Amnesty Hearings — Cape Town — 2000-03-15

MR SIBANYONI: In an answer to Mr Williams you said, you sounded as if you are not accepting the Constitution because you said there are some portions with which you do not agree, did I understand you correctly?

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: I do not have a problem with the new Constitution, I'm not involved with it.  There are small aspects, the little I do know about the Constitution but it's not something that I think about so the fact that there's a new government and that there's a new Constitution is something that is acceptable to me but it has nothing to do with me.

MR SIBANYONI: Do you accept fully this Promotion of National Unity and Reconciliation Act?  The Act upon which these proceedings are based?

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: I accept it and that is why I am here and that is why I have to do this but there are many aspects involved in this and I do not agree with it.  With the Government of National can also be seen as in some sense as a one party State, it has many negative aspects but I do not want to go into the political side of things.

MR SIBANYONI: Although it's not a requirement to get amnesty to show remorse but one of the aims of this Constitution is that there should be reconciliation in the country.  We have seen in many of these applications where people who are applying were prepared to even meet with the victims and apologise or try to reach some reconciliation.  Should we understand your attitude to say you are not prepared to apologise or to contribute towards reconciliation to the members of the Kewtown Youth Movement?

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: Mr Chairperson, concerning that point I made statements back then and my proposal was that I would like to talk to the person who did the work that I did and then we look each other in the eye and then I'll say to him we fought and this was like a rugby match, we tackled each other and after the match it is over but what happened here only comes from one side.  It is in my opinion only projected on people like me, it is only in the minority.  At the moment I represent a minority in this country.  The same path was not followed with the other side of the spectrum.  Those people who were my enemies back then and that I put in writing, in statements and it can be found in documentation with the Commission.  I am not sorry that I did things that could protect the sovereignty of the State as I understood it at that time.  I performed my duty to the best of my ability, I wanted to do it in a productive way and that mistakes had occurred and that we were all people, might be so and I'm sorry about the mistakes but I am not of the conviction in a Roman Catholic style go and sit in a box and then to make a confession and within this context then I would handle it.

MR SIBANYONI: Was it per design or was it mere coincidence that people who were used in the CCB some of them had cross-purposed with the law, in other words they've contravened the law, they were convicted or they were members of gangsters?

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: No, that is not the case.  In certain projects people were used and this was done by the other side of the political spectrum, the SACP/ANC alliance.  There are very few people who were conscious, trained, Special Forces soldiers who had big difficulties with the law.  The biggest problems we had was with the inquiry after the Government of the day had changed.

MR SIBANYONI: If you draw a parallel between the CCB and Vlakplaas Unit, during it as it stands whenever they had some operations we were told in some of these hearings that they would receive some decoration, some medals.  Has it ever happened with members of the CCB?

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: Yes, we received our medals within Special Forces but not at all for this kind of action.  We had a system that can be found in our financial plan where remuneration or allowances would be made in the form of, if I can remember correctly, a watch would be given but because we were working in the civilian side of the state we could not receive medals.

MR SIBANYONI: One of the aims of this Act, I was referring to the Promotion of National Unity and Reconciliation Act, is that we should endeavour to get as full a picture as possible about the conflicts of the past.  Would you say after listening to your applications the Committee will have a full picture of what the CCB was doing?

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: I can put it to you in the following manner that this on it's own will not be sufficient but over the years that everything has been handed in with all our documentation and I'm not only speaking of written projects, I'm talking about our procedures, our plans, our working procedures.  You have this in your possession so this should be available and yes in that regard I do think that it should give a full picture.

MR SIBANYONI: In whose possession are those documents?

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: Excuse me?

MR SIBANYONI: The documents we are talking about, are you talking about the documents which have already been made public?

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: Yes and the documents that are in the possession of the Commission.

MR SIBANYONI: Let me come to the victims.  From the cross-examination by Mr Williams, he was painting a picture that the CCB made a mistake by identifying Kewtown Youth Movement as people who were involved in illegal activities.  My question relates to Mr Dullah Omar.  On what basis was he regarded as a person who was involved in illegal activities?

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: Mr Omar was against the then Government and he was busy to try and destabilise law and order by means of his activities, by means of his participation with the activities of the UDF.  He was a sympathiser who threatened the order of
the State, who threatened the sovereignty of the State from the inside and in this regard we treated him as an enemy of the then Republic of South Africa.

MR SIBANYONI: By participating in the UDF activities how could that be illegal because UDF was not banned.

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: Yes but it has to do with all other subversive activities and this is how the information was presented to me, Mr Chairperson, and I handled it as such.  He was busy undermining the authority of the State and this is how I handled it.

MR SIBANYONI: Thank you Mr Chairperson.  No further questions.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you Mr Sibanyoni.  Mr Lax do you have any questions you would like to put to Mr Verster?

MR LAX: Thanks Chairperson.  Just to follow up on Mr Sibanyoni's last point to you.  You indicated in answer to questions by Mr Williams or Mr Hockey, I can't remember which one, that one of the issues that would "qualify you" for elimination would be your participation in violent conduct, in acts of violence, bombs, acts of terror and so on.  Now in nothing that you said now about Mr Omar is there any indication that he was involved directly in any acts of terror.   But he was a leadership person, how did that qualify him for elimination?

PIETER JOHANN VERSTER: I will say again it was not my decision whether he was a target or not.  That was made in the total position that he occupied in the intelligence system of the then government.  Whether he sympathised somewhere or whether he helped people to get into or out of the country, that was in a bigger picture which was not available to me.