Amnesty Hearings — Boksburg — 1998-03-18

GEORGE BIZOS: I am not unmindful of the point made judge.  What I 
am saying is that like in the case of accomplices, we don't reject 
the evidence of an accomplice because he originally made the 
statement to the police that he didn't know anything about it, but 
when the matter came nearer home to him, he made to confess to 
the crime, but what we do require in relation to the evidence of 
accomplices is that because by nature they are unsatisfactory 
persons who were prepared to lie, we do not accept their 
evidence unless there are cogent reasons to do so, bearing in mind 
that the oath at times doesn't mean much or anything to them 
when their own purposes are to be served.  I do not want to take 
it further than that, and I would certainly not make myself guilty 
of submitting that because he lied nothing that he said here 
should be believed.  
	What I am submitting is having regard to the fact that he is 
a person who was prepared to lie under oath, who said that his 
legal representatives were responsible for his being found guilty 
because they did not give him proper advice and they did not give 
him any reasons.  I don't want to repeat everything that he said in 
the application, I want to take it now further than that and most 
certainly do not submit that as you have indicated judged, most if 
not all of the people have denied it in the past particularly if they 
have been tried, but tremendous caution has got to be exercised 
in accepting the evidence of Mr Derby-Lewis so that when a 
member of the Committee asks a question of Counsel, where is 
this, merely to be pointed to a statement made by Mr Derby-Lewis 
without comparing that statement to what he said in his 
application for amnesty, to what other witness have said and what 
the probabilities in the case are, it is not enough to merely say Mr 
Derby-Lewis and Mr Walus said.  That's as far as I want to take it 
and I will deal specifically in relation to some of the self-serving 
statements made by Mr Derby-Lewis which we will submit can not 
be relied upon in order to apply it as a fact and in turn apply the 
law.
	Let me deal with Mrs Derby-Lewis.  She too admitted that 
she lied to the Judge President of the Transvaal Provincial 
Division in relation to the circumstances under which the list was 
handed out, which is a matter on the very core of the matter.  
Again we cannot accept the evidence of Mrs Derby-Lewis merely 
because she has said so, we will have to have regard that she is a 
person who is capable of lying under oath and who obviously has 
a very strong desire to get her husband's release under amnesty.
	Now as far as Mr Walus is concerned, he too has 
contradicted himself in relation to vital matters between the notes 
that appear in R4 and particularly pages 362 and not the pages 
that have been quoted by Counsel for the applicants and also, Mr 
Chairman, the issue here is not what may or may not be on the 
tape, the vital passages that we rely on were read to Mr Walus 
and if you have a look at pages 98 and subsequent pages of the 
second record, you will see that he has for all practical purposes 
admitted to have said the things that were recorded, but we will 
come to that in much greater detail.  So that again what we would 
appeal to the Committee to have regard to, that the matter is to 
be decided on with a more, with respect to Counsel for the 
applicants, a thorough examination of the facts than they have set 
out in their written heads of argument and have made submissions 
here.
	The other matter Mr Chairman that we want to say about 
these three witnesses and in this regard I would join Mr Clarke as 
the fourth, because he falls into the same category that there 
attitude to the fundamental changes that were taking place after 
1990 and more particularly the preparatory changes to have a new 
constitution from 1993 onwards which was being prepared at 
CODESA was absolute anathema to them.  I do not think that we 
will be overstating the case Mr Chairman, if they are described as 
a clique or small cabal of fanatics who irrespective of what the 
policy of their political party may have been, partly as a result of 
what may or may not have happened in Poland as far as Mr Walus 
is concerned, partly because of deeply felt and fanatical religious 
beliefs, they set themselves up as saviours purporting to be 
motivated by a religion for the vast majority of the people in the 
world preaches peace, is an excuse to commit murder by trying to 
persuade the committee that they were really after the Antichrist 
rather than the person described in evidence by Mr Jeremy Cronen 
as the person that had done so much in order to bring 
reconciliation to the country.
	With those preliminary remarks I now want to turn Mr 
Chairman to page 1 of our written heads and there we submit at 
4.1 that the assassination of Mr Hani was not committed on behalf 
of, or in support of the Conservative Party.  And we submit that 
the CP had not adopted violence and most certainly not murder as 
one of their means to wage its political or ideological struggle 
against the African National Congress, its allied organisations or 
any other organisation.  And more particularly, and this I would 
like to add having listened to the questions by members of the 
committee, and particularly there was no policy of assassination 
of a political leader with a high profile, if you would add that on 
point 4.2 Mr Chairman.  With all the difficulties that we have had 
in our violent past, Mr Chairman, the political assassination of 
high profile political leaders, if not entirely unknown, was almost 
unknown on the South African scene.
	It has never been suggested Mr Chairman that the killing of 
the President or the leader of a political party, or someone, 
whatever one's views may have been about their actions, the 
country's problems would be solved by killing them.  When I say 
never, we of course have the notable example in this case where 
are going to submit it was proved that it was not only Mr Hani 
that was on the list for elimination but also Mr Mandela, Mr 
Slovo and other political figures in the country in order to create 
the chaos that the two applicants have spoken of.  We submit that 
their act could not have been permitted in the course and scope of 
their duties because the CP had not advised, planned, directed, 
commanded or ordered assassinations as one of it's means of 
waging political struggle.  Mr Derby-Lewis told us what his 
duties were, Mr Walus hardly had any duties to perform in regard 
to the Conservative Party except to possibly help with elections.  
So that in the course and scope of their duties, advised, planned, 
directed or commanded or ordered by the political party.
	In order to answer this question we have to say, what were 
their duties and was it within the purview of their duty and were 
they ordered to do it?  One can understand Mr Chairman the 
security policeman who said that I was given the duty of 
safeguarding the security of South Africa, the politicians made 
the decisions that this is the society that they wanted, I was a 
servant, my duty was to protect people.  The politicians 
identified, or my superiors identified Mr Goniwe to be 
assassinated, in the furtherance of my duty, I did it.  How do 
these two applicants bring themselves, having regard to the duties 
that they had to perform, vis a vis the Conservative party into 
saying that it was in the course and scope of their duties as 
members of the CP  Mr Chairman?  There is no such evidence and 
in our submission the applicants haven't even applied their minds 
to that question and therefore on that ground amnesty should be 
refused.
	But let's go further Mr Chairman; 4.4, the CP had not given 
any express or implied authority that assassinations of political 
opponents was sanctioned and you may notice Mr Chairman that 
we actually draw a distinction between the assassination of 
political opponents of high ranking and I would ask high ranking 
political opponents in Section 4.4 because it is in the South 
African context a most unusual thing.  Which national leaders of 
any political party have been assassinated in South Africa?