Amnesty Hearings

CHAIRPERSON: Right, should we go through the normal formality of asking the representatives to place themselves on record.

MR BOOYENS: May it please the Commission, Mr Chairman, J A Booyens instructed by van der Merwe and Bester on behalf of the first applicant, Mr Bellingan.

MR WILLIAMS: Mr Chairman, members of the Committee, I am Mr P Williams of the firm E Moosa, Wagley, Petersen, appearing on behalf of the second applicant, Mr Mbelo.

MR HUGO: My surname is Hugo, I represent Mr Eugene de Kock. He is only in his capacity as a witness.

MR WILLIAMS: Thank you Mr Chairperson, members of the Commission, I am Brent Williams, I am from the firm Y Ebrahim and Company Incorporated and I act on behalf of the families of the victims in this matter.

MS PATEL: Thank you Mr Chairman. It is Ramala Patel, leader of evidence for the Amnesty Committee. Thank you.

CHAIRPERSON: Right, can we now start with the applications of Bellingan and Mbelo?

MR BOOYENS: Thank you Mr Chairman. Just before I start there, just one aspect and I can assure you I do, I am not going to delay matters as a result thereof. I have just been handed a copy of the affidavit of Mr de Kock. We have not had time to go through it, so at the conclusion of my evidence in chief of Mr Bellingan I will just ask for an adjournment to enable me to go through that quickly.

I, another aspect of, on which there is certain uncertainty is in the papers at page 387 to 397 appears what purports to be a document by one Frank Mbane. That, however, at least in the copy I have got, is just what I have been described as purporting to be an affidavit, but it has not been signed by anybody, it is not, it is a piece of paper. So, I do not know what status, if there is an original that has been signed by anybody, otherwise I have got problems with what status, if anything, this document has got.

MS PATEL: If I may respond, Adv Booyens, to the first point, Mr de Kock's submissions were handed in late on, we received them late on Friday from his attorneys, they were couriered to us, and that is the reason that they were only made available this morning. Unfortunately, Adv Booyens, the copy you received, did not receive, did not have the full application, I apologise for that.

Secondly, regarding the statement that is in the bundle, there is a signed copy, it is merely a statement, not an affidavit. The rest of the statement relates to other incidents not relevant to this matter and that is the reason for only that particular portion having been included in the bundle. If that satisfies my learned colleague.

MR BOOYENS: I am indebted to my learned friend, Mr Chairman. Mr Chairman, ... (intervention).

CHAIRPERSON: Before you continue, can I deal with one matter. I have just been given a note which points out that I should have introduced the Committee members. Adv Motata, Mrs Khampepe, Judge Miller and myself, Andrew Wilson.

MR BOOYENS: Thank you Mr Chairman, I call Mr Bellingan. He will speak in Afrikaans.

EXAMINATION BY MR BOOYENS

W RIAAN BELLINGAN: (Duly sworn in, states).

MR BOOYENS: Please sit down. Thank you Mr Chairman. Mr Bellingan, your application is in front of you which is related to an incident in Guguletu. Is that correct?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, that is correct, Mr Chairman.

MR BOOYENS: If you look on page 128 in the document, that was a written statement by you, you are not going to refer to that?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR BOOYENS: From page eight up to page 24, you refer to your background, your history in the police, your experience there, your history at Vlakplaas and that type of information. Is that correct?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR BOOYENS: Do you want to add anything to that?

MR BELLINGAN: Not at this stage.

MR BOOYENS: Possibly only on page 21, you refer to other incidents which is the subject of other applications. Is that correct?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: You referred to annexures to your application, that is in essence, documents to provide background information, it is broad, general information. Is that correct?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: If we come to page 25, - M'Lord, I have reached agreement with my learned friends that I am going to lead the witness in order to expedite matters as far as possible and that if we get to a controversial point, I will let him speak on his own, but if they are, if they feel I am leading on something which, in their view, might be controversial, they just, they will just give an indication.

Page 25, in January 1986 you were stationed at C1 Unit, Vlakplaas and early in January or February of 1986, Colonel de Kock, who was the Commanding Officer of Vlakplaas at that stage, told you that you should come to Cape Town and you set that out in paragraphs two, three, four and five. Is that correct?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, it is.

MR BOOYENS: The issue you mention on page 26 regarding the two AK47's and the Tokarev Pistol and the purpose of those. Now, what further instructions did you give them regarding these weapons?

MR BELLINGAN: I brought these weapons from Pretoria, as it was mentioned in the previous paragraph, and the purpose of these weapons was to prove a legend and to build up a legend round the network of the ANC freedom fighters, which had to be infiltrated. So, the weapons were not to kill people, it was simply to establish a legend.

MR BOOYENS: Did they have to keep the weapons in their possession or did they have to hand it to the people?

MR BELLINGAN: They had to keep it in their possession and they had to keep control of those weapons.

MR BOOYENS: You then drew these weapons from Brigadier Schoon?

MR BELLINGAN: Correct.

MR BOOYENS: And also the Volkswagen Panel Van with the false panels?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR BOOYENS: Paragraph seven, you there mention the people involved, as far as you can remember, people who came down to Cape Town. Were those the only ones?

MR BELLINGAN: There could perhaps be another name added there. I think Sergeant Nobelo or Constable Nobelo was also in this group, he might have been present. He was a South African Police member, he was not an askari.

MR BOOYENS: Paragraph eight, you mention that Colonel de Kock also gave you some background as to what was going on in Cape Town.

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct. The request went to Colonel de Kock from Cape Town and I had to go and report to them. So, de Kock gave me the instruction to go and report to them and that I would fall under their command for that period.

MR BOOYENS: Now, just for clarity, Mbane and Maluleka had already started infiltrating this place. So, you did not have to start with this operation right from the ground?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR BOOYENS: Did you come from Vlakplaas only for this, let us call it, the Guguletu Operation or why exactly why were you sent down to Cape Town?

MR BELLINGAN: The purpose was they would have received a request from the Divisional Commander in Cape Town, that would have gone to head office and we would have helped them to hunt out these freedom fighters, because at that stage Cape Town Security Branch had absolutely no information and it was not only for the Guguletu Seven, the Guguletu Seven incident arose out of that. So, it was purely an intelligence gathering operation.

MR BOOYENS: You say that you stayed at the Koeberg Power Station and infiltrated the people?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: You also mention that you had contact, that is in paragraph 12, with other police units, Sanob and the Riot Squad, etcetera, Narcotics Bureau. Why was that necessary?

MR BELLINGAN: The reason why I had contact with the other units, special units and the police, was that we were purely a terrorist detection and tracking unit and the feeling in Cape Town was that the security police had no information and the people who patrol the streets for 24 hours a day were Murder and Robbery, Riot Squad, the Narcotics Bureau, Detective Branch of Guguletu, so I shared my information with them and shared my photographs, my photograph albums with them so that we would, between the whole group of us, the whole lot of us, we would be able to track down terrorists in a better way, in a more co-ordinated. So, these people would have been the people who would have picked up my Black members if they were moving around in vehicles at night and these other units worked on the ground very, very regularly, so it would have, actually, caused my operation to miscarry if I did not share information with them. I went to Brigadier Ronnie van der Westhuizen ... (intervention).

MR BOOYENS: Who was he?

MR BELLINGAN: He was the Divisional Detective Commander. I have introduced myself to him, I said I am from the Counter-Terrorist Unit and I am working with the security police in Cape Town, may I please also work with your units? He said, well, you go and have contact with the different units, just go and introduce yourself, tell them what kinds of vehicles you are using, because we can do whatever we like, but if the detectives pick up these people, then the whole thing will miscarry. That was the reason why we had to have contact with the other branches.

MR BOOYENS: Page 27, paragraph 13, there you deal with how you moved into KTC and the situation as you found it on the ground?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: In your view it was clear that normal policing, at that stage, was no longer possible?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, that I observed from my own observations and also as a result of the information which I got from the various branches. I realised that you could simply not enter into these areas with your unarmed vehicle, if I can use the English term, it was a free for all situation. You had to be accompanied by several other men if you entered KTC or Crossroads, you had to move in in small groups, late at night, because they picked up our presence there, they used whistles to stay in contact with each other and they shot at us. So, it was a crisis in Cape Town at that stage.

MR BOOYENS: You also say that you had to enter Crossroads on foot, because ... (intervention).

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, it was a squatter settlement, so there were a limited number of roads in and out of Crossroads, there were heavy rains and the roads actually were, we could not use these roads. So, the Commissioner of Police, in those days, did not want to allow unarmed vehicles in that area at that time. That is why we decided to enter the area on foot and in small groups to try and arrest suspects.

MR BOOYENS: How successful were you?

MR BELLINGAN: We supported the Guguletu Detective Branch quite a lot and we helped them, achieved quite a bit of success in arresting people.

MR BOOYENS: Paragraph 14, you mention that you never identified yourself as a member of Vlakplaas when you contacted the other units, but that you simply told them that you were in command of a Counter-Terrorist Unit from head office. What is the reason for that?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, that stage Vlakplaas was a very, very sensitive operation. We used the word "The Farm" and we did not actually mention the name Vlakplaas. I was involved right from the establishment in 1981 and it was a very, very sensitive operation which was operated by means of secret funds. So, we actually just referred to "Die Plaas" or "The Farm" and not Vlakplaas, but I am sure many of these policemen knew that it was the farm outside Pretoria called Vlakplaas.

MR BOOYENS: Nou, u handel dan op bladsy 29 uit, gee jy net 'n opsomming van die samesprekings met Luitenant Liebenberg. Nou, net kortliks, wie was Luitenant Liebenberg en hoekom het jy met hom gepraat?

MR BELLINGAN: Luitenant Liebenberg was die Bevelvoerder van die Teenterroriste Lessenaar by die veiligheidspolisie hier in Kaapstad. Hy was toe nog 'n jong man uit Offisierkursus uit en hy is die taak gegee om 'n Teenterroriste Lessenaar en netwerke te begin vestig om sodoende inligting in te samel rondom terroriste opspoorting, mnr die Voorsitter.

MR BOOYENS: En u meld ook spesifiek ... (intervention). MS KHAMPEPE: Sorry, I think there is a, there seems to be something wrong with the translation. What ... (intervention).

INTERPRETER: If ...

MS KHAMPEPE: ... the witness has just said was not translated.

INTERPRETER: If the witness would please repeat what he said, it will be interpreted.

MR BOOYENS: Please just repeat.

MR BELLINGAN: Lieutenant Liebenberg was a young officer and he was the Commanding Officer of a Counter Terrorist Desk in Cape Town in the security branch and he was placed there to establish a network of intelligence regarding terrorists, but I do not think they were particularly successful at that stage.

MR BOOYENS: In paragraph 15 you mention certain information which was obtained from informers. Are these the informers that you infiltrated?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, also informers from Murder and Robbery, from the Detective Branch, Riot Squad and they gave us information as to what the situation was like and I did not have direct contact with those informers. From time to time, however, I spoke to their handlers and they told me what the situation was like in KTC.

MR BOOYENS: Was the information also obtained in the way which you mention in paragraph 15?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: You also mention in paragraph 16 something which you already referred to, namely the prohibition on unarmed vehicles entering those areas and you also elaborate on the situation there.

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR BOOYENS: In paragraph 17 you mention the objective of your operation and that there was the aim to make the area ungovernable by the liberation movements?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR BOOYENS: Paragraph 18, page 30, towards the end of February you received information from the one man whom you had infiltrated at the group, that is Jimmy Mbane, and the information was to the effect that the group was busy planning to either attack a police station or to attack a police van or minibus. Is that correct?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: This police bus, just to get some clarity on that, did this police bus transfer staff who lived outside of Guguletu, did it pick up these staff on a daily basis and then drive through a particular route and this particular crossing where the incident later took place on the way to Guguletu Police Station?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct, it was a little van belonging to the administrative staff and this bus used the same route at the same time every morning. It came from a northerly direction to the Guguletu Police Station.

MR BOOYENS: Was the vehicle easily identifiable as a police vehicle?

MR BELLINGAN: It was a yellow police mini-bus.

MR BOOYENS: Typical of the type of police vehicles used at the time?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: On page 21, page 31, paragraph 21 you mention that about a week before the taking place of the incident, Jimmy Mbane made arrangements to meet Liebenberg and myself at the Holiday Inn. Could you perhaps elaborate on that, what happened there?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, just to take the story back a little bit, these two people, Maluleka and Barney were infiltrated by me, they were already there and then those days we did not have cell phones, we used this radio tracking device. They would contact me and we arranged certain meetings in certain places. They would come there and tell us what the situation was like. In this particular case Jimmy and, I think, Eric was present as well, I am not sure, we usually met each other one by one, we, I, we spoke to him at the Holiday Inn in Bellville and he told us that there was a plan to attack a police van on a Monday morning. He gave us more or less the area where it would take place and we told him that he should try and get back to us as soon as the information was confirmed. He said that would be very difficult, because this group was particularly radical and they did not actually very lightly trust anybody else and I said it does not matter what happens on that morning, please just try and retain control of the operation. It is very difficult to plan such an operation a week ahead of time. I said keep the arms and the weapons and the van or the bus under your control and we would do whatever we could from our side. Then Jimmy went back, yes, that is our discussion in the Holiday Inn with Liebenberg and myself.

MR BOOYENS: Now, the arrangement was that he would try and get back to you?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: However, he did not do that?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR BOOYENS: So, the information which you had at, on Friday was that the police bus would be attacked at this particular crossing?

MR BELLINGAN: Correct.

MR BOOYENS: Is it correct that Liebenberg and yourself then realised that you were more or less in a situation where you would start to take steps, have to take steps to prevent something from happening?

MR BELLINGAN: Correct, we realised that with this information on the table we would, actually, have to act, we would have to inform the other units to try and prevent whatever was going to happen and we would try and arrest these members and we contacted the various departments. Lieutenant Liebenberg had another informer who informed him that there was, indeed, such a plan to attack the police van. I did not speak to that informer myself.

MR BOOYENS: Liebenberg's informer, although you did not speak to him, what did this man tell Liebenberg or when did Liebenberg receive the information from the informer?

MR BELLINGAN: I believe it was the day before the incident, on the Sunday, yes.

