Amnesty Hearings — Johannesburg — UNKNOWN

ANSWER: It's possible but a presumption is not necessarily what one knows it's just something that you presume.

JUDGE WILSON: When I asked you what you thought you avoided saying that didn't you, you avoided saying that you presumed that he had been killed when I questioned you about it, didn't you?

ANSWER: I heard your question as though what I thought they were going to do with him.

JUDGE WILSON: Were you told when you made an application that you must be truthful if you applied for amnesty?

ANSWER: Yes I was told.

BERNARD MAKGABO NGOEPE: To a question by your counsel you said you saw it as part of your duty to abduct and assault Mr Dibali?

ANSWER: Yes sir.

BERNARD MAKGABO NGOEPE: But are you saying that to abduct and assault a relative of a political activist is part of your duty simply because he's a relative of a political activist?

ANSWER: Sir the way I was told by the people who instructed me to abduct this person and assault him the way that we did assault him, there was no way in which I could not do that and say no I cannot do this because he's related to this person.   There are a lot of people who become victims because of questioning authority at Vlakplaas and I could simply not have done that.   I just had to do what I was told to do.

BERNARD MAKGABO NGOEPE: It's easy to say I assaulted him simply because I was given instructions to assault him, but it's a different thing, as you said in a question to your counsel, to say that you actually saw it as part of your duty to assault him.   How can you ever see assaulting somebody
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merely because he's a relative of a political activist as being part of police duty?

ANSWER: The people who were instructing me sir were people who whose command I was, if they said to me go and fetch a certain person and bring him here, I had to do that.   I had to bring that person to them.   My duty was to obey their instructions without question.

JUDGE WILSON: ...are you saying that any instructions given to you by a superior officer you must obey and that was your police duty.   Is that what you're asking us to accept?

ANSWER: Sir if I believed that what I was sent for that he wanted me to fetch Dibali so that he could question him, I saw it in the line of my duties.  It was the instruction that I should go and fetch him for interrogations.   The fact that he was brought there and assaulted is something that I followed when I saw it happening, I was not told beforehand that we were going to abduct this person and assault him if he does not answer the questions the way he should have answered.   I merely followed instructions given by my superiors.

BERNARD MAKGABO NGOEPE: ...instructions were to go and abduct him so that he could be interrogated, those are the instructions as you told us.

ANSWER: Yes.

BERNARD MAKGABO NGOEPE: ...was assaulted and you also assaulted him?

ANSWER: Yes sir.

BERNARD MAKGABO NGOEPE: ...to assault him, you were only instructed to go and abduct him.

ANSWER: I said that Vermeulen said that we should assault him, Vermeulen started assaulting him and Joe also started
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assaulting him and then I joined in and then Joe and I were assaulting him and Vermeulen was present.   I did not start assaulting him when I had abducted him I was told that he was not telling the truth and that we should assault him.

BERNARD MAKGABO NGOEPE: ...you were actually instructed to assault him.   You told us that he was assaulted and you took part in the assault, that you told us, but you didn't tell us that you were actually instructed to assault him.  Were you in fact instructed to assault him or did you just see people assaulting him and then you joined?

ANSWER: I said that Vermeulen is someone who speaks mainly Northern Sotho and he spoke in Northern Sotho that we should assault this person because he is not telling the truth and he was saying that while assaulting this person, after asking him a question because as I said Joe was also disputing what he was saying because Joe also knew him and knew the area where he was staying.   I was also told to assault him and that's when I assaulted him, severely.

BERNARD MAKGABO NGOEPE: ...okay Nofomela now you can assault him?

ANSWER: You know sir there was this process of assaulting a person when bringing them out of this place where he was being questioned, he would be pushed and be hit with fists, he just said "hit him" as a general instruction to the two of us.   He did not say Nofomela hit him he just said hit him so that he can speak the truth.

BERNARD MAKGABO NGOEPE: Did you understand them to be instructions to you as well to assault him?

ANSWER: Yes sir.

BERNARD MAKGABO NGOEPE: ...because he said things you people didn't want or didn't agree with?

ANSWER: I trust that they did not agree with what he was
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saying because there was an argument between Joe and Mohabi and others who were asking him questions.   There was nothing I could ask him because I did not know anything about the information that they were trying to extract.   Joe was the one that knew his sister and knew where he moved around and they were arguing about things like that.   So there was an argument.

BERNARD MAKGABO NGOEPE: ...that he was assaulted for having told the truth?

ANSWER: I cannot dispute that.

JUDGE WILSON: You told us you were not part of the interrogation team, you had nothing to do with it did you?

ANSWER: That's correct sir.

CHAIRPERSON: Have you been present at any other interrogation apart from this?

ANSWER: Yes sir.

CHAIRPERSON: Interrogation of suspected political activists or supporters?

ANSWER: Yes sir.

CHAIRPERSON: Do you think it is fair to say that interrogation really means beating somebody up whilst you're asking him questions?

ANSWER: Yes sir.

CHAIRPERSON: ...this man that that is what was going to happen to him?

ANSWER: That is possible sir.

CHAIRPERSON: ...in fact so you knew that that is the only way in which interrogations are done, people are beaten up while they are being questioned.

ANSWER: It's possible that when interrogating a person when you put questions to them, they give you the answer
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that you want to hear but sometimes it happened that the person said something that the interrogator was not satisfied with and you assaulted him until you extracted what you wanted to hear.

CHAIRPERSON: You were familiar with this whole process of assault, interrogation, assault until you got the answer that was satisfactory to you?

ANSWER: Yes I am.

SISI KHAMPEPE: Was it quite often Mr Nofomela that you participated in assaulting relatives with the view to extracting information from them of suspected ANC activists? (end of 4a)...

ANSWER: I remember one whose name was Japie Maponja who was also assaulted because of his brother (indistinct) Maponja.

SISI KHAMPEPE: You were not part of the interrogating team, you were invited by Vermeulen to participate in the assault of Mr Dibali?

ANSWER: Yes.

SISI KHAMPEPE: Do you know what the rank was of Mr Vermeulen?

ANSWER: I think he was a lieutenant or something or he had just been promoted to a captain, I'm not sure, I cannot remember.

SISI KHAMPEPE: ...that you could accept instructions from?

ANSWER: Yes I used to receive instructions from him quite often.

SISI KHAMPEPE: ...the people who instructed you to go and abduct Mr Dibali that day, did he give you such instructions?

ANSWER: Yes because he was at Vlakplaas and Captain Jan
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Coetzee was at Krugersdorp and that was the person that moved around with Joe Mamasela and I was with Vermeulen so my commander, my immediate commander at the time was Vermeulen.