Amnesty Hearings — Durban — 1999-08-16

MS GABRIEL: Well the family wants to know why it is that you forgot to put this in your application, why it is that you did not deem it important enough to research, for the purposes of your amnesty application?

S G DU PREEZ: Mr Chairperson, it did not relate to this matter.  I did not remember it in the first place and in the second place, it did not relate at all to my amnesty application.

MS GABRIEL: Well, it's our argument that this was the beginning of Mr Ninela's relationship with the Security Branch, with Taylor and with yourself, and that you actually knew a lot more about his activities than you would have this Committee believe.

S G DU PREEZ: This is not the case, Mr Chairperson.

MS GABRIEL: The family will also lead evidence from a Mr Senzo Bhengu and this relates to a limpet mine explosion in or around the 8th June 1988 at which a young man was killed, details of which are set out in Exhibit D, and we will go through this when we lead the family's evidence, but Exhibit D clearly implicates Bheki Ninela as having given the brothers this limpet mine.

CHAIRPERSON: Blessing Ninela.

MS GABRIEL: Blessing Ninela.

S G DU PREEZ: This is what Taylor had also told me.  This is what Taylor told me, I did not have any personal knowledge of this.

MS GABRIEL: And you did not deem these events important enough to be researched and included in your amnesty application?

CHAIRPERSON: Of what?  Of what Taylor tells him?

MS GABRIEL: Well, relating to the eventual execution of Mr Ninela.

CHAIRPERSON: I think that we've got to confine ourselves.  If he's to do research on all the things that Taylor did and didn't do, then the ambit of these inquiries can go on for many, many days.

MS GABRIEL: Understood.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes.

MS GABRIEL: I will move on to a different line of questioning.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes, please.

MS GABRIEL: Mr du Preez, Gratina Ninela will also lead evidence that, and Eric Ninela, that their investigations show that Mr Ninela was not in any way involved in military activities for the ANC.  Will you be in a position to dispute that?

S G DU PREEZ: This is not what Taylor had told me and I believed what Taylor told me.  I had no reason not to believe Taylor.

CHAIRPERSON: Ms Gabriel, what do you - the word union activities has been mentioned, do you know what union they're talking about, just for the purposes of the record?

MS GABRIEL: Yes, I believe it was SAWU, the South African Workers' Union.

MR LAX: ...(indistinct- mike not on) Workers' Union.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes, do carry on.

MS GABRIEL: So it's the family's basic contention that there is a lot more in the history of Mr Ninela's killing than you have been willing to disclose in your amnesty application.

S G DU PREEZ: Not that I know of, Mr Chairperson.

MS GABRIEL: The problem that the family has is that if you haven't investigated this matter and that if, as you say, you acted purely on the instructions of Taylor, then you're not really in a position to dispute any of the evidence that they present before this Commission.

S G DU PREEZ: Mr Chairperson, it wouldn't have surprised me after Ninela was murdered, to investigate the circumstances.

MS GABRIEL: But why, was this just another death, didn't you think that the family was entitled to the reasons and the details and given that Taylor had since died, aren't they entitled to the truth?  Isn't that the purpose of amnesty?

S G DU PREEZ: That would be so, Mr Chairperson and it would appear as if they had done the investigation.  My part in the death of Ninela was by taking him to the railway line and by blowing him up and this is what I'm leading evidence in.

MS GABRIEL: But you see, that presupposes that Taylor then was confused in his initial amnesty application and of course, him being dead, there is no way that anybody could dispute that.

S G DU PREEZ: I do not know.

MS GABRIEL: How is it possible, do you think, that Mr Taylor could have confused an event relating to the killing of three people with a very specific event at which he wasn't even present, on your version?

S G DU PREEZ: Mr Chairperson at the time when Mr Taylor had made this statement, he had cancer and ...(intervention)

MS GABRIEL: So what you're saying is he wasn't ...(indistinct - mike not on) senses when he made his initial amnesty application?

S G DU PREEZ: I would not say this, but Mr Taylor had forgotten a lot of things at the time of his application for amnesty because he was sick and he could not remember things of the past.

CHAIRPERSON: May I just interrupt.  Mr Visser, there was a gap in the hearing last time about Mr Taylor.  Can you just look through the record, tell me when was it that Mr Taylor passed away, when did he die?

MR VISSER: Mr Chairman, normally my attorney's memory is far better than mine.  He recalls it was in the second half of 1997.  You will recall that I pointed out to you that he had made, Wagener had made an appointment to see Taylor in order to fill in missing gaps in his application where it related to applicants for whom he appeared and before that could come about, Mr Taylor had died and he says that was in the second half towards the end of the year, 1987, 1997.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you.  I'm sorry, Ms Gabriel, I wanted to know this.  Mention had been made about Taylor having died and we didn't know when it was.

MS GABRIEL: It's an important part of this case, Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes, please carry on.

MS GABRIEL: So, Mr du Preez, what you are saying then is that, page 4 and specifically the paragraph that has not been blocked out of Taylor's initial amnesty application, is really quite suspect.  Is that what you would have this Committee believe?

S G DU PREEZ: No, Mr Chairperson, I said that he was wrong in saying that he had accompanied us on this occasion.

MS GABRIEL: Was he wrong in saying that you had interrogated Ninela together, or rather questioned him?

S G DU PREEZ: That would be correct, Mr Chairperson, he was wrong there.  We did not interrogate Ninela along with him.

MS GABRIEL: And he was wrong when he said there was no - that you collectively realised that there was no evidence on which he could be convicted in a court of law?

S G DU PREEZ: That is correct, Mr Chairperson.

MS GABRIEL: And he was wrong when he said that you drove to the railway line together?

S G DU PREEZ: That is correct.

MS GABRIEL: So then presumably he was wrong also when he gave the instruction, when he says that he gave you the instruction to kill him and blow him up, given that everything else in Taylor's evidence so far is wrong?

S G DU PREEZ: No, Mr Chairperson, he did give us the order.

CHAIRPERSON: They're not doubting that Taylor gave you the order, it's being put to you that Taylor was wrong in giving such an order.  Isn't that what you're trying to say?

MS GABRIEL: ...(indistinct - microphone not on)

CHAIRPERSON: I'm sorry. Well put your question then?

MS GABRIEL: My question is, you want us to believe selective bits of Mr Taylor's evidence and specifically the bits that qualify you for amnesty and you seek to distinguish everything else that you find undesirable in Taylor's evidence.

S G DU PREEZ: Mr Chairperson I said which parts of Taylor's statement I do not agree with.

MS GABRIEL: Well this is one of the reasons why the family believes that you have not made a full disclosure, Mr du Preez, it's because you seek to strategically distinguish bits of Taylor's evidence that you intend to rely on in your amnesty application and the bits that you seek to distinguish actually point, in their view and on the evidence that they will lead, to a much more complicated picture of the killing of Mr Ninela and his relationship with the Security Branch than you would have this Committee believe.