MR BOOYENS: So, as far as you were concerned, that was enough confirmation or it was confirmation of Mbane's information?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: Now, Mr Bellingan, people will surely ask you the following, you receive information on the Friday, a week before this planned operation, why did you not just simply go out and arrest these people who were planning this operation?

MR BELLINGAN: These people, according to the informers and the people that we had infiltrated, did not stay in the same place, did not sleep at the same place night after night, houses were not marked, addresses were not clear in those areas. Sometimes we did react on certain information, we tried to arrest people, but we were unsuccessful. We did not have photographs of the suspects. So, it was rather difficult to try and arrest them, because the information related to about ten to 17 suspects. So, it would be very difficult to go round to ten to 17 addresses in these circumstances.

MR BOOYENS: On the other hand, you also had to face the fact that if you did not react in any way, took no steps and the information proved to be correct, then innocent policemen would lose their lives?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR BOOYENS: And what was then decided was that you would plan an ambush action at this crossing?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct, we met at a place in Wingfield, there were senior officers of the Riot Squad and Detective Branches and there we planned what we were going to do. We allocated certain groups to wait in the bushes and allocated vehicles to wait in the area to apprehend these people as soon as they crossed the bridge.

MR BOOYENS: And as far as the police bus and its occupants were concerned, what happened to that?

MR BELLINGAN: The staff, it was said that, the instruction was given that the staff who were supposed to be in the bus on the Monday morning, should not be in the bus, but to be replaced by policemen wearing bulletproof jackets, so that if an attack was launched, these men could protect themselves.

MR BOOYENS: Now, it would also possibly be said, and I want to place it on record, paragraph 23, there was also the alternative simply not to allow the minibus to travel that morning. Why did you not do that?

MR BELLINGAN: If we did not allow the minibus to travel at all, then the liberation fighters would simply find another target for another day and we still did not know what exactly was going to happen, we did not have full control.

MR BOOYENS: Mr Bellingan, very shortly, you were at the time a Sergeant. Is that correct?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: Your situation in the Cape was the following, you were actually in control of the askari group, if we can call them that, but you were under the command of the local security branch. Is that correct?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: And the operation which Mr Liebenberg finally launched, what was the objective of this operation as far as you were concerned, what were they trying to do?

MR BELLINGAN: Lieutenant Liebenberg was a very, he worked strictly according to the book, the Letter of the Law, and he decided to arrest these people that morning. So, they were in command of that planning of the operation, him and Dolf Odendal and they decided to arrest these people. Odendal was the Commanding Officer of the Riot Squad for the Peninsula area.

MR BOOYENS: Now, then on page 32 in paragraph 24, you describe the way they had thought about these or about this operation, that is now Liebenberg?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR BOOYENS: Mr Bellingan, you have, you had experience of this type of thing, what did you personally think was going to happen?

MR BELLINGAN: My personal feeling was almost that it was a situation similar to having to foil a bank robbery. If you know that the people are armed and the situation in the Black townships was ungovernable at the time, I was of the opinion that this was not going to be a Sunday School picnic and that we would be shot at and we would not allow a single policemen to be killed that morning. So, I might have said to my juniors, look, we are going to actually shoot them dead if they should raise their weapons and aim it at us, because I did not want to have a sort of a Trojan Horse situation to the detriment of innocent people. We would have shot them dead.

MR BOOYENS: Now, what did you think as far as the probabilities that this would degenerate into a shooting incident?

MR BELLINGAN: The information from the askaris was to the effect that there would actually be a fight, there would be shooting back and forth that morning and there would be loss of life and I was totally satisfied in my own mind that this would not just be a normal arrest procedure.

MR BOOYENS: So, as far as you were concerned, in any way, you thought that the theoretical attempt to perform these arrests would probably not work and you expected a shooting?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, I did and, perhaps, I should mention, I cannot remember so far back, it was 11 years, but maybe I said, as a Sergeant, look guys, we are not going to get hurt this day, today, we have lost enough innocent people and informers and policemen. If the situation calls for it, will then fight to the bitter end.

MR BOOYENS: Now, the group was put together in that, you mention that in paragraph 25, and this group consisted of about 20 policemen, people with counter-insurgence training?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct and I approached people who had fought in the Rhodesian Bush War and, perhaps, also in Namibia and who had been in the Task Force there. I did not go there with a group of administrative staff, I used people who had experience of thinking on their feet and people who would know how to deal with the situation on the ground.

MR BOOYENS: Briefly, as far as the planning of the operation is concerned, paragraph 26, here we talk about stoppers. That is actually a type of surrounding protection?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, some of these people were normally placed in the bushes as surrounding protection, because it was close to the N1 highway and it could have been dangerous if some of them actually ran in the direction of the highway. Jimmy originally told us that the people would all be in the bus, he would be the driver and he would control everything. So, we simply organised certain cutoff points to stop these people from running away.

MR BOOYENS: You had considerable firepower on that morning?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, the policemen were well armed. I was, personally, was very well armed and the people in the bush had also all been issued with R1's and enough ammunition for their guns.

MR BOOYENS: And you were armed with a R1 and a Baretta Pistol. Is that correct?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: And these armed policemen formed the majority, you had the upperhand also as far as firepower was concerned?

MR BELLINGAN: Correct.

MR BOOYENS: In paragraph 27 you refer to the fact that the, this operation, in any case, as far as the planning was concerned, was comparable to what the police would have done if they had gotten wind of a bank robbery?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR BOOYENS: On page or paragraph 28 you deal with the situation on the ground and, perhaps, just for sake of completeness, there is a little bit more detail here. That morning, very, very early, before it was light, this police task team moved in?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct. We met at a particular place where the planning was done as to who would go where. The members were then sent out to their various posts. I cannot recall whether they, at that stage, were already aware of what the panel van or combi would look like in which the liberation fighters were to travel. Each person was given a certain spot, a certain position to take up. Some went into the bush and the group who were opposite, who sat opposite the bridge and had to give us the message as soon as they saw the vehicle, everybody was in place and we also envisaged or thought that we would hire a big truck to just block the road, just in front of the van so that there would be a situation where the panel van would actually then collide with the truck, but we abandoned that, because the risks were too great. The driver of the truck would have been very exposed and he could possibly have been killed.

MR BOOYENS: Now, were the policemen or the police bus, the normal people who would have been in the bus, were they replaced by heavily armed policemen?

MR BELLINGAN: Correct and the bus drove the normal route as it was planned and it crossed the bridge. We waited for a couple of minutes, we thought nothing was going to happen.

MR BOOYENS: You were in radio contact and you received the information that the bus had crossed the actual intersection and nothing had happened?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, it went into the direction of Guguletu, a vehicle moved in behind it and nothing happened.

MR BOOYENS: Let us just stop there and look at the situation at the, on the ground before the bus comes through the intersection. If you look at the plan - Mr Chairman, I presume this will be EXHIBIT A, because I do not think it has been handed yet.

CHAIRPERSON: No.

MR BOOYENS: I understand that an inspection in-loco is being planned, but could you please just tell us your initial position? You say you were a passenger in a vehicle driven by Grobbelaar and where Charles Brazelle was also present. The initial position which you took up, Mr Bellingan, when you were still in the position where you were supposed to cut-off these people, would that have been further back on the right-hand side of this plan?

MR BELLINGAN: It would have been the eastern side, further back behind the letter "A".

MR BOOYENS: Round a curve in the road there was a little side road, that is where you were waiting in a car?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR BOOYENS: So, that was you, Grobbelaar and Brazelle?

MR BELLINGAN: Correct.

MR BOOYENS: And these other police vehicles were spread out and the policemen all spread out in this area marked "bushes", surrounding the crossing, the intersection there were people in camouflage uniform?

MR BELLINGAN: Correct.

MR BOOYENS: And there were also other vehicles stationed in other turnoffs or other roads?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR BOOYENS: You have already said that the bus crossed the intersection, nothing happened, you waited a bit longer and nothing happened. What then happened with the vehicle in which you were?

MR BELLINGAN: We also withdrew into one of the side streets and I think when we crossed NY1, went into the direction of Guguletu Police Station, we received a message on the radio, I do not know who it was, and they said they are here, come back, and later I heard that Constable Mbelo, applicant number two, had identified some of them there, had pointed them out to the people in the vehicle with him. We then turned round. In other words, Grobbelaar was the driver, Captain Brazelle was left, the left front passenger and I was sitting in the back of the car. We then moved back into a northern direction, NY1, and turned right into an easterly direction in NY111.

MR BOOYENS: Please go a little bit slower. Just to make it very clear, there are no, so it was not actually a northerly direction. So, let us just refer to the top side of the plan, towards the N2, that is towards the top end of this plan?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR BOOYENS: So, from the side street you drove around off the map, in fact, and moved up in NY1 and turned right in NY111?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR BOOYENS: In other words, you drove in the direction of where the vehicle marked "A" is standing?

MR BELLINGAN: Correct.

MR BOOYENS: Did you see any people who looked suspicious there in the crossing?

MR BELLINGAN: There were people in the crossing, they wore long coats and some instinct just warned me that this did not look good and we drove down NY111.

MR BOOYENS: When you were about 80 to 100 metres down NY111 you saw Mr Maluleka.

MR BELLINGAN: I saw Maluleka on the left-hand side, the one askari, and I asked Grobbelaar just to stop there. I asked him what was going on and he said in English, Sergeant, watch out, they are in the area and I tried to keep some of the weapons and they are lying behind a bush. We made a U-turn after I got back into the vehicle. I cannot recall whether Brazelle was inside or outside the vehicle, but I told him, Charles, get out.

MR BOOYENS: So, you made a U-turn and you returned in the direction of the crossing?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: When you approached the crossing what did you, Mr Bellingan, see? You saw somebody looked suspect and you stopped.

MR BELLINGAN: There were Black men in the road in front of us, they looked suspicious, we stopped on the left-hand side of the road.

MR BOOYENS: Now, tell us what you can recall from that point onwards, after you stopped on the left-hand side?

MR BELLINGAN: I was in the process of getting out when I heard an explosion and many, many shots. The next moment I realise that I had been hit and there were two bullet holes in the front window of the car. I fell down onto the back seat of the car. I felt that my face was bleeding. I got out, asked Captain Brazelle what was happening and he told me that my eye was bleeding, but that it did not look too bad.

MR BOOYENS: Mr Bellingan, you are just going a little bit too fast. As you have already said, you were sitting on the back seat?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR BOOYENS: While you were in the vehicle, somebody fired at that vehicle. Is that correct?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: Did you see the person who was firing at you?

MR BELLINGAN: I cannot say yes or no, there were too many people at that crossing.

MR BOOYENS: In any case, this vehicle in which you were travelling, was hit right from the front?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR BOOYENS: M'Lord, the problem is we had some colour, old colour photographs, but not negatives. So, if I may ask permission, I will hand in as we proceed. Unfortunately, making photocopies of these do not work too well either, but as we proceed I will hand in some photographs which become relevant, my attorney can just undo them, and if we can then just make use of the one photograph we have got. We have got one colour photocopy, but these are extremely expensive to make as your Lordship is no doubt aware.

Mr Bellingan, I am showing to you and we call this B1, I am showing photograph B1, it shows a yellow police with two holes in the windscreen. Was that the vehicle you were travelling in?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR BOOYENS: This will be B1, EXHIBIT B1. You also mentioned that you heard the two shots and something hit you. Did you have a weapon in your hands?

MR BELLINGAN: I was busy getting out of the vehicle and I held my weapon in front of me to get out. At that stage it hit the rifle, these two shots came through the front windscreen.

MR BOOYENS: You say on page 35 that it hit the butt of the weapon, but EXHIBIT B2, and I will mark it with various circles, the holes on the magazine and where the weapon was damaged on the butt.

Mr Bellingan, the magazine of the R1, did the bullet go directly through the magazine?

MR BELLINGAN: No, it got stuck in the magazine.

MR BOOYENS: And that one which hit the gas chamber in the front?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, it deflected to the roof of the vehicle.

MR BOOYENS: And some of the shrapnel hit me in my left eye and the eye was hurt and it was bleeding and it went through my nose and my cheek, the shrapnel from that, the shrapnel from this shot.

MR BOOYENS: You also lost part of your sight?

MR BELLINGAN: I went for medical examinations and I have left 5% to 7& of the sight of my left eye because of this.

MR BOOYENS: When these shots rang, after you have got out of the car, did you see, and I refer to page 35, that there were people? You knelt by the vehicle and tried to shoot, but only one shot rang, because the weapon had already been loaded, there was gas enough only to fire one shot and because of the damage to this weapon, you could not reload again?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR BOOYENS: Did you then, at that stage, saw a person shooting in your direction, I refer to page 30. Brazelle also shot in the direction of the person shooting at us? Is that correct?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct, Mr Chairman.

MR BOOYENS: You are saying that somebody shot at something about, about a hand grenade, on the right-hand side of the motor vehicle somebody shouted, be careful, hand grenade and somebody carrying a hand grenade was shot dead on the left-hand side?

MR BELLINGAN: I did not see that incident at that stage. I was suffering from shock and I was very worried what was going to happen on the ground and I tried to control the situation.

MR BOOYENS: Later on there was a person carrying a hand grenade found dead near this vehicle.

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct, Mr Chairman.

MR BOOYENS: Is that correct, you moved forward in the direction of the crossing with a pistol in my hand? Was there still a shooting going on?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, there was a shooting going on. I could not see.

MR HUGO: Mr Chairman, could I ask that my learned colleague would not lead the witness regarding this aspect. He must tell himself what was happening.

MR BOOYENS: I was not going to lead him in this case. Yes, you moved in a forward direction. Please tell us step by step, you moved forwards, what happened? You mentioned something about your eye before we were interrupted. What about your left eye?

MR BELLINGAN: The sight in my left eye was limited at that stage. I was suffering from shock and I was thinking at that stage, I was a Sergeant, this is, was, this is my operation, I summoned the people here to arrest these people and it was peak time on a Monday morning. I was thinking of hostages, I was still hearing shots ringing out and while I was running in the direction of the crossing I came near a Kombi and one of the so-called people identified by the askaris, these freedom fighters, it seemed as if he had a, he was throwing a hand grenade in my direction and then I shot him from a, from near and he fell down. What precisely happened there, I cannot remember in much more detail.

MR BOOYENS: Referring to the Kombi, first of all, why did you think or suspect that this Kombi was involved?

