Amnesty Hearings — Cape Town — 2000-03-15

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: Yes I do not want to deny it because on either side, if I did it then someone will think I'm very good and someone else will put it in another way and then they will think that I'm trying to avoid responsibility but what I want to say is that the exact procedures with the forming of the CCB had been that you should receive guidelines from the commanding general.  In my case I wrote those guidelines as proposals and I said let's propose that it should look like this and they were reviewed on a higher level than my level and then after this there were other members like potential Regional Managers and other individuals and other officers who were involved and plans were formulated in different phases that covered years and based on this I was responsible for the whole planning cycles that I then presented to a higher authority.

MR LAX: The thrust of my question goes to a slightly different issue and that is within that planning, what upward accountability did you build into that?

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: That nothing that the CCB did in terms of finances could be delegated, it had to be authorised from a higher authority and no operational instruction was delegated to my level except for if it was allocated in terms of a project.  In other words, I could not as my perception is of Vlakplaas, I could not climb into a vehicle and only run around and do what I want to.  I could only present a project and then a combat order would be given to me for that project and then I would have to execute it and then I would have to report back and in the third place, it was logistics.  I could not, because I was in the civilian sector and functioning in that sector it had to be authorised.

MR LAX: That's clarified that for me and that was in your proposal and that was accepted as part of your modus operandi?

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: That is correct.

MR LAX: And therefore any action by any CCB operative, wherever, that didn't follow those strict guidelines wasn't an authorised action?

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: That is correct.

MR LAX: Now I want to turn just to the financial issues.  We dealt with the audit processes and so on and you spoke about people making affidavits to account for money and things of that nature.  I wanted just a brief expanding on that if you could because to me it's inconceivable that you can do an audit without a paper trail.  In other words, if money is given to someone to disburse without any kind of accountability or receipts being got back and I understand the covert nature of the operation, but there are lots of ways of dealing with that.  The question is how on earth could the Auditor General do a proper audit without any of those things?  It simply doesn't accord with accounting practice?

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: I think in the first instance that our financial plan was unique.  I explained to you on which basis we started developing it, that was based on criticism from the Auditor General.  At some stage for instance the intelligence community, military intelligence wanted to use our plan for their activities but it was not approved but the essential difference can be found in that and this you know yourself that normally the State's problem is that money has to be audited after it has been spent and in our case according to a financial plan it was controlled before it was spent and after that there would be access to it and this was all in the plan as I told you but if the auditor was there, firstly we had an internal auditor who knew the system and if the external auditors arrived there, there were two files.  Firstly the operational files and in certain cases it could have been pointed out by the Chairperson if it was sensitive then it did not have to be pointed out in terms of the plan but on the financial file you would then have a document that would say the plan was presented by me to the Chairperson, etc etc and the person who was identified to execute the task and the plan was accepted and then I would sign and the Chairperson would sign and that would be the formal structure and then there are second procedures that I mentioned for instance to phone a hotel and to find out what the real cost if a specific hotel is or two or three quotations and then the co-ordinator or the person who phoned or the financial official or the clerk would then say in that region "I phoned and this is what I found" and based on this it was done.
	What we then did is that there were specific for instance so much petrol per kilometre or so much money per kilometre and the same also for the levels of expenditure per day.  There were all those procedures that had been laid down and after this it was signed and this is what the auditor would come and audit, that the project that was there and the money that was budgeted for it and this is like in any business plan and after it has been spent and then the accounting in the result of the project and the accounting would then be in the handling in terms of the production or you see it on television that an information report would be made so it is measured against the result that would be laid before me or before the Chairperson.

MR LAX: So to talk about the Early Learning Centre, when you saw there was an explosion, you were satisfied there was product?

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: That is correct, then that process in terms of the budget and then the external auditor could then come and say I'm auditing the project and he will see it.

MR LAX: I'm with you, my only problem is this, is that how do you account for the money paid to Mr Hardien for example?  Where we know there was a shortfall or at least on Mr van Zyl's purported affidavit which is his version, I'm not sure that that's necessarily the version he may give in due course but so far that's what we've heard?

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: It is authorised exactly like that, payment to a source or an agent.  The co-ordinator or the region can sign it that he did that but not the person because he does not know you, he receives it from the State.

MR LAX: Would Mr van Zyl have signed that he in fact paid Hardien R30 000 when in fact he only paid him ...(intervention)

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: He has to be accountable for this in that regard, he should if there had been any differences, he should have done it like that and if he did not do it like that and it doesn't accord with what the ...(intervention)

MR LAX: You see, the point I'm getting to is this.  If there was a fraud perpetrated somewhere, it would have been perpetrated by the person whose obligation it was to account for that money?

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: This could be the case.  I just want to say the following that this was of the best control that I think was possible on the individual.

MR LAX: I want to just turn to the question of co-ordination.  You've spoken a lot about co-ordination meetings but we don't have any content about what actually happened in them and so let me direct my questions otherwise you're going to give me another general answer and that's not a slight on you it's just on my need to be more careful in how I ask my questions so I'm not inferring in any way that your answers are vague or evasive or anything like that, please don't misunderstand me.
	Gen Webb and you met on a regular basis and you indicated once a week and the purpose of that meeting was co-ordination.  Now what exactly was co-ordinated?