Special Hearings — Political Party Recalls — UNKNOWN

DR BORAINE: I accept that entirely. I think it is true, of course, that the consequences of many of these policies over a 40 year period are also still with us today. And what I want to put to you is that in the Act when a gross human rights violation is defined it also includes the definition severe ill-treatment. I want to suggest to you that as a prominent member of the National Party, as one of its leaders for a number of years and finally its President and now head of the National Party, that in terms of your own statement that tremendous harm has been done to millions of South Africans, 17 million people were prosecuted under the pass laws, for example, more than 3 million people were forcibly removed, that I would suggest that it could be defined as severe ill-treatment. 
As accepting political and moral responsibility for that I would have thought that the amnesty process was the exact place where both in terms of your own statements, the consequences of policies which are with us today and will be with us for a very long time in terms of suffering, and for the sake of reconciliation, that it would have been helpful, and I ask for your comment, if you had taken that step of applying for amnesty.

MR DE KLERK: I am not being legalistic when I say that Parliament made a law, that law instituted this Commission and this Commission has three main tasks. The one is to deal with amnesty in respect of crimes, and only those who are involved in crimes should, to my mind, use the amnesty procedure.
Then the truth, the truth also deals with the harm done to people, with everything, the whole context which caused the bitterness, which caused the conflict and apartheid is very relevant and the harm that it has done with regard to that aspect of your task. And the right place to deal with one's role that you have played in that situation is under that heading.
The third is reparation. Reparation has already started in many instances when apartheid was abolished. But you have a tremendous challenge ahead of you in conjunction with the government and with all other role players in South Africa to look at the question of reparation.
So it is within that framework that I am saying I am not just being legalistic. It would be using the wrong procedure, the wrong aspect of your activities to use the amnesty route.

DR BORAINE: Thank you Mr de Klerk. I don't want to pursue this any longer, save to say, and certainly it's too late in any case, but save to say that in terms of the Act that not only talks about commission but also omission and secondly, the whole question of severe ill-treatment could not only be acted against in a criminal court but also in a civil court, and I don't want to argue this matter, I am just saying that in the light of the overall legacy of apartheid, let's accept that apartheid is over, that the legacy of apartheid is such that to try and reach reconciliation in this country every attempt should be made to accept fundamental responsibility. But you've made that point and I thank you for your answer.

MR DE KLERK: Can I just say, the civil courts have never been closed to anybody in South Africa. During the years when it was apartheid at its worst, any individual assisted, if it was a poor individual, assisted by the best legal brains in the world, if that assistance could be organised, had free access to our civil courts. And in that sense where anybody was harmed to the extent that it gave rise to a civil claim in terms of our generally speaking very fair common law, which is built upon international principles, our civil courts have always been accessible to anybody.

DR BORAINE: I think the point I was making that it may well have to be available in the future.

CHAIRPERSON: Dr Ramashala this is the last before we break for lunch.

MAPULE RAMASHALA: Mr de Klerk, Sir, you present both a dilemma and a very serious contradiction where you say you accept moral and political responsibility on behalf, and I quote because that's according to your definition now, "on behalf of criminals".

MR DE KLERK: On behalf of?

MAPULE RAMASHALA: Of criminals. If we follow through with the classification according to mala fide and bona fides, these are people who perpetrated criminal activities, so you present a dilemma for me. If the carrying out of murders, tortures and other violations was never the official policy of the National Party what did the Party, as a State, do to monitor and deal with the perpetrators of gross-human rights violations, particularly between this period, that is the mandate of the Truth Commission? 
Surely Sir, no Cabinet Minister can claim to have been unaware of gross human rights violations on the part of the security forces? 
The massacres, detentions, severe torture leading to death were often picked up by the media and the international community joined to condemn apartheid practices especially of gross human rights violations, if the perpetrators were not authorised specifically what did the State do? 
I mean you are saying a number of things were done, specifically what did the State do to monitor these? 
The massacres, detention of young people, young people leaving the country out of fear, if all these resulted from unauthorised practices specifically what steps did the State take to protect all citizens? 
Where does your argument in response to this classification of mala fide and bona fides where does it leave the people who have applied for amnesty or even those who have been granted amnesty for that matter? 
Specifically what are you taking moral and political responsibility for? 
Sir, to say that you neither authorised nor knew about such serious violations suggests, at least to me, that you were not in charge and I find that very difficult to accept. Thank you.

MR DE KLERK: Thank you. Can I just start out by saying that I also in, I think I must read again what I said about the acceptance of responsibility. I would ask the Commissioner to listen very carefully. I said that,
"The National Party and I accept full responsibility for all our policies, decisions and actions. We stand by our security forces who implemented such policies and decisions and all reasonable interpretations thereof. We accept that our security legislation and the state of emergency created circumstances which were conducive to many of the abuses and transgressions against human rights which form the basis of the Commission's investigations, creating or playing a role in the creation of such atmosphere because the ANC also played a role in the creation of such an atmosphere, by planting bombs, by doing this, by doing that. We acknowledge that our implementation of unconventional projects likewise created such an atmosphere, no rules, easier to do things against the rules. We have no problem with General Malan's formulation of acceptance of overall responsibility".
Then I said, 
"But like the ANC, like General Malan and many others the National Party also says that many things happened which were not authorised, not intended and of which we were not aware".
And then in the end I said,
"We accept overall moral and political responsibility for our part in the conflicts of the past".
Now what the question, the essence of the question is, if you say you didn't know you should have known, and you didn't do enough to find out. Now I've listed in my original submission on page 26 and 27 some of the steps which we have taken. I said that,
"Soon after my inauguration I gave instructions for the investigation of all secret and covert operations of the security forces with a view to their possible termination. By March 1990 a number of such operations had been phased out".
I then account the fact that I spoke to the police, I have already dealt with that this morning.
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