Amnesty Hearings — Johannesburg — 1998-10-14

MR VAN SCHALKWYK: And I put it to you that we all have choices.  Now you had a choice in killing that policeman and you also had a choice in becoming an AWB member earlier.

OCHERT ANTONIE DE MEILLON: Well I have always supported the right-wing politics but at that stage I just didn't view it important to join.

MR VAN SCHALKWYK: I put it to you that you didn't have any right-wing relations before that date, you're only using it to obtain amnesty.

OCHERT ANTONIE DE MEILLON: Well I have proof of my membership with the organisation and as I have said I was raised very conservatively in an Afrikaner house.

MR VAN SCHALKWYK: Nowhere you refer to an AWB number or any proof that you are an AWB.

OCHERT ANTONIE DE MEILLON: Well I don't have my AWB membership card any more because I had to hand that back when I joined the BWB but I do have my BWB membership here, the original.

MR VAN SCHALKWYK: I put it to you that you were not a member of the AWB whilst you were in the army because you didn't want to, it was only after these events that you obtained membership?

OCHERT ANTONIE DE MEILLON: I don't agree, just after I completed my military service I then obtained membership at the AWB, that was after I met Commandant Ochert van Schalkwyk, he was with me in the single quarters.  He introduced me to the AWB.

MR VAN SCHALKWYK: Are you going to call Ochert van Schalkwyk to testify?

OCHERT ANTONIE DE MEILLON: I don't know what my advocate is going to do, I don't know what purpose it would serve.

MR VAN SCHALKWYK: So you're not going to call him?

OCHERT ANTONIE DE MEILLON: I don't think so.

MR VAN SCHALKWYK: Are you going to call Gerhard van Rensburg to testify?

OCHERT ANTONIE DE MEILLON: I don't know, I don't think so.

MR VAN SCHALKWYK: You say there in your testimony that it was not Gerhard van Rensburg who gave you the instruction?

OCHERT ANTONIE DE MEILLON: That is correct.

MR VAN SCHALKWYK: How do you know that it wasn't him?

OCHERT ANTONIE DE MEILLON: If it had been him I don't know of it.

MR VAN SCHALKWYK: I put it to you that you come to us and you say that you know that one specific person didn't give the instruction but then you say that you don't know who gave the instruction?

OCHERT ANTONIE DE MEILLON: Mr van Rensburg at that stage wasn't available, he was on an angling expedition with his family, so I don't know how he would have contacted me per telephone and given me an instruction.  We were good friends, we trusted one another.

MR VAN SCHALKWYK: No, you testify and you say that it is not him.  How do you know that he did not give it?

OCHERT ANTONIE DE MEILLON: In the first instance, I know his voice, I would have immediately recognised the voice if it had been Mr van Rensburg's voice.

MR VAN SCHALKWYK: How many instructions did you get over the telephone from anonymous people?

OCHERT ANTONIE DE MEILLON: That was the first one.

MR VAN SCHALKWYK: So you've never before received such an instruction?

OCHERT ANTONIE DE MEILLON: No.

MR VAN SCHALKWYK: I put it to you that you never received such an instruction and that it is something fictitious that you have thought out?

OCHERT ANTONIE DE MEILLON: I don't agree.

MR VAN SCHALKWYK: How do you know that it was perhaps just someone who phoned you and let's say for example someone just playing with the telephone.

OCHERT ANTONIE DE MEILLON: There aren't just people playing with the telephone having knowledge of the BWB and knowing of their operations.

MR VAN SCHALKWYK: Now you say someone who did not identify himself tells you that the time is right, for what?

OCHERT ANTONIE DE MEILLON: The time was right to obtain weapons, that is what the person said and that I would know where to get it.

MR VAN SCHALKWYK: I put it to you that your statement doesn't indicate that the time is right to get weapons, it was only said that the time is now right, nothing was said about weapons.

OCHERT ANTONIE DE MEILLON: That was not my precise words.