MR BELLINGAN: This Kombi, Jimmy Barney was driving this and somebody shouted shoot the long man and I said leave him, because he is the informer, he was running in the direction of the Guguletu Police Station. Mbane, he jumped from the Kombi, he was driving this Kombi. He purposefully drove into the pavement and we arranged that should something happen, just bring them up to this point where we could arrest them.

MR BOOYENS: You said that this person got out of the Kombi while you were approaching?

MR BELLINGAN: I think he got from the Kombi, but at, later on they found his weapon in the Kombi.

MR BOOYENS: You are referring to a stick grenade.

MR BELLINGAN: It is a grenade which has a long stick and then you can throw just a part of that. At that stage there were ammunition from Eastern and Western Bloc countries. They ... (end of tape 1A).

They, the liberation fighters, used all that.

MR BOOYENS: From a short distance somebody said shoot the man, how many shots?

MR BELLINGAN: I think two shots, Mr Chairman.

MR BOOYENS: And it seemed that at, it was not a stick grenade? Is that correct?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, that is correct.

MR BOOYENS: Why did you shoot this man?

MR BELLINGAN: At that stage I thought my life was in danger. I was already injured, there was fighting and shooting going on and I wanted to prevent any other incidents and I felt my life was in danger at that stage.

MR BOOYENS: Could you confirm, is that the Kombi and the person lying there?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR BOOYENS: And right in front of the door of the Kombi is a kind of, let us say, a big nail, it looks like a stick with a knob.

MR BELLINGAN: It is a big thing with a knob, Mr Chairman and that is what I am referring to.

MR BOOYENS: That will be EXHIBIT B3. Can you just indicate the stick to which you are referring. You have a ballpoint pen, just draw a circle.

Mr Bellingan, while the shooting was going on, while you fired the shot, was the shooting still going on?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, it was still going on, I heard shots from my left side.

MR BOOYENS: I am going to ask you, you have already given a description, but it is very important. It is a bit awkward, but just give us the details. When you shot this man, what did you see, where did you shoot him?

MR BELLINGAN: I shot him on the side of his head, that is what I gathered from the inquest. There was blood spouting out on the tar road and there was a lot of blood coming from his head.

MR BOOYENS: How quickly did this blood come from his head?

MR BELLINGAN: It could have been seconds after I had shot him. I cannot go into detail, it could have been a few seconds. Immediately I tried to obtain a radio to get control over the situation, because I was frightened that during this peak hour there could be hostages. There was a helicopter on standby, there were ambulances on standby, because I have a very good background regarding counter-terrorism and I was prepared for all this. There was no radio in the radio room?

MR BOOYENS: Wait a bit. This is now the radio room at the airforce?

MR BELLINGAN: No, this was, was the radio room at the radio station in Mannenberg. The Alohetta Helicopter was summoned from a neighbouring airforce basis. I requested Sergeant Mbelo and another member of the Riot Squad to get into that helicopter and at a stage they said certain people got away. Caspars were summoned and everything was brought there to assist us. There was total chaos there.

MR BOOYENS: Mention was made by your co-applicant that instructions were given that a person, there is a typing error in paragraph 31, person who put his hands up in the air, that he should be shot. Do you know anything of that nature?

MR BELLINGAN: No, I only saw that in the documentation.

MR BOOYENS: It is the, it is "lig", Mr Chairman, in paragraph 31, the third line, the last word, it is "lig" there, like in light, it should be "lug".

CHAIRPERSON: When you come to a convenient stage?

MR BOOYENS: Oh, certainly, Mr Chairman.

You do not have any knowledge of that?

MR BELLINGAN: No.

MR BOOYENS: And in paragraph 32 you refer to other allegations from the documents which you deny.

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR BOOYENS: May this then be a convenient stage, Mr Chairman?

CHAIRPERSON: Very well, we will take the short adjournment now.

MS PATEL: Would everyone please rise?

HEARING ADJOURNS

EXAMINATION BY MR BOOYENS (cont)

W RIAAN BELLINGAN: (Still under oath).

MR BOOYENS: Thank you Mr Chairman. In paragraph 33 you make a statement that the operation did not go as planned. Can you please elaborate on that?

MR BELLINGAN: Chairperson, whilst that bus came from the uniformed branch, we expected that bus to be attacked and the other bus was supposed to have crossed the bridge just a short while before and our idea was to block them off there and to arrest them and whatever else happened there. So, when the police bus had passed, we withdrew and we thought that, well, that was just a false alarm and nothing was going to happen. So, the operation actually came to a halt there.

MR BOOYENS: So, the shooting which took place later had, actually had, was not a planned operation?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR BOOYENS: Paragraph 34, could you please explain that?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes. I cannot recall whether it was a day or so after the shooting, I took the two askaris to the State Mortuary to identify the bodies independently, I did not want to send them in a group and they all identified the corpses as was later indicated also in the encoded messages from head office, the corpses were these people who were trained freedom fighters.

MR BOOYENS: Now, were they alleged to be members of the group?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, and also the person that I shot in the crossing, there was a proper identification done of him by the two askaris and, I think, Constable Mbelo, if he had met him.

MR BOOYENS: Paragraph 35 you simply mention that there was a point 45 revolver in the Kombi.

MR BELLINGAN: I later learnt that the investigating officer had found a point 45 revolver in the mini-bus and that related to the person that I had shot. I cannot say what investigation was done regarding the revolver and whether any fingerprints were found.

MR BOOYENS: Mr Bellingan, after the shooting was over did you have anything more to do with the investigation of the scene and so on?

MR BELLINGAN: No, what may have happened is that those weapons which Maluleka pointed out to me in the bushes and which had been wrapped in a blanket, well, I cannot say with certainty, but I think that I would have handed those weapons to the investigating officer or pointed it out to the Investigating Officer of Murder and Robbery as belonging to the freedom fighter and I think I would have pointed out the man that I had shot and told him what had happened on the scene, as put in my statement.

MR BOOYENS: Yes, but you did not deal with the actual investigation of the case?

MR BELLINGAN: No.

MR BOOYENS: You are aware of the fact that we are possession of a fax from the former Minister of Law and Order, at that stage the Deputy Minister of Law and Order and later he became the Minister of Law and Order, it is, in which he reacts to what you said?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR BOOYENS: Mr Chairman, I understand, in fact, that that has been sent to the Commission. I do not know whether, it is not strictly speaking an exhibit for our side.

You simply say that you are aware of the statements which he makes there, that he accepts personal responsibility and he makes a number of statements which you can comment on if asked, but as far as you are aware you simply take note of what the Minister says or said?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, Minister or Mr Jan Wagenaar contacted me and said that the Minister wanted to make a statement, because I implicated him. The Minister spoke to me personally and told me that he takes full political responsibility for what happened at Vlakplaas. Last night he spoke to me, half past eight, and wished me all the best for today and told me that I should just remember that he bears the full political responsibility for the fact that we, at Vlakplaas, tried to prop up the National Party Government and keep them in power.

MR BOOYENS: You then deal with your political objectives as far as this operation is concerned. That you deal with on page 38 and 39, 40 and 41, up to page 41, (viii). Do you confirm that is correct?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: Now, briefly, you were a police Sergeant at the time, I am referring to page 41, (viiii), and you here refer to an incident where you actually met Louis le Grange and Johan Coetzee on your way to Robben Island. Is that correct?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: Please just tell us in your own words what happened there and what the perceptions were?

MR BELLINGAN: I was a Sergeant at the time and we went to a function on Robben Island and General Johan Coetzee, who was the Commissioner of the Police at the time, was there and so was Minister le Grange and in the bus he said to Minister le Grange that these are Schoon's people who work in the Cape and he asked me what does the situation look like, what are you doing and I said that I am, I was hoping for a breakthrough and we had started infiltrating and le Grange wished me all the best and shook my hand.

After the shooting there was also a function held at Maitland to thank us for the good work we had done after the shooting of the Guguletu 7 and we were also wished everything of the best by Minister le Grange. So, my belief was that our actions carried the approval and the blessing of the Generals and the politicians, because the remark was also made that a silver cross should be, also, given to me for my bravery, but I said I was not interested in that. I would like to place it on record though.

MR BOOYENS: Now, did you, well, let me put it this way, it is mentioned that some of the askaris received payment after this incident. Are you aware of that?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, that is correct. It was a normal, standard practice in the security police from the times of Rhodesia, South West Africa, that there was a certain bounty money paid or head money paid, that if a certain killing was made then the askaris would receive money. In this case they receive R7 000,00 and that was done with the approval of the Commissioner of the Police and the Head of the Security Police.

MR BOOYENS: But that was policy, you had nothing to do with that?

MR BELLINGAN: No, but I would just have given the motivation on the ground and I then would have channelled it through all the normal channels to the top.

MR BOOYENS: Did you, as an ordinary member, did you receive any head money or any compensation?

MR BELLINGAN: No, I did not.

MR BOOYENS: You mention, as far as orders are concerned, the following. Colonel de Kock, your erstwhile Commanding Officer, had nothing to do with the situation on the ground as far as you were aware.

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR BOOYENS: Was Colonel de Kock in any way involved in the planning of this?

MR BELLINGAN: No, he was not involved in the planning and I can give you some background as to how the chain of command worked.

MR BOOYENS: Yes, I think you should do that.

MR BELLINGAN: I have known de Kock from the 1980's, I have a great deal of respect for him. He was a Commanding Officer and he kept very strictly to the rules and he would only have sent us down to Cape Town on the request of the Cape Town Security Police. I reported to him from time to time, but we actually fell under the command of the Cape Town Security Branch and he said to me that we were under the command of the Cape Town people, we should follow their orders. So, the allegation was made that we came especially from Pretoria to come and shoot dead the Guguletu 7, that is absolute rubbish. With all respect, I must say then, Colonel de Kock would have done that operation himself if that was the case. He would not have allowed a junior to do it. At that stage he was very, very strict in regard to this kind of operation. So, there was absolutely no question of not knowing what was happening on the ground.

MR BOOYENS: So, when you say that the orders that de Kock gave to you, those were orders that you should come down to Cape Town and infiltrate?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes. Our primary task in Vlakplaas was the identification of the then freedom fighters, whether they were ANC's or PAC's. We did not only come down to a specific area where there was trouble. The askaris were the eyes and ears, our eyes and ears and they were used to, perhaps, take up position in places where there was drug smuggling or taxi ranks to try and track down some of their former colleagues and sometimes these things led to a shooting. So, the primary line was I would never have done anything before clearing it with Colonel de Kock and we were very, very strict as to that chain of command.

MR BOOYENS: Directly in command on the ground was Major Odendal from the Riot Squad?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes. He was the senior rank on the ground at that stage.

MR BOOYENS: And in your planning was Lieutenant Liebenberg also your senior in rank although, as you said, you played a very large role in the planning of this operation?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR BOOYENS: In the press one has read certain reports, I do not know what it was based on, but that these people were actually ambushed by yourselves, they were lured into an ambush and that you used ajan provocateurs to actually lead them into this ambush and led them to their death, you wanted to eliminate them. Is that correct?

MR BELLINGAN: That is not correct. I believe that if we knew where they lived and we wanted to kill them or eliminate them, because the word "eliminate" means kill, we would have done so at their homes, at their addresses. I certainly would not have arranged it for a Monday morning peak hour when I could have been shot or some of my other colleagues could have lost their lives. If I wanted to eliminate them I would have done so at specific points and they would not have known about it to this day and if my askaris, during their infiltration, had done anything of which I was not aware, then I will assume the full responsibility for myself and my askaris and the members in Cape Town who were my seniors and who say that they were not aware of us, I will then take the responsibility that I mislead them, because I said I was from Vlakplaas, because now, unfortunately, nobody knows who Riaan Bellingan from Vlakplaas is.

MR BOOYENS: Mr Bellingan, if we can, perhaps, get clarity on some other point. In one of the witness statements reference was made to a man by the name of Benting and I am drawing the inference here that he is making an allegation that it was you, I am referring to the affidavit of page 389, that you were the man in the blue jacket and that you had shot somebody who was lying on his stomach, that you shot this person in the head. Did you do that?

MR BELLINGAN: No, I did not.

MR BOOYENS: You shot one person there?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR BOOYENS: In the circumstances which you already explained?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes.

MR BOOYENS: And as far as the other people are concerned, you can tell us that there was a shooting. Did you hear an explosion which could have been a hand grenade?

MR BELLINGAN: I heard the explosion and I know there was a shooting, but I cannot testify about the other people involved in the shooting.

MR BOOYENS: Just a moment please. Mr Chairman, if necessary, I will just, after the inspection, and I understand there is a video and maybe it may be relevant that we may just have to deal slightly with Mr Bellingan's evidence in chief as a result thereof, but for the time being I am finished with him.

NO FURTHER QUESTIONS BY MR BOOYENS

MR BOOYENS: It may, perhaps, even be, if I may suggest, I do not want to suggest to my learned friend how she should do it, I do not know whether the Commission has seen the video, but I think his evidence, with respect, would be, perhaps, more understandable. It is a video that was taken on the scene very shortly after the incident and I would suggest that it may, in fact, shorten proceedings if everybody had a look at it, but that is entirely up to the Commission and up to my learned friend, the evidence leader.

CHAIRPERSON: What are your views Ms Patel?

MS PATEL: Thank you Mr Chairperson, I have discussed this with the other legal representatives and it seems that this is an appropriate time at which to show the video.

CHAIRPERSON: It may be that having seen the video the need for an inspection falls away. So, perhaps, it would be.

MR BOOYENS: That is what I am angling for, Mr Chairman. CHAIRPERSON: I understood you were going to go and do it on your own. Very well, we will now, I take it this video was prepared by the police at the scene? We will now have this video. Can, now we have got two Mr Williams' have we not? MR WILLIAMS: Mr Chairperson, I have had sight of the video ... (intervention).

CHAIRPERSON: Oh.

MR WILLIAMS: ... on a few occasions. I can possibly see from the angle that I am at. I do not have a problem.

CHAIRPERSON: If any of the representatives have difficulty they can move around. Could we have the lamp immediately above the video turned off? Immediately above the screen turned off.

VIDEO SCREENING

"MR LABUSCHAGNE: 26 February 1986, die tyd is nou sewe minute voor twee in die middag en ons staan hierso by Mondingweg reg voor Monding Hoër Skool. Verskeie klippe kan nou gesien word op (...indistinct)weg ..."

