DURBAN August 23 1999 - SAPA
MAHARAJ OPPOSES AMNESTY APPLICATIONS OF SECURITY POLICEMEN
Former transport minister Mac Maharaj on Monday dismissed the amnesty
applications of five former security branch policemen as "concocted"
stories and opposed them on the basis of his own insider knowledge. Speaking at
the Truth and Reconciliation Commission's amnesty hearings in Durban on Monday,
he questioned the circumstances surrounding the abduction, detention and secret
murder of two Operation Vula operatives 11 years ago. The amnesty committee
heard that Charles Ndaba and Mbuso Shabalala were "arrested" in Durban
on July 7, 1990, shot dead a week later and their bodies thrown in the Thukela
River. Five former Port Natal security branch policemen - Major Hendrik Botha,
Major Salmon du Preez, Colonel Laurence Wasserman, Lieutenant Casper van der
Westhuyzen and their commander General Johannes Steyn - are seeking amnesty for
their involvement in the crimes. Botha last week told the committee he recruited
Ndaba as an informer in the late 1980s. At the time Ndaba was a highly-regarded
Umkhonto we-Sizwe (African National Congress armed wing) commander in Swaziland
in charge of military activities in Natal. On Monday, presenting evidence on
behalf of the Ndaba and Shabalala families, Maharaj punched holes in Botha and
Steyn's evidence by presenting three sets of damning articles compiled over a
couple of months in 1988 by Wasserman and Botha. In the articles, which were
circulated to more than 14 security branch groups around the country, Ndaba was
listed as one of the most wanted men and his name was not accompanied by a
"PN" reference number used to identify police informers. As former
internal commander of Operation Vula, Maharaj disputed evidence that Ndaba had
told policemen about the presence in the country of Operation Vula's top
command. "Even some of the most senior members of the ANC did not know of
our whereabouts," said Maharaj. "How then would Charles Ndaba have
known?" Maharaj opposed the applications on the basis that the policemen
had made false disclosures. He said Operation Vula was going on inside the
country for two years before its "accidental discovery" in 1990. In
1990 the intelligence forces "concocted" a story which suggested that
they knew all along about the operation through their "informant"
Ndaba, Maharaj said. It was also suggested that Ndaba and Shabalala might have
cracked under torture after askaris (liberation movement activists
"turned" by the police into government agents) stumbled upon Ndaba in
Durban. Most of the operation's leaders were rounded up soon after the two men
disappeared. The applicants will on Tuesday attempt to rebut the evidence that
they collaborated and concocted a false story and that they smeared Ndaba's name
before killing him.
© South African Press Association, 1999
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