Special Hearings — Chemical And Biological Warfare Hearings — 1998-06-08

JAN LOURENS: Dr Boraine, I had at not stage been under the illusion that it was for anything other to assassinate human-beings, fact, there's no ways one could even contemplate that excuse.  On the other hand is, there's I never applied my mind in that era, and I must be quite honest with you, in terms of who it would be applied to.  It's something that I - in hindsight it's a strange experience in not looking back and actually questioning and saying, but who would be applied to, there's wasn't a face that I could attach it to, or a republic enemy that publicly ...(indistinct) would say that this is potentially ...(indistinct), and I didn't question it.  And I'd like to be able to say to you yes, I went through the moral - I went through the total moral process in terms of thinking it through at the early stages, it doesn't happen at a late stage.

UNKNOWN: Alright, and precipitated by the fact that you now suddenly going to have to explain what this fund was and what this account was all about, you've already said that that is the case, now your friend who is a lawyer, have you given that name to Mr Vally at all, do we know who that is?

JAN LOURENS: Well, his name is Kobus Bekker.

UNKNOWN: Thank you.  And Kobus Bekker was someone that you could confide in and you asked him to gain access to the them Minister?

JAN LOURENS: Yes.

UNKNOWN: Yes, but the Minister said no, he wouldn't see you, but he would see Mr Bekker?

JAN LOURENS: What happened there was is that after I'd consulted with Kobus he contacted the Minister and we flew down that same evening to Cape Town and until we actually went to the Minister's office, I had been under the impression that I would see the Minister.  He went in, and I really have to recall, I'm not all that clear, he went in and he had a discussion and came back and said, listen the Minister is not going to see you, wait, and he went in to discus the - but he had all the data, the details etc with him, yes.

UNKNOWN: And in substance, what the Minister said, well, this is not something I know anything about, or I can't deal with it, go and see the Surgeon General, is that right?

JAN LOURENS: The way in which I recall it was that the Minister said that he bore no knowledge of this project at all and that it was - he would open the way for us to talk to people that may be able to give some sort of a clear direction on this project, yes.

UNKNOWN: So you went then to General Knobel?

JAN LOURENS: Yes.

UNKNOWN: Just tell us again, very briefly, you obviously must have told him that you had been through your friend to see the Minister and that you're now seeing him and that this plot had been uncovered, if you, and  you were concerned, and what did he say to that?

JAN LOURENS: By the time that he had arrived at his office, it was quite obvious that the Minister had already spoken to him.  He knew exactly why we were there.  He received us in the manner in which he always does, cordial, we may even have had a cup of tea, and he basically said to us that this particular project is outside of his scope of control or jurisdiction and we would need to see General Liebenberg, and he set up the appointment for us.

UNKNOWN: And he was in no way sort of worried about the fact that you were worried or concerned, or that you'll maybe cause an embarrassment to anybody else?

JAN LOURENS: Not that I can recall, but I must tell you, I was reasonably pre-occupied with myself at that point, I wasn't particularly sensitive to other people's ...(indistinct)

UNKNOWN: Yes, that's understandable.  And then you had the discussion and a couple of whiskies and quite a pleasant chat with General Liebenberg?

JAN LOURENS: A very pleasant chat, it was - we in actual fact didn't discuss it at all, we didn't discuss the project, the toys at all.  He was briefed, I told him what it was in terms of screwdrivers, etc, etc, and that was it, and we did not discuss the details when we were going to go to, what we were going to do, what was going to happen, and he just said, forget it, it's over, don't worry, I'll handle it, and that was it.  It was as simple as that.  And very cordial, very well received.

UNKNOWN: Now, did you actually believe him, that he was going to handle it, and that was that, the problem was over?

JAN LOURENS: I desperately had hoped so, yes, I did believe him.

UNKNOWN: And yet you went along and buried it, why didn't you give it back to him then?

JAN LOURENS: Well, you know, I wasn't going to give anything back to anybody until I've had some sort of proof.  I mean, by that stage, my - the extent of my disillusionment was number 1 myself, and second the sort of environment that I was operating in with was to such an extent that I'll be honest with you, at one stage I thought that I was going to land up in jail, I thought this is it, I'm going to be caught with this horrible stuff, I won't be able to justify, there's money missing, jail, jail's it.  So it was to a certain extent a trump card that I decided to bury.

UNKNOWN: So you took out some insurance?

JAN LOURENS: I took out some - it was the proof of that particular project.

UNKNOWN: Okay, so not to push the point, but you didn't really feel that Liebenberg, General Liebenberg could really solve the problem and deal with it, even though he had given you that assurance, otherwise clearly you would have said, well that's fantastic, let me hand the stuff over to you and you deal with it.

JAN LOURENS: I think what we need to bear in mind is that, you know, during '93 a lot of things had changed in this country and things really started to move, and I did not feel that I had this unqualified promise that would be kept at all costs, no, so yes, there were some reservations from my side, and as a matter of interest, this is that the final conclusion thereof in terms of that I was never phoned by anybody that said, listen, it's okay, don't worry, it's all over.  I was just not - it was never discussed with me again, so I just kept my evidence hidden and that was it.

UNKNOWN: You will appreciate, Dr Lourens, that one could ask an enormous number of questions, but I do have colleagues that are also dying to ask questions as well, so let me not take that any further, and just conclude by asking, two much more briefer questions.  One, you talked about the other thing that disturbed you after a while, and that the was the life of luxury that the project team enjoyed.  Now, was that in terms of salary, or houses, or cars, or what, what sort of lifestyle was that?

JAN LOURENS: Dr Boraine, I cannot reply in terms of salary, other than my own, but it was a very comfortable life that we lived in the sense that we travelled - all of us travelled to Europe frequently, perhaps even excessively so.  We always travelled business class, and in certain cases, people even travelled first class.  We stayed in excellent hotels at all cases, we had a good lifestyle.  I earned a reasonable salary, I earned a good bonus, bonus as a function of profitability of Protechnic especially, and in terms of the life that we were living, I obviously have had to measure myself, and obviously my colleagues, in terms if my peers, and it was a comfortable life, yes.

UNKNOWN: Last question, you mentioned your visit overseas, which clearly was a distressing experience personally.  You mentioned that you met Trevor.  Was he South African?

JAN LOURENS: Yes.

UNKNOWN: What sort of age and description, I mean how - what is your recollection?

JAN LOURENS: Trevor was at that stage I would have judged him about 45, greyish, shortish man, no distinct features, not a big nose or whatever the case may be.  South African in terms of, I judged him to be South African in terms of his accent, we spoke Afrikaans, so he was South African, and his clothes, I mean, when I saw Trevor at the station, he was South African.