Amnesty Hearings — Durban — UNKNOWN

WILSON J: And finally, for me, you had got poison previously from General Neethling, you said.

WITNESS:   That's correct, Mr Chairman.

WILSON J: And on this occasion you got poison, more poison - of the same poison, was it?

WITNESS:   Knock-out drops, that's correct, Mr Chairman.

WILSON J: So I take it you administered more this time than you had on the previous occasions when they hadn't worked?

WITNESS:   I wasn't the person who put it into, but I suppose it was anything between four and six drops.

WILSON J: Who administered it?

WITNESS:   One of the junior officers present.  I can't recall specific which person.

WILSON J: Did you give it to them to administer?

WITNESS:   That's correct, Mr Chairman.

WILSON J: And you knew it was potentially lethal?

WITNESS:   That's correct, Mr Chairman.

WILSON J: A matter of two drops could have killed.

WITNESS:   Actually not killed him.  It actually has the effect that the person falls over, but never really falls asleep.  He's staring with his eyes wide open in the air, and would not wink if you moved your hand in front of his eyes, and 	/would be

WILSON J: would be very restless during the whole night, scratching in the ground.  So the effect that General Lothar Neethling said the stuff would have was in fact - well, I couldn't see it in that way, apart from the person losing his balance, falling over, and didn't know what was going on around him when administered to him.

WILSON J: That's not what you said in your book.  There you said,

WILSON J: "In essence General Neethling told me the drops had the effect of chloroform."

WILSON J: ---   That's correct.

WILSON J: "Too much, approximately eight drops on a medium built man, would kill him."

WILSON J: ---   That's correct, that's what he said, but - and I kept record, Mr Chairman, in that same document.  If one goes on I describe it at the stage how this person falls over, lies with his eyes wide open, staring into the night sky, without winking if you would move your hand in front of him, and then scratching in the ground and rolling restlessly.

CHAIRPERSON: But he would be unconscious, would he?

WILSON J: That's with four drops.

WITNESS:   Not unconscious, but not knowing what's going on around him.  Mr Chairman, there's a specific guy still alive, Godfrey Ndawana, who Gene de Kock tested this same drops on at Vlakplaas, and it was administered to four of them.  Petrus Kgaodi, Godfrey Ndawana, and the person who they call Small Mshezi, Ernest Ramaka's youngest brother, and it made them very aggressive in the end.  And then he explains to you how it feels that there's no feeling in his body any more, and that the person in front of him

WILSON J: /changes

WILSON J: changes into some funny creature, and how they then called out the one ambulance at a stage, and they wanted to break the ambulance down, and they had to call in the Erasmia Police Station's police van to take them to hospital.  So at all not the effect that General Lothar Neethling said it would have.  It did not have that effect.  But he said that was in fact what should happen.

WILSON J: Yes, this was all much later you heard about this.  When you got this poison you were told by General Neethling, the scientific expert, and the man who made it, that eight drops would kill.

WITNESS:   Would - ja, let him fall into a sleep.  That's correct, Mr Chairman.

MR DE JAGER: But would it kill, or let him fall asleep?

WITNESS:   Fall into such a deep sleep that his nerve system would collapse and he would stop breathing then, and that will have the effect then that he dies of a shortage of oxygen.

MR DE JAGER: Because there's a difference about falling to sleep and being killed.

WITNESS:   I beg your pardon, Mr Chairman?

MR DE JAGER: There's a difference between falling in a deep sleep, in a coma, and being killed.

WITNESS:   No, if you die as a result of that drops, Mr Chairman, because too many drops were administered, and it had in fact the effect that General Lothar described, you would then get killed.

CHAIRPERSON: Then you don't get up in a hurry.

WITNESS:   You don't get up in a hurry, Mr Chairman.  But it all proves that General Lothar was not a big poisoner that he - or expert on poison that he posed to be.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Jansen, any re-examination?

MR JANSEN: Yes, Mr Chairman.

MR JANSEN: /FURTHER

MR JANSEN: FURTHER QUESTIONS BY MR JANSEN

MR JANSEN: Mr Coetzee, with which section of the ANC did you mainly have contact when you left the country and went to Lusaka and London?

WITNESS:   Only with the intelligence section, the security section, and mainly with Comrade Jacob Zuma, and a few of his men in the beginning.  Later on I just lived in exile on my own, collecting my monthly allowance once a month, and my mail from one Tuwan Ekanhuizen, who was on the financial side of the ANC.  But I wasn't actively involved in any intelligence work.

MR JANSEN: What was your initial impression of these intelligence officers of the ANC?  Did they immediately accept that what you were doing was genuine?  Were they sceptical, or what would you describe it as?

WITNESS:   The first - with the first short debriefing in London they were just listening.  They never asked any questions, they just listened to my story, and initially Andre Simon would have stayed with me for 10 days whilst they were assessing my evidence - or what I told them, my information.  But after two days Mr Zuma told Andre Simon that he could leave because it was then already apparently clear to them, out of the information that they already had in their possession, that I was completely open with them.  And then in December, the first week in December 1989, I was debriefed in Bulawayo in full, with all the experts in the different areas, where Mr Matthew Khoza was present, Mr Zuma was present, Mr Daniel Olifant was present.  All experts of the intelligence, I suppose - I accepted, of the areas that I was talking about, who could cross-check on my information, whether I was trying to mislead them, and whether it was open and proving or supporting the

MR JANSEN: /information

MR JANSEN: information they already had.

MR JANSEN: Prior to testifying before the Harms Commission had you ever seen any of the documentation relating to Mr Khondile that was issued by the South African Security Police?

WITNESS:   Nothing at all, Mr Chairman.  The only information I had was in my memory, and that was what this book was written on.

MR JANSEN: Mr Chairman, if you could just indulge me.  I have various documents in my possession that was handed up in the Harms Commission.  Now, initially I thought - I obviously wasn't certain to what extent the details of the facts would be relevant, and I thought it would be unnecessary to burden the Committee with the entire Harms proceedings, and I thought it more appropriate to rather see as things go along what might be relevant or may not be relevant.  But I think it would be important to hand up a couple of documents, of which I don't have copies for you at this very stage, relating to Mr Khondile.  And I think those documents will appear quite - on the face of them they would appear - they tell the story that - one can gather the content of the documents from themselves.  They don't - I don't think you need any extraneous evidence.  They were in fact also handed in to the Commission by the South African Police.  But just in that context, Mr Coetzee, if a document issued by the South African Security Police on the 11th of September 1981 had stated that there were rumours that Mr Hani had killed Mr Sizwe Khondile, what would your comment be on a document like that, emanating from the South African Security Police on the 11th of September '81?

WITNESS:   Typical with what they said after the Mxenge murder to the 	/public