Amnesty Hearings — Ermelo — 1998-07-22

MR HATTINGH: That's correct, the modus operandi.  So, if I'm restricted to one incident and he now comes and tells us that, "No, this was politically inspired", but we know that he's committed five or fifty other armed robberies where there was no indication whatsoever of any political motive, then I say I think it's relevant, there's a modus operandi.  We need to go into that.  We want full disclosure.  We want to see the truth, hear the truth.  I think it would leave ... (intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: Hear the truth of what?

MR HATTINGH: We would like to hear the truth from this applicant.

CHAIRPERSON: For what?  Of the incidents for which he makes application or the truth about his whole life?

MR HATTINGH: No, we would like to hear the truth about his motives for this incident and if there is a modus operandi of fifty other armed robberies where clearly there was the motive of personal gain then we can say there is something reflect on his credibility about his intentions, his aims, his motives for this one.

CHAIRPERSON: Now, deal with my other two problems.  The first other problem is this document is not signed.  Let's deal with that first.  What's your submission on the status of that document?

MR HATTINGH: Mr Chairman, I may be speaking under correction, I think none of the further documentation or statement from any of the applicants were signed.  We dealt yesterday with Mr Mndebele's statement which was not signed.  None of them were signed.  For what purpose I don't know, and in this regard I may just add, Mr Black said that it was due to time constraints that that statement was not signed and was prepared in haste, in a hurry.  That statement was sent to the Amnesty Committee after the date of the previous hearing which did not carry on.  So, there was no hurry whatsoever.  It wasn't prior to the hearing, it was after it.  It does make me a bit concerned about various explanations for various things.

CHAIRPERSON: Well, that's a matter that's separate from my question.  The question is, what is the status of that document given that it's not now signed?

MR HATTINGH: Mr Chairman, I can merely make a submission because I do not find myself moving within a normal court of law where we have normal rules, but what appeared to be the most obvious status of such a document is once it is annexed to a signed application for amnesty, it's being sent in timeously, it's signed, the application, it's annexed and it's stated, "I annex hereto my full - there were not enough space on page three (3).  I want to say more.  So look at the following page that I'm adding", or, "I refer to the statement enclosed herewith".
	Then I say whether it's signed or not is not important.  At some stage that application is signed.  There's no indication that the statement or the application is to be signed on each page.  Then I say that document, the additional statement, the status thereof is that it does form part and is the version of the applicant.  Once we deal with further statements which came to light at whatever later stage, being sent in for whatever reason and it is not signed then, then I say it has no status, it has no legal existence apart from the fact that the applicant will have to explain how this came into being.  
	Why his attorney or his legal representative prepared such a thing, where they got the knowledge from and why they submitted it to the Committee.  But it cannot be said that that document not having been signed which came to light later, which was furnished to the Committee at a later stage, is on the same footing, on the same status value as the document which was submitted together with the application and in this particular matter with this applicant Mr Gushu, we're dealing with the first statement which, on the information supplied to this Committee now, was part and parcel of that very first application.  
	And the second statement, the status of, is dubious, but the first one I would like to submit is there's no doubt about the status of that document.

MR SANDI: Mr Hattingh, you will recall that yesterday we asked that you inform the Committee as to the ground on which the applications are being opposed.  I'm not quite sure what your reply was to that.  Did you say it was on the basis that there was no political objective?

MR HATTINGH: As far as I can remember, I said yes, I would do so, I would make with each and every applicant I will, before I start my cross-examination I would give an indication as to the basis of my position.  I think that was the decision that was made yesterday as far as I can remember.  In general yesterday, with the applicants of yesterday I said yes, we are opposing the applications on the basis that there was not a political aim or motive.  I can go back to the Act to specify the more greater peculiarity of that, but in general that is the basis, yes.

MR SANDI: Now today, in a nutshell, if I understand you, you want to be allowed to cross-examine the applicant on those other incidents which are not part of this hearing on the basis that there was or there could never have been a political objective.  Is that what you're saying today?

MR HATTINGH: Not at all.  I'm saying that I would like to cross-examine this applicant on his application which forms part of the volume before the Committee in which he made application for six murders to which application he annexed a statement which did not find its way onto the formal bundle of documents.  I don't want to cross-examine him, or at this stage, perhaps I should rephrase it, I'm not interested in this particular witness to go into matters which are not on the papers before this hearing, but the way I see it is that he elected to put six murders on the papers before this hearing.  There was no indication whatsoever that he at some stage decided that he want to retract on one of the murders, one of the incidents and he wanted that to be conducted in another hearing.  We were not advised in that regard.

MR SANDI: I still do not understand why you're persisting to be allowed to deal with matters which are not before this hearing, unless I would understand you if you were saying you wanted to show that a consistency in terms of lack of political objective in all these matters, even those that are not being heard today.  That argument would make sense to me I think.

MR HATTINGH: Well, in essence it boils down to that, yes.

MR SANDI: But in doing so you would not want to go into all the nitty-gritty's, the merits of those matters which are not before the Committee today?

MR HATTINGH: I do not understand you.

MR SANDI: Certainly we would not allow you to cross-examine the applicant on the merits of incidents which are not the subject of the hearing today.

MR HATTINGH: Mr Chairman, if I'm not allowed to cross-examine the applicant on the merits of the other matters, then there would be no use in cross-examining him because then we can't get to the bottom of it, for his motives on the other matters.  So, we can't really test his modus ... (intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: I understand what you're saying.  I don't say I necessarily agree with you.  Deal with the second issue.  According to the Act, as we understand it, that the information and the merits of any particular incident for which amnesty is applied for is privileged until that particular matter enters the level of a public hearing.  Now, we've heard that there's one incident that is still being investigated.  It has nothing to do with the so-called Black Cat activities and therefore the applicant's right to that privilege must be respected, whether we agree with it or not.  How do you overcome that problem in respect of the incident which is not part of this application?