Amnesty Hearings — Durban — UNKNOWN

MR MSHE: Thank you, Mr Chairman.  I am equally indebted to the Committee for the chance given to me.  We have no questions - I have no questions to put to the witness.
NO QUESTIONS BY MR MSHE

MR DE JAGER: Mr Coetzee, you've stated in evidence that you grew up in a conservative Afrikaner house.

WITNESS:   That's correct, Mr Chairman.

MR DE JAGER: Would you advance that for an excuse for committing these murders?

WITNESS:   No, Mr Chairman.  I think we must look at it in context, not only the Afrikaner - the conservative Afrikaner house that I grew up, but the complete environment, the complete non-contact at all with the black Afrikaners of my age at all, so in context yes, but not singly just the household.

MR DE JAGER: You grew up in a city in Pretoria.

WITNESS:   That is correct, Mr Chairman.

MR DE JAGER: Many conservative Afrikaners grew up on farms.

WITNESS:  That's correct, Mr Chairman.

MR DE JAGER: /But they

MR DE JAGER: But they didn't become murderers, and even Afrikaners growing up in cities didn't become murderers.

WITNESS:   Yes, Mr Chairman.  It's difficult to explain.  I can just by indicating that never before I joined Vlakplaas did I commit any murders, stole cars, or anything to that extent, and never thereafter.  It was a war situation as I saw it, and it was a question of using the same methods that the enemy used, illegal methods, to achieve our goals, namely to try and prevent the total onslaught from succeeding, the revolutionary onslaught.

MR DE JAGER: But, Mr Coetzee, you were transferred from Oshoek, or from Middelburg to Vlakplaas.  You took with you, as far as I could gather, some of your colleagues who were with you at Oshoek, or at the - for instance van Dyk.

WITNESS:   That's correct.  Eventually after a year, that's correct, Mr Chairman.

MR DE JAGER: Did you request them to come?

WITNESS:   I've asked him whether he will be interested and he said yes, and then I arranged it, Mr Chairman.  It was a free choice.

MR DE JAGER: The people serving under you then, how many of them and who were they that were serving under your command previously?

WITNESS:   If I can just - I think there's a list.  I would like just to refresh my memory, but I can start off by Sergeant Koos Schutte, Warrant-Officer Connie Swikelaar, who was mostly involved in administrative work, myself of course, Captain Koos Vermeulen from Bronkhorstspruit, Constable Arends van Jaarsveld from Oshoek Border, Constable Louis Le Roux, or Louis Roux, Sergeant Louis Olivier, Sergeant Balletjies Bellingham, and Constable or Sergeant - ja, Constable at that stage Braam du Preez, the son of Brigadier Jan du Preez.  As far 	/as my black

MR DE JAGER: as my black policemen colleagues were concerned I can remember Almond Nofomela, I can remember Constable Joe Mpofu.  I can remember Warrant-Officer Letsatsi, Dan Mohabudi.  Constable Dan Mohabudi at stages were at Vlakplaas, but I think he more fell under the Northern Transvaal division based in Pretoria, but he frequented Vlakplaas.  And then, as far as labourers were concerned, there were three ex-Rhodesia freedom fighters, Matthew Mabisera, Nixon and Godfrey Ndawana, two brothers.  Nixon has since died in a motor car accident.

MR DE JAGER: Yes.  Mr Coetzee, what I wanted to know is whether you requested or influenced these people to come to Vlakplaas because they were under your command previously?

WITNESS:   The only people - no, Mr Chairman, not in full.  The only people that worked under me, served under me previously, was Paul van Dyk and van Jaarsveld, Arends van Jaarsveld.  Koos Vermeulen was on his own request as a friend when he heard that things were going to built up at Vlakplaas, and the rest was chosen by Brigadier Jan du Preez's son.  And the Constable Louis that I said - Le Roux, was a friend of Constable Braam du Preez, so - Balletjies Bellingham came from Northern Transvaal Division, I never knew him at all.

MR DE JAGER: All right.  Mr Nofomela?

WITNESS:   Mr Nofomela - the policemen, except for Warrant-Officer Letsatsi, was chosen after completing their training at Hammanskraal Police Training College at the end of 1980.  At the time Colonel Trevor Baker was sent to Hammanskraal to select people for Vlakplaas.  I had no insert in that choice at all.

MR DE JAGER: But didn't you sort of brought up Mr Nofomela?  Didn't he work in your garden?

WITNESS:   No, Mr Chairman,

MR DE JAGER: /it's Tshikalanga

MR DE JAGER: it's Tshikalanga, David Tshikalanga.

MR DE JAGER: Oh, Mr Tshikalanga.

WITNESS:   That's correct, yes.

MR DE JAGER: Yes, sorry.

WITNESS:   He travelled actually after the school - after I've left Sibasa in January 1976, and during the school unrests in 1976 he eventually joined me when I was at Volksrust, station commander.  He then joined up with me.  He phoned me, traced me down through my parents, and then came to live with me at Volksrust, and then went on to live with me when I was transferred to the border post, Oshoek Border Post, and from there to Middelburg.  And he had frequent contact with Major Nick van Rensburg and was accepted as one of the family in the end, and he then - when I moved to Pretoria, Middelburg and eventually Pretoria, he came with me, and they made him a - they gave him an informant fee at first.  I can't remember the ... (intervention)

MR DE JAGER: Yes, but he was always with you and under your influence.

WITNESS:   That's correct, Mr Chairman.  That's correct.

MR DE JAGER: Since he've worked in your garden.

WITNESS:   Yes, after school.

MR DE JAGER: Yes.

WITNESS:   Yes, that's correct, Mr Chairman.

UNKNOWN: Mr Coetzee, in your opinion was General Johan Coetzee aware that C1 was in fact used for hit squad operations and not used to perform the originally intended function thereof, and in particular in this case was he aware that Brigadier van der Hoven had given instructions for the elimination of Mr Mxenge?

WITNESS:   My answer would be 100% yes.  He was in a meeting that Friday morning, and was called out of the meeting to be informed, according to Brigadier Jan du Preez, of what happened to Mr Mxenge.

UNKNOWN: /And on

UNKNOWN: And on frequent occasions afterwards he was very

UNKNOWN: interested in which specific individual was responsible for it, and Brigadier Jan du Preez' answer was, "It's better for you and me not to know."  Now, I think that was as a result of the need to know.  Brigadier Jan du Preez will have to explain that.  But for sure, as for instance in the Joe Pillay case he personally congratulated me before he knew that it was a complete disaster in the end.  He congratulated me the morning after the van Heerden sitting with, "Good work done," and mentioned at the time to me that, "One of these days the ANC in London is also going to be dealt with."  And that in the end proved to be the London bomb blast, when they were busy smuggling explosives in the diplomatic bag, which came to my knowledge, and eventually the ANC offices were blown up in London.

UNKNOWN: But in this case why should then Brigadier Jan du Preez be reluctant to get him apprised of who had conducted the hit operation?

WITNESS:   I would not know at all.  I think if one looks at the newspaper report, especially in the Afrikaans newspaper, which I saw either that Saturday morning or the Sunday morning, where he made his statement clearly as usual implicating the ANC, and holding them responsible, or making it to look that they were the responsible people, clearly shows that typical - in context again, that he 100% knew.  He was just curious of which specific individual in the end did perform this operation.

UNKNOWN: Now, when you reported to Brigadier van der Hoven about the success of the operation that Thursday after the murder had been committed, and you again has a meeting

UNKNOWN: /with him

UNKNOWN: with him for the second time the following day, would it