Amnesty Hearings — Cape Town — 2000-10-03

CARL CASTELING BOTHA: Then I would have accepted that Mr Barnard would have fired the shot and then gotten out and reloaded and fired again.  I was placed in that position.

MR WESSELS: Mr Botha, what I'm asking you is to test how reasonable your action would have been simply to accept that this was an order, in light of probabilities.  You see if only one person were to have been involved, say Mr Barnard was involved alone, it would increase the risk of successful completion and escape of this project.

CARL CASTELING BOTHA: I cannot answer to that.

MR WESSELS: But if Mr Barnard had to do the driving himself and shoot with the left hand, possibly while driving by the house, he would have to fire through an open window, he wouldn't be able to aim and wait first, he would have to drive and as soon as the target was in line he would have to shoot precisely at that time.  So it would take a very specific time calculation.

CARL CASTELING BOTHA: Yes, with his left hand.

MR WESSELS: And didn't that mean that it was a very risky operation to complete successfully?

CARL CASTELING BOTHA: It was his project, I cannot say.

MR WESSELS: Yes naturally, Mr Botha.

CHAIRPERSON: Why do you think he asked you to assist him?

CARL CASTELING BOTHA: Honourable Chairperson, maybe because he wanted to make sure about the facts that Mr Wessels now highlighted and he thought it would be better concerning the aim, leaving the scene, one of many reasons.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Wessels.

MR LAX: But in essence these were all factors that would reduce the risk of failure.

CARL CASTELING BOTHA: That is correct.  To take somebody with, yes.

MR WESSELS: There was a great risk that it could not succeed and if he had to stop and get out and shoot again, somebody could see him, that you could be cut off or he could be cut off at the scene and if he was arrested then the whole organisation would be exposed and the State would be exposed, is that not true?

CARL CASTELING BOTHA: That is correct.

MR WESSELS: Then it surprises one that he did not at that specific time when he received the instruction and made the suggestion, inform Luitingh and Verster: "Look let us get somebody else to assist us, it will improve our chances of success with a hundred percent."

CARL CASTELING BOTHA: Possibly he did say that, I cannot give you an answer if he said it or not.

MR WESSELS: Did you not think that you should ask him: "Listen Ferdi, why don't you suggest, or why didn't you suggest to Verster and Luitingh that I must assist you or somebody else must assist you"?

CARL CASTELING BOTHA: Sir, I did not ask him that.  At a previous opportunity I think I told Mr Bizos that certain things I did not ask, you just do not ask certain things, you're asked to assist with an operation and you assist in the way in which, or on the basis of what you believed at that stage.

MR WESSELS: Mr Botha, it was not that you did not ask questions because there's an instruction and your work was to execute instructions, this was your friend who asked you to commit murder.

CARL CASTELING BOTHA: That is correct.

MR WESSELS: Then you do ask.

CARL CASTELING BOTHA: I did ask the question concerning the approval of the operation, I did not ask if there was another person who was tasked to assist and who was not available.  I believed that he involved me because he trusted me first of all, and because hypothetically he did not trust the person who he was supposed to take with.  I cannot say, I just knew that he trusted me and he asked me to assist him because we believed in the same ideology.

MR WESSELS: Mr Botha, you realised right from the beginning, as you testified, that you were not authorised to be in that vehicle, that they did not give their approval.

CARL CASTELING BOTHA: The was approval for the project yes, but ...(intervention)

MR WESSELS: But not for you to assist.

CARL CASTELING BOTHA: No.

MR WESSELS: Why did you not tell Mr Barnard: "But listen, get some approval that I assist you or that I can go with you, so that I do not have to act in an unauthorised manner"?

CARL CASTELING BOTHA: Sir, we functioned in two different cell structures and it would have been ridiculous of me to have asked him that.

MR WESSELS: Now you come here and you are in a position, it's the end of March, it's almost April, can you recall when you were informed?

CARL CASTELING BOTHA: It was just before the end of April.

MR WESSELS: Before the end of April?

CARL CASTELING BOTHA: Yes.

MR WESSELS: How long before the end of April?

CARL CASTELING BOTHA: I would say a week or two weeks, I cannot say.

MR WESSELS: Very well.  And you now know that Mr Barnard, according to what he told you, was placed on ice by the organisation because he committed two security breaches.  Did you know that?

CARL CASTELING BOTHA: Sir, to be placed on ice they never attach a specific period of time, he could have been placed off the ice or he could have been active again, it could have suspended at that stage.

MR WESSELS: Well we do know that those security breaches - well the first happened in the beginning of the year and the second one early in '89.  I think Mr Barnard said it was in March/April that this occurred.  Well let us accept it for now, it corresponds with evidence that has been led before and which was not disputed.  Well now you know that Mr Barnard was either suspended or discharged or placed on ice, is that correct?

CARL CASTELING BOTHA: I accepted that was so, yes.

MR WESSELS: Exactly in the same period of time when he leaked this - he received this very serious instruction to go alone and kill Webster.

CARL CASTELING BOTHA: It came from his abilities and skills, "die feit dat die teiken hom voorgedoen het en dat hy die vermoe gehad het om die teiken uit te wis."

MR WESSELS: Well there was a long period of time in which he could practise, he could monitor the house and so forth, so it was not that urgent, Mr Botha, this was a planned murder which was planned over a period of time, weeks actually.

CARL CASTELING BOTHA: Well it became a priority and he was then removed and he could become active again.  As what happened to me with the Athlone bomb.

MR WESSELS: Let us not think further back, you are now in March.  You are told by Mr Barnard that he's tasked to kill Dr Webster.

CARL CASTELING BOTHA: It was April.

MR WESSELS: End of March/April, whenever.  End of March you said. It doesn't matter, during that time.  You know that it was in the same timeframe in which he was in trouble and if he was now discharged from the organisation or if he was placed on ice, it happened in that period of time.

CARL CASTELING BOTHA: Or if it was an argument or not, that is also a possibility.

MR WESSELS: I beg your pardon?

CARL CASTELING BOTHA: Or if it was an argument or not, that's also a possibility.

MR WESSELS: An argument between?

CARL CASTELING BOTHA: Between himself and his Co-ordinator.

MR WESSELS: Yes, between himself and Lafras Luitingh?

CARL CASTELING BOTHA: That's correct.

MR WESSELS: So they don't have a good relationship?

CARL CASTELING BOTHA: Yes.

MR WESSELS: Did you not see it as a contradiction that in the light of his relationship with Luitingh and Verster and in the light of his security breach that he committed which was very serious and placed the organisation which was just established, could result to the exposure of this organisation, that this could not be associated with an instruction that he directly, him of all people received to go and kill Dr Webster?

CARL CASTELING BOTHA: Sir, I cannot comment on that because I do not know what his relationship was with his Regional Manager or his Co-ordinator.  I do not know anything about it.  I myself was in a position where I had a personality clash with my Regional Manager, but they still applied me.  So I do not know what the situation was.