Special Hearings — State Security Council Hearings — 1997-12-04

LUCAS DANIEL BARNARD: I have no doubt in my mind that exactly as in the governing of a country  that  there must be checks and balances between the executive and the judiciary, there must be checks and balances to deal with this.  The security people have to be a) under political guidance and b) that there must be taken care that they do not indulge in unlawful actions.  Thank you.

GLENDA WILDSCHUT: Dr Barnard Brenda Wildschut.  It's actually the job of the Chairperson to say my name.  We were quite intrigued by the theory that was put forward in the various political parties submissions.  The theory that was put forward by the National Party for example seemed to me to be the so-called "bad apple" theory. There seemed to be a group or some people who misinterpreted or did not understand or acted  mala fide in the execution of their duties and so on. That seemed to be the threat that I understood to be running through the submission.  I read in your submission on page 30 paragraph 10.1.25, you will excuse me if I misinterpreted this because my Afrikaans is not very good.  It seems as though you're saying that there were some people who were not behaving professionally and acting very well, in your opinion.  Can you just explain this a little bit more can you explain why you put this in, what really are saying and is it really pointing to the "bad apple" theory?

LUCAS DANIEL BARNARD: Thank  you Chair I just want to make sure is it 10.1.25 on page 30?  Chair I do not wish to comment on this from the point of view of commenting on a political party submission.

GLENDA WILDSCHUT: The other  previous paragraphs 24 and 23 and so on sort-of lead up to this so I'm just linking those two.  In a sense I'm also linking my question to what my colleague Ilan was talking about in the sense of checks and balances and never again kind of situation.

LUCAS DANIEL BARNARD: Paragraph 10.1.25 means in practice the following.  After the Cabinet in a case which was relevant to the security the State had to execute the relevant order and the normal procedure that would then follow would be that the minister calls the Director General if it's in Cape Town and if there are other senior officials involved, they would not be there, they would tell the AG that the Director General - the director general who would then fax people responsible for that in Pretoria.  He would then say that these people and that the Minister wants this information.   Those people would contact the other under them.  The Commission must understand in the Government of a country's administration there is often a discrepancy between the how an order is given and how it is given through the hierarchy.  It often does not carry the same weight and the same meaning.  That is an international truth regarding bureaucracy.
 I also think that it is in our current South Africa, a critical problem, it's a general problem and that is why it says that orders regarding sensitive safety matters had to be communicated very carefully. If orders aren't given carefully there can be misunderstandings and that can only lead to problems.  
 The second point I want to make is I say in my submission that the most important departments taking part in that time disagreed with each other or there were differences between them.  The police, the Military and the National Intelligence worked closely together.  It was in their line function.  And as a matter of fact and of course officials disagreed.  It is also relevant that there was the granting of a budget.  We have to budget, if you can just grant me a minute, must we leave hospitals or schools or what must we cut out of the budget?  In this people take certain stances on certain matters and people might on purpose often say things wrongly.   An official has an empire and he does not want his turf to be decreased or made smaller.   That is a point that one must remember.  South Africa in those years was not free from differences between departments who disagreed with each other.  I think it was healthy that we disagreed with each other.  
 I must then also formulate something that I mentioned to Mr Lax in a different way especially during the late 80's when the conflict was at its peak, senior officials worked under pressure.  I think if I now think back, it was in a certain sense an undeclared war.  There was great tension and people could have made mistakes under that pressure.  That is the perspective I would like to put it in.

GLENDA WILDSCHUT: Perhaps you might want to comment on this because I have noted that you do want to comment on something but rather specific questions.  I don't really - what I'm struggling with is that it seems to me, even though we have before us, your explanation with regards to people acting mala fide in some situations or people pursuing personal agendas and so on, what we have as a Commission before us is reams and reams of testimony of people actually dying at the hands of bureaucrats or of security police persons and so on, so it seems to me that is not one or two or a few people who are acting mala fide, but it seems to me that there was a systematic almost regular pattern of abuses and I'm trying to struggle with the theory that there were few people who were acting, a few people that are not behaving professionally and in their line of duty.  Who were acting outside of orders.  But the evidence before us proves different, and I'm trying to put those two and that's a disjunture that Ilan was talking about.  How do we put this together?  How do we make sense of this?  And I'm appealing to you to help me understand that.

LUCAS DANIEL BARNARD: (Ek dink nie ek kan better doen as wat ek nou net 'n poging voor aan gewend it.  Die staan punt wat u in neem dat daar in die voor van die konflik ook van die oeverheids sector in hierdie verband bepaalde optreedes geneem is en greuwel daar 'n plaas) and that certain atrocities were committed is true.  I want to explain to you that I find it strange that the Commission does not take into account that the security forces and the officials at that time worked under the force and under the stress of a revolutionary war basically.  It was to them a reality they saw it happen and in those circumstances they acted in certain ways.  I personally do not try to paint white any of the atrocities committed at that stage.  That is the point I would like to make.  The problem about the orders and the authority I cannot explain on any further and I do not want to waste your time any further on that.