Amnesty Hearings — Cape Town — 2000-03-15

MR WILLIAMS: Sir, I've waited eleven years for the truth, I'm prepared to wait a few minutes more but I don't think you're answering the question.  Your statement clearly says that Special Forces could only act within the country if the police knew or if they had co-operated therewith.  Now is that correct?

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: This is about what I said initially, Mr Chairperson, about intelligence and information.  The paragraph deals with intelligence and information and what is said about that is a structure that I have just explained to you.

MR WILLIAMS: Sir, I'm asking you these questions because I formed the opinion subjectively, that the police was aware of what was going to happen and that they had the plan to cover up for the other arm for the perpetrators and I'm asking you this question because maybe you can shed more light on this question, maybe you can answer?

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: Mr Chairperson, I did this and then it will have to be at the level of the people who worked at ground level and the question would have to be asked of them and the way in which they operated and whether it happened.  It was not allowed to have happened at all with our types of operation.  If it happened at ground level then it could have been an arrangement they made but I was not aware of it.

MR WILLIAMS: Let me go to another point, I want to refer you to bundle C, page 97 and I'll read the answer there.  I take it this emanated from the Section 29 hearings.  The answer is
"Yes our view was that we only wanted to use Special Forces operatives and people with the necessary skills, operational skills."
Was that your answer?

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: If that is the case, I see it was translated into English, normally I would not have done it like this and I accept it like that then.

CHAIRPERSON: And sorry then just for the record purposes, that was in response to a question
"Were there particular guidelines as to the type of person you would use as a conscious member"
I think we've referred to such a person as an aware member here.

MR WILLIAMS: Now can you tell the Committee what is meant by the words operational skills or people with special skills?  Did that mean people who were able to commit murders for example or what is meant by that?

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: Mr Chairperson, what we meant with this is qualified, trained soldiers that according to formal structures as it is internationally and also locally accepted with formal instances.  I've mentioned it in the last couple of days.  If one takes an infantry soldier there is a specific role and the function of an infantry soldier to kill his enemies.  Specific roles and functions of a paratrooper which would be dropped behind enemy lines and then a specific role and function of Special Forces to do tasks that others would not be able to do and the same applies with regards to the CCB so what is said here is the formal courses that would qualify them to carry out their task.

MR WILLIAMS: But didn't unit six or Region 6 consist of only ex-policemen?

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: That is correct.  That is correct, I am saying that that is what we would have liked to do if we go back to the definition that I gave you.  Clandestine definition means that you would be acting in such a manner where the State is prepared to accept responsibility.  We were a covert structure where the definition would be that the State is not prepared to accept responsibility and this would mean that if a member was to act in a covert situation and he was trained according to what we have just said then there would be a greater risk involved.  In such a case then it was the case that Region 6 was used and a whole new approach was used because we could not do it like we wanted to do it and the reason why in the heat of the battle and in the emergency situation in the country at that time, why we used the police is because they had the access because they worked on ground level because they knew the internal law and actions better than we knew it so they were specialists on their area but they were initially, these things happened when they had just started to work with us so they in time would also improve their qualification and their training.

MR WILLIAMS: Would you then also say that your unit, specifically unit six, was a professional unit or would you like to believe that?

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: They were professional.  They were professionally trained for what they could perform the best as police personnel and they were busy with other training.

MR WILLIAMS: Generally speaking, who were the targets of the CCB?

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: The targets, I can only do it by summarising, the targets I have already mentioned it, the targets of the CCB appeared in the army that was responsible for the land combat, the annual planning that would be done there from which Special Forces and also the CCB would be co-opted against these targets.  These targets were divided into priorities and the priorities were named category A, B, C, D, E type targets and I can't remember all of them but broadly it read enemy targets, enemy individuals, enemy logistical lines and that would mean the ANC/SACP Alliance and anyone who was a threat to the sovereignty of the State of the day and within this context you would then evaluate your enemy from where your enemy would be geographically.  In this case the enemy was right around South Africa in Botswana, in Zambia and in Lusaka and in Zimbabwe etc. and there were routes by which the enemy could infiltrate the Republic and they would then come into the Republic to do acts of terror and it was our work to trace them on that basis.  So co-operators were targets and these people were targets and they were all divided within these broad categories that I've just mentioned.

MR WILLIAMS: What did a person have to do in order to qualify, you know, for action to be taken against this person?

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: He would have to be within the category, he had to have been part of organisations that were banned in the country, who worked to plant bombs to destroy the infrastructure, that an organisation that would in general plant bombs, that would intimidate people and that would be busy with revolutionary warfare in South Africa and that would be encouraging revolutionary warfare and then he would be placed in such a category.

MR WILLIAMS: Now Sir, then Sir, there was a stage in the country when we were under State of Emergency when certain educational organisations, certain religious organisations were banned, where certain non-violent organisations who were opposed to apartheid were banned.  Now did they automatically qualify for selection as a target?

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: No Mr Chairperson, unless they fell within this category and there were structures within the State, within the National Security Management system and also the intelligence community where personalities and we all know this, were identified as a threat to the State and people who fulfilled these requirements and within this intelligence community there were people who were watched, people that came from these different organisations and there were people who were identified as people who would cause trouble or who would try and initiate a revolutionary climate in the country.

MR WILLIAMS: Now we know for a fact that more than 63% of the country's total population supported the ANC at the time and if one translates that into numbers that's an excess of 25 million people.  Did those people automatically qualify for selection as a target?