Amnesty Hearings — Durban — 1998-11-09

FRANK MCCARTER: Where I murdered or killed an unarmed person, yes, that's correct, Mr Chairman.

MR MALAN: So in none of the other actions whilst you were at Koevoet or at Vlakplaas or wherever did you ever shoot an unarmed person?

FRANK MCCARTER: No, Mr Chairman.

MR MALAN: Did you believe it to be the policy - rather let me put it the other way around, if you accepted it to be an order, at the time you apparently assumed it also to be a legitimate order that you had to follow?

FRANK MCCARTER: Mr Chairman, I could possibly refused to carry it out, they couldn't have done anything to me but I would have been sidelined, but I definitely felt that it was justified at the time.

MR MALAN: Justified on what score?

FRANK MCCARTER: At the time where we were in a war situation, drastic measures for drastic times.

MR MALAN: So then drastic measures for drastic times would have included that you would have killed any unarmed person at that time if told by a senior officer that it was important?

FRANK MCCARTER: No, I think we can qualify that that if the person, there was sufficient grounds, I wasn't going to kill just anybody.

CHAIRPERSON: But this was a person who had just been found not guilty in the trial where eight of his colleagues had been convicted, didn't that indicate that he was not as active as Taylor was saying?

FRANK MCCARTER: Mr Chairman, I don't recall the precise circumstances, I think Mr Wasserman would able to tell you more, why they were acquitted, on what grounds, but in my mind there was no doubt that he was involved.

MR MALAN: Now tell us why in your mind there was no doubt, on what basis?

FRANK MCCARTER: Well the very fact that when Ernest Ramatala approached him and said that the ANC wanted him to go outside for further training, that he readily packed his bags and was ready to go, not packed his bags but was ready to go.

MR MALAN: Mr McCarter, were there not thousands if nor millions of youngsters that at that stage is approached would not have readily packed their bags?

FRANK MCCARTER: Mr Chairman, I can't speak for those people but ...(intervention)

MR MALAN: On what basis can you then speak for Mr Bhila?

FRANK MCCARTER: Well the fact of the matter is he did climb into the car, Mr Chairman.

MR MALAN: The fact that he was prepared to join the ANC in exile, did that constitute sufficient reason to kill him, in your mind?

FRANK MCCARTER: Not that alone, Mr Chairman

CHAIRPERSON: How long had he been in custody?

FRANK MCCARTER: I don't know, Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: I take it some considerable time, in detention and awaiting trial.

FRANK MCCARTER: I take it so, Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: And then he's told the Security Police are coming for him again, can you really draw any assumption from the fact that he was trying to avoid further detention?

FRANK MCCARTER: Mr Chairman, I don't know that he was told that the Security Branch were coming for him.

MR MALAN: Answer that same question on the basis of the police coming for him.

FRANK MCCARTER: If he was told that I suppose he would leave but I don't know that he was told that.

MR MALAN: I want to try and explore please with your assistance, the frame of mind which constituted, in the minds of those of you who were involved, the concept of a legitimate action, reasonable, acceptable, defenceable action of killing an unarmed person.  Were you ever close to or involved in a killing of other unarmed persons?

FRANK MCCARTER: No, Mr Chairman.

MR MALAN: And this the only incident ever that you were involved in, according to your evidence?

FRANK MCCARTER: Correct, Mr Chairman.

MR MALAN: Did you not ask yourself questions?

FRANK MCCARTER: I did ask myself questions.

MR MALAN: Did you know it was illegal?

FRANK MCCARTER: Correct, Mr Chairman.

MR MALAN: Did you know it was not part of the policy?

FRANK MCCARTER: Correct, Mr Chairman.

MR MALAN: If you got the orders from Captain Taylor, did you not ask him where his authority was derived from?

FRANK MCCARTER: No, I didn't question him but I knew it would have come from higher up.

MR MALAN: Why?

FRANK MCCARTER: Because there was this situation that should we have been caught we basically knew that we would be looked after.

MR MALAN: By Captain Taylor?

FRANK MCCARTER: No, by the government.

MR MALAN: Who in government?

FRANK MCCARTER: I'm not sure but the government as a whole.

MR MALAN: Who told you that?

FRANK MCCARTER: It was an accepted thing.

MR MALAN: I'm asking you whether you were told that.

FRANK MCCARTER: Not explicitly, no.

MR MALAN: On what basis were you told implicitly  then?

FRANK MCCARTER: Well one only had to look at the circumstances of people, the Biko Trial and various other places where the State actually helped those people.

MR MALAN: Did you know that at the time?

FRANK MCCARTER: The Biko Trial was long before this.

MR MALAN: Yes, that's exactly why I'm asking you.  You were a young boy of some nine years old at the time of Biko's death, what do you know about the government having protected people then?  It was certainly not the government's position then, not publicly.

FRANK MCCARTER: In 1977 I was 20 years old.

MR MALAN: Sorry were you born in '57?

FRANK MCCARTER: Correct, Mr Chairman.

MR MALAN: At that time did you believe that Biko was manhandled and killed by the police?

FRANK MCCARTER: I definitely thought so, yes.

MR MALAN: Why do you say that Taylor would have had instructions or given authority to eliminate Bhila, did he tell you that?

FRANK MCCARTER: No, he didn't, Mr Chairman.

MR MALAN: Why do you assume that someone would have asked him or ordered him or requested him to see to that or do you believe he simply had the authority to make such decisions, that such authority was delegated to him?

FRANK MCCARTER: I can't really say, Mr Chairman, I would take it that the authority was delegated to him.

MR MALAN: Actively and explicitly or implicitly, to use your terminology?

FRANK MCCARTER: I would say implicitly.

MR MALAN: So do you still believe that the government instructed them, that it was government policy and that government would have protected you?

FRANK MCCARTER: I wouldn't say it was government policy and it wasn't openly sort of encouraged or anything like that but it was secretly condoned.

MR MALAN: Why do you say that?

FRANK MCCARTER: No politician or senior policeman was ever instituted, an investigation into any of these incidents.

MR MALAN: There were quite a number of departmental investigations into many of these things, always turned saying that the South African Police was not involved.

FRANK MCCARTER: I think the outcome of those investigations speak for itself, Mr Chairman.

MR MALAN: Right.  Now you say that you believed that the, these acts and omissions - I'm referring to 11(a), second paragraph
"I believe that these acts and omissions were carried out on instructions of the then South African Government."
Do you stand with those words, "instructions of the government"?

FRANK MCCARTER: Implicit instructions.

MR MALAN: The same goes for the South African Police, implicit or explicit?

FRANK MCCARTER: Implicit, Mr Chairman.

MR MALAN: Did you report after the incident, after the killing to anyone?

FRANK MCCARTER: The only person I may have reported to was Eugene de Kock.

MR MALAN: I'm asking you whether you did report, not whether you might have or may have or whatever.  Can you recall that you reported?

FRANK MCCARTER: No, I can't recall, Mr Chairman.

MR MALAN: In other words you probably did that and just left it, job completed?

FRANK MCCARTER: Correct, Mr Chairman.

MR MALAN: Did you report to Taylor?

FRANK MCCARTER: Yes, Mr Chairman.

MR MALAN: Were you not supposed to file a report when you get back to Vlakplaas, people there?

FRANK MCCARTER: No, one doesn't commit that sort of thing to paper, Mr Chairman.

MR MALAN: Does one orally report on such things?