Amnesty Hearings — White River — 2000-05-04

MR SMIT: Just a couple, Mr Chairperson.  Might I from the outset state that I will deal with all three applicants as one.
	First of all, I would submit that it is from the documents and the evidence, obvious that all three the applicants were members of the Conservative Party, two of them members of Toekomsgesprek, the organisation who acted in that capacity, and that they all acted at all times under instructions from their Commander, if one can put it that way.  Therefore I would submit - and then the deeds that they are requesting amnesty for are obviously with the political objective of getting to the, at that stage, ruling party, being the National Party, to reconsider the transformation process 'cause the Conservative Party were at that stage fully convinced that that was not the right way to go, that the National Party was actually doing it to the detriment of the white South African.
	Now it is obvious that they believed this, that this was said at the Toekomsgesprek meetings, that certain of the high - how could one put it, well even the Secretary-General, Mr Andries Beyers, was present at certain testings of explosives and did not disapprove of their plans to bomb certain government buildings.
	Now what I would like to refer to and what I would submit is a very sightly document, appears on pages 106 to 110 of the documents, one by Adv Christian Daniel de Jager, who is implicated by Mr Snyders, stating that he was a member of the Conservative Party.  What I would submit is that the statement by Mr Snyders is actually to the effect that Mr de Jager was in a legal advisory capacity at that stage, but affidavit filed by him, I would like to point out on page 107, paragraph (d) thereof, he says:
"Ek was nie bewus dat so 'n verdedigingsgroep bestaan het nie, maar is nie verbaas om dit nou te lees nie, want dit verklaar baie van die dinge wat in die KP gebeur het."
I would submit that is corroboration as can be, for the fact that the three applicants were actually convinced that Toekomsgesprek was part of the CP at that stage and that they acted in the course and scope of instructions from the Conservative Party, especially once again in the light of the fact that the Secretary-General personally writes Mr Snyders a letter and then attends meetings of Toekomsgesprek in his capacity as a Conservative Party member.  
	Therefore I would submit that amnesty should be granted with regards to all the incidents mentioned, to all there the applicants.
	Just two other matters.  The averments made by my colleague, Mr van Wyk, on behalf of Mr Louis Snyders, I would submit does not amount to much and should not be taken into consideration as - I think what he attempted to do was to point out that Mr Snyders contradicted himself or is not a witness that can be believed, but the fact remains that Mr Louis Snyders never came to testify, these statements were made vaguely by Mr van Wyk and they left.  There was nothing more to it.   If Mr Louis Snyders was serious, he would have come before this Committee to come and testify to the effect that he knows this and this and this, and this was not done.  Therefore no cognisance can be taken of the averments made by them.
	The last very important aspect is Mr Douw Steyn.  He's implicated in several ways.  He was given on two occasions notice of these hearings and not once - on the one instance he actually wrote on the notification that was given to him - if I may just point that out to the Learned Committee, that appears on page 112, he actually wrote on the Acknowledgement of Receipt that he - he says:
"Ek verkies om hierdie verrigtinge nie by te woon nie, soos ek u reeds meegedeel het op 22 November 1999."
So he is in complete ignorance of these proceedings, he does not come and contradict what is said, so I would submit that it has to be accepted that the applicants are telling the truth, that they complied with all the provisions of the Act, and therefore should receive amnesty for these deeds as put before this Committee.
	I have nothing further to add, unless there are questions from the Committee, Mr Chairperson.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes, I think the one difficulty that does arise in this application, and I think that has been referred to by Mr Sibanyoni, is that the applicants should establish that they were acting on behalf of a publicly known political organisation, in order to qualify.  Now they have this situation that Mr Steyn, on page 112, in that Acknowledgement of Receipt, says that although the application he received was incomplete, he finds the allegations to be absurd and laughable "absurd en belaglik", as he puts it.

MR SMIT: Indeed.

CHAIRPERSON: And therefore he doesn't want to respond and then he writes this other note that you've referred to, that
"I elected not to attend as I've already indicated to you on the 22nd of November '99"
So those are his notes on this thing.  And then there is this letter from the Conservative Party, on page 70.  It says that they were given notice of these applications and they say no, they don't have any interest in this because they have never been involved at any stage in any planning or any activities outside the framework of lawful political activities.
	Now the question arises, on whose behalf were your clients actually acting?  And that's the one that we must be satisfied on, we must be satisfied that your clients have acted on behalf of a publicly known political organisation.  And you might have some submissions on that.

MR SMIT: I do indeed.  Mr Chairperson, if one looks at the evidence it seems like - well it is to the basis that Christo Smit and Douw Steyn were both leaders in the Conservative Party.  These people were giving instructions to the three applicants.  Andries Beyers was the Secretary-General, he was attending meetings in his capacity as Secretary-General of the CP, he was attending Toekomsgesprek meetings and condoning the acts performed there.

CHAIRPERSON: That is precisely the question.  Two of the applicants, more of them, I'm not even sure now, but in any case they've referred to Beyers.  The last applicant said that he accepted "Ek het aanvaar", he accepted that Mr Beyers was there in his capacity as the Secretary-General, after you had asked him about that.  He says Mr Beyers said nothing for or against what he had seen.  There is no indication whether Mr Beyers is under the impression that this could be training for defensive purposes, not necessarily sabotage or killing people.  There's no clarity as to what the position of Mr Beyers is.   We have this letter on page 70, indicating that the Conservative Party distanced itself from this.  Now this the official version that is before us.  Mr Steyn isn't here, he's not come to explain, he says he finds the allegations absurd and laughable.