Amnesty Hearings — Boksburg — UNKNOWN

GEORGE BIZOS: But surely, if you felt so strongly that a by-election in Krugersdorp wouldn't matter tuppence in relation to the future of the country, why would you not have discussed the other options available?

EDWIN JOHN CLARK: That is not correct, Mr Chairman, I did not state that by-elections did not matter tuppence.   If by-elections did not matter at all at that time, I would not have wasted my time walking down streets and knocking on doors and fighting with dogs.   By-elections then were still a possibility.   At any stage, any responsible person would prefer to avoid bloodshed ...(intervention).

GEORGE BIZOS: Was that ...(intervention).

EDWIN JOHN CLARK: ...and by-elections is a peaceful means of achieving change, and I support peaceful means of achieving change if possible.

GEORGE BIZOS: Did Mr Derby-Lewis share your view about elections at that time?

EDWIN JOHN CLARK: I believe he did.

GEORGE BIZOS: Did he say so?

EDWIN JOHN CLARK: I cannot remember him specifically saying so, but if he did not believe that, why would he stand in a by-election?

GEORGE BIZOS: Well, did you discuss how important elections were in order to show the feeling of the people?

EDWIN JOHN CLARK: Mr Chairman, I think it's important to realise that no responsible person would throw by-elections out as an avenue if it was still available.

GEORGE BIZOS: I merely want to establish as a fact, for the purposes of the committee, that during March/April 1993, Mr Derby-Lewis still believed in the ballot box?

EDWIN JOHN CLARK: Mr Derby-Lewis, at that point, I am sure, was well aware of the diminishing chances of the ballot box, but nevertheless, being the upright Christian man that he is, he's prepared to give it a last shot, and in that sense I was prepared to help him.

GEORGE BIZOS: Yes.   So that if he or anyone else told us by that time he had come to the conclusion that the elections were a waste of time and that the only way to solve the country's problems was to kill the anti-Christ Hani, and we are going to submit, although he does not admit it at this stage, the other leadership of the SACP and the ANC, that he was either not being frank with you or he did not say?

EDWIN JOHN CLARK: Mr Chairman, let me put something in perspective, things are not quite as black and white and as simplistic as you are stating.   Even when it regards the by-elections, the by-elections that were being fought were fraudulent on their own.   The National Party, on many occasions, used less than upright and honest means to gain victories, and the diminishing chance in the ballot box was really one that is being pushed for its own sake, but I do not believe that anyone who was active and concerned in those days, would have ignored other options and just pushed for the ballot box.   You hope for a miracle, go for the ballot box, that is fine, but to ignore other options would be very foolish indeed.

GEORGE BIZOS: You say that you were discriminated or treated unfairly by the police, do you, Mr Clark?

EDWIN JOHN CLARK: Most definitely, sir.

GEORGE BIZOS: Your name was found in the diary of the wife of the man that was apparently correctly suspected of having killed Mr Hani?

EDWIN JOHN CLARK: My name was found in the diary of Mrs Derby-Lewis?

GEORGE BIZOS: Yes.

EDWIN JOHN CLARK: In regard to?

GEORGE BIZOS: Well to being a regular visitor to that house.

EDWIN JOHN CLARK: That would be correct, sir.

GEORGE BIZOS: Were you asked to make a statement?

EDWIN JOHN CLARK: By the police, yes sir, I was indeed.

GEORGE BIZOS: Did you resist in the beginning?

EDWIN JOHN CLARK: No, I was quite happy to make a statement.

GEORGE BIZOS: And did you make a statement?

EDWIN JOHN CLARK: Yes, I did.

GEORGE BIZOS: And you were released within what period?

EDWIN JOHN CLARK: I was released before the day was over.

GEORGE BIZOS: What is your complaint against the police?

EDWIN JOHN CLARK: The police deny that I was arrested.   I fail to bring that together with the fact that they knocked me up before five o'clock in the morning, told me I was not allowed to use my telephone, because this was section 29, drove me all over the place, refused me the facility to contact my lawyer, and basically I was incarcerated for a period until roughly the middle of the day, before things started to change.

GEORGE BIZOS: And you made a statement?

EDWIN JOHN CLARK: I made a statement during that morning, yes.

GEORGE BIZOS: No, not at the end of the end of the ordeal.   By mid-afternoon I knew what was going on.

GEORGE BIZOS: What was going on?

EDWIN JOHN CLARK: My advocate at that time had found out that the police in fact had no warrant for my arrest, had no authority whatsoever to arrest me, to confiscate my computer equipment, my computer disks, to search my premises, they had no authority whatsoever, and he informed me of this, he managed to get a telephone call through to the police station where I was being held.   When he informed me of this, I walked to where they were looking at my computer, I uncoupled the power and I informed them that I objected in the strongest terms to them looking at my computer equipment.

GEORGE BIZOS: And they succumbed to your request?

EDWIN JOHN CLARK: They did not.   They informed me in very strong terms that I would sit down at a place, the words I remember very clearly, "Sit Edwin, or else", and I had to sit, and I've got these big policemen standing over me, you've got no choice whatsoever but sit, while they switch your computer equipment back on and carry on with their devious deeds.

GEORGE BIZOS: Yes.   There may have been information, in their view, in your computer that you may have been involved in the murder of Mr Hani.

EDWIN JOHN CLARK: I cannot tell what they thought, I can only tell that they were operating against the law and I object in the strongest possible terms.

GEORGE BIZOS: Now I am going to put to you, Mr Clark, that you, together with a small clique of close friends of the Derby-Lewis's, must of necessity have been in some way involved, or at least had knowledge of the plans to kill Mr Hani?

EDWIN JOHN CLARK: I would not know, sir, because I had no knowledge of such a plan, and I would not have anticipated at that point that Mr Derby-Lewis would have knowledge of such a plan, because he was fighting an election.

GEORGE BIZOS: And I'm going to put to you that the evidence of Mr Visser, the whole of it, in relation to you and the other person that he mentioned, Roodt, is true and that your evidence is false?

EDWIN JOHN CLARK: I would deny such an allegation, sir.

GEORGE BIZOS: And in this co-operation that you were taking part in with Mr Roodt, who was senior, you or he?

EDWIN JOHN CLARK: I do not understand the question, me with Mr Roodt, what were we doing together?

GEORGE BIZOS: Well, Mr Visser said that there were structures, that there were cells of sorts, and one of them consisted of him, yourself and Mr Roodt, and that money was being stolen for arms and two-way radios ...(intervention).

INTERPRETER: The speaker's microphone is not on.

GEORGE BIZOS: ...for the war that was coming ...(intervention).

CHAIRPERSON: Did he say that was a cell, Mr Bizos?   I understood that the cells were something completely different that Mr Roodt was in charge of in Western Transvaal, they were AWB cells.

GEORGE BIZOS: Yes.   No I used the word, I used the word ...(intervention).

INTERPRETER: The speaker's microphone is not on.

GEORGE BIZOS: ...loosely and not, that it was a small group, that's all, Mr Chairman, not a formalised group, I've made it quite clear that it was not a formalised group in 1992 on the evidence of Mr Visser.   That you, Mr Visser, leave out the question of cell, you, Mr Visser and Mr Roodt were busy stealing money to be used for the purposes of the war that you now say was inevitable?