... (intervention).

MR BOOYENS: Mr Chairperson, ... (intervention).

VIDEO SCREENING

"MR LABUSCHAGNE: ... (...indistinct) Monding Hoër Skool ..."

... (intervention).

MR BOOYENS: Mr Chairperson, it would appear as though we are on the totally wrong scene here. We are not at the scene of where this incident happened.

VIDEO SCREENING

"MR LABUSCHAGNE: ... verskeie voertuie ..."

... (intervention).

MR BOOYENS: We are not at the scene where the incident happened. This appears to be the wrong video.

VIDEO SCREENING

"MR LABUSCHAGNE: ... besonderhede was verkry van voertuie wat getref is. Daar was ook 'n optrede van (...indistinct) Barnard deur van die leerling wat (...indistinct) ..."

VIDEO SCREENING

"MR LABUSCHAGNE: Die persoon is saam met 'n ander opgemerk op die hoeke van NY111 en NY 1 in Guguletu. Drie van die Swart mans is na 'n polisie optrede hier geskiet. By hierdie Swart man kan ook 'n handgrenaad by sy linker arm gesien word. Een van die ander Swart mans kan gesien word by 'n wit Kombi voertuig. Die voertuig waarin Kaptein Brazelle en Sersant Andrich Grobbelaar gery het, daar was op hulle gevuur met 'n AK47 geweer. Die koelgate kan hier baie duidelik in die voorruit van die voertuig gesien word.

Die Swart man met die AK47 geweer, kon gesien hoe hy magasyne het wat aanmekaar vasgesit is sodat hy 'n redelike groot hoeveelheid rondtes by hom gereed kan hê. Die persoon lê ook op die oomblik met 'n handgrenaad onder hom. Daar is altesaam agt AK47's magasyne. Dit is ook die persoon wat, na beweering, op die polisie voertuig geskiet het. Daar kan gesien dat daar nog steeds in een van die magasyne AK47 rondtes is. Die person het vanuit die rigting van die brug afgehardloop en op een van die voertuie begin skiet. Hy het in die hardloop gevur en daar is vanuit die bosse deur die polisie op hom gevuur.

Sersant Andrich (...indistinct) wys nou hier van die AK47 se doppies waar dit hier in die pad lê. Die persoon het alskietende oor die pad gehardloop.

Nog een van die Swart mans by die voertuig waarmee hulle gery het. Hulle voertuig leier oop hierdie oomblik nog steeds.

Die voertuig waarmee hulle gery het, die registrasie nommer tans op hierdie voertuig, Charlie Alpha 439417. Die voertuig wat deur die lede van die Veiligheidspolisie bestuur was, jy kan duidelik gesien word hoe daar ook op hierdie voertuig gevuur is. Selfs die knip van die regter voordeur is afgeskiet in die proses. Die veiligheidsvoertuig uit 'n ander hoek afgeneem. Daar was ook 'n handgrenaad na hierdie voertuig geslinger. Die handgrenaad het ontplof.

'n Vierdie Swart man wat deur Adjudant-Offisier Moggee geskiet is nadat hy hierdie vuurwapen op hom getrek het. Die Swart man net uit 'n ander hoek geneem met die punt 38 revolver nog steeds op sy maag.

Nog een van die Swart mans, sowat 200 meter van die toneel van die handgrenaad gegooi is hier in die veld in die rigting van die spoorwegstasie.

Waar die twee lede nou aangestap kom is die plek waar die hangrenaad gegooi was. Alhowel hierdie voorval om omgeveer 07H20 na 07H25 gebeur het en die tyd nou 07:56 is, word daar nog steeds uit die bosse op die polisie gevuur.

Dit is nog een van die Swartes wat die bosse ingehardloop het en net deur die polisie aangekeer is. Op die oomblik is die optog nog aan die gang en lede van die SAP besig om die bos te veë.

Dit kan gesien word dat hierdie bosse reedelike ruig is. Nog een van die Swartes. Die Tokarev Pistool lê nog stees lanks hierdie Swarte. Swarte nou veereens duidelike deur die bosse se pad. Kan nog steeds baie duidelik gesien word, bloed aan die takkie voor die boom soos hy deurgeval het en die Russiese 7,62 Tokarev Pistool langs hom. Nog steeds hier met hierdie bosse reedelik ruig is. Hierdie bos is sowat drie na 400 meter vanaf die eintlike toneel waar die meeste skietery plaasgevind het. Op die oomblik is hier 'n totaal van sewe Swartes wat gedood is.

Kasper voertuig kan hier gesien word waar hy bykans versteek is in die bos. Die plek waar die handgrenaad ontplof het kan 'n baie duidelike wit kol op hierdie sementagtige oppervlak gesien word.

Die ondersoek beamptes het nou aan ons hierdie gat uitgewys en gesê dat dit nou die gat is waar die handgrenaad geval het. Die hefboom van die handgrenaad sowat twee en 'n half meter vanaf die gat waar die grenaad ontplof het. Van die AK doppies nou hier in die pad nou uitgemerk. Nog van die AK47 rondtes wat hier in die pad aflê. Die pad, in hierdie geval, NY1, Guguletu.

Die lede van die Veiligheidspolisie gaan nou probeer om die Swart man wat voor ons lê om te rol deur van 'n tou gebruk te maak aangesien daar vermoed word dat hy op 'n handgrenaad lê.

Ons staan hier by Sersant Bellingan wat ook by hierdie operasie betrooke was. Sersant, kan jy net vir ons vertel wat gebeur het asseblief?

MR BELLINGAN: Ek het agter in daardie Datsun Polisievoertuig gesit en ek was besig om net uit te klim toe 'n patroon van die vyandelike wapen my deur die voorruit tref en my wapen en toe in die gesig tref en daarna het ons maar oorgegaan tot (...indistinct).

MR LABUSCHAGNE: Was u deur die patroon van die wapen in u gesig getref of van die dele wat van die vuurwapen afgespring het?

MR BELLINGAN: Dit is maar van die skrapnel van die wapen, van die dele van die wapen.

MR LABUSCHAGNE: As u praat van die voertuig waaruit geklim het, is dit die geel Datsun voertuig?

MR BELLINGAN: Ja, dit is die geel Datsun. Ek het agter in die middel gesit.

MR LABUSCHAGNE: En ... (intervention).

MR BELLINGAN: (...Indistinct) om te bestuur.

MR LABUSCHAGNE: Is dit die magasyn van die voertuig, ... (intervention).

MR BELLINGAN: Ja.

MR LABUSCHAGNE: ... ag van u vuurwapen?

MR BELLINGAN: So daarmee is plus, minus twee skote deurgegaan het.

MR LABUSCHAGNE: Die skade kan nou baie duidelik op die magasyn sowel as op die vuurwapen selfs gesien word. Nog steeds hier NY1 by die toneel van optrede. Hier kan gesien word hoe een van die Swartes (...indistinct) se venster 'n koelgat (...indistinct) of 'n gat deur een of ander voorwerp veroorsaak. Dan is daar ook op die dak, van die dakteëls beskadig. Ook, meer na die linker kant toe, is van die dakteëls beskadig.

Waar hierdie lyk nou lê is dit in die middel van die kruising, NY1, voor ons an en na regs en links NY111. Die bos wat uit of van die regterkant, dan, van NY11 is. Ja, die AK47 wat hierdie Swart man gebruik word is van die opvou kolf tipe. (...Indistinct) my (...indistinct) van die beseerings ook aan sy hoof gesien word. Die Swart man het die selfde tipe sokkies aan as wat ook deur die polisie gebruik word.

Die polisievoertuig, is 'n deurknip wat hier op die grond lê.

Lugsteun in hierdie geval in die vorm van 'n lugman Alhoewet Helikopter. Hy het nou ook opgedaag om na die, vermoedelik, een persoon wat weggekom het in die bosse te soek. Die Swart man met die RDG pyp, Russiese handgrenaad, nog steeds by hom. Daar kan baie duidelike gesien het waar die haalgeweer korrels sy liggaam, in hierdie geval sy gesig en op sy, regtekant van sy bors, gepenetreer het."

(End of Tape 1B).

"Die binnekant van die voertuig wat deur die Swartes gebruik was. 'n Swart pet en 'n klein knippeltjie, hout knippeltjie wat naby die Swart persoon lê. Nog een van die doppies wat hier gesien kan word. Die (...indistinct) Komisaris Brigadier C R Swart en Brigadier van Staden besig om die toneel te besoek.

Die polisievoertuig van binne. Kan sien word dat van die rondtes ook selfs deur die bakwerk gedring het en hier deur die kussing is. Kan baie duidelik gesien word waar die patroon van die geweer deurgekom het, deur die deurhandvatsel, dwarsdeur die deur binne in die voertuig in. Nog een van die ruite wat hier ook deur 'n koel getref is. 14 Magasyne is afgetrek. Daar word vermoed dat hierdie Swart man op 'n handgrenaad lê en om veiligheids redes gaan hy sy stukkie vir stukkie die vuurwapens onder hom uit getrek word en dan hyself omgedop word. Die tou word nou weer aan die man gehak om die lyk omtetrek. Die lyk word nou deursoek. Die Swarte se gesig nou van naby.

Die AK47 geweer wat by die laaste lyk gekry is. Ek kan duidelik sien dat daar twee van die magasyne leeg is en een magasyn is vol.

Nog steeds op die derde Maart 1986. By nadered ondersoek is daar vasgestel dat hierdie lyk ook 'n RDG pyp handgrenaad tussen sy bene het. Die handgrenaad is eers gevind nadat die lyk gevisenteer was."

CHAIRPERSON: I do not know if any of you have been to the scene.

MR BOOYENS: I have M'Lord.

CHAIRPERSON: Was that the road we saw at the end, before it went off, is that the NY1?

MR BOOYENS: No, N2, that is the coast road.

MR BELLINGAN: The one passing the airport.

MR BOOYENS: The one passing the airport, M'Lord.

CHAIRPERSON: The road going up?

MR BOOYENS: The highway that one see ... (intervention).

CHAIRPERSON: No, not the highway, ... (intervention).

MR BOOYENS: Oh.

CHAIRPERSON: ... the road that goes over the highway and comes out.

MR BOOYENS: The bigger one is the NY1, the smaller one is the NY111. M'Lord, we have got some colour photographs, aerial photographs of the scene here also that was, that were taken at the time which, I do not know whether you had seen any of these.

M'Lord, perhaps, just one further bit of information I could give to the Commission. I visited the scene and the area looks completely different from what it was at the time. The whole, that whole crossing is now a crossroads, it is now surrounded by an informal settlement. So, there are none of the bushes or anything of that anymore. I, in fact, think we have got some more aerial photographs available and, subject to what my learned friends say, I think we will see more on this than we would see at an inspection in loco.

CHAIRPERSON: Perhaps you might like to discuss that during the long adjournment and see if you want to put any of the men out. I will hand this back to you at the moment and then we can give numbers to the ones we think would be useful.

MR BOOYENS: That concludes Mr Bellingan's evidence, Mr Chairman.

CROSS-EXAMINATION BY MR WILLIAMS

MR P WILLIAMS: Thank you Mr Chairman. Mr Bellingan, at the time of this incident you were a Sergeant and Mr Mbelo was a Constable. Is that correct?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct, Mr Chairman.

MR P WILLIAMS: And you were Mr Mbelo's Commander. Is that correct?

MR BELLINGAN: I was a group leader, Mr Chairman.

MR P WILLIAMS: Mr Bellingan, it is common knowledge that junior policemen must obey or follow orders from their superiors and is it correct that Mr Mbelo's superiors would, at that stage, be a Sergeant or a Warrant Officer or Lieutenant or a Captain?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct, Mr Chairman.

MR P WILLIAMS: Now, Mr Bellingan, I also note that in your application you state that the group consisted of, inter alia, Warrant Officer Moss. Would he not be your senior at that stage?

MR BELLINGAN: Mr Chairman, Warrant Officer Moss was promoted, he was a Captain later, he was also a previous member of the ANC. In the 1960's he infiltrated South Africa, he was also classified as an askari although he was a very reliable and educated person. Should he have lived today he would have had a senior position. It was a normal practice, as a senior, he was a senior among the Black members and controlled them, although our ranks differed, it was, the main purpose was liaison with the local branches. I was a permanent member of the police and Warrant Officer Moss was also regarded as a previous member of the ANC.

MR P WILLIAMS: But it is common that askaris do not have rank within the police force at that stage?

MR BELLINGAN: No, Mr Chairman, they had ranks. They were made Constables. Once they had defected from the ANC and joined us at Vlakplaas he became an informer, a headquarters informer and after the necessary documentation he was appointed as a Constable and was trained as a policeman.

MR P WILLIAMS: Now, was he under your command at that stage, because he was a Black person, former ANC member or is it because of experience or whatever?

MR BELLINGAN: Mr Chairman, it was not because he was Black and I can say, Colonel de Kock is also here, there was no racism. The main thing was leadership. Later de Kock promoted some of the Black members and they were in control of administration of Vlakplaas.

MR P WILLIAMS: So, at that stage even though he had a higher rank to yourself, you would consider yourself as having had more experience than him?

MR BELLINGAN: That is positive, Mr Chairman.

MR P WILLIAMS: Mr Bellingan, I will refer to your application as well as to your answers or statements that you made during the Section 29 inquiry. I want to start off on page 23 of your application. You make the following statement or statement to this effect. That is page 23 of the paginated bundle. At the bottom you say that

"The carte blanche which politicians and generals gave to de Kock made us juniors realise that we should obey all orders from de Kock."

Before I ask the question, I also want to refer you to a statement at, on page 19 where you say, also the last paragraph,

"Vlakplaas was regularly visited by politicans like Adriaan Vlok and other senior police officers where members were told about the total onslaught against the Republic and that units like Vlakplaas was very important and we should use all methods in this combatting terrorism."

Now, I want to refer to the words "that we should obey all orders" and I want to refer to the words "and we should use all possible methods". Does this include illegal methods or orders?

