Amnesty Hearings — Johannesburg — UNKNOWN

UNKNOWN: Well, I can't comment on that, Mr Chairman.

BERNARD MAKGABO NGOEPE: It troubles me because it seems to me that there was in fact no such order from Brig Schoon who was your senior and the discretion to kill or not to kill was left to somebody who was your junior and in the end really it comes back to you.  You could have, without in any way offending Brig Schoon, have stopped Koos Vermeulen from killing that person.

UNKNOWN: In theory maybe yes, with hindsight, but the
23.1 - 1B	way/....
JUDGE NGOEPE	302	D COETZEE
way it worked in the culture, for sure not, and if the Chairman would allow me just to repeat this quote as I have done before about our way of speaking when it was explained by the notorious Craig Williamson to a presiding officer, exactly this same kind of conversation in the Security family which would have a complete different meaning in normal life.  He says, and if you will allow me:
"It is a very devious way of talking. It is something that Security people will understand"
And also:
"I think for people in the profession, people who speak deviously to each other, and who have a very intimate rapport with each other, understand intimately, understand very well what is going on in this type of conversation".
And this was Craig Williamson at my internal trial on 10 June 1985, Volume 6 page 292 and 293.  So if Brig Schoon gives the green light to - he overrules me.  He is our boss.  If we are there, I am not the boss, Brig Schoon is the boss and if Brig Schoon gives Koos Vermeulen the green light to say do as you think fit, that gives Koos the green light and he knew that Isaac Ace Moema will then be killed.

BERNARD MAKGABO NGOEPE: I know that people communicate with devious ways, but that's something different.  It is one thing to give a definite order through devious ways, which is what you are reading from the paper, but the situation you are dealing with now is completely different.  You yourself is saying - you are telling us that Brig Schoon said well, do as you see fit, what does that mean?  What does the "do as you seem fit" mean, if simply to say well, if you want to kill him, kill him.  If you don't want to kill him, don't
23.1 - 2A	kill/...
JUDGE NGOEPE	303	D COETZEE
kill him.  There can't be an order out of that, Captain.  You cannot read a specific order to kill out of that kind of communication.

UNKNOWN: Mr Chairman, if Koos indicated that Isaac Ace Moema must be assassinated, and Brig Schoon gives him an answer of "Do as you think fit", he would have very well known that Isaac Ace Moema are going to be killed, nothing else.

CHAIRPERSON: Anyway, what is alarming in this whole thing is that without any proper investigation or even an attempt at investigating and testing this man to find out whether he was in fact a plant or not, a decision is taken so flippantly and a man's life is put to an end.  I am alarmed by that.

UNKNOWN: I can understand it, Mr Chairman.  I think in those days a black man's life meant absolutely nothing.  One can see it clearly out of what I am explaining at the moment.

SISI KHAMPEPE: Are you saying therefore, Mr Coetzee, that your office, as a commander of Vlakplaas, prevented you to order an investigation to be conducted to verify information which had such catastrophic and fatal consequences of declaring someone to be a double agent, you couldn't have done that?  You couldn't have ordered such an investigation to be conducted?

UNKNOWN: My duty on the operational side falling under Section C - Vlakplaas was not something on its own, it fell under Section C Security Headquarters, Brig Schoon, and as I say, my job was to report to him and it was for him as a very old, experienced - more experienced Security man than I was at that time, to decide how forth from here onwards.
23.1 - 2A

SISI KHAMPEPE: /...
MS KHAMPEPE	304	D COETZEE

SISI KHAMPEPE: But you could have conveyed to Brig Schoon your particular reservations about Mohema's double agency status.

UNKNOWN: Well, I actually also agreed that there was some concern as a result of his actions, but not to the extent that Koos Vermeulen did.

JUDGE WILSON: You agreed there was some concern.  You didn't oppose your objection.  You didn't say, you don't think that action should be taken?

UNKNOWN: No, I didn't say that, Mr Chairman.

JUDGE WILSON: Why not?

UNKNOWN: As I say, I had my sort of doubts and I was worried about Mr Isaac Ace Mohema's behaviour.

JUDGE WILSON: You worried and a man dies.

UNKNOWN: I beg your pardon?

JUDGE WILSON: You were worried about his behaviour and you let a man die, is that what you are telling us?

UNKNOWN: That is correct, Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: Which really boils down to this, that you could have avoided his death.

UNKNOWN: Well, in theory I can assure you, Mr Chairman, in the Security set-up in that farm set-up, in that culture set-up, I wouldn't have last long and might be I might have ended up where some other of my black colleagues ended up after posing a threat to the Security Police as clearly proved when I left into exile.

CHAIRPERSON: You would be faced by your junior.  You would have told your junior not to proceed with this.  So what threat could that be to you?

UNKNOWN: I could not have overruled Brig Schoon's ...

CHAIRPERSON: No, Brig Schoon, the matter was only referred to
23.1 - 2A	Brig Schoon/...
CHAIRMAN	305	D COETZEE
Brig Schoon because you had some suspicions and it was your suggestion that it should go to Brig Schoon.

UNKNOWN: That is correct.

CHAIRPERSON: But if you had decided there was no need for Brig Schoon to decide on the matter, if you yourself thought there was insufficient evidence or information about this man.

UNKNOWN: Well, I think in my manuscript I said some of the other policemen, and I think it came from Almond Nofomela, and other policemen, who also expressed their concern, as a result of that I felt it my duty to accompany Koos and discuss it with Brig Schoon.

SISI KHAMPEPE: But Mr Coetzee, your evidence is quite clear, Brig Schoon did not say go and eliminate.  He said you and Vermeulen were to use your discretion.

UNKNOWN: No, it was a specific instruction to Koos Vermeulen do as you think fit.

SISI KHAMPEPE: So he didn't say go and eliminate.  You could have prevented then Mr Vermeulen, who was your underling, from proceeding with the elimination.

UNKNOWN: If Brig Schoon gave him that authority, Mr Chairman, I couldn't have overruled that.

UNKNOWN: Do I understand you correctly that you say it was a specific instruction to Koos Vermeulen, go and kill the man?

UNKNOWN: In our language, yes.

UNKNOWN: What would have happened if Koos Vermeulen didn't kill him, decided not to kill him?

UNKNOWN: Difficult for me to speculate, Mr Chairman.  If he then defected later ....(intervention).

UNKNOWN: And he would come back to Brig Schoon and
23.1 - 2A	Brig Schoon/...
ADV DE JAGER	306	D COETZEE
Brig Schoon would ask him why didn't you kill him, so he said oh, you told me I should do what I think fit.

UNKNOWN: Well, I think one should ask that question to Vermeulen, with all respect, Mr Chairman, and Brig Schoon, put it to him.  I can't answer for that.

MOKOTEDI MPSHE: Captain Koos Vermeulen made a report to yourself as well as Brig Schoon about him having taken care of Mohema.  Did he report to you as to how the "taken care" was done?

UNKNOWN: No, not as far as I can remember in explicit words, but by doping, getting knock-out drops from General Lothar Neethling, I can only assume shooting him at point blank and burning him, but that's only an assumption.  He just said the problem has been taken care of.

MOKOTEDI MPSHE: You didn't ask him how did you take care of this man?

UNKNOWN: No, I did not.

MOKOTEDI MPSHE: At that stage now you were no more concerned about Mohema's life any more.

UNKNOWN: No, it was not my concern, that's correct.