MR VAN SCHALKWYK: So you say that your statement is not correct?

OCHERT ANTONIE DE MEILLON: We have already changed that.

MR VAN SCHALKWYK: Now the order and the way in which this was put was not quite correct.  Now I put it to you that I asked you do you agree with the changed version and you said yes you agree?

OCHERT ANTONIE DE MEILLON: But at that stage I was not aware of what this paragraph says.

MR VAN SCHALKWYK: So you want to say to us that this changed version you have also not read through thoroughly?

OCHERT ANTONIE DE MEILLON: I've read through it, yes.

MR VAN SCHALKWYK: I put it to you that the first version and the changed version nowhere is reference made to weapons in this telephone conversation and that you are not telling the truth?

OCHERT ANTONIE DE MEILLON: It is most definitely not an untruth.

MR VAN SCHALKWYK: So what you're saying to us is that your first statement and the changed statement is incorrect?

OCHERT ANTONIE DE MEILLON: Yes, in that regard, yes.

MR VAN SCHALKWYK: Is there anything else in your statement that you would like to change?

OCHERT ANTONIE DE MEILLON: At this stage I can't think of anything, anything that is not correct.

MR VAN SCHALKWYK: I want to put it to you, in paragraph 6 and I read your words
"I realised that the situation is urgent and that two of my former confidantes of the AWB, Edmond Holder and Willem van Zyl, and that I approached them"
Why do you still refer to them there as confidantes if you now say that you only met them once.

OCHERT ANTONIE DE MEILLON: As I said, Mr van Schalkwyk put it to me that I could trust them and rely on them, now in that regard I view them as being confidantes.

MR VAN SCHALKWYK: I'm going to put it later to the co-applicants Mr Holder and Mr van Zyl that they weren't confidantes.  Should they testify that they weren't confidantes, what would your answer be to that?

OCHERT ANTONIE DE MEILLON: I view them to be confidantes.

MR VAN SCHALKWYK: I put it to you that Constable Swart is here and he is going to testify against you and say that you never said that you are a right-wing group and that you were not looking for weapons when you entered the building?

OCHERT ANTONIE DE MEILLON: That is what I said.

MR VAN SCHALKWYK: Why would he lie concerning such an important point?

OCHERT ANTONIE DE MEILLON: I don't know why he would lie but I also don't know why I would lie.

MR VAN SCHALKWYK: I put it to you Sir that you are a convicted murderer and therefore you would lie to stay in prison for ten years less.

OCHERT ANTONIE DE MEILLON: No, I'm not prepared to tell any lies here.

MR VAN SCHALKWYK: The statement in paragraph 7 of how it happened, are you sure that it is correct?

OCHERT ANTONIE DE MEILLON: I won't say that it is a hundred percent correct.  As I explained to the Committee earlier, that is how it happened.

MR VAN SCHALKWYK: You told the Committee that you are sure that you didn't fire the first shot, is that correct?

OCHERT ANTONIE DE MEILLON: Yes.

MR VAN SCHALKWYK: Van Zyl was in the vehicle, so Van Zyl could not also have fired the shot?

OCHERT ANTONIE DE MEILLON: No, it was definitely not Van Zyl.

MR VAN SCHALKWYK: According to your statement, it would then only mean that it would have been either Holder or Swart could have fired the shot?

OCHERT ANTONIE DE MEILLON: Yes that is correct.

MR VAN SCHALKWYK: I put it to you that Constable Swart's hands had been tested by Nel for some residue and there was nothing found?

OCHERT ANTONIE DE MEILLON: That's possible.

MR VAN SCHALKWYK: In other words you say that if the testimony of Swart is that he did not fire the shot that the only other possible person who could have fired it would have been Holder?

OCHERT ANTONIE DE MEILLON: That is correct.

MR VAN SCHALKWYK: Should Holder come and testify that he did not fire his weapon, is he lying?

OCHERT ANTONIE DE MEILLON: It's quite clear, yes.