Amnesty Hearings — East London — 1999-04-07

JOHANNES LODEWIKUS GRIEBENAUW: The Ciskeian supporters and Liza Lomzi, that was  a matter of some concern for me, and immediately after Charles Sebe was liberated, and after certain claims were made in the press that Namba Sebe said that he was responsible for this act, Liza Lomzi started with certain activities, acts of terror.
	There were explosions for instance, and it was difficult to determine whether it was Liza Lomzi, but all indications pointed out that that was the fact.  
	At that stage, the whole thing actually I found it hard to swallow as a Policeman, because on the one hand I was trying to combat terrorism and on the other hand, I was aware of people who were being trained as terrorists.
	I was aware of this.   Apparently, or probably because there was no proper control over these people and they used their own initiative, I am not saying it was part of the Operation that they should commit acts of terror, but that is in actual fact what did happen.
	A meeting was planned for the 10th of November 1986 at a remote military camp in Pondoland at Nsikaba, as a result of my involvement during other incidents, I asked Major Van der Merwe whether I could attend, I would probably have been able to rearrange my priorities to attend, but I didn't do so for two reasons.
	The one reason was that I didn't believe that this Plan could work, and the other reason was that I felt that I would have to involve another witness in the whole matter.  My instruction to him was to listen and not to say anything, because I was convinced that the Plan was doomed to failure and I couldn't associate myself with the methods being used.
	The report which Major Van der Merwe brought me and well, I can't tell you the specific phrases and the words that he used, but the way that Van der Merwe conveyed it to me, brought me under the impression that what we were now concerned with, was killing, actual, physical killing and physical removal, and that was probably the biggest reason why I withdrew and why I asked Head Office that we as the Police should withdraw completely and Gen Van der Merwe, I told Gen Van der Merwe this, and he agreed with me completely.

MR AVENANT: This meeting, this is the 10 November 1986 meeting, that was actually a whole series of meetings, and the first meeting took place on the 10th of November and the last on the 13th of November?

JOHANNES LODEWIKUS GRIEBENAUW: Yes, I think what happened was that a meeting took place and then there was a visit to the training camp of Liza Lomzi, I think that is how it happened.
	Now the next meeting which I attended, I can't remember the date, there I said that the Police were going to withdraw entirely from the whole Plan.  My knowledge of the activities which arose from what later became known to me as Project Katzen, but seeing as I gained this information in ways other than personal involvement, I don't see the necessity for elaborating on this any further.
	The Committee may ask me questions about that, a document which may be important, is the only document which I, when I still went through the files and official documents, and had access to these, is a document which I drafted, the history of it is this, there was a request at some stage and I have to repeat what was told to me, Gen Viljoen, he was at Security Head Office and he was second in command of Security, said that President De Klerk had made an appointment with Major General Holomisa and that he wanted to be completely informed as to activities in the Eastern Cape so that he could prepare himself.
	A request had been directed at National Intelligence, Military Intelligence and the Security Police.  I then attended a meeting at which all of these components were represented and National Intelligence represented by Mr Botha, Defence Force by Chris Stirrion and then myself.  Initially there was the proposal that we write a joint information or intelligence memorandum for the President, but later on it was decided that each department would write his own report.
	I then prepared a report.  I don't know Chairman, whether it was actually conveyed in this form to President De Klerk, I placed it at the disposal of Gen Viljoen, who in turn placed it at the disposal of Gen Van der Merwe, who was then the Commissioner of Police.

MR AVENANT: Chairperson, we would like to ask that this document, it was the one made available to you earlier this morning, that this be handed in as an Exhibit.

CHAIRPERSON: Is this the document headed "Uiters Geheim" and then Memorandum?

MR AVENANT: That is correct.

CHAIRPERSON: And it is - yes, we will receive this then as Exhibit F.  Does everybody have a copy of this?  Make copies available to the others, or Mr Mapoma could just make arrangements for copies to be made available to those who wish to have them.

JOHANNES LODEWIKUS GRIEBENAUW: .

MR AVENANT: At this stage I should perhaps just enquire ...

CHAIRPERSON: ... Mr Mapoma could just make arrangements for copies to be made available for those who wish to have them.

MR AVENANT: At this stage I should perhaps just enquire whether the document must be read into the record.

CHAIRPERSON: I think rather if it could be described as it's a little bit long, it's 20/30 pages long.  It will form part of the record, it doesn't have to be read in.

MR AVENANT: Thank you, Chair.
	General, could you just discuss the document in broad terms?

JOHANNES LODEWIKUS GRIEBENAUW: This deals with the entire period when I was in the Eastern Province and I was the Regional Commander.  It deals with the liberation of Charles Sebe from prison, and it deals with actions which took place subsequently and which were connected coups or attempted coups in the Transkei. It deals with the involvement which the Transkei Defence Force had in the attack on President Sebe's house.
	I think what comes across very clearly in this document is what the, how many problems Katzen caused for policing tasks, because there were allegations of coups left right and centre between the Transkei and the Ciskei and I had the privilege of appearing on the front page each and every time, as the chief agent of destabilisation.
	I tried in every possible way to try and find out who was behind all these actions, but we didn't get anywhere with that.  Later when I was already in Pretoria, General Smit and I, arising from allegations from Holomisa, we visited him and a joint investigating team was appointed with members from South Africa and the Transkei, but it never actually functioned, Transkei never did its part.  Later on there was a committee of investigation under the chairmanship of General Fisher.  And it deals with all of that.
	It is a very thick document and I think that one would probably expect that if this document was submitted to President de Klerk in its entirely, that there would have been some action as a result of this, but that did not happen.

MR AVENANT: General, just to get back to Annexure A.  There are further annexures to your application, documentation for instance, things that were said by Major-General Holomisa at a press conference.

JOHANNES LODEWIKUS GRIEBENAUW: Yes, that's correct.

MR AVENANT: How did you become aware of the name Katzen for the first time?

JOHANNES LODEWIKUS GRIEBENAUW: In those documents.  In the first press releases regarding this document, that was the first time I heard about the name.