MR BELLINGAN: Mr Chairman, Colonel de Kock was taken into the confidence of the general staff and Minsters when they visited Vlakplaas and said that we should do something regarding Shell House. De Kock was called in and the necessary plans were drawn up and when we say legal instructions, that does not mean legal, it means that the general staff and the Ministers gave him instructions. On a regular basis they called him in, because they trusted him. If there was instructions for a cross-border operation or operations internally, that would be conveyed to de Kock and he would plan accordingly.

MR P WILLIAMS: If an order was manifestally unlawful or illegal would you have obeyed such an order from the commanders?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, I, in my amnesty application I say that when I receive a command from de Kock I regarded that as a legal instruction. We would do that for the flag and our anthem.

MR P WILLIAMS: And I want to refer again to the words, the Afrikaans words that I have referred to earlier and my question is do those words include murder, "all instructions or all possible methods"?

MR BELLINGAN: We also committed murder and people who have turned, we had to eliminate. We also did that. Whether you shot a man in Botswana, Johannesburg or Swaziland, murder remains murder and we saw that as a legal instruction.

MR P WILLIAMS: Mr Bellingan, in your, one of the answers that you gave at the Section 29 inquiry was on page 53. The second sentence or the first sentence,

"Headquarters felt that these askaris had to infiltrate these various groups further to eliminate some of them."

Now, today you have said that the word "eliminate" means to kill. Is that correct?

MR BELLINGAN: The word "eliminate" and I do not want to have, discuss this in detail, because it has various meanings. At that time it meant, eliminate was not a police term at that stage, it was a term used by other security forces. We said directly it is time for that person to be taken out or a plan had to be made with him. To eliminate a person was to kill him.

MR P WILLIAMS: Now, can you just shed more light, what was the meaning of the word at that stage?

MR BELLINGAN: We wanted to arrest those people, but as I said earlier in my evidence, I knew and my common sense told me that it would not be an easy task, so I planned to become involved in a shooting where people could be killed.

MR P WILLIAMS: Mr Bellingan, you are not answering my question. The question is, what did the word "eliminate" mean at that stage?

MR BELLINGAN: To arrest.

MR P WILLIAMS: And why is it that the word "eliminate" has a different meaning today?

MR BELLINGAN: I do not want to start quoting from dictionaries, because it can mean arrest, kill, it all depends on how you interpret it.

MR P WILLIAMS: Now, on the same page, 53, you also say,

"If I say 'eliminate' I mean thereby by means of arrest or actually in any possible way.",

and I think further onwards you concede that it might mean also to murder. Is that correct?

MR BELLINGAN: It can be correct.

MR P WILLIAMS: Now, if askaris had instructions at that stage to infiltrate groups and to eliminate them, if I understand you correctly, would that mean they would, that they can either arrest them or that they can kill them?

MR BELLINGAN: The askaris would not have received instructions from us to go and arrest somebody or kill somebody on his own or of his own accord. It would have come back to us and that is what I mean there.

MR P WILLIAMS: If an askari was given the instruction that he must go and eliminate a certain ANC member, is it correct that the askari would, according to your definition of the word "eliminate", either understand it to mean that, that he must arrest the person or that he must kill the person? Is that correct?

MR BELLINGAN: It depends on the particular case.

MR P WILLIAMS: But you do not discount the possibility or the strong possibility that it would not mean that he would have to kill the person?

MR BELLINGAN: I would never have given an askari such a task if I was not prepared to do it myself. If I was not prepared to kill somebody, I would not have given the task to an askari. So, I do not actually understand the question.

MR P WILLIAMS: Mr Bellingan, what were the requirements for a person to be drafted as an askari?

MR BELLINGAN: Usually the Research Desk and the local security police, they started, did the preparation and as soon as a freedom fighter was arrested, they would try and determine whether he had been involved in any act of terror in South Africa. If he had not been so involved then the people who had actually made the identification from photograph albums and so on would then have gone to the person, had an interview with him and from that interview it would have been determined whether that person was suitable for recruitment to Vlakplaas. So, it was mostly people who were involved in murders or motor car bombs did not become askaris. I think there were a couple of exceptions to that rule though and, of course, he had to renounce violence and he had to co-operate with the security police.

MR P WILLIAMS: I think you say something to that effect on page 74 as well. Now, assume that an askari successfully infiltrate a group consisting of ANC members and he arrest that person. What would he do to that person if that person failed to co-operate or if that person was involved in some car bomb or something to that effect? Would he still be arrested?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, he could still be arrested and he could then have been handed over to the local security police who would have opened a docket.

MR P WILLIAMS: But then the askaris had instructions, if I understand your statements correctly, to eliminate those people. Would it not also mean that they had carte blanche to kill those persons?

MR BELLINGAN: No, if you look at my Vlakplaas record I was involved in several shooting incidents and arrests and my members as well. So, it all depended on the circumstances on the ground and at that particular scene.

MR P WILLIAMS: Mr, you also say on page 24 you use the term "counter-terrorism, acts of counter-terrorism", page 24, that is the paginated page. In the second paragraph, excuse me, it is the first sentence, the last part of that sentence read,

"... because units such as us, such as ourselves had to commit counter-terrorism acts behind the scenes."

What do you mean by the term "counter-terrorism acts"?

MR BELLINGAN: I once again refer to Cosatu House and so on, before the, before an election the politicians would notify headquarters and headquarters would notify de Kock that we would have to make a plan with some of the trade unions and their offices and that is what I am referring to. That is the type of counter-terrorism acts. Then it would have been a specific reason, because the allegation would have been that these buildings would have been used by the terrorists groups to plan attacks in South Africa and then there would have been a proper analysis by the Trevats or Stratcom units and then the instruction would have been given further to task units such as ourselves.

MR P WILLIAMS: And also later on you say that,

"Legal action ...",

that is in the second paragraph,

"Legal action had no positive effect anymore.".

MR BELLINGAN: At that stage several States of Emergencies had been declared and there was also talk of marshall law, that that would have been brought in under Botha and in certain areas there was total lawlessness. Total lawlessness was the order of the day and normal policing methods simply had no effect any longer.

MR P WILLIAMS: Now, if the, if lawful operations on the side of the police have no effect, then what type of operations would have, would be effective in your view?

MR BELLINGAN: That would depend on the circumstances, what the nature of the problem was.

MR P WILLIAMS: But are you not saying, by implication, that the police or the force had to resort to unlawful means?

MR BELLINGAN: That is what I mean and I have referred to several instances. General Johan van der Merwe's amnesty application, for instance, where there was the zero hand grenade incident where the hand grenades were actually tampered with and then handed to activists. That is the kind of method I am referring to. The blowing up of Cosatu House, the cross-border operations, any conceivable method to simply stabilise matters and bring it to an end.

MR P WILLIAMS: Now, if I understand you correctly, the milieu that you were operating in at that stage lawful operations by the police was not effective and would you say that means that were less lawful or that were illegal was the order of the day on the side of the security forces?

MR BELLINGAN: No, it was not a, simply a matter of a free for all that we could whatever we wanted to. There was some measure of control and there was proper planning. I was involved in several instances where terrorist networks were exposed in the Cape and they were all arrested, the people involved. So, it was not a, simply a matter of doing what we wanted to and a free for all, it was a very closely controlled situation.

MR P WILLIAMS: Somewhere else, I think it is page 73, you also mention, if I understand you correctly, that some of the selection criteria for allowing people to work at Vlakplaas were White members who were involved in the bush war on the Namibian border. Is that correct?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR P WILLIAMS: Would that be members who were previously involved in Koevoet Operations?

MR BELLINGAN: No, there were members who had been in the Defence Force, there were members who had been with Koevoet or with the local security branches in South West Africa. It was only members who had already had experience of counter-terrorism methods, because there was no point in taking a totally inexperienced person and putting him in Vlakplaas. We need people who had already shown that they were excellent group leaders, disciplined people.

MR P WILLIAMS: So that would include members who were previously operative within Koevoet?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, there was nothing wrong with Koevoet and members were also recruited from there.

MR P WILLIAMS: If I turn to page 135 you concede that there were a pattern from Vlakplaas, which had its or which said that,

"... must trace down the terrorists and kill them."

Page to 135, do you have that?

MS KHAMPEPE: Can you give us the page again, Mr Williams?

CHAIRPERSON: One three five.

MR P WILLIAMS: The second paragraph, it is a question by Adv ... (intervention).

MR BOOYENS: Mike.

MR P WILLIAMS: ... Ntzebeza.

MR HUGO: Mike.

JUDGE MILLER: The mike Mr Williams.

MR P WILLIAMS: Yes, sorry Mr Chairman.

That somewhere Adv Ntzebeza says that that was intended to be followed was that which Vlakplaas use to follow, trace down the terrorists, kill them and he also says that the spirit in which things were done in Koevoet were being imported into the operations of Vlakplaas and lower down, the second sentence into your answer you say, you confirm there was, indeed, such a pattern at Vlakplaas. Would you confirm that now?

MR BELLINGAN: What I meant there was that Colonel de Kock had come from South West Africa as a Commanding Officer of Koevoet, he taught us how to go about counter-terrorism units and he taught us discipline and so he was not the only person to teach us those things. We had already learnt that before and we knew that a person in any encounter with a terrorist, it was the person who shot first who survived. So, it had already been established by de Kock's predecessors.

MR P WILLIAMS: The person who shoots first, he is the person who survives?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, if somebody aims a gun at you, you certainly would not try and show your certificate of appointment where we can see what is happening in our country today.

MR P WILLIAMS: Would you try other means to arrest the person, for example, shooting him in the legs or in the arm or whatever or ...

MR BELLINGAN: Of course you would try and apprehend a person alive.

MR P WILLIAMS: At some stage you also say that whilst you were in South West Africa you were visited on regular occasions by politicians. Can you remember what politicians visited you there?

MR BELLINGAN: Those were the Ministers of Defence, Ministers of Police, it could have been Minister le Grange and Vlok. Vlok, Mr Vlok also refers in the document he sent to me on Friday. He there says that he takes full responsibility for certain statements by him during his motivational visits. We were in a state of conflict at the time.

MR P WILLIAMS: And in your application you also, you say that,

"When suspects were interrogated we did not really whether they died or not."

I take it that also refers to the stage when you were based in South West Africa.

MR BELLINGAN: When we had information that that particular suspect possessed certain information that there would be a motor bomb explosion in a particular place, we would have used all methods at our disposal to extract that information from him. For instance, Tony Yengeni was arrested at eight o' clock at night and half past eight he pointed out to the security police where all his other cadres were. So, all conceivable methods were to be used.

MR P WILLIAMS: So, you did not care whether the suspect die or not?

MR BELLINGAN: No, I was responsible. I would not just walk into the office and beat him to death with a chair. It was a responsible decision when you were interrogating somebody.

MR P WILLIAMS: But it is your statement, you say that,

"We did not care whether they died."

MR BELLINGAN: In South West Africa it was a different situation.

MR P WILLIAMS: And somewhere you also confirm that that pattern was imported here into South Africa or into Vlakplaas. Is that not so?

MR BELLINGAN: It was not incorporated 100%. As I said, if we had information that somebody was, had planted a motor car bomb or there was a bomb that would explode at a particular time, we would have used all possible methods, yes.

MR P WILLIAMS: Mr Bellingan, if we come to this actual incident, let us go to the planning stage early in the morning at Wingfield. What was the instruction that were given to your members with regard to arrests or eliminate?

MR BELLINGAN: I was asked several times by the Truth Commission as well what happened and what was said. I cannot recall exact words, but if I walked out and told my junior members, look boys, if they shoot at us then we take them out, then that is possible, but it did not come from Liebenberg or Odendal that we had to shoot them dead that morning. That is as far as I can recall.

MR P WILLIAMS: But did you agree that most of the members who left that meeting were under the impression that their mission would have been to kill these people?

MR BELLINGAN: I do not agree completely. I think in that particular situation the Black townships in the Cape were so tense at the time and so ungovernable that, actually, everybody knew what was going on and we knew that there was daily shooting incidents and the Riot Squad and so on. I cannot actually speak on anybody elses behalf.

MR P WILLIAMS: But you have also not, my client says in his amnesty application that he left that meeting with the impression that the mission was to kill those people.

MR BELLINGAN: If that was his impression then I will assume the full responsibility for that, for the decisions taken there and I will assume the responsibility for decisions which were misunderstood. So, I have no problem with it if that is the way he interpreted it, because I was in command. I accept responsibility.

MR P WILLIAMS: The group that was eventually shot on, I will refer to them as guerrillas, I think you mentioned previously that that group consisted of a, between approximately ten to 17 members. Is that correct?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct. Afterwards we were told that some of them had actually run away and got away and earlier this year I asked the Truth Commission to find us that video and there was a programme by Max du Preez where it was, he was on one of Max du Preez's programmes and he sat with his back to the camera and he said how bad the askaris were and that he did not trust them and that they were the well trained terrorists. So, yes, some people got away. I cannot remember exact figures.

MR P WILLIAMS: Sir, what I find quite amazing is that, is the total absence of arrests whatsoever even though your group had the capacity to infiltrate that group on numerous occasions and in this respect I refer to the infiltration of Sergeant Mbelo, I refer to the infiltration of Eric Maluleka, Jimmy Mbane. Somewhere else we also hear that Mr Liebenberg had his own sources who were inside the group and I assume that these different people infiltrated that group at various stages, at the different stages. Do you want to comment on that?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, I, my, infiltrated or my colleague infiltrated at one point and he returned, because he said the, his legend was not in order and he told me how fearless those men were. So, it was not an easy task to arrest these people. They slept in a different place every night, they had different addresses and I cannot comment on what Lieutenant Liebenberg discussed with his source.

MR P WILLIAMS: But how were you able to infiltrate this group on a regular basis, who, on more than one occasion?

MR BELLINGAN: When I was sent down to Cape Town I was asked to come and take over where other members were, apparently, not able to obtain success. So, they had already prepared the ground for me and for me and the askaris to continue. So, I actually inherited somebody elses problems and I did some research at the Security Branch. I found out who are the suspects, who are the activists, let us send these people there. Mbelo, at some point, he was in the cells with one of the suspects and, perhaps, he can testify to that, I have not got more details. So, yes, we actually tried to find out where these activists were and we tried to information from all quarters just so that we could actually support our legend, but it was easier said than done.

MR P WILLIAMS: Will you agree with me that in order for Jimmy Mbane or Eric Maluleka to infiltrate this group someone who or their superiors or whoever sent them had to tell them, here is an address, you go to this place?

