Amnesty Hearings — Bloemfontein — 1997-03-27

MR DE RU: Your Honour, they were questioned about the identifications which they were going to make to me.  If I could just describe to you how identifications work.  You fill in a form, he fills in a form where he says that he wants to identify certain, point out certain places to you and he would have to explain those.  I am just sketching an example here.  If he pointed out a window to you, he could say that I broke this window and climbed through it.  If he pointed out a cupboard to you, he could say that I stood on this cupboard or I tramped on this cupboard or whatever or whatever the cupboard, role the cupboard played.  That is what the identification form was used for.

JUDGE MGOEPE: So, you did not question them about their possible political activity and affiliation?

MR DE RU: No, your Lordship.

JUDGE MGOEPE: Now, you did not know them beforehand, you did not question them about their possible political affiliation, on what basis did you think that they were inspired by politics or political slogans?

MR DE RU: Simply based on my belief that, that I believed that these murders were committed through incitement by the political leaders.  I investigated hundreds of cases in my career and the pattern of murder cases here differed from the murder cases which took place on the aged people and the other, the farmers.  The cases of murder on farmers and aged people and in outlying areas were done in utterly cruel manners and fitted the political instructions that it should send shockwaves through the community so that more publicity could be granted to it and the more it would, it would send fear into the people.

JUDGE MGOEPE: But, but common crimes, ordinary crimes can also be horrible.

MR DE RU: Your Lordship, I would agree with you to an extent, but most of your normal murders are a gunshot wound or a stabbing wound, but in these cases the bodies are terribly mutilated.  The murders, there are some cases which I saw where the body are far worse than these and these were the attacks on the farmers and the aged.  They were utterly shocking and they would be, make ones skin crawl.

JUDGE MGOEPE: In the first instance, the deceased was chopped with an axe.

MR DE RU: That is correct.

JUDGE MGOEPE: And you thought that the, the suspect must have been either ANC or a PAC person?

MR DE RU: Most definitely.

JUDGE MGOEPE: Attacking his victim with an axe?

MR DE RU: That is correct.

JUDGE MGOEPE: Would you not have expected that if that person was ANC or PAC, he would have used, well, some of the weapons which were commonly used by such people?

MR DE RU: Not necessarily, your Lordship, not necessarily.

JUDGE MGOEPE: There had been many murders before, before you received instructions from, from Colonel Voigt, there had been murders and robberies.

MR DE RU: There were many murders and robberies, your Honour, but not as, on farms and on aged people at that
time.  These murders escalated from 1989, they really seriously escalated.

JUDGE MGOEPE: Well, they had always, they had always been there, but what you are saying to us is that they increased?

MR DE RU: There was definitely an escalation in them.

JUDGE MGOEPE: And that led you to the conclusion that everyone of them, as you say in your statement, because I have noticed that you said, "all of them", it led you to the conclusion that everyone of them must be politically inspired?

MR DE RU: That is correct, Your Lordship, that is what I believed.

JUDGE MGOEPE: You made no room, whatsoever, for exceptions?

MR DE RU: No.

JUDGE MGOEPE: And are you, are you saying that there would have been no exceptions?

MR DE RU: Your Lordship, I did not see how there could be exceptions as far as attacks on aged were concerned.  I did not see it as such, no.

JUDGE MGOEPE: Now, I do not know whether we are really in a position to conduct a meaningful communication under the circumstances.

JUDGE WILSON: We will adjourn, I think, at this stage till two o' clock.
COMMITTEE ADJOURS

MR DE RU: (s.u.o.)

JUDGE MGOEPE: I was, Mr de Ru, I was almost through, but page 17, Mr Mpshe asked you about what Detective Nel said about having shot a Black person some, a long time back.  Why was it necessary to, for him to say that, to say that he had shot a Black person, he had shot a Black person for a long time?

JUDGE WILSON: He had not shot a Black person for a long time.

JUDGE MGOEPE: That, why was it necessary for him to say that he had not shot, oh yes, why was it necessary for him to say what he said, that he had shot a Black person some times back?

MR DE RU: Your Lordship, I am not sure why he mentioned it, but what I can bring to the attention of the Committee is that before he came to me at the Detective Unit he worked for the Internal Stability Unit, the riot squad as it was known back then.

JUDGE MGOEPE: Is it not, if I may ask you the question, which may be an uncomfortable one, was the colour of the possible victim not a factor to be taken into account?

MR DE RU: Your, yes, that is a possibility.  Meaning I am convinced that at that stage there probably were not that many White people who were known as ANC members and up to this day I am not sure that there are that many White PAC members.  So, I am not sure whether the colour factor was that crucial.

JUDGE MGOEPE: If, if you had been called to a scene where an elderly farmer had been killed and robbed and you found that the suspect was, was White would you have also executed him in the same way?

MR DE RU: I would have, Your Lordship.

JUDGE MGOEPE: So we have a situation where anybody if he had killed a farmer during that time and if you had been involved in the investigations, that person would be, be killed during that time?

MR DE RU: That is correct.

JUDGE MGOEPE: Now, what would, what would it take to indicate to you that a particular killing on the farm was not politically motivated, but plain, ordinary crime?

MR DE RU: Your Worship, as I have already said, the belief that the murders during that period I mentioned to you were committed on farms and on the aged, made me believe that they were politically motivated and that was my honest belief in that.

JUDGE MGOEPE: Nothing would have indicated anything to the contrary?

MR DE RU: No.

JUDGE MGOEPE: Thank you.

JUDGE WILSON: The, this man who you were convicted of murdering, he had already admitted his guilt.  Did you know that or is it likely you would have been told?

MR DE RU: M'lord, I would like to try and understand the first part of the question from you.  You said the man who was, in connection with the murder, is that the second case?

JUDGE WILSON: The second case, did, he had admitted his guilt?

MR DE RU: That is correct, your Worship.

JUDGE WILSON: That, and that appears in the Appellate Division judgment on page 48.  Thank you.

ADV DE JAGER: At the end of your testimony you said that
you would ask your legal representative to submit a letter.

MR DE RU: That is correct, your Worship.

ADV DE JAGER: Has the letter been submitted?

MR DE RU: M'lord, I assume he is going to do it now.  In actual fact there are two letters and I assume that he will do that now.

ADV DE JAGER: Do you think we could have the letters before you conclude your evidence so that we could see if any questions will emanate from that?

MR DE RU: As it pleases you, Mr Chairman.

ADV DE JAGER: Do you know who the Chairperson is of the Free State Agricultural Union?

MR DE RU: Your Worship, no, I only know Mr Jannie Els who is the Chairperson of the Security Committee.  I am not sure who the Chairperson is of the Agricultural Union itself.

ADV DE JAGER: It was in the newspapers and last night on TV as well there was a statement by Dr Gous.

MR DE RU: He is the president.

ADV DE JAGER: He took the politicians and the police to task because they did not support him when he said earlier that these murders were politically motivated, these murders on the farmers.