Special Hearings — Mandela United Football Club Hearings — 1997-11-24

MR PIGOU: What was the relationship between Section D and Section C, the operational counter-revolutionary unit of the security branch?

JOHN LOUIS MCPHERSON: You see we did the gathering of intelligence, Section D was the intelligence unit of the security branch and when it came to Section C we would supply them, when I say "we" then it is the intelligence unit, would supply them with relevant information about subjects whether they are in Africa or abroad or internally.

MR PIGOU: In your personal knowledge do you have any information regarding Section C operations against Mrs Mandela?

JOHN LOUIS MCPHERSON: No not that I am personally, I am not personally aware of any.

MR PIGOU: Did you receive any information from Section C?

JOHN LOUIS MCPHERSON: We - all the sections used to have a morning meeting, we called it the Sanhedrin and there we of course exchanged information and intelligence on a daily basis and then we had also a week, a Friday weekly meeting where everybody presented a document or we presented a document that went for the rest of the country on intelligence gathered for that specific week.  So of course we did receive information from C Section as we would receive information from say the PAC desk or the ANC desk and we would receive information from all over the country from the different branches and regions.

MR PIGOU: Did you use Unit C for the execution of any operations at all, yourselves, in Section D?

JOHN LOUIS MCPHERSON: No, no, no.

MR PIGOU: Were you aware in Section D, yourself, of what Section C members were doing as you will know from the experiences in the last year or so and the numerous amnesty applications involving members of Section C they were involved in all sorts of heinous crimes, were you in Section D aware of this and what they were doing?

JOHN LOUIS MCPHERSON: Yes and if you read the statement of Eugene de Kock, Dirk Coetzee and other people, of course you will become aware that things were happening.

MR PIGOU: And was this sort of a common knowledge within the security branch, within all the various sections or was this reserved for specific sections dealing with counter-revolutionary activities and intelligence gathering?

JOHN LOUIS MCPHERSON: Yes we worked in compartments if you can call it that way and we worked on the need to know principle, therefore not everybody knew what we were doing and not everybody knew what C section were doing and in fact it was not good to try and find out what another section was doing.  You don't ask questions because in the intelligence game if somebody starts asking questions who are your sources or what are you up to you start thinking he is a spy in your midst.

MR PIGOU: But in your experience Mr McPherson there was a general understanding although people may not have known the specifics, there was a general understanding that people knew that assassinations were taking place, evidence was being falsified in court and so forth, was there a general awareness of this?

JOHN LOUIS MCPHERSON: I wouldn't say, I would say no, not a general awareness.

MR PIGOU: Were you aware of this?

JOHN LOUIS MCPHERSON: No, no.  When I say - okay you are talking about the falsification of ...(intervention)

MR PIGOU: Well what, if I may just butt in, what I am driving at is that it's become clear in the course of the last year and a half within the submissions to the TRC that people did lie under oath in court, gave testimony against people implicating them in things that they didn't do, I am trying to find out whether Section D, and yourself in particular as head of Stratcom Section D, whether you knew these things were going on?  I am not asking whether you were involved in them, I am asking whether you knew that they were going on?

JOHN LOUIS MCPHERSON: Well shall I put it this way, yes, we were aware but I haven't got information on any specific incident.

MR PIGOU: You've mentioned to us that the security branch in Soweto ran their own Stratcom operation.

JOHN LOUIS MCPHERSON: That's correct Mr Chairman.

MR PIGOU: Could you tell us at the time that you were head of Stratcom in 1989, 1990, who was head of that operation in Soweto?

JOHN LOUIS MCPHERSON: It was Dickie de Jager, his first name is Louis.

MR PIGOU: Is this the same man that was then transferred down to the Western Cape in 1990?

JOHN LOUIS MCPHERSON: That's correct, ja, he was transferred to Cape Town.

MR PIGOU: Thank you.  Did you participate in or did you ever hear about discussions related to any plans to start a Stratcom operation directed specifically towards Winnie Mandela or the Mandela United Football Club in Soweto?

JOHN LOUIS MCPHERSON: No.  Can you just repeat the question again?

MR PIGOU: Ja.  Did you participate in, or did you ever hear about discussions relating to any plans to start a Stratcom operation directed specifically towards Winnie Mandela and/or the Mandela United Football Club?

JOHN LOUIS MCPHERSON: No.

MR PIGOU: Now could the Soweto or the Johannesburg branch have taken their own initiative to start such a Stratcom operation towards Mrs Mandela?

JOHN LOUIS MCPHERSON: No.

MR PIGOU: So they wouldn't have been able to operate independently?

JOHN LOUIS MCPHERSON: No because all operations, I mean the funds are being controlled from head office so they'll have to have permission first to obtain funds to become operational.

MR PIGOU: Are you aware of any specific directives given by your superiors within the SAP regarding information related to the Mandela United Football Club or to Mrs Winnie Mandela?

JOHN LOUIS MCPHERSON: No. The operations we had going like Operation Romulus it was wide enough to address Stratcom then related to Mrs Madikizela-Mandela.

MR PIGOU: I just want to finish off with one aspect and that is in the statement dated the 27th of October that you handed to us.  You stated that Mr Fred Bridgeland was one of your informers that you handled from the security branch head office and that you also met him on a number of occasions, is that correct?

JOHN LOUIS MCPHERSON: Yes I think it's not correctly quoted Mr Chairman.

MR PIGOU: Can I read for you?

JOHN LOUIS MCPHERSON: Ja, ja.

MR PIGOU: I do beg your pardon if I've given the inference because Mr....

JOHN LOUIS MCPHERSON: No I will tell you the story now.

MR PIGOU: Mr McPherson has provided us with categories of people that they were dealing with from Stratcom in terms of within the media, those that were fulltime paid-up members, those who received payment on an irregular basis and those who they regarded as sort of friendly journalists, and Mr McPherson has said on paragraph 7 that
"Fred Bridgeland was considered as a friendly reporter and I even had his telephone number.  Our relation was however very limited since he never provided us with any information.  I can't remember any occasion when I took the initiative to contact him.  He contacted me and asked about information concerning a specific issue, I gave him then the feedback which was produced by the Security Branch on the basis of a general information related to the issue".
 You also say, well let me just finish on that particular point with regards to the issues that you dealt with you say on paragraph 7 that you never received any questions from Fred Bridgeland related to Mrs Winnie Madikizela-Mandela's activities.  
 But I want to go back also to paragraph 5 Mr McPherson where you say that -
"In the late 1980's I had a few meetings with Fred Bridgeland, it could have been about three or four meetings in which I provided him with information on his request about different 'terrorist activities'.  The meetings with him took place in my office in Pretoria.  Of all the people I dealt with within the media he was the person that I dealt with least".
 Now just on paragraph 5 did you meet with Mr Fred Bridgeland in your office in Pretoria?