Amnesty Hearings — Durban — 1999-08-23

MR WILLS: Now, I want to turn to the fateful meeting on the 14th between you and Botha, that is the meeting that Botha refers to and which only came up in your later affidavit where you say, or when Botha says he came I think to your house and he reported that Ndaba was panicky and was wanting to go back to the ANC and tell them about the story and he sought your advice.

J A STEYN: That's correct.

MR WILLS: Can you tell me what happened at that meeting?  First of all, did it in fact take place at your house?

J A STEYN: No, I cannot remember where it happened.

MR VISSER: Botha never said so, Mr Chairman.  Paragraph 11.  Gen Steyn's statement, paragraph 11.

MR WILLS: I'm sorry.  You can't remember where the meeting took place?

MR VISSER: At his office.

MR WILLS: Thank you Mr Visser, I'm trying to remember a lot of information.  So the meeting took place at your office.  This is the Saturday now?

J A STEYN: If I can remember correctly, that is correct.  That is how I had written it in my application.

MR WILLS: Now were you called by Botha to come into your office, specifically for this purpose?

J A STEYN: I cannot remember, Chairperson.

MR WILLS: Anyway, what did Botha say to you at this?

J A STEYN: Chairperson, Botha informed me, as I said in my evidence, that problems had arisen.  He referred to the fact that we had Shabalala in our possession and that we did not know what to do with him.  He said that in the light of Shabalala's arrest, a fear had arisen that if he had to be set free, that he would endanger the position of Ndaba in the ANC.  We discussed different matters.  Over and above this Shabalala, he said that Shabalala suspects that Ndaba was co-operating with the police and that setting him free for this reason would probably not have been possible.  Ndaba, according to Botha, verbalised his fear and that the ANC, as a result of the arrests on the 7th, had or could have become aware of the arrest on the 7th and Botha said that up to that stage his conversation had been of such a nature that it would, or that it appeared that Ndaba would rather want to play open cards with the ANC if he had been set free.  This is more or less the conversation that had taken place that day.

MR WILLS: Was it not discussed that you were worried about the fact that de Beer's unit might eventually find out where these people were?

J A STEYN: I don't believe that we spoke about this Chairperson.

MR WILLS: Now, it seems that the gist of Mr Botha's evidence was his concern of the state of mind of Mr Ndaba at that time.  It seemed as if his state of mind had deteriorated from when he came back from Pretoria on the 13th and advised Ndaba of the fact that there were no prosecutions that were going to take place, that that is when Mr Ndaba began, to use a loose phrase, to fall apart?

J A STEYN: If I remember his evidence correctly, that is what he said, yes.

MR WILLS: Now this is a person who's been working as an informer for you people for the best part of 2 and a half years, since 1988.

J A STEYN: Chairperson, no, I don't think it was for such a long time.  As far as I can remember, unless Botha wants to give other evidence, after Ndaba, in 1988 according to him, he had gone to Lusaka and as far as I know until he returned to the Republic, as far as I know, he had not made any contact with him.  If there had been any contact, there were various informers and I can't remember everything and if there were and I cannot remember it now.

MR WILLS: Rephrase.  He was helping you with information and he had been, he'd agreed to put his life on the line to help you with information and your unit.

J A STEYN: That's correct, Chairperson.

MR WILLS: Didn't you think, Mr Botha, didn't you feel it in your heart that it might be, it might at least be decent to give him an opportunity to regain his stability, to give him a couple of days to compose himself?  Why didn't you do that?

J A STEYN: Are you meaning that we had to set him free?

MR WILLS: No, I'm not.  I'm not meaning that.  You've already held him for the best part of a week, six days and whilst I can't remember the names, I've become aware of people who've been held by the Security Force for three months before I've got to see them.  It would have been easy for you to have held him for a couple of more days just to give him a chance to compose himself.

J A STEYN: I think Botha's fear was, not his fear, I think Botha's point of view as he gave it to me and I had accepted it was that a stage had been reached where Ndaba was not prepared to take any of these possible options that had been presented to him.  I think this was the factor that had been taken into account, that no more time had to be used.

MR WILLS: No Botha's evidence is that he was very upset and beside himself and not in control of himself and it was in that context, according to Botha, that Ndaba had said that he was considering going over to the ANC.  He was very upset.

J A STEYN: That's correct.

MR WILLS: Well surely you must at least know that when people are upset, they say things that they don't mean and that it would have been wise for you to wait at least possibly even for just another 24 hours to give him a chance to regain his senses.

J A STEYN: Chairperson, according to Botha, he had reached a stage where he thought that the conversation had stopped there.  That's how I understood it.

MR WILLS: Didn't you challenge Botha on this?  You're the senior man here.  Botha had come to seek your advice.  I would have thought that at the very least, had he been one of my comrades, I would have said "let's give him a chance, let's give him a break, let's see if he changes" but instead you rushed through with this execution.

J A STEYN: Chairperson, I accepted what Botha had done at that stage.  I accepted it to be like that.

MR WILLS: You believed everything Botha had said to you?

J A STEYN: I had worked together with Botha for a long time.  He did very good work.

MR WILLS: You didn't think it would be necessary to think that you're killing one of essentially your own men to go an see him yourself, and see the situation for yourself?

J A STEYN: No, I accepted his word, Chairperson.

MR WILLS: Now, I can't understand your logic in regard to the decision to kill both of them.  I know this has been covered by the Committee but very briefly, what would have been wrong with killing Shabalala and letting Ndaba go free?

J A STEYN: If Shabalala had been eliminated and Ndaba was set free, is that what you're talking about?

MR WILLS: Yes.

J A STEYN: Then Ndaba could have - the fact that Shabalala was in our possession could have been made known by him.

MR WILLS: It was already known that these people had disappeared.

J A STEYN: That's correct.

MR WILLS: You see, Mr Botha mentioned this issue in his evidence in chief, that if you tell the ANC that there's an informer in their midst then a big witch hunt takes place within the ANC and they can use this situation to their advantage.

J A STEYN: That's correct.

MR WILLS: Well, why didn't you do the same with Ndaba at that time?  Release Ndaba to the ANC, let them know by some, for want of a better phrase, dirty tricks department that this person is an informer and then they themselves would conduct their investigation and they'd never trust a word that Ndaba said and you could exploit this whole situation in relation to Vula?

J A STEYN: Chairperson, as Botha had pointed out in his evidence, Ndaba would have been capable of conveying certain information that he probably could have gotten hold of during their meetings in the last three or four meetings.  He could also become aware of information due to the interrogation by other members of C20 and of Headquarters members that were there.  He could, for this matter have conveyed any information to the ANC and this was a risk.