Amnesty Hearings — Pretoria — 1996-07-01

UNKNOWN: Mr Chairman, thank you.  I intend calling two witnesses to lead very short evidence, and I would apply that we continue to call them today.

HASSAN MALL: Please do.
ADV MSPHE CALLS

STEPHANUS MARTHINUS ROUX: (Duly sworn, states).

UNKNOWN: Mr Roux, if you will just please switch the microphone on.  Thank you.  Mr Roux, you are an adult and you are currently residing in Louis Trichardt.

MR ROUX: That is correct.

UNKNOWN: One Maria Claudine Roux was your wife?

MR ROUX: That is correct.

UNKNOWN: And one Morella Dubene and Wilson Thubane were your employees, is that correct?

MR ROUX: Yes.

UNKNOWN: And these three people were killed in October 1991, is that correct?

MR ROUX: Yes, on the 14th of October, yes, 1991.

UNKNOWN: Mr Roux, you listened to the evidence today. It was evidence presented in order to obtain amnesty for the two applicants, Mr Van Wyk and Mr Du Plessis.

MR ROUX: Yes.

UNKNOWN: Evidence was led that on a certain day an operation was launched to obtain weapons and ammunition at your home.

MR ROUX: That is correct.

UNKNOWN: Could you please tell the Committee whether you had any weapons or ammunition in your possession?

MR ROUX: Yes, I had weapons and ammunition in my possession.

UNKNOWN: What kind of weapons and ammunition?

MR ROUX: I had a 207 hunting rifle, a 6 mm hunting rifle, a ,22 rifle, that one was fitted with a telescopic sight and a silencer and I had a ,22 revolver, but at that stage I did not have a military weapon. I had resigned from military service and I had handed in my weapon. So I had no military weapons in my possession at that stage.

UNKNOWN: So the firearms which you have just mentioned, where are they?

MR ROUX: I still have them today.

UNKNOWN: Did you lose any of your firearms at any stage?

MR ROUX: Never.

UNKNOWN: Sir, you have heard of one Jurgens White? Are you familiar with him?

MR ROUX: Yes.

UNKNOWN: Could you tell the Committee about this Jurgens White?

MR ROUX: I knew Jurgens White since primary school, his primary school days. He was a friend of my daughter's.

UNKNOWN: A friend of yours?

MR ROUX: He often came to our house and he always came to visit us and greet us and there was never an occasion when he left the town without coming to say good-bye.  He was a very close friends of ours.

UNKNOWN: Were you aware of Jurgens White's political affiliations?

MR ROUX: No, but once I heard him mentioning that he might undergo weapon training in France.

UNKNOWN: What else did he say?  What else did he say?

MR ROUX: Well, that was all.

UNKNOWN: Did he say anything about establishing a political party?

MR ROUX: No, at all.

UNKNOWN: Mr Roux, I am terribly sorry, but I must ask you the following question.  On the day on which your wife died, what did you find when you arrived at home that day?

MR ROUX: Well, when I arrived there, there were helicopters and police dogs all over, lots of policemen and my two employees had been shot dead outside,  The woman's throat had been slit and I found my wife in a cupboard, in a wardrobe. She was dead.  The ,207 rifle was next to her and the barrel was full of bullets?

UNKNOWN: Apart from muddy tracks in the house, there was nothing else amiss?

MR ROUX: The telephone connection had been disconnected but nothing was missing.

UNKNOWN: You told us Mr Roux, that you had certain expenses relating to your wife's funeral and the funerals of your two employees?

MR ROUX: Yes, I paid for my employees' funeral and obviously also for the funeral of my wife.

UNKNOWN: What did that cost you, if you can remember?

MR ROUX: I would estimate round about R7 000,00.

UNKNOWN: Now when I spoke to you about compensation, you told me that you were not certain whether you wanted it or not.  Could you elaborate on that?

MR ROUX: I didn't hear the question?

UNKNOWN: When I spoke to you during lunch-time regarding the reparation or compensation, you said that you weren't quite sure whether you wanted it or not.  Could you comment on that?

MR ROUX: Yes, I don't want any compensation for that.

UNKNOWN: Mr Roux, the two applicants, and especially Mr Van Wyk, I am specifically referring to him, they are applying for amnesty before this Commission. What are your views on this?

MR ROUX: Yes, it is very difficult for me.  You know, my wife, I knew her for 32 years, we had been married for nearly 26 years and to lose a wife in such a manner is not easy.  We virtually grew up together.  So I don't want to say the Committee they must grant him amnesty, but if he does get amnesty I will have to learn to live with it and I will abide by that.

UNKNOWN: The two applicants apologised to you yesterday and today.  What is your reaction to that?

MR ROUX: I accept their apology.

UNKNOWN: Are you saying that you also accept the possible reconciliation between yourself and them?

MR ROUX: Yes.

UNKNOWN: Thank you, Chairperson, that is the evidence.
NO FURTHER QUESTIONS BY ADV MSPHE

UNKNOWN: Mr Roux, on that particular day, now if I can remember correctly, you testified during the Supreme Court matter that you and your wife usually left home at the same time.

MR ROUX: No, we never left home together, I always left first.  But the big problem that particular morning was or happened as a result of the fact that we had been away for the weekend and the bakkie was parked in the garage and the car parked behind the bakkie. I always drove the bakkie and my wife drove the car.  Now on that particular morning I shouted to her through the window that she must drive the bakkie, I am taking the car, because my daughter was late for school.  And I then took the bakkie, or rather I took the car and then Jurgen and them saw the car leaving, they thought it was my wife leaving, but as it happened, it was myself and not my wife.

UNKNOWN: So somebody who knew the set-up there would have thought that you and your wife had both left the house.

MR ROUX: Yes.

UNKNOWN: Now in regards to the four firearms in your house, I understand that there was also an R4 in your bedroom?

MR ROUX: Yes, that was the military weapon which I had to return.  And Jurgens knew about that because he knew the lay-out of the entire house.

UNKNOWN: Now are you saying now that there were 270 guns next to your wife, your deceased wife when you arrived there.  The fact that nothing else had been taken from your home, does that not cause you to think that perhaps the person had taken fright after they had killed your wife and then fled?

MR ROUX: Yes, I think so too, but I didn't hear Mr Van Wyk's testimony yesterday because I didn't know the case was proceeding, otherwise I would have been here.  But what I found strange was that they first had to shoot the servants, so my wife must have heard the shots. That's what I think, and my wife must have heard the shots and then hid in the cupboard. In other words, I am not able to say what they did first, but my feeling is that when they saw the Black people they just decided to shoot them.  And when they ran out of bullets, because that's what the post-mortem also said, then they killed her with a knife.  Because the shots that they fired at her would not even have caused her to be crippled in any way.

UNKNOWN: Now as far as Mr Jurgens White is concerned, you say that the two of you were good friends.  Do you know anything about his military background?

MR ROUX: I only knew that he had a Army training and that he was a Recce and he had been in the Recce Reconnaissance Division, but I heard a rumour that he wasn't quite successful in that, but that is all I knew.

UNKNOWN: The Recce, is that now the special forces?

MR ROUX: Yes.

UNKNOWN: Mr Roux, one last question.  You remarried?

MR ROUX: I remarried in April 1992.  I am not solitary person.

UNKNOWN: Thank you.
NO FURTHER QUESTIONS BY ADV RHOODE