Amnesty Hearings — Pretoria — 1997-02-25

CAPT MENTZ: Mr Chairperson, I cannot attach a time to it, I think it was, everything happened so 
quickly, it could
have been a matter of a minute getting him from the car to the kombi, it was seven to ten metres, we took  
him from the - grabbed him out of the vehicle and first he was on the ground so that we could bring him 
under control by assaulting him and then we picked him up and ran to the kombi.  The door was open, the 
seat was down, we put him at the back and then we were able to tie his hands.	Everything happened 
so fast.

UNKNOWN: ....if it took such a short time and the man was rendered unconscious, it would mean that 
he was delivered quite a number of blows, and very hard blows that made him be unconscious very 
quickly?

CAPT MENTZ: Yes Sir.

UNKNOWN: Now an AK47, how many bullets does it have?

CAPT MENTZ: 25 to 30, I am not sure.
PRETORIA HEARING	AMNESTY/

UNKNOWN: 121

UNKNOWN: 25 or 30?

CAPT MENTZ: 25 to 30, that is correct.

UNKNOWN: If we assume that it had 25 at the time, would it mean that he was pumped with 25 
bullets of an AK47?

CAPT MENTZ: Mr Chairperson, Bellingham was firing this firearm automatically so it was impossible 
to count and to me it sounded as if the entire magazine had been emptied.  It happened too fast, I was 
unable to count.

UNKNOWN: Two shots, even one from an AK47 have rendered this man dead?

CAPT MENTZ: Yes, Sir it would have.

UNKNOWN: You were part of this operation, do you think it was necessary for 25 bullets to be 
pumped into his body?  Was this not an extreme?

CAPT MENTZ: Yes, Chairperson, it was.

UNKNOWN: After shooting him, you wrote in your
application that "we left him there and drove back", where exactly did you leave him?

CAPT MENTZ: Where we threw him out of the kombi, where he was shot dead, that is where we left 
him and we then left.

UNKNOWN: How did it come about that he landed at Vlakplaas for the funeral?

CAPT MENTZ: Mr Chairperson, the local police of Lehabele or someone in the area was - apparently 
encountered the corpse and informed the police who came in a hearse and picked up the corpse, identified 
it.  His family and next of kin were then informed that this was a policeman, an ascari and the funeral was 
conducted at Vlakplaas.

UNKNOWN: So when he was identified by the local police and the family, you then came around and 
shed crocodile tears and claimed his body to bury?
PRETORIA HEARING	AMNESTY/

JUDGE MGOEPE: 122

CAPT MENTZ: No Mr Chairman, I cannot remember exactly, but I think there were riots.  I think he 
stayed somewhere in Winterveld, which was on the other side of Pretoria, somewhere near Soshanguve 
and Mabopane.  If I can remember correctly there were riots and unrest and I think it would have been 
problematic to bury the man there at the time, so the police offered and then De Kock said he had no 
objection to him being buried at Vlakplaas.

UNKNOWN: Do you want this Committee to accept that you acted on instruction, agreed to partake in 
the killing of a human being for reasons given to you without yourself verifying whether it was necessary 
to do that?

CAPT MENTZ: As I already testified I believed that the instruction came from Head Office, I believed 
that the gentleman who was leaking information was a traitor and as I already said we were not, I believed 
that, we didn't question anything, I believed that the instructions came
from Head Office, I was merely a Warrant Officer at the time and I was in no position to go to a General's 
office at Head Office and say give me proof that this man has been leaking information before I do 
anything.  It just didn't work like that in the police system.

UNKNOWN: So if you were given any information and instruction by your seniors to kill, you just go 
about killing?  Is that what was happening there?

CAPT MENTZ: That is correct, Chairperson.

UNKNOWN: And was the family informed as to what caused Brian Ngqulunga's death when they 
attended his funeral?

CAPT MENTZ: No Mr Chairperson, the impression was to have been created that the ANC, I 
think he was an ANC or PAC member, I am not too familiar with that, that the liberation PRETORIA 
HEARING	AMNESTY/

UNKNOWN: 123

CAPT MENTZ: movement because he was an ascari, had killed him.  The impression was to have been created that the 
ANC or PAC had killed this man because he was an ascari in the Security Police.	It was never said that 
he was killed for any other reason, it wouldn't have made sense.  The police never said that we killed an 
ascari because he was leaking information.

UNKNOWN: You stated, when led by your counsel, that the purpose of instruction was politically 
motivated, but was the death of this man politically motivated?

CAPT MENTZ: Yes Mr Chairman.  As I've already testified  he was a freedom fighter who had been 
arrested, who had been turned into an ascari, who had decided to work with the police which he had indeed 
then done.  He had been transferred from Vlakplaas to Headquarters at C2.	The reasons for this 
and the period when this happened, I don't know, but then he worked for a unit where there were
very sensitive information and documentation and if he had been leaking this information to ANC, PAC 
whichever liberation organisation, this turned him into a political problem.  He was affecting the National 
Party by working for these other parties and for the police on the one hand and for example, the ANC on 
the other hand.
	He had sensitive information, policemen's houses were burnt down, we've heard much testimony 
to this effect, people were attacked when people found out that somebody was an informant.  When 
informers were exposed, they were necklaced, they were burnt, their throats were cut, they were shot, their 
families were attacked, so he was - he just had to be eliminated.  You couldn't charge the man and take him 
to court because what proof was there, I was not in a position to question this.  The thing to eliminate him, 
was 
PRETORIA HEARING	AMNESTY/

UNKNOWN: 124

CAPT MENTZ: the quickest solution and the easiest one, but I was not in a position to go and question General why did 
you say that this had to be done, it was not my position to do this.  I was a foot soldier, I had to carry out 
my task, I believed it.  It was part of the political struggle of keeping the National Party in control.  As a 
policeman I had to support the Government of the day, that was my job.

UNKNOWN: Are you in a position to tell this Committee that very sensitive "inligting" which Brian 
Ngqulunga gave to the ANC that led to the incidents that you've just mentioned, the specifics thereof?

CAPT MENTZ: No Mr Chairman, I testified to this effect earlier, I said I didn't know of specific 
incidents where he had given out "x" information and this person, informer had been killed or that person 
had been necklaced, I don't know
about specific incidents, but I accepted that the seniors had ascertained this, had obtained the necessary 
information and had given us the instruction.  I couldn't go and determine that myself, I don't know of 
specific incidents of leaked information.

UNKNOWN: So you acted on general information, and perhaps even better weight on hearsay about 
this man?

CAPT MENTZ: Mr Chairman, I didn't regard it as general information.  I saw it and I believed that it was 
an instruction that came from my seniors who wouldn't have said this man had bothered me, he needs to be 
killed.  They would have probably got the right information, well let's call it then hearsay, but it is not 
hearsay, it is an instruction, command that came from above, from De Kock, Baker, Bellingham, through 
to me.  I couldn't go back up the line of command and ask for evidence, I believed that was not a 
PRETORIA HEARING	AMNESTY/

UNKNOWN: 125

CAPT MENTZ: general thing, it was a specific thing and the command was valid.