the wives and children must come with?

ABRAHAM CHRISTOFFEL FOURIE: Yes he said we must bring everyone with because he, Brigadier Leon Van der Merwe, conveyed a message that apparently a fax had been intercepted which indicated that there was a threat towards the Ystergarde members, their children and wives.  And the reason, we believe, was in order for us to be a threat to the enemy.

MS VAN DER WALT: Who uttered this threat?

ABRAHAM CHRISTOFFEL FOURIE: It was Brigadier Leon Van der Merwe who told me about this threat.

MS VAN DER WALT: In this fax, who threatened the Ystergarde?

ABRAHAM CHRISTOFFEL FOURIE: He said the enemy, it could have been the security forces, it could have been the ANC I do not know.

MS VAN DER WALT: Did he specify?

ABRAHAM CHRISTOFFEL FOURIE: No he did not.

MS VAN DER WALT: And then at a later stage you received a call up instruction.  Is that correct?

ABRAHAM CHRISTOFFEL FOURIE: That's correct Chairperson.

MS VAN DER WALT: When was this?

ABRAHAM CHRISTOFFEL FOURIE: Round about the 10th of April 1994.

MS VAN DER WALT: I see on page 132, paragraph 20 you mentioned the 14th?

ABRAHAM CHRISTOFFEL FOURIE: Yes but under the trees they spoke and said that on the 14th and 15th we must rise up towards Ventersdorp and then Gert Fourie said wouldn't it be better to go there before the time because it might be chaos with all the convoys of cars and everything and if you go there on the 12th then you'll be stationed there earlier.

MS VAN DER WALT: And did you all move up to Ventersdorp?

ABRAHAM CHRISTOFFEL FOURIE: The 10th I received a call from Brigadier Leon Van der Merwe and he told me that we must go to Ventersdorp.  Me and the Major who was underneath me, Major Johan Smit, I contacted him by phone and I told him that he must give this message to the men, the fact that we received a call up instruction to Ventersdorp.

MS VAN DER WALT: Just to interrupt you, this Major Johan Smit was also a person who was charged with you?

ABRAHAM CHRISTOFFEL FOURIE: That is correct Chairperson.

MS VAN DER WALT: And he was found not guilty?

ABRAHAM CHRISTOFFEL FOURIE: That is correct.

MS VAN DER WALT: So what did you do with your family?

ABRAHAM CHRISTOFFEL FOURIE: Yes, to put it this way it was a massive struggle to leave behind all the things you have been working for all your life, specifically if you are not young anymore and you must give it all away and move again.  But to go to a Volkstaat where you know people will look after your interests, then surely you must make the sacrifice so I spoke to my wife and I explained it to her and we trusted what we were told and what we were promised and there will be milk and honey in this Volkstaat so we gave it all up and we sold all our things and we decided to march on towards this Volkstaat.

MS VAN DER WALT: Were you still working at Barlows then?

ABRAHAM CHRISTOFFEL FOURIE: That's correct.

MS VAN DER WALT: How many years was it then?

ABRAHAM CHRISTOFFEL FOURIE: 13 1/2, 14 years around there.

MS VAN DER WALT: And as I understood your evidence you worked yourself up when you left school in Standard 7 in order to obtain that position at Barlows?

ABRAHAM CHRISTOFFEL FOURIE: No, first I worked at the railways, because I worked very long hours there and then I moved up to the Transvaal where I saw I could only work day shifts and I could spend more time with my family and then I started working for Barlows.  I didn't have my papers but they gave me a chance to get into the car industry and that's where I worked as a mechanic.

MS VAN DER WALT: And there you qualified?

ABRAHAM CHRISTOFFEL FOURIE: No up until now I did not qualify as a mechanic, there were problems with the writing of the papers, I don't know things weren't going very well, I don't know why.

MS VAN DER WALT: And then you decided to give up these years of service at Barlows and go to the Volkstaat?

ABRAHAM CHRISTOFFEL FOURIE: That is correct.

MS VAN DER WALT: And then you went to Ventersdorp, is that correct?

ABRAHAM CHRISTOFFEL FOURIE: That's correct, all the men came to my house with the caravans and their possessions that they brought with them, their belongings and from there we all drove together towards Ventersdorp.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Fourie, you did all these things because you believed that, did you believe all the promises?

ABRAHAM CHRISTOFFEL FOURIE: Chairperson it might be difficult for others to believe.

CHAIRPERSON: No I'm only asking.

ABRAHAM CHRISTOFFEL FOURIE: But me myself it was a thing I believed in and I think I was doing the right thing.

CHAIRPERSON: At least there was a hope that it would realise?

ABRAHAM CHRISTOFFEL FOURIE: Yes.

CHAIRPERSON: So things didn't work out that way.  Where do you live now?

ABRAHAM CHRISTOFFEL FOURIE: Now I'm back in Johannesburg Chairperson.

CHAIRPERSON: At Barlows?

ABRAHAM CHRISTOFFEL FOURIE: No Chairperson I lost that job, because of all these things I lost my job.

CHAIRPERSON: Did you return to your house?

ABRAHAM CHRISTOFFEL FOURIE: No I don't have a house anymore Chairperson, I live with my child.

MS VAN DER WALT: In Ventersdorp there was evidence that the people got together at Trim Park.  Did you also go there?

ABRAHAM CHRISTOFFEL FOURIE: Yes Chairperson, first in Ventersdorp where we went around the head office and I got Leon Van der Merwe there and I told him we are here, the men are here with their wives and children.  We were promised that there would be a safe place for the wife and kids and that we would have a place to stay and I asked him where do we go from here so he told us that we must go the Trim Park, that there are already people there.  We must go and establish ourselves there and he would later joint us.  And then we went to the Trim Park.

MS VAN DER WALT: Carry on.

ABRAHAM CHRISTOFFEL FOURIE: So we hung around there.  We found Etienne Le Roux there, him and his wife were sort of settled in, they gave us coffee and Brigadier Leon Van der Merwe then arrived there and he spoke to us and he told us - firstly when we all got together there he said to us it's a good thing you're here and that we were supposed to do the security and he would inform us later about what we were supposed to do because he didn't know exactly what was going on and somebody would take us to Cliffie Barnard's farm where there was a better place for us to camp and to settle ourselves in.

MS VAN DER WALT: And did he also address you with regards to the Volkstaat?

ABRAHAM CHRISTOFFEL FOURIE: Yes he did say something, he said that the Ystergarde would occupy the towns and the CP people or the towns with CP councils - I'm not clever enough that I understood all these things well, but the major thing was that we trusted in the leadership and he also mentioned the hunting of our people and he asked us whether all the "Garde" people were there and I said all of us were there.

MS VAN DER WALT: It would seem that the farm of Barnard was not quite fit and woman went elsewhere?