Special Hearings — Mandela United Football Club Hearings — 1997-11-24

MR CORNELIUS: Mr McPherson, for the clarity of the Chair and the members of the Commission can you generally, shortly explain how Stratcom operated, gathering of intelligence reports and how it was utilised.

JOHN LOUIS MCPHERSON: Stratcom had to act on intelligence gathered by the security branch.  Stratcom in itself formed just another section also within the security branch.  Now to obtain intelligence we speak very easily of intelligence but intelligence is actually a process and the process is firstly, the gathering of information and there you have to use different sources, you use human sources who are basically like agents and you also use technical sources, that is the tapping of telephones and post and photography and so forth, and then of course through interrogation you obtain information and then there are many open sources like the newspapers, SABC and other types of documentation that you can lay your hand on.
 All this information is sent to head office security branch where the information is collated, it's analysed and we can get confirmation of the information through sources and so forth and only then the final product can then be regarded as intelligence.
 This intelligence again is then passed back to the different branches and the regions and is then being received by the Stratcom operators on the ground that then apply or do something with the intelligence that they have received.

MR CORNELIUS: Thank you.  Is there anything you wish to add?

JOHN LOUIS MCPHERSON: No thank you.

MR CORNELIUS: Thank you Mr Chairman.

DR BORAINE: I think this would be an appropriate time to break and have an adjournment for tea.  I'd be grateful if you could be back here by twenty past four.  Thank you.
HEARING ADJOURNS
ON RESUMPTION

DR BORAINE: Thank you very much.  Yes.

MR PIGOU: Thank you Chair.  Mr McPherson you gave us a definition referring to page 5 of your statement, end of page 4 beginning of page 5, of what Strategic communications, Stratcom was, could you tell the Commission where that definition comes from?

JOHN LOUIS MCPHERSON: Mr Commissioner the definition was worked out by the branch of Strategic Communications under the structure of the State Security Council and I can tell you it took us weeks to come to this definition because every country has got its own definition and its own matters to address through Stratcom and so this is the end result of communications then you can say between the different departments, defence, foreign affairs, national intelligence and then law and order.  All of us that worked on Stratcom we came to this definition.

MR PIGOU: Mr McPherson could you tell us whether you have in your possession any documentation which actually sets out that definition of what Stratcom is and whether if you do have that documentation you would be prepared to make it available to the Truth Commission?

JOHN LOUIS MCPHERSON: Yes I do have a lecture on Strategic Communications, covert strategic communications and this definition is in this lecture and in fact I have already made it available to Mr Gelberg.

MR PIGOU: Thank you.  I want to turn now to Operation Romulus and one of the objectives that you have put down there on page 8 20.2 is the promotion of disunity between the ANC and the SACP.  I would then like to refer to your annexure A point 7 where you are referring to Mrs Mandela, or the document is referring to Winnie Mandela abroad, discreditation of the ANC and I quote
"Of cardinal importance and interest is the fact that all the reports indicate that the information is perceived to have been leaked by elements within the ANC and it is clear that a vast amount of suspicion and conflict has resulted within the ranks of the ANC and most importantly within the executive itself".
Would you agree that the definition that has been provided on page 8 of your submission referring to 20.2, the promotion of disunity between the ANC and the SACP that in fact that should also read Promotion of disunity within the ANC as well?

JOHN LOUIS MCPHERSON: That is correct Mr Chairperson.

MR PIGOU: Thank you.  In terms of the objectives of Operation Romulus that you have mentioned, it seems to have been a very broad operation.  According to your knowledge in what way did Mrs Mandela fit inside this operation?

JOHN LOUIS MCPHERSON: Mr Chairperson to understand it I think, or to put things properly in perspective each department, like the department of law and order we received certain areas as I explained that had to be addressed through Stratcom.  Now as I said the three areas were the educational field, the labour field and the counter-revolutionary field.  Now we had projects, these basic three major projects registered and it was Project Jackal, that was on the educational field, and then it was Project Omega, that was on the labour field, and then Project Wigwam which was on the counter-revolutionary field.
 Now you can look at it is like an umbrella project incorporating different operations then sub-operations.  Now Operation Romulus was one of those sub operations under Project Wigwam.  In other words in the counter-revolutionary field.  Now Operation Romulus was a national operation it was directed at the whole country, not to a specific or at a specific individual, and it is so that Mrs Madikizela-Mandela was one of the what we can say major subjects within the Witwatersrand/Soweto area and therefore she did receive prominent attention through the Stratcom, but then there were hundreds of others over the rest of the country that also received similar attention through Operation Romulus.

MR PIGOU: So it wasn't uncommon though, even though you were dealing with hundreds of potential targets for disinformation that someone as prominent as Mrs Madikizela-Mandela would come under specific attention within Operation Romulus as evidenced by the document that is attached in your annexures?

JOHN LOUIS MCPHERSON: Yes these examples I think indicate very well that she was a prominent subject with regards to Romulus and she received prominent attention from the Stratcom section in Soweto and the Stratcom section here at the Witwatersrand.

MR PIGOU: In your statement that we obtained from you on the 27th of October of this year you stated that if there was a Stratcom operation directed towards Winnie Mandela I was not involved in that, can you explain that statement?

JOHN LOUIS MCPHERSON: Mr Chairperson we from head office, and I was the head of Stratcom I was more involved in setting strategies there and coordinating Stratcom operations throughout the country.  So I personally did not get actively involved in Stratcom operations against Mrs Madikizela-Mandela, but we had people, as I said, Stratcom section at Soweto and the section here at Witwatersrand that dealt on her matters personally.

MR PIGOU: In your experience Mr McPherson, was there Stratcom involvement in criminal investigations in order to falsify information or evidence to involve people in criminal activities of any nature?

JOHN LOUIS MCPHERSON: Not as far as I know Chairperson.

MR PIGOU: And based on the same question was there any  experience from yourself in terms of Operation Romulus, was it used to intervene in criminal investigations in order to falsify information or evidence to involve Mrs Mandela in criminal activities such as kidnapping or the killing of Stompie Seipei?

JOHN LOUIS MCPHERSON: Mr Chairperson that would not fall within the ambit of the objects set out by Operation Romulus.  I think I can't see any necessity of falsifying criminal information and so forth, because criminal facts must speak for itself.

MR PIGOU: Could you tell me what section of the Security branch Stratcom fell under?

JOHN LOUIS MCPHERSON: Within the last days it was under Section D, but it changed names, before that it was Section G.