Amnesty Hearings — Bloemfontein — 1998-01-23

UNKNOWN: Talk about the second before you talk about the third.  Did you get information you wanted from the second person?

MR KOPI: I didn't get any kind of information I sought from him or her.

ADV MEMANI: You were not satisfied?

MR KOPI: Yes I was not satisfied.

UNKNOWN: However, you did not assault her even though you were not satisfied, Your version is that you did not assault her?

MR KOPI: I was not satisfied and I did not assault because if you start to assault that person will tell you a lie then at the end of your interrogation you find that this person has told you a lie.  That is why I don't like that person should be assaulted during interrogation.

UNKNOWN: Then you were interrupted while you were talking to or interrogating the third person?

MR KOPI: Yes I remember that is the third person.

ADV MEMANI: You left to go and see your informer and subsequently in the afternoon at half past three you came back.

MR KOPI: That is correct.

UNKNOWN: At that time, when you came back at half past three following the logic of your evidence, you had still not been satisfied within that you had not yet as yet obtained information you had wanted to obtain from the people you wanted to interrogate in the morning.

MR KOPI: The time when I left I was not satisfied but when I came back I found, I received a different information which we need to follow up.

UNKNOWN: Did you at any stage make a follow up?  You had made a few notes, you were interrupted, you had not got information you wanted, did you after 4 o'clock or whatever, did you make your follow-up and finish up where you had started with regard to those particular individuals?

MR KOPI: No I didn't continue with the interpreting or the interrogation.  When I arrived I went to fourth floor, I went back to Mr du Plooy then I give him the information I received.  Then Du Plooy said leave at 4 o'clock and go home.  Then half past four, go and see that person you're supposed to see.

UNKNOWN: Do you not feel that well, you know, I need to interrogate some people and I was not satisfied, I made some few notes I must follow up that.

MR KOPI: He said to me, I will tell you, leave, do that work with your informer, meet your informer at half past four then we'll meet again.

CHAIRPERSON: Is the position that on that day there were teams of people interrogating these nineteen people, there were lots of other members of the security branch there interrogating them.

MR KOPI: I remember then it could have been like that because there were many.

UNKNOWN: You see the version given to us by at least some of the complainants is that there was such a vicious assault on them and that there were traces and evidence of assault in the form of blood on the walls and the like.

MR KOPI: I said firstly, nobody was assaulted in my presence and secondly if you talk of blood I haven't seen blood anywhere.

ADV DE JAGER: Mr Memani put it to you that you Motsamai took people to the doctor, when was that?

MR KOPI: Say a person is sick, I transported many people it's not only specifically involving these nineteen people.  Even before that any person who was sick who was being detained, if Motsamai was near then I would request that I should go with Motsamai and take this person to the doctor.

ADV DE JAGER: But wasn't the District Surgeon right down in the same building?

MR KOPI: The time when I arrived there in 1984 there was no District Surgeon, he has already left.

ADV DE JAGER: And 1996, on the 6th April 1996 when the nineteen people ...[intervention]

CHAIRPERSON: 1996?

ADV DE JAGER: 1986, sorry, when the nineteen people were arrested, wasn't there a District Surgeon on the ground floor or the first floor roundabout?

MR KOPI: No.  There was no District Surgeon there.

ADV DE JAGER: Thank you, it had been at another stage then.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Memani, have you any further questions?

ADV MEMANI: No questions, Chairperson.
NO FURTHER QUESTIONS BY MR MEMANI

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Brink?

MR BRINK: Thank you Mr Chairman.  Mr Kopi, during the time that you were at Fountain, did you ever see bags which could go over heads or tubes which were used to blindfold people?

MR KOPI: I didn't see those things because I was not using them myself.

MR BRINK: Did you ever hear anyone talk about them?

MR KOPI: There was no policeman who came to tell me that there was those kind of things, the bags or tubes in the office or in the offices.

MR BRINK: Were any of the offices where interrogations took place soundproofed?

MR KOPI: I'm not sure whether they were soundproof or not.

MR BRINK: Did you ever enquire?

MR KOPI: You mean about soundproofed?  You'd hear if somebody was screaming or calling, you would hear if somebody was calling or screaming.

MR BRINK: I beg your pardon, I didn't hear you?

MR KOPI: You'd hear if somebody is calling or screaming.

MR BRINK: If you were in your office, someone could shout from another office then you would hear that, is that the situation?

MR KOPI: Yes if the window is open you would hear but if the door and the windows are closed it's not quite possible to hear.

MR BRINK: Now, can you help me.  Are there any regulations or were there at that time any regulations regarding the requirement that a policewoman should be present when a female detainee was being questioned?

MR KOPI: I don't know, I haven't seen a female police, only white female police were present and they were doing clerical work.

MR BRINK: No the question is were their regulations, to your knowledge which required a policewoman to be present when a female detainee was being interrogated by members of the security branch?

MR KOPI: No.

MR BRINK: I take it you read newspapers?

MR KOPI: At times, yes.

MR BRINK: The fact that there had been a number of hearings before the Amnesty Committee, where a large number of security branch or former security branch policeman have gone so far as to admit having murdered activists, you know that.

MR KOPI: Yes I saw it on T.V. I read it on the newspapers I listened on the radio.

MR BRINK: All at about this time '85/'86, a lot of them.

MR KOPI: Yes I saw that.

MR BRINK: But you say that the security branch headquarters at Fountain in Bloemfontein, to your knowledge, absolutely nothing untoward took place?

MR KOPI: I would not say that because I do not know.

MR BRINK: To your knowledge?

MR KOPI: It's difficult to say they did that because I do not know.

MR BRINK: Thank you.
NO FURTHER QUESTIONS BY MR BRINK

CHAIRPERSON: Did you share this office that you've told us of with anybody?  The office on the fifth floor?

MR KOPI: It was the four of us.  Myself, Melesi, Mafisa, Ngalo, He has since died.

CHAIRPERSON: And what sort of work did the other three do?

MR KOPI: We were doing investigation.

CHAIRPERSON: You were a team were you.

MR KOPI: That is correct.

CHAIRPERSON: And who was your officer in charge of you?

MR KOPI: That was Captain du Plooy.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you.

UNKNOWN: Mr Chairman, there is one question in ...[intervention]

ADV DE JAGER: Did you keep a pocket diary?

MR KOPI: The time I arrived they were not using the pocket book.

MR STANDER: Did you sign a register?

MR KOPI: No we were not signing a register, we were reporting directly to Captain du Plooy.

CHAIRPERSON: Would he have kept a record of when people reported for duty and when they left?

MR KOPI: I would not able to affirm that because we reported half past seven and then when we supposed to knock off duty we would report back to him again.

UNKNOWN: Thank you Mr Chairman.  In 1986, what was your rank then?

MR KOPI: I was constable.

UNKNOWN: Did you have anything to do with the registration of informers, the paperwork concerning the registration of informers?

MR KOPI: My work was to look for informers and to make it possible for them to be registered.