MR BELLINGAN: There was a man by the name of Oscar Mpeta or Mpetla, he was in a wheelchair here in Guguletu, and according to the security police information, many of the people went to him, so that was a good start, it was a good contact point.

MR P WILLIAMS: So, couldn't the police, through establishing contact with Mr Mpeta, then find out where the group was and proceed to that address and arrest them?

MR BELLINGAN: Mr Williams must ask Mr Liebenberg that, but according to their information the Cape Town Security Police had absolutely no information, not a scrap of information. Vlakplaas actually started gathering information.

MR P WILLIAMS: Sir, you see, this seems to confirm my client's view that the mission of the group was, of the police was to kill the group and not to arrest them?

MR BELLINGAN: As I have said earlier, if that is the way he interpreted it, I will assume full responsibility for that. I will not, do not want to dispute the matter with him now. At that stage we were in a, waging a war, we were actually fighting a battle and if that is the way he sees it, then I will take responsibility for that.

MR P WILLIAMS: Now, elsewhere in the Section 29 hearings you also say something to the effect,

"But you know what policemen are like together, they get excited and they might have said we will shoot them dead. I cannot deny that."

Those are your words.

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct. Policemen make statements like that. You also saw and heard it on the video how the one man sort of dramatised the events. I do not know who said it, but it does happen.

MR P WILLIAMS: Mr Chairman, I notice it is one o' clock by now. Maybe we should adjourn at this stage.

CHAIRPERSON: I think, you are not going to finish. We will take the long adjournment until two' clock.

MS PATEL: Would everyone please rise.

HEARING ADJOURNS

CROSS-EXAMINATION BY MR WILLIAMS (cont)

W RIAAN BELLINGAN: (Still under oath).

MR P WILLIAMS: Thank you Mr Chairman. Mr Bellingan, I want to refer you to part of your testimony where you refer to the fact that, what you call, head-money was paid to the askaris and to certain policeman for this incident. Can you confirm that Mr Mbelo was one of these people who received a portion or some amount?

MR BELLINGAN: Mr Chairman, I cannot say whether Mr Mbelo received any money, but the two askaris did.

MR P WILLIAMS: Now, in his application Mr Mbelo states that he received R1 000,00. Can you tell the Commission was the issue of head-money discussed at the planning meeting early in that morning?

MR BELLINGAN: Mr Chairman, no it was normal practice, as I have previously said, people came from, money, sorry, came from the secret fund to motivate the askaris. That was not discussed that morning.

MR P WILLIAMS: Now, Mr Mbelo also says that he at no stage, prior to the incident, knew that he was going to get an award of some kind for this incident. Do you have any knowledge of that?

MR BELLINGAN: No, I have no knowledge of that.

MR P WILLIAMS: Then, Mr Bellingan, I am not going to be very long with you. I just want to clear up a few other points. In your statement or previously you have mentioned the fact that the two askaris that infiltrated this group prior to Mr Mbelo and my instruction from Mr Mbelo is that he was sent to infiltrate this group, this specific group, before the two askaris. Do you want to comment on that?

MR BELLINGAN: Mr Chairman, this may be a technical point. It may be that he together with other members from Vlakplaas visited Cape Town. I cannot say with certainty yes or no, it is a possibility, but I did meet him once and then the askaris were already there. I infiltrated him once. I met him before the security branch's offices in Loop Street. He had a shirt, looked like, looking like a clown in a circus and this is just a technical point.

MR P WILLIAMS: So, you would concede that it is possible that Mr Mbelo could have infiltrated the group before the two askaris?

MR BELLINGAN: There is the possibility, yes, Mr Chairman.

MR P WILLIAMS: I want to focus your attention to particular choice of words that you use in your original application.

MR BELLINGAN: The page number, please?

MR P WILLIAMS: It is page two. In paragraph 9(a), furnish sufficient particulars of the act, etcetera, and then in your, in what appears to be your own handwriting appears the words, under number nine,

"... conspiracy to murder Guguletu 7.".

Did you write this in your own handwriting or did someone else write it?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, this is my handwriting. I and my legal representative discussed this, under that time it was brought under the impression that there was a conspiracy between me, the general staff and Colonel de Kock. I denied that and at that stage I just wrote "conspiracy to murder", because, although there is another version on my application. It is my own handwriting and, and that stage I thought I was applying for conspiracy for murder.

MR P WILLIAMS: And then subsequent to this incident, I believe yourself and Mr Mbelo were required to furnish the police with certain affidavits with regard to what happened at the scene. Now, Mr Mbelo tells me that he originally wrote some version as to what happened there and then he was told by yourself that, you used the words,

"This statement is not correct",

and Mr Mbelo says that you then drafted an affidavit on behalf of him and that affidavit was submitted to the inquest.

MR BELLINGAN: Mr Chairman, I think he is partly correct. That was because I was the group leader, I told him to write his statement and then I would control it to see whether the language was correct and certain parts of sentences or phrases had to be changed, but I cannot think that I have omitted, asked him to omit something, because he wrote something controversial. If I did that I accept responsibility.

MR P WILLIAMS: In Mr Mbelo's application he says that he shot at someone who had surrendered, someone whose arms were in the air and someone who indicated that he is prepared to show the police where the other guys are and then at the scene he was instructed by some policeman, not yourself, that he must shoot this person, which he did. Now, in other words, he shot a person under circumstances which did not necessitate him to shoot that person. What would have happened to Mr Mbelo if he disclosed that fact at that stage in 1986?

MR BELLINGAN: I cannot comment on that. If he did that and he said that before other members, he must say who they were. I do not know anything of that. If he wanted to mention anything at that stage, I have no knowledge thereof.

MR P WILLIAMS: But what he is trying to say is that his affidavit was drafted in such a manner as to cover up for him as to, because if he had confessed at that stage, that he could have arrested the person instead of shooting him, Mr Mbelo could have been charged at that stage. Would you agree with that?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct, but I think Constable Mbelo must not think that would, he would have been so stupid at that stage to believe in what he was saying, to write any such information in an affidavit. I cannot remember. If that is what he thinks, what he believes, it is correct.

MR P WILLIAMS: But did you agree with the fact that you drafted his second affidavit for him?

MR BELLINGAN: No, I did not draft it, but I could have changed various phrases. I am honest, it might have been, it might, could have happened.

MR P WILLIAMS: I have got no further questions to the, to Mr Bellingan. I have got no further questions. Thank you.

CHAIRPERSON: Well, I do.

NO FURTHER QUESTIONS BY MR P WILLIAMS

MR HUGO: Thank you Mr Chairman. Just a few aspects. Mr Bellingan, you refer, in the exposition of your background, you refer to the elimination aspect which we have addressed previously. Mr de Kock compiled a statement referring to your exposition and he refers specifically to the word "elimination" and he says that his perception is that the instruction was not that these people should be killed bona fide and he said that in every operation where Vlakplaas was involved it was considered thoroughly and it was done on behalf of instructions received from senior officers. Targets were evaluated, discussed and clearings for these targets were obtained from senior officers on a continuous basis. Is that correct?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, that is 100% correct.

MR HUGO: Then I want to refer to the weapons involved here. I am putting it to you that there was a large arsenal of weapons on Vlakplaas, but that these arsenal was only established in the late 1980's when the weapons were brought from the previous South West Africa. Is that correct?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes.

MR HUGO: And the weapons involved in the present operation was not obtained from this arsenal.

MR BELLINGAN: I want to inform Mr de Kock and his legal representative that those weapons were stored at headquarters. When weapons were confiscated it was sent from the various branches to headquarters and used as exhibits after the cases were finalised and I am referring to those weapons. His legal representative is, it correct in that respect.

MR HUGO: Once again, regarding the background you have given, you refer to the fact that you have acted under instruction of Mr de Kock in various acts of terror and for those you are also, you have also applied for amnesty?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR HUGO: Is it correct that all these deeds you have applied for amnesty, to the best of your knowledge, also occurred under the instruction of senior officers who gave these instructions via Mr de Kock?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct. Everything Colonel de Kock conveyed to us we believed came from politicians and senior Generals. We experienced it in that way at Vlakplaas.

MR HUGO: And then just for the sake of completeness, in your statement you say that this, there was a so-called carte blanche by, given by politicians and Generals to Mr de Kock and his reaction to that is that the instructions given to you and other of his men were given in reaction to specific instructions received by him from his, from senior people.

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR HUGO: I want to refer again to the way you obtained the weapons from headquarters, that is the two AK47 weapons, rifles and a Tokarev Pistol. What was the administrative procedure to obtain these weapons?

MR BELLINGAN: If Colonel de Kock would have informed, if he had informed me on Vlakplaas he would have given me a letter to give to Schoon, he would approve that. I would go to Captain Drury to, at the Logistics Department and I would draw those weapons and it will be entered in a register, I would sign for that and I would be responsible for those weapons. After a certain operation I would take those back and a letter would be given to me.

MR HUGO: At that stage, I want to ask, were those weapons returned after this operation?

MR BELLINGAN: Mr Chairman, I think that those weapons in the blanket, which was referred to at the Section 29, were the weapons which were confiscated by Brits. The Tokarev which I obtained, was that one evening it was lost, it got lost and a few months afterwards it was found in an armed robbery in the Peninsula and according to their procedure they handled that weapon. I cannot, I think it was sent to the Quartermaster where the other branches sent their weapons to.

MR HUGO: But from the side of Captain Drury, did he ask when those weapons would be returned?

MR BELLINGAN: If he had a request regarding these weapons, I would have written a letter to him and said there are, were outstanding weapons and it were, they were handed over to Murder and Robbery.

MR HUGO: Mr de Kock says in his statement that these weapons could not have been issued by the arsenal at headquarters without Willem Schoon giving approval for that.

MR BELLINGAN: In this case Schoon did give the approval for that. I spoke to him at his house and he agreed that that was the procedure. He could not remember the specific incident, but he did give instructions for that.

MR HUGO: Then, shortly, I want to refer to the Volkswagen Kombi. What happened to this Kombi after this operation?

MR BELLINGAN: Mr Chairman, that Kombi was white, was painted white and it had false panels. One evening it was involved in a shooting, shoot-out with the police. There were AK magazines in the Kombi and it was resprayed from funds from the secret fund. We put in some windows and it was used again in Guguletu. After this operation it was painted dark blue and it was taken back to Vlakplaas.

MR HUGO: Regarding the structures in place for calling Vlakplaas members to assist in operations countrywide, I want to put it to you that Mr de Kock said that it happened in a very structured way and that the commanding officer, for example in this specific incident, was the Commanding Officer of the Western Cape Branch, would contact Brigadier Schoon in Pretoria and ask for permission to use members from Vlakplaas in his specific region.

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR HUGO: And Brigadier Schoon from his side would contact Colonel de Kock, put his need and then Colonel de Kock would liaise with the Commanding Officer in the Western Cape and then it would happen that the Commanding Officer in the Western Cape would tell Mr, Colonel de Kock who was the officer who expressed the need and then Mr de Kock would contact that person?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR HUGO: And Mr de Kock, as soon as he had obtained this information, would contact you and would inform you with whom you had to liaise in the Western Cape?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR HUGO: Colonel de Kock would then continue, that the control and the authority over your group would fall under the officer to which you will be reporting when you arrive in Cape Town?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct. I would not do anything after I have cleared it out with the local security police and the person to whom I was responsible and in this case it was Liebenberg, on a daily or even hourly basis I would report back to him.

MR HUGO: One aspect which I have neglected to address, when a need is expressed from, for example, the Western Cape, Mr de Kock says that such a need would, had to be confirmed with Brigadier Schoon via a telex.

MR BELLINGAN: That administrative arrangement was established when Colonel de Kock took over at Vlakplaas. We said that everything should be written on paper and there should be clear guidelines. That is correct then.

MR HUGO: While you were in the Western Cape and involved in this operation and in this infiltration process, did you contact Mr de Kock from time to time?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct. I did contact him regularly to tell him that everything was going well. That was just good manners and once or twice he visited us. He visited various members countrywide to see whether everything was still in order.

MR HUGO: In his statement he says that that information given to him and the discussions he had with you were of a general nature and he never received detailed information from you or anybody in the Western Cape?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR HUGO: Mr de Kock says, Mr Bellingan, that about three or four days before this incident, this is the incident which happened on the third of March, you, and he cannot remember very well, or somebody else from the Western Cape contacted him and told him that a certain attack on a police station was being planned. Can you remember something like that?

MR BELLINGAN: It is difficult to say, but under normal circumstances I would have contacted him to tell him that things are going well and we hope that our mission will be successful.

MR HUGO: And then after this incident various telexes and encoded messages were sent to headquarters and some of them were addressed to Mr de Kock. Is it so that you wrote those telexes?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct. Either I or Liebenberg or both of us wrote those telexes.

MR HUGO: Why did you address them to Mr de Kock?

MR BELLINGAN: Because at the Terrorist Desk everything resorted under Colonel de Kock, everything had to go there, he was my Commanding Officer. There were questions in Parliament, there were various reasons why we had to do that.

MR HUGO: While we are busy with questions in Parliament, are you aware that Tiaan van der Merwe, a previous member of Parliament, for the previous Progressive Party, asked questions regarding this incident?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR HUGO: And Mr de Kock says that the nature and the detail of those questions were never brought under his attention or nobody ever asked him for any input?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct. From the Western Cape we would send these telexes at the Research Desk with Colonel Boegner, I think, would go to him. He would compile all the questions and documents, asked for the signature and take it back to the Commissioner and would be given to the Minister's office and the answer returned to Cape Town. It could have been that these telexes did not pass him.

MR HUGO: You also, regarding the aspect of the so-called head-money, which has been referred to here, you have also said that the askaris received an amount of R7 000,00 and that was a normal procedure. Could you tell us how this process worked from the administrative point of view?

MR BELLINGAN: If I can remember correctly, he would come back after a successful mission and a claim was instituted for these askaris either under their names or fictitious names and it was processed to Schoon and then to the administrative section who paid out the money.

MR HUGO: The report compiled afterwards, was that presented to de Kock and he had to approve that?

MR BELLINGAN: I think if he was there I would have given it to him or second in charge. It was normal practice, it had to go to de Kock.

