Amnesty Hearings — Cape Town — 2000-09-29

FERDINAND BARNARD: No I do not agree.  I think what happened was that there was a good case hearing as it happened with Willy Smit and additionally if there's any reference to records we should not only consult the records of my criminal trial but we should consult the record of his cross-examination when he testified during the PMI.  What actually took place during the tea adjournment is that I recalled something in which he and I were both involved and he attached the Webster admission to an incident where a Pretoria police officer was involved.  I know how the police operate, I know that there are records of everything that takes place and so forth, and during the tea adjournment I went to phone Mr Fuerter(?) and General Hume, they consulted their pocket books and they saw that what I had said is something that he knew about.  And then he folded.  And when he saw Colonel Fuerter come in and that the notebook was handed in to the Presiding Judge he folded at that point and not at another point.

MR WESSELS: So Judge Els had the wrong idea.

FERDINAND BARNARD: That is correct.

MR WESSELS: Then I am astonished that yesterday in your evidence you made mention of the fact that everything that was found was correct, that you had not said that Judge Els was mistaken.

FERDINAND BARNARD: Please, I did not work through thousands of pages of evidence to make a finding against the Judge.  That is not my job.  I don't even have the training to do so. I never said that.

MR WESSELS: Well the record will show clearly ...(intervention)

FERDINAND BARNARD: Yes it will.

MR WESSELS: Mr Barnard on the first day of the evidence of Willy Smit, the 28th, the day upon which he testified that the evidence given during that day was the truth and when the Judge also accepted his evidence he came to give evidence and he testified that you had a photo album which you showed him, among others, and in this photo album there were photographs of more than 20 persons whom you had murdered.  Do you recall that evidence?

FERDINAND BARNARD: Yes I recall the evidence and I also know what he is referring to.

MR WESSELS: Yes, is his evidence the truth?  Is it true that you had such a photo album containing such photographs and that you boasted then and there that you had murdered all these persons?

FERDINAND BARNARD: No, what he saw was a photo album which had been compiled throughout my years in service to the South African Police, there were shooting incidents in which I had been involved during which robbers were shot dead, or during which persons had attacked me with firearms and also incidents in which my partner had been involved.  In other words shooting incidents with regard to the Narcotics Branch where I worked, scenes and photographs of scenes that I had visited.  I didn't say that I killed all those persons but some of them were killed by me.  And sometimes there was a newspaper clipping to accompany the photograph.  I didn't really want it any more but I had it at one point.  It was locked in a cupboard in my office.  We were busy tapping telephone lines of certain assessors.  He saw the photo album there, he asked if he could look through it, it was a question of general record.  It was public knowledge and I am not shirking from that.

MR WESSELS: Wasn't there anything sinister about any of those persons who had died?

FERDINAND BARNARD: No I don't think so.

MR WESSELS: What was your evidence during the PMI?  Did you deny that such an album existed which contained all those photographs?

FERDINAND BARNARD: I cannot recall.

MR WESSELS: Did you admit that there was nothing sinister?  Did you state that this was simply a photo album of persons to whom reference had been made during PMIs or who, during the normal and legal course of your duties and your partner had been shot?

FERDINAND BARNARD: I cannot recall.

MR WESSELS: Well we will obtain the record Mr Barnard and we will determine to what extent you are lying or not.

FERDINAND BARNARD: Then get the record.

MR WESSELS: You see Mr Barnard I want to put it to you that during that PMI you did not provide this explanation, the explanation that exonerated you, and that Willy Smit's evidence was indeed the truth, that these were persons whom you had killed and that you boasted about the fact that these were persons who had been killed by you, and that you created the impression that you were indeed a hit-man.

FERDINAND BARNARD: I do not have to create the impression, the record speaks for itself.  I had spent time in jail previously for killing people and now I am doing the same.  It doesn't have anything to do with something that I am not.  That is what I am.  I cannot escape that.

MR WESSELS: But I want to know more about the others that you have killed, those that we don't know about Mr Barnard.

FERDINAND BARNARD: If there are any such persons bring them and then we can finish that off as well.

MR WESSELS: I would like to know if there are any other persons whom you have killed the details regarding which have not yet been disclosed.

FERDINAND BARNARD: You asked me yesterday and I said no.

MR WESSELS: You said you couldn't recall.

FERDINAND BARNARD: I said that I didn't know of them, not that I knew of them.  I would have recalled if there was anything like that which was beyond police context.

MR WESSELS: You and Lafras Luitingh didn't get along very well, is that correct?

FERDINAND BARNARD: Yes we had a personality clash.

MR WESSELS: From the very beginning?

FERDINAND BARNARD: He was one of those guys that I didn't really like and I could sense that he didn't like me either and it was that way since the beginning, so-to-speak.

MR WESSELS: How long were you in the CCB?

FERDINAND BARNARD: I cannot give you precise dates but I think it was approximately 18 months.

MR WESSELS: And how did you leave the CCB?

FERDINAND BARNARD: I was arrested in terms of section 29, I was detained, and after my discharge from the section 29 detention it just happened that I went over to DCC.  Nobody told me that I would be fired from such and such a day.  I was just told the CCB is finished.

MR WESSELS: When were you discharged from section 29 detention?

FERDINAND BARNARD: I don't know.  I cannot tell you.  It was approximately 5 days before Nelson Mandela's release.  I think it was 1991.

CHAIRPERSON: Sorry Mr Barnard you said that, just correct me if I am wrong, that it was in July that you got a three month salary from Luitingh?

FERDINAND BARNARD: June, but it was for June, or July, August and September.

CHAIRPERSON: And then, October, November, did you get a salary for those months?

FERDINAND BARNARD: No then I was then under arrest and I was in detention.  I cannot recall the precise period but I know that in November I took out an AK47, so I was already in detention.  I had spent much time in detention and I was only released in February.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you.

MR WESSELS: The last month for which you got a salary was then September 1989?

FERDINAND BARNARD: Yes, as far as I can recall.

MR WESSELS: And in November you were arrested.

FERDINAND BARNARD: I cannot say that I was arrested in November.  I think I was arrested before November.  I can recall that I read somewhere in the documents that I had to hand over the AK47 to the Warrant Officer because they thought that was the AK47 that killed Lubowski.  I then considered everything and I thought, yes, there is an AK, they are going to lock up innocent people, people whom I asked to hide the AK47, they wanted to know if this was the AK47 that killed Lubowski, that was a brand new AK47 that was mine, it had never fired a shot.  I picked up the AK47 rather than locking up my brother who had a family and asked to hide the weapon.  And then I cut a deal with the General, I take the punch for the AK47, do not charge anybody else, I'll take it out and you can see if it is the one that killed Lubowski.