Amnesty Hearings — Pietersburg — 1997-07-01

WILLEM JOHANNES VAN DER MERWE: In the first place he would have been driving another vehicle to convey these three people.  When it changed to six people the question was, what then? Then we discussed the matter again and I can't remember whether I asked him.  I wouldn't have given him an order because it was a very risky job, anything could have gone wrong, but I'm absolutely convinced that I asked him, "Sehlwana you must tell me, if you are not prepared to do this, if you're not prepared to act as driver or you're not quite clear as to how to jump out and escape the shooting that could possibly follow, you must please just tell me".  And he said no, he was quite prepared to do it. He brought the whole operation to that point and I think he was prepared to follow it through. There was no order given to him that he had to do that.

MR ROSSOUW: Do you think that he saw it as an instruction, as an operation by the security forces in which he as a member had to take part, in other words that he saw it as an order?

WILLEM JOHANNES VAN DER MERWE: I don't think it's possible because as I just said, I expressly told him that it was not necessary for him to do so and he had to tell me very honestly if he was not prepared to do it. He might have felt compelled by loyalty to do so but he couldn't have seen it as an order.

ADV DE JAGER: Mr van der Merwe I think you are using the word order in two different ways. I think what Mr Rossouw is asking is, did Matthew act in execution of his duties?   In other words, in the execution of a police order in a broader sense of the word and not in the sense that you said to him, whether you want to or not, you must, it's an order. It's more in a sense of a broader police order.  This operation had to be carried out, will you do it, and that he assumed that it was an order.

WILLEM JOHANNES VAN DER MERWE: Yes I'm with you.  It is true and I would like to add that because he was loyal and because it was his job, not necessarily this dangerous bit of business but for that reason he might have been willing to do it and he might have seen it as his task, his duty to do it.

MR ROSSOUW: You must please tell me and when it's a convenient time to adjourn.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes we'll adjourn until 2 o'clock.
COMMITTEE ADJOURNS
ON RESUMPTION

WILLEM JOHANNES VAN DER MERWE: (s.u.o.)

MR BLACK: The gist of Sehlwana's evidence is to the effect that prior to his arrival at the meeting place he did not know whether the parties would be armed.
	The other issue I just want to raise with you is relating to the questioning or interrogation of one of the wounded cadres. Was information given to you as to what the people at the scene managed to extract from this wounded man, what information they managed to get from him?

WILLEM JOHANNES VAN DER MERWE: Yes.

MR BLACK: In what form was that information given to you?

WILLEM JOHANNES VAN DER MERWE: Yes I'm trying to think.  I know for a fact that the wounded man had said to the person questioning him that they were on their way to Pietersburg to the station, they had to meet someone there with a red scarf around his neck. Something like this, there would have been some form of identification.  I cannot say who told me or gave me the information from the scene itself but this led to the fact that Brigadier Coetsee and myself, I don't know if someone else was present, at that stage went to the station and also observed the situation with the possibility that we might or could see such a person.

MR BLACK: Now was a tape recording handed over to you as to what this wounded man would have said in answer to questions put to him.

WILLEM JOHANNES VAN DER MERWE: No I know nothing of a tape recording.

MR BLACK: Insofar as - do I understand you correctly that it was only a few months ago, about two months ago that you had sight of or became aware of the contents of the statements and accounts given by your men to the inquest inquiry?  That is I refer to Mr Erwee's statement and Mr Swart's statement.  Is that the first time you became aware of the contents of those documents, about two months ago?

WILLEM JOHANNES VAN DER MERWE: Yes that's correct.

ADV DE JAGER: About the, they being armed, when did they in fact inform Matthew that they're going to bomb the shop in Pietersburg?

MR BLACK: My learned friend, without looking at my notes, my learned friend to refresh my memory, he says it was on their way while they were travelling in the combi.

ADV DE JAGER: No not according to my notes, that's why I'm asking.  When did they inform Matthew that they - during the time that they were travelling they didn't speak to him.  Matthew was informed that they were on their way, two of them would bomb a shopping centre here at Pietersburg.

MR ROSSOUW: Mr Chairman I think if my recollection is correct, Mr Teboga at one of the meetings with Mr Sehlwana informed him that two persons were to go to, I think Nelspruit and to Johannesburg, I'm under correction, and two were to come here to bomb the shopping market and from that he made the deduction, if I'm not mistaken, that they would be armed but he wasn't...(intervention)

ADV DE JAGER: So he was aware, or he made the deduction that they will be armed before he took them from the scene.

MR BLACK: Well yes he does say at one stage that he deduced that they would be armed but at the same time he also says that he didn't know if they would be armed.

SISI KHAMPEPE: Mr Black if I do remember Mr Sehlwana's evidence on that issue, I think he was not sure what was in their baggage. I know that they were not heavily armed.

ADV VISSER: Well Mr Chairman if I may say that's with all due respect not entirely correct. You'll remember that the evidence was that he found these six people sleeping at the fountain with AK47's next to them. They then left there Mr Chairman, so there was no doubt in his, there couldn't have been doubt in his mind that they were armed with AK47's, I think that was the gist of that evidence, with respect.

CHAIRPERSON: I think he said they put them in their bags and that's when I asked him whether they had been dismantled.

SISI KHAMPEPE: But I think what I was trying to drive at Mr Black is that the discussion with Mr Boyikanyo was that they were going to come with some luggage and that's why he had to organise a combi, because more people were going to come with more luggage.  That time when that information was passed over to him it was not explained to him what the nature of the luggage was.

MR BLACK: Those are my notes to that effect that that's why he arranged for the combi.

ADV DE JAGER: Right thank you Mr Black, thank you, you can continue.

MR BLACK: Thank you.  The further issue I just want to raise with you is you mentioned that Sehlwana received a cash payment of R2 000 because of the good work he did.  Did any other members of that task team receive any form of reward or recommendation?

WILLEM JOHANNES VAN DER MERWE: No not at all.

MR BLACK: And was Mabena paid for his information?

WILLEM JOHANNES VAN DER MERWE: Yes he was paid.  He was a registered informer and he was paid for the information.

MR BLACK: Are you able to just tell us how much off-hand or?

WILLEM JOHANNES VAN DER MERWE: I'm not a hundred percent certain but I think R8 000.

MR BLACK: You were asked by my learned friend Mr Visser whether or not instructions had been given to the Security Police at one stage to engage in a form of guerilla warfare and that you denied.  Would you agree that, well evidence has been given, not at this hearing but elsewhere by some security police, that at that time there was, it was sometimes being described as a low intensity warfare, that was being waged between the security forces and the people infiltrating?  Would that be the perception of the security forces at that time?