MR HUGO: Is it correct to say that there was nothing sinister about the payment of these amounts? There were formalities which had to be followed and certain procedures were established for that purpose?

MR BELLINGAN: That is 100% correct. We went so far as after payment, we took these members to the bank to avoid mishandling of the money. We opened bank accounts for them, we were busy with the rehabilitation process. It was not just to capture people and to shoot people, we were there for rehabilitation.

MR HUGO: I have no further questions.

NO FURTHER QUESTIONS BY MR HUGO

MR B WILLIAMS: Thank you Mr Chairperson, members of the Committee. Mr Bellingan, if you could just start with a few sections, few questions regarding Vlakplaas itself. Some of these have already been covered by my colleague, but if you will be patient with me.

If we could just deal with the reason for the existence of Vlakplaas as a covert operational centre. Would you just deal with that briefly again?

MR BELLINGAN: Methods were taken over from the Rhodesian Bush War and the South West African Bush War and was decided that the combatting of terrorism in South Africa would be centralised in one place and that was Operation Vlakplaas, which was a covert operation and it was established by General Johan Coetzee and General Fikter, they were all involved, and the idea was to adopt those methods used in Rhodesia. For instance, that you turn the terrorists and that the terrorists would then give then co-operation and work with the system and against their former colleagues and all information would be centralised there in the, at the Information Desk, the database would be there. So, the idea was to co-ordinate the action against terrorism, that it would be one central point from where it would be launched.

I also believe that when we started there we were given forms and on this form, I think it was a S8, 68 form, whatever, which said that you were now a member of a unit combatting terrorism and that wherever you go throughout the country at a police station that you should be given assistance. In other words, being a member of Vlakplaas opened doors for you. In other words, the idea was to establish an elite unit to combat terrorism and with that also went covert actions against the liberation movements.

MR B WILLIAMS: Thank you. Now, you have already mentioned in reply to questions from my colleague, Mr Williams, that the intention was that Vlakplaas would act outside the normal police investigative procedures to combat, as you say, resistance to the Government of the day?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct, yes. It was one of the units which had been established to, for instance, if there had been cross-border operation, in those days, Vlakplaas would be used. Any country in the world had that type of unit.

MR B WILLIAMS: Yes, but to get to the short point of this all, death by assassination, cross-border raids, anti-insurgency operations, torture of popular leaders, this was all part of Vlakplaas' modus operandi, not so?

MR BELLINGAN: I do not know if it was part of the modus operandi, I think it was part of the task and purpose and function of Vlakplaas. These things were selected. It was not a matter of just doing all these things at random, these were controlled operations and the orders came from above and it would have been controlled and done in a very professional way and it would not just have been a free for all.

MR B WILLIAMS: Yes, but free for all, then, Captain Bellingan, it is those aspects which actually distinguished Vlakplaas from the other normal police operations. That is the point.

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR B WILLIAMS: If I understand you correctly, you were one of the first intakes of Vlakplaas. In fact, you were there from its inception?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct. I arrived there on the third of August 1981 and I finished there on the sixth of March 1983.

MR B WILLIAMS: If I also understand you correctly, you will agree that the operatives who were selected to be part of Vlakplaas were essentially combat trained or had combat experience?

MR BELLINGAN: Most of these members, I suppose there were a couple of exceptions, but most of these people had a counter-insurgency unit and had training in that regard and were selected for the security branch.

MR B WILLIAMS: You were not employing your ordinary uniformed staff at Vlakplaas?

MR BELLINGAN: People were recruited from the uniformed branch if they had the necessary discipline and if they were required with certain requisites. So, it was possible that people from uniformed branch came there.

MR B WILLIAMS: But you will accept that the predominating requirements was anti-insurgency experience and, as my colleague has questioned you, possibly even experience in Koevoet and you have mentioned yourself, experience in Rhodesia, as you call it?

MR BELLINGAN: It was not a tradition, it was simply that it had happened in South West Africa and it was not, actually, a laid down guideline of things which people had to comply with, but there was a very definite selection procedure.

MR B WILLIAMS: And the reason for that is that Vlakplaas was going to be engaged predominantly as a, at a military level, if we want, then call it that. Do you agree?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, I would rather say as a para-military unit. I think we were better than other military units as well.

MR B WILLIAMS: Now, you were aware of the fact that murder, I say again, deception, fraud, housebreaking, robbery, we all know that today these were some of the things that Vlakplaas got involved in, not so?

MR BELLINGAN: No, Chairperson, we were never involved in armed robbery or rapes. Well, it is murder when you kill somebody else, but we did not get involved in murders and rapes and robberies for our own benefit. The murders committed there, if you want to interpret it like that, was simply from one project to another project.

MR B WILLIAMS: But you will agree that these were illegal activities, not so?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, they were illegal.

MR B WILLIAMS: You were not bound to stay at Vlakplaas were you?

MR BELLINGAN: Please repeat that question?

MR B WILLIAMS: You were not bound to stay at Vlakplaas, you could have been transferred out of Vlakplaas if you wanted to be?

MR BELLINGAN: At one point I did ask for a transfer after I did an Officers Course and the feeling was that I should not leave, that we were going through a very, very difficult time and I think it was said that the old operators should not run away and Colonel de Kock was satisfied with my services, he saw me as a good group leader and he regularly commended me and also wrote complimentary notes on my file and I enjoyed my work. Today we are actually sorry that we were so exploited and abused by the generals and the politicians.

MR B WILLIAMS: Yes, quite obviously you enjoyed your work, Mr Bellingan, you stayed there for about 11 years?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR B WILLIAMS: Now, this is not withstanding the fact that you were aware of the fact that Vlakplaas operated by, essentially, unlawful means.

MR BELLINGAN: At that stage I had no moral scruples in serving in a unit such as Vlakplaas. I was proud of that fact and I was often praised and we were given medals and honourary awards. Today I am sorry that I did not remain a uniformed policeman, but at that stage I believed in what I was doing. We were not only committing illegal actions left and right, it was a controlled setup and operation.

MR B WILLIAMS: Is it not correct that you were aware of the fact that, if it is not you yourself, but your colleagues at Vlakplaas, were involved in the murder of people and the disappearance of people, you were aware of that?

MR BELLINGAN: We heard that people were, from time to time, involved.

MR B WILLIAMS: You were aware of people being tortured on a regular basis at Vlakplaas?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, we knew about that.

MR B WILLIAMS: And that was the predominating nature of its work?

MR BELLINGAN: It was not the normal procedure. I think we can mention many, many instances today where I was involved in counter-insurgency or counter-terrorism actions where we did not assault these people. Some of them just immediately surrendered and hand over their weapons, so it was not normal procedure.

MR B WILLIAMS: Yes, what one is coming to is that arresting people for the purposes of processing them through the criminal justice system was not part of your operation, not so?

MR BELLINGAN: It was, yes, and the instruction was clearly from Colonel de Kock when we arrested somebody we had to hand him over to the local security branch as soon as possible, who would then cause the normal process of justice to take its course.

MR B WILLIAMS: Do you recall, sorry, go ahead Mr Bellingan.

MR BELLINGAN: We did not just catch people, pick them up from the street, detain them and then just do what we wanted to, there were certain laid down procedures.

MR B WILLIAMS: Was it not the policy of Vlakplaas that askaris, for example, were not to be, not to given evidence in court ever?

MR BELLINGAN: No, they did testify in terrorism trials as Mr X and Mr Y, but as far as possible we tried to keep them away from trials, because they were being exposed and their lives were at risk. Their colleagues sent out documentation and they were wanted people, they were hunted by their former and they would have been hunted down and eliminated. So, we wanted to actually keep them away from the limelight so that their identities remained a secret.

MR B WILLIAMS: You see, Mr Bellingan, the point here is that your operatives at Vlakplaas worked, you can tell me if I am correct or incorrect, they worked on the basis that if they captured people, I am not going to grace you with the term arrest, if you captured people, there was one of three options available to them. Either they became an askari, is that correct?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct, except if the local security police had quite a sizeable docket on that person, that he was involved in active terror and then they would have taken it through the legal channels.

MR B WILLIAMS: Right, or that person became an informer. Am I correct?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, we turned many of them and sent them back into their organisations.

MR B WILLIAMS: Or, thirdly, that person died?

MR BELLINGAN: No, I was not involved in those kinds of cases where we captured a person and just shot him or caused him to be killed.

MR B WILLIAMS: Are you saying today with, in all honesty, Mr Bellingan, that you are not aware of a situation where people were arrested, who refused to comply with your requirements and were, therefore, eliminated, as you put it?

MR BELLINGAN: I do not want to talk for other people and on their behalfs, so I cannot comment on those cases.

MR B WILLIAMS: The question is asked whether you were personally involved, the question is asked are you aware of it?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, I have heard about it.

MR B WILLIAMS: So, it was the other option?

MR BELLINGAN: I cannot say that today.

MR B WILLIAMS: Perhaps you can assist the Committee in understanding how it was, as a human being, that you could reconcile yourself with this kind of activity for 11, 12 years. Perhaps you can explain to us?

MR BELLINGAN: I grew up in a very strong Afrikaans, Christian, Nationalist home. I believed in what the Government and the National Party and the police were doing and we only woke up when we realised that the senior people had actually stabbed us in the back, but we came from a culture in where we believed in what we were doing.

MR B WILLIAMS: I have never understood the Christian belief to justify unlawful killing. Is that how you understand the Christian belief?

MR BELLINGAN: I am not going to speculate on that, but if the Israeli Defence Force commits cross-border raids it is the same thing. We believed in the same way as they believed in what they are doing. Today I can say it was wrong and I do not want to become involved in it and I want to live a clean life and become involved in reconciliation, but at that time I believed in it. Many other countries have Christian defence forces and politicians, they also become involved in cross-border raids, etcetera. We believed in what we were doing as Christians?

MR B WILLIAMS: You see, what concerns one, Mr Bellingan, is the fact that you are saying, to use your words, I enjoyed my work, it is not what you believed in, it is what you actually, you enjoyed it. Now, can you explain to the Committee what was enjoyable or delightful about being party to Vlakplaas and the kind of operations that they got involved in?

MR BELLINGAN: Perhaps he is interpreting my words incorrectly. I did not actually mean to say that I enjoyed my work in the way you enjoy an ice-cream, but I liked the work that I did. I believed in it and I thought I was making a contribution in keeping my country safe. So, in the same way as any other policeman in Murder or Robbery or Narcotics Bureau or whatever enjoyed their jobs. In the same way I enjoyed my job.

MR B WILLIAMS: How did you measure, Captain Bellingan, the success of the various operations that you were involved in? What was your measure of success? Was it the amount of people who were killed?

MR BELLINGAN: No, I can count on the fingers of one hand the type, number of shooting incidents which I was involved in, but I never kept track of the number of people arrested and so on. So, you did not make like little notches on the barrel of your gun or whatever, you simply did your work, you did not keep tally.

MR B WILLIAMS: In this particular operation, the Guguletu 7, I will come back to it in more detail, but if I can just ask you at this stage, would you agree that had you arrested those individuals you would have been able to achieve the objectives that you wanted to achieve, namely infiltration, for example?

MR BELLINGAN: It is difficult to say. I think if we could have arrested them by, then by means of the askaris we could have proved a prima facia case against them, but we knew it would not be easy. Jimmy and Eric told us they were very dangerous people. It was not a matter of just taking out your appointment certificate and arrest them. I expected it to be quite a difficult matter.

MR B WILLIAMS: Perhaps I stated the question incorrectly. Did you not believe that you, had you arrested these people, you would have been able to obtain information from them?

MR BELLINGAN: That would have been the task of the local security branch to do that interrogation and to actually gather together the exhibits and witnesses and evidence.

MR B WILLIAMS: So, are you saying to the Committee today that the possibility of arresting these individuals was not part of your plan at all?

MR BELLINGAN: It was part of the planning, but in my heart of hearts I knew that it would not be easy. I did not actually lay much store by the fact that there would be an arrest, but it might have been the view of some of the seniors.

MR B WILLIAMS: Would you say that you would have, it would have been more profitable to arrest these people? I ask you that question again.

MR BELLINGAN: It is always, in a way, better to arrest these people or profitable to arrest the people, but if they train their guns on you, then you have to shoot back, but if you can arrest them, then it is actually more beneficial in the, at the end of the day, because then you can extract more information.

MR B WILLIAMS: This is precisely my point. These are some of the things that you raise in your application, that there is a lot of benefit to be derived from arresting people, not so?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, there are many benefits.

MR B WILLIAMS: Now, can you tell the Committee why you considered, in your own words, this operation to be 100% successful?

MR BELLINGAN: I would not say that the operation was 100% successful. There was, however, no loss of life, but at the end of the day you had seven corpses and you had funerals and every weekend there were riots. So, that also did not solve the problem.

MR B WILLIAMS: No, no, Sergeant Bellingan, you mentioned specifically that the operation was 100% successful when you dealt with this in your Section 29 evidence which you gave. Now, if I can just, if ...

MR BOOYENS: Which page there, please.

MR B WILLIAMS: If the Chairperson of the Committee will just give me a second, I need to find the page. It is page 82, I believe. If I can approach you Mr Bellingan, you say, and I quote from line 23 on page 37,

"As far as I am concerned I feel that it was an operation which was 100% successful. I would not have organised an operation in which I got myself shot."

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR B WILLIAMS: Is it not correct, Captain Bellingan, that the operation was considered by yourself to be so successful that you presented the video, the gruesome video which we have seen, to Cabinet Ministers as an indication of your success?

MR BELLINGAN: That was not my idea. We have to be very clear about that. After the Guguletu 7 incident I reacted, I and some of my people reacted to some information which we got from Guguletu Detective Branch and there was an ANC freedom Fighter, Lizobright, which we arrested in Crossroads and from that ten or 14 more arrests followed and we were also involved in the Tony Yengeni case. We arrested him with the help of the local security police and we then decided to compile a video for State President P W Botha, a video of 18 minutes to be able to justify our police budget. I think the Deputy Commissioner was General Hennie de Wit at the time and General Liebenberg flew up and then made a video of all the successes and other arrests which we had achieved. So, our successes were used to actually push through our budget.

MR B WILLIAMS: No, this is precisely my point, Mr Bellingan, you held out this operation as a trophy.

MR BELLINGAN: At that stage it was a major success.

