Amnesty Hearings — Durban — UNKNOWN

MR BOTHA: Oh yes, most definitely. At the time that this video material was made available, it followed shortly after the incident when the weapons were stolen at the headquarters in Pretoria and it was quite a sensational issue at the time, so I think everybody realised that this was an official declaration of war. Would you .....

MS VAN DER WALT: Yes, read the oath.

MR BOTHA: It says
"I hereby......"
and then my name
"DAVID PETRUS BOTHA,
and your date of birth.
I take an oath that I commit myself to the freedom struggle of
the Boer nation to:
1)   to establish the independence of the Boer Republics in 		      1902;
2)   the current, so-called Republic of South Africa to bring 	      that to an end; and 
3)  the steps taken by the National Party Government and it's associates who support it and the ANC and the SACP to combat these parties with everything at my disposal even if it means that I would have to sacrifice my life in the process.
I also swear that I will be faithful to this oath and carry out all orders issued to me in the furtherance in the above objectives. That I will ensure that all instructions which I might issue in the furtherance of the above objectives and I further declare under oath that I will not, in respect of an instruction by any body in respect of the ideals of the Orde Boerevolk and the old Boer Republics or the Republic of the Orange Free State that I will not infiltrate, commit espionage or report on their activities, whether orally, in writing or in whatever form, and furthermore I undertake to never, in respect of the activities of any member fighting the above struggle, to report the activities of such a member to anybody.  
And lastly, that I never in any court of whatever nature, will
testify against any existing or former member, or in respect of
the activities of the Order or its supporting bodies will never 
testify against it or these people.
So help me God." 
And was signed in the presence of two witnesses.

MS VAN DER WALT: And you then took this oath on that particular day?

MR BOTHA: Yes, that is correct.

MS VAN DER WALT: And did you believe everything mentioned in this oath?

MR BOTHA: Yes, absolutely. In the Orde Boerevolk I saw that the Boer nation had not yet surrendered and that it was willing to enter the struggle. The instructions I'd received to establish a cell in Richards Bay, I carried that out.  And I must also mention that at that stage, the violence, or the civil war which reigned in the country at the time - it was mainly Black on Black violence. The Orde said that this violence would spread and that it would ultimately change to Black on White violence, and that it was only a matter of time before that happened. Especially the PAC, the PAC was very militant and they had various slogans like "one settler, one bullet".
We prepared ourselves for an onslaught against our people, and on the morning of the 9th of October 1980, I heard on SABC news that a group of about 30 Black people clad in PAC T-shirts had attacked Whites on the Durban beachfront using knives, and that various people had been wounded and taken to hospital and that an elderly man had died as a result of the wounds so sustained.
I was convinced that the PAC had started implementing its campaign of  terror against White people, and - I'm sorry, I thought you wanted to ask a question.

JUDGE WILSON: Yes, the date, you said 1990, is that correct?

MR BOTHA: When the attack took place?

JUDGE WILSON: Yes.

MR BOTHA: Yes that is when the attack took place.

JUDGE WILSON: Because it was interpreted I think as 1980. I may have misheard it, but I think the interpretation was wrong.

MR BOTHA: Thank you. I was under the impression that the campaign of terror by the PAC against Whites had now commenced, and since we had already declared war against the National Party, and as a result of this attack, I as cell leader felt that we should launch a counter-attack to prove to the government of the day, and to show to it that the road it was following was full of danger and that incidents of this kind would increase in frequency.
Our purpose was also to show to the PAC and its communist allies that attacks of this kind would not be tolerated, and that we would take counter-measures in a very forceful way.
And I also felt that the counter-attack should take place in Durban where the attack from the PAC had taken place in the morning and I felt that the attack by the PAC and the counter-attack should be seen in context, and I think we succeeded in this, because in the Sunday Tribune of the 14th of October 1990 in which interviews had been conducted with passengers in a bus from where the attack was launched, it said that they believed that the attack had been launched by Boers as a result of the PAC attack that morning on White people at the beach front.
We travelled by car from Richards Bay to Durban and it was late in the evening when we arrived here, it was about, I think about eight o'clock or nine o'clock maybe when we arrived here.

INTERPRETER: The speaker's microphone is not on, I, it's impossible to interpret.