Amnesty Hearings — Potchefstroom — UNKNOWN

<UNKNOWN>: Then in June 1989, your younger brother, Adriaan, came or approached you.   Could you briefly explain to the commission what he suggested to you?

MR VAN STRAATEN: On the particular evening of this incident, we were sitting around and having some drinks.   This was, I don't want to give drink the reason or why I did this, I was fully aware of what I was doing, but on this
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particular evening we were sitting around drinking and then we decided that we would remove a truck of Terblanche Transport off their property.

<UNKNOWN>: Did you decide there and then, as you were sitting there, to do this, to carry out this action to remove this truck?

MR VAN STRAATEN: Yes, to remove this truck from the particular property.   We went to this particular property, drove past the property and then we saw a single night watch behind a sort of a building which served as a guard room.   We drove past in our car and about three or four hundred metres past the property, we left the car, walked back to the property.   Arriving at the property, we saw that it had high walls and we could not see what was going on inside the property.  Dawid and I then entered the property.   Having entered the property, we noticed that there were two rather than only a single night watchman.   Dawid and I each grabbed a night watchman, held them so that Andre and Dion would be able to tie them up.

<UNKNOWN>: You refer to Andre, who is Andre?

MR VAN STRAATEN: That is Adriaan.

<UNKNOWN>: You may continue.

MR VAN STRAATEN: I then passed my night watchman over to Andre, entered the property to scout the property.   I walked to the truck which was standing there, looked around and decided that this would be the easiest vehicle to remove, since it was parked right across from the gate.   I looked around, walked back to the guard room, saw that there were keys hanging from a particular board, I took some of the keys and walked to the particular vehicle with these keys.   On the way to the vehicle, I saw Andre and asked him
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if everything was under control, if the guards were tied up, and he then told me that there was a struggle going on.   I then told him that we had to finish up so that we could continue with the removal of the truck.   I entered the vehicle, switched the vehicle on, started the vehicle, but lacking experience with the driving of trucks, I started the truck, which I had seen people do on occasion.  While the vehicle was running, I jumped out of the vehicle, out of the truck, and went to the place where the night watchmen were supposed to be tied up.   Andre and Dawid then told me that there was a struggle and that they had mistakenly knifed one night watch to death.   This upset me, because it was not our intention and we had not made an agreement to kill any of the night watchmen.

<UNKNOWN>: What would you have agreed to do?

MR VAN STRAATEN: We agreed to tie them up.

<UNKNOWN>: You may continue.

MR VAN STRAATEN: In the course of the struggle, Gideon knifed one of the night watchmen.

<UNKNOWN>: Let's leave the matter there, what was your further contribution, you had started the truck, what further contribution did you make with regard to this particular truck?

MR VAN STRAATEN: Being upset about the one night watchman, because I only knew of the one night watchman at that time, who was dead, I then said to them that we must hurry up so that we can remove this particular vehicle, since the entire matter had turned out unfortunately, as we had not planned.  I then entered the vehicle.   Dawid had opened the gate.   It wasn't actually a gate, but sort of a chain which was serving as a gate.   Gideon and I then jumped into the truck
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and I attempted to remove the truck from the property.

<UNKNOWN>: You say that you attempted to remove the vehicle?

MR VAN STRAATEN: Yes.   Since I had no experience, for instance with the brakes of the vehicle or where its various instruments are located.

<UNKNOWN>: What did you then do with this truck after removing it from the property?

MR VAN STRAATEN: I drove the truck out of the property, but it was difficult to get the truck to move along, it was difficult to start it up and to get it to move along.   I then drove the vehicle toward the place where we had intended to leave it, which would have been about 300 metres from the property.   We had difficulty to get the vehicle to the place where we wanted to leave it.   Andre and Dawid were then going to pick us up with the vehicle at that point.

<UNKNOWN>: Is this how things then went, did they come and pick you up with Adriaan's vehicle?

MR VAN STRAATEN: No, not immediately.   Since I then left the truck some distance from the property, I then waited for them to come and pick me up with the vehicle, but then when I looked in the reverse mirror of the vehicle, I saw unfamiliar vehicle lights behind me, which was not the lights of the vehicle which we used, of the motor car which we used, these were different lights.   It turned out to be a bakkie which had round lights rather than the square lights of our car.   I immediately noticed that this was not these people.   Gideon and myself then jumped out of the left door of the truck cabin and ran into the veld, Gideon in his own direction and I in my own direction.   Later that
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evening we met each other at home.

<UNKNOWN>: If I can take you back to the moment when Adriaan arrived at your home that evening of the 17th with this plan which he suggested to you, what did you intend, what did you understand to have been the ultimate purpose of this action?

MR VAN STRAATEN: As far as I could understand it at that moment was this, the National Party continued to give in to the ANC, PAC, other such organisations, that white people kept on being fired out of their positions and black people kept on being employed.   Many of my friends who had businesses, and also myself, had been damaged because, or hurt, because of parts that were stolen from vehicles, people who broke into scrapyards and so on, even at places where night watchmen were on duty, maybe because they were sitting and sleeping, or maybe because they were drunk, but in any event people had losses because of these night watchmen, so we then decided that we would make a contribution as white people that both government and private organisations had to be shown that black people were not up to this particular kind of task.   We believed that if this happened on more occasions, they would fire black people and employ white people.

<UNKNOWN>: Did you understand this to be the purpose of your action?

MR VAN STRAATEN: Yes.

<UNKNOWN>: Why did you agree to this action, when Adriaan came to you with this plan, why did you agree to do this?

MR VAN STRAATEN: Being a supporter of the AWB, sharing their purposes and their objectives and believing it to have been right, and in view of the many people who had difficulties due to unemployment...
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<UNKNOWN>: /...
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<UNKNOWN>: If you talk about "us", who are you referring to?

MR VAN STRAATEN: White people, people who lost their positions, who had high positions but were fired and replaced by black people.   I thought that, from my point of view, with Adriaan's suggestion, I thought that I would be doing something for my people, and that if this were to happen more than once, or on several occasions, the consequence would be to create employment for white people.

<UNKNOWN>: Two weeks later you were arrested, is that correct?

MR VAN STRAATEN: Yes.

<UNKNOWN>: Upon your arrest, could you briefly sketch for the commission how it came about that you made the confession and what happened at your later trial, at your subsequent trial?