MR B WILLIAMS: Now, what was the reason for that success?

MR BELLINGAN: Good policing on the ground, good networks, good intelligence gathering, good command.

MR B WILLIAMS: No, the reason for the success, I would like to put it to you, is the fact that you killed seven people.

MR BELLINGAN: That was only part of the video.

MR B WILLIAMS: Is there anything else significant on that video, Mr Bellingan, with the greatest of respect?

MR BELLINGAN: That video was made for the benefit of the members of the Cabinet, whether people were killed or arrested or whatever.

MR B WILLIAMS: I want to put it to you, Mr Bellingan, that you should like the Committee to believe that you acted out of political conviction, not so?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR B WILLIAMS: But I want to put it to you that your being chosen as a member of the Vlakplaas and your measure of success as a Vlakplaas operative was by virtue of your ability to eliminate people, to use your words. What do you say about that?

MR BELLINGAN: I would not agree with that.

MR B WILLIAMS: Is that not why you stayed on until the dying throes of Vlakplaas? You have no answer to that, Mr Bellingan?

MR BELLINGAN: No, I do not agree with what he is saying. I stayed there, because I believed in what I was doing, I was part of the dispensation of the time, I was part of the security police and today it can be interpreted in a sinister way, but at the time I believed in what I was doing.

MR B WILLIAMS: You see, Mr Bellingan, it is all too easy to say at the end of the day that I relied on superior orders, I relied on my political convictions, but it was your hand that had to pull the trigger.

MR BELLINGAN: But I do make it clear in my amnesty application, if, I say I am sorry that I took a life and I am asking for amnesty for it, where I did take a life. It has happened and it is past and I think one should just try and prevent this kind of thing happening again.

MR B WILLIAMS: No, Mr Bellingan, we will be coming to the details of your amnesty application in respect of the Guguletu 7 matter in a moment. What puzzles one in your application and, perhaps you can explain this, is that your original application you apply for amnesty in respect of this matter being conspiracy to murder. Am I that correct?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, I explained it just now why I did that.

MR B WILLIAMS: Correct. Your most recent and more complete application, however, seems to indicate that if you are found to have committed a delit or an offence, if I understand your documents correctly, then you are applying for amnesty. Am I correct? That is what you say.

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR B WILLIAMS: Well then, Mr Bellingan, why are we sitting here today?

MR BELLINGAN: I was notified by the Truth Commission that some of my former colleagues had implicated me, wrongly implicated me in the Guguletu 7 matter and they were saying things about me and that is why I thought it fit to do this, because was no shooting incident ever happens exactly as planned. There was a lot of sensation around this incident and I thought it a good idea to apply for amnesty for whatever went wrong there. I shot that person in the intersection, he was not, he did not have a weapon and if that is the case then I ask for amnesty for that and also for the planning that went wrong beforehand.

MR B WILLIAMS: Captain Bellingan, I do not want to burden you with a legal issue which I am sure your council is going to be dealing with, but you will agree that in your second application you are actually not conceding or admitting that you have done anything wrong. Am I correct?

MR BELLINGAN: I just want to try and find the relevant paragraph. (end of tape 2B).

Page 37, paragraph 36 I said it was pointed out to me that it could be argued that in the circumstances I had acted overhastily to shoot this particular person. It, I must, however, point out that this happened during the course of a shooting incident and then, and the rest of the paragraph I deal with that issue. So, if I was involved in an offence I apply for amnesty and for all delicts flowing from that offence or offenses and I want to assume the responsibility for the juniors who were with me that day, if they give a different version of what happened there that day. The responsibility is mine and I stand up today and I say that I take responsibility for Constable Mbelo and the askaris who were with me on that day.

MR B WILLIAMS: Ja, Captain Bellingan, it is, I am concerned about why you are applying for amnesty here, because you use the words "indien". In other words, there does not appear to be a concession by yourself that you have done anything wrong. Perhaps, I speak under correction.

MR BELLINGAN: Something wrong was done. To come down here and infiltrate people with AK47's and so on is normal practice, but later I was questioned by the Truth Commission and I was told about these allegations against myself and Colonel de Kock and some of the other members. So, I did not know where exactly I stood and that was the reason why I applied for amnesty and if the members actually overplayed their hands with this ajan provocateur situation then I assume the full responsibility for that.

MR B WILLIAMS: Yes, but now can you explain to the Committee if you are saying that perhaps there was unlawfulness in sending in askaris and that is, perhaps, the unlawfulness for which you are maybe making application for amnesty for. What I would like to know is why did you then in your first application indicate that you apply for amnesty for conspiracy to murder?

MR BELLINGAN: As I explained just now, I was of the impression that there were witnesses saying that I had conspired to murder these people and this is actually just a mistake on a piece of paper. I did this on the spur of the moment, that I just wrote "conspiracy to murder". I was advised to do that by my former legal representative after we had traversed the whole issue and afterwards we realised that it was not actually conspiracy to murder. So, it was a technical, legal point where I made a little mistake.

MR B WILLIAMS: I will not burden you with that issue any longer, Captain. Now, the planning of this particular operation itself, am I correct that you say that you came down to Cape Town upon the instruction of then Colonel de Kock, if I am I correct, in February of 1986.

MR BELLINGAN: Mr Chairman, I think it was late January, the beginning of February 1986.

MR B WILLIAMS: In other words, you were in Cape Town for four weeks before this incident happened?

MR BELLINGAN: It could have been the first week or the second week in February or the last week in January. I cannot specifically remember. It was normal practice that we would be at headquarters or at Vlakplaas for the last month in January. It could have been ten days or 14 days before the time.

MR B WILLIAMS: All right, I am not going to try and hold you to a day. Captain, do I understand you correctly, also, to be saying that prior to February you had not been involved in the infiltration of cells, MK cells in the Western Cape?

MR BELLINGAN: No, Mr Chairman, not before I came here, except late in 1991 I was here when we were busy with the sabotage investigation at Koeberg. This is not related to this incident.

MR B WILLIAMS: And you are saying that you were also not involved in the handling of Jimmy Mbane and Eric Maluleka prior to you coming to Cape Town?

MR BELLINGAN: The immediate period before that I was not involved. In January 1986 I was doing a course for three weeks. There were other people, I think Beeselaar and Roelf Venter were involved in that matter.

MR B WILLIAMS: All right. So, you say that you have come to Cape Town in February and that is when you get involved in the infiltration or the ordering of the infiltration that was, at that stage, quite unsuccessful by Jimmy Mbane and Eric Maluleka.

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct Mr Chairman.

MR B WILLIAMS: I want to quote to you a document and, perhaps, we can just hear your comment on this. Sorry, if I can just ask one further question. You say that you have never received a commodation for this particular incident itself, no medals, no money, no trophies?

MR BELLINGAN: Not as far as I know. I was praised in my files, but nothing more, no medals.

MR B WILLIAMS: All right. If I can just refer you to a document, unfortunately it is a bundle that has been handed to us by your legal representatives. Mr Chairperson, I am sorry, I do not have a copy of this. It has been handed to me by Mr Bellingan's council and, unfortunately, it also does not have page numbers. If I can just try and get a heading on this. The document ... (intervention).

JUDGE MILLER: I think we have a bundle of documents here, Mr Williams. I do not know if it is the same.

CHAIRPERSON: What is the front of the ... (intervention). JUDGE MILLER: Is it dated the tenth of ...

MR B WILLIAMS: Sorry, the front of this document is called "Top Secret - How many Askaris were there?" and it is quite a substantial bundle of documents.

All right, if I can just quote from one ... (intervention).

CHAIRPERSON: Is that from the second page?

MR B WILLIAMS: I do not have ... (intervention).

CHAIRPERSON: The bundle we have (...indistinct) from the first page (...indistinct) has attention (...indistinct).

INTERPRETER: The speaker's mike is not on.

CHAIRPERSON: We have been given a bundle, the first page of which is dated the tenth of November 1997, it is a letter from van der Merwe and Bester. On page two is the document, "Top Secret - How many Askaris were there?".

MR B WILLIAMS: Thank you Mr Chairperson, that seems to be the bundle which I have and I am referring to a section of the document. It, unfortunately, the photocopying is very bad. Let me just ... (intervention).

CHAIRPERSON: Well, before you go any further, we have a large bundle which we should, perhaps, call Bundle A, we have a second bundle which is a follow-on to that which should be, sorry, the large bundle is Volume one, the second one is Volume two. We have now got the new bundle, should that be called Volume three?

MR B WILLIAMS: Thank you Mr Chairperson, may I proceed?

CHAIRPERSON: Yes.

MR B WILLIAMS: Thank you. I am on the, what would be my 16th page and, probably, your 17th page of that bundle. It says "uiters geheim" and it has a number five at the top, it looks like page five of that particular document. If I could just quote to Captain Bellingan from the second paragraph of that document. It reads as follows,

"The member in this period, he did many brave things in the combatting terrorism. In one case he did the total planning regarding the activities during a period of months. The members associated with other branch received the Cross for Bravery for this actions. This member was responsible for the planning, he was shot and he got no remuneration."

I do not want to go any further at this stage, but it would seem to be that, and it seems to be signed by a Lieutenant-Colonel Baker. You know that individual?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, I can comment on this document. It is the fifth of August, 15th of August, Colonel Bakerveld and we knew or we felt that the generals were leaving us in the lurch and when we see, we foresaw Nurenberg Trials and he said he was going to apply for the members. He took this document to the Commissioner of Police, but nothing realised afterwards and we received no medals afterwards. Nothing was, were issued to us.

MR B WILLIAMS: Yes, the question is not that, the question is not that, you have missed the point, the question is not the medals. Lieutenant-Colonel Baker would have extracted this information from your official records, not so?

MR BELLINGAN: I assume so, yes.

MR B WILLIAMS: Right, now the point that he makes here is that you were involved in the planning of this operation for months and that is the question that I asked you. According to you, you were involved in the planning of this operation for four weeks prior to it happening.

MR BELLINGAN: No, there is a problem with this document. I was only involved for a few weeks, not for months. I think the idea was from Baker to obtain recognition for the members. I think at that stage our personal documents had very little in them at headquarters.

MR B WILLIAMS: Yes, but you do not know that?

MR BELLINGAN: No, I do not know.

MR B WILLIAMS: All right. So, according to Lieutenant-Colonel Baker you say that he is incorrect. He says that you were involved in the planning of this operation for months, you say, no, you were involved in the planning of this operation for four weeks only. Correct?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR B WILLIAMS: In that four weeks that you were in Cape Town you were having regular contact meetings with Jimmy Mbane and Eric Maluleka, the two askaris whom you were handling at the time, not so?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR B WILLIAMS: And those meetings took place twice weekly, thrice weekly?

MR BELLINGAN: I cannot say whether it happened every week, it depended whether we could find Jimmy on the radio tracer and then we would meet at a safe premises.

MR B WILLIAMS: But you were down here specifically for this operation, not so?

MR BELLINGAN: We did not come down for the Guguletu 7, we had to infiltrate to find freedom fighters.

MR B WILLIAMS: Yes, but you were down here specifically for the purposes of infiltration?

MR BELLINGAN: I was the group leader of that group.

MR B WILLIAMS: And you certainly were not going to tolerate people doing, being on their own jaunt, as it were?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR B WILLIAMS: So, you had contact with them regularly?

MR BELLINGAN: They would contact me, I could not contact them. If we had a meeting this, one afternoon I would say we would meet again on Friday or Monday if we did not reach agreement, there was a way of reaching or contacting them.

MR B WILLIAMS: All right, I understand that. Now, in addition to that and I am afraid some of this has already been covered by my colleague, in addition to that you also had Captain Liebenberg and his sources who were infiltrating the same group, not so?

MR BELLINGAN: Captain Liebenberg should comment on that. He also had informers, I do not know who they were, but later on I heard that they were also involved in infiltrating.

MR B WILLIAMS: Yes, but you were aware of that at the time?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, Mr Chairman.

MR B WILLIAMS: And you say today to this Commission that it was absolutely impossible to effect any pre-emptive arrests?

MR BELLINGAN: These people did not have specific addresses. We could not look for them at those addresses. The askaris could not pinpoint those addresses and that is why I stand with my point.

MR B WILLIAMS: You see, this is what I am having difficulty in having understanding. You must help me here, Captain Bellingan. Your askaris maintained contact with this group for a period of months. Am I correct?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, even before that they were also here.

MR B WILLIAMS: Right. They have regular contact with these people, and you are saying and you are wanting the Commission, the Committee to accept that there was no way that you could arrest a single individual?

MR BELLINGAN: Mr Chairman, if I had arrested one of them I had to use the askaris or the security branch members to give evidence in camera in the court and then we would not have found out who were the freedom fighters trained overseas.

MR B WILLIAMS: Yes, that is somewhat of a different answer, Captain Bellingan. So, now you are saying that it was possible to arrest some people, but that would have defeated the purpose of the operation?

MR BOOYENS OBJECTS

MR BOOYENS: That was not what he said. He said should you arrest one of them it, he did not say it was impossible.

MR B WILLIAMS: I will accept my learned colleague's criticism, your Worship. So, are you saying then that it was possible to arrest one or two people, at least?

MR BELLINGAN: Mr Chairman, if we could have done it we would have, but this had happened 11 years ago when Liebenberg was there, we conveyed the information to them and he has to explain. I cannot say now whether we could arrest one or two of them or not.

MR B WILLIAMS: You will agree that as Vlakplaas operatives and in terms of the, some of the methods which you used, you were extremely effective in getting information, not so?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, we were successful in many cases, Mr Chairman.

MR B WILLIAMS: Indeed, you were the experts.

MR BELLINGAN: You can say we were experts or we were the best, but there was also place for failures and not successes. We were not the very best in the country, we did make mistakes, we were not untouchable.

MR B WILLIAMS: Yes, well, that is a matter of opinion. Captain Bellingan, why, if you were the experts, are you maintaining to this day that it was not possible to arrest anybody?

MR BELLINGAN: Mr Chairman, I cannot comment on that. If we could, we would have arrested them. We tried that morning and the operation was unsuccessful and they attacked us first.

MR B WILLIAMS: All right. We will come to that in a moment. What do you say about your erstwhile colleague, Mr Mbelo's comment, that when he infiltrated this group it was quite clear to him that they