Amnesty Hearings — Pretoria — UNKNOWN

MR BOTHA: Mnr De Bruin, ek sien dat u het inderdaad hier 'n afskrif aangeheg van u bewys van lidmaatskap van die Afrikaner Weerstandsbeweging?

JOHANNES JAKOBUS DE BRUIN: Ja, dis korrek.

MR BOTHA: When did you apply for this document and when did you receive it?

JOHANNES JAKOBUS DE BRUIN: In 1989, the exact day and month I cannot recall, but it was a question of three months after I had applied for membership that I received my membership card.

MR BOTHA: I see that there is a small block, firstly there's a triangle with the AWB logo, and then there's a small square which would appear that it has been left there for a passport size photo?

JOHANNES JAKOBUS DE BRUIN: That's correct.

MR BOTHA: On my copy there is no photo of you on this AWB membership card.   Can you explain why?

JOHANNES JAKOBUS DE BRUIN: I never had a photo taken or pasted thereon.  I didn't see the purpose of it, because my name, my surname and my signature were enough for me in terms of this membership card.

MR BOTHA: Very well. As a member of the AWB, if I understand or remember correctly, the AWB wore certain uniforms with certain ranks?

JOHANNES JAKOBUS DE BRUIN: That is correct.

MR BOTHA: What was your position within the hierarchy of the AWB movement?

JOHANNES JAKOBUS DE BRUIN: I was simply a regular member of the AWB.

MR BOTHA: Can you tell me whether you wore a uniform of the AWB?

JOHANNES JAKOBUS DE BRUIN: No, not at all.

MR BOTHA: Did you at any stage see that the two applicants, either one of them, wore a uniform to indicate that they were members of the AWB?

JOHANNES JAKOBUS DE BRUIN: No, we never wore the uniforms.

MR BOTHA: Can you tell the honourable committee why not?

JOHANNES JAKOBUS DE BRUIN: I saw no purpose as to why we should wear the uniform because the uniforms that you are referring to were regular khaki clothes, which the AWB members regularly wore and I saw no purpose to prove to one and all that I was a member of the AWB.   I attended meetings in civil clothes and Mr Wheeler and Mr Corrie Pyper did the same, and that is all that I can say regarding this, we saw no purpose to wear the uniform in order to prove that we were members of the AWB.

MR BOTHA: Very well.   Is it true that by wearing the uniform, one would identify much more clearly with the purposes and the objectives of the AWB?

JOHANNES JAKOBUS DE BRUIN: That is so.

MR BOTHA: When you, as a soldier, because it appears to me that you were also operative on the Angolan border, at any point when you entered that war in your civil clothing, did you at any point make war?

JOHANNES JAKOBUS DE BRUIN: No, it was discipline which was enforced upon one to wear a uniform and one was more proud of the uniform which was issued one in the army.

MR BOTHA: Would my inference be unfair then if I were to say that these applicants neglected to wear their AWB uniform while they were entering this war situation and that therefore they would not be proud or identify themselves with the objectives of the AWB?

JOHANNES JAKOBUS DE BRUIN: With all respect, it would depend on each person whether or not they would want to wear the uniform and I cannot explain why the applicants refused to wear the uniform or purchase the uniform for that matter.

MR BOTHA: In paragraph 8 of your statement, you mention the Church Street bombing, can you remember approximately in which year that took place?

JOHANNES JAKOBUS DE BRUIN: That is a sudden question, but I know that with the Church Street bomb a school friend of mine was injured and I can't provide the exact date and day.

MR BOTHA: Was that approximately five or six years before the election?

JOHANNES JAKOBUS DE BRUIN: Yes.

MR BOTHA: And the Magoos Bar bombing, can you remember when that took place, how long before the election did this take place?

JOHANNES JAKOBUS DE BRUIN: That was also quite some time before the election.   If I had to estimate, I would say also approximately five to six years before the election, in the 1980's.

MR BOTHA: Could you tell me what the relevance of that would be to the election day, can you explain that to us please?

JOHANNES JAKOBUS DE BRUIN: I feel that many explosions occurred, exercises of sabotage, before the election, and as I have said in the former paragraphs, that I was raised in a very conservative manner, that I was in the military division of the Parachute Brigade, and there we were specifically made aware who our enemy was and what our enemy was doing on the borders of Namibia, and also what they were doing internally, and I feel that the bombs which were planted were planted by those who wanted to overthrow the government of that time, and I felt that in our action on election day, had to be an expression of what our feelings were.

MR BOTHA: On the 27th of April 1994, did you regard a bomb attack from the side of the ANC/SACP alliance as a possibility?

JOHANNES JAKOBUS DE BRUIN: No.

MR BOTHA: Can you specifically recall the words, you mentioned the name of Mr Terreblanche, I assume that that is the leader of the AWB, what exactly did he say?

JOHANNES JAKOBUS DE BRUIN: His exact words I cannot recall, but what it boiled down to was that on the day that the ANC would become this country's government, on that night he would take over the country and take it back with violence, those were his words, not exactly as I have stated them, but what he said inferred to that which I have said to you today.

MR BOTHA: Paragraph 9 of your statement indicates that at various meetings, Mr Terreblanche called you up to prepare for the imminent freedom struggle and to arm yourselves.   He didn't tell you to make war, he told you to protect yourselves?

JOHANNES JAKOBUS DE BRUIN: That is correct.

MR BOTHA: If that was the call, and you, along with Mr Wheeler and Mr Pyper, had undertaken discussions and recalled these bomb explosions from six to seven years ago, why is it then that only the two of them decided that they would go and shoot the people and that you decided, or in fact you didn't make any decision, you yourself did not at all participate in any such activities as what they did?

JOHANNES JAKOBUS DE BRUIN: As I referred to in paragraph 9, where Mr Terreblanche called us to prepared for the imminent freedom struggle and to arm ourselves, I thus waited for specific instructions from specific people, and ultimately I did not receive such instructions, although I had much to do with AWB officers.

MR BOTHA: However, you weren't even at home, you went to visit your parents in Randfontein, so you wouldn't have received those instructions?

JOHANNES JAKOBUS DE BRUIN: I drove to my parents that afternoon, and the AWB officers with which I was involved knew that I would be with my parents and they would have known where to contact me and that would have been at my parents' home.

MR BOTHA: I'm going to ask you one more time, why is it that only Mr Wheeler and Mr Pyper decided to go and shoot people and you did not go along to go and shoot?    They received the same instructions, why didn't you?

JOHANNES JAKOBUS DE BRUIN: Because I was waiting for a specific instruction from a specific person.

MR BOTHA: And why didn't they wait for these instructions?

JOHANNES JAKOBUS DE BRUIN: I suppose that they were not aware of the fact that specific instructions would be issued.

MR BOTHA: I put it to you that in all possibility they were not aware of such instructions because they simply were not members?

JOHANNES JAKOBUS DE BRUIN: They were members and they attended various meetings with me.

MR BOTHA: Do you have personal knowledge that they received appointments as members of the AWB?

JOHANNES JAKOBUS DE BRUIN: I know specifically of applications that they filled out and which were handed in, but I don't know why they did not receive feedback from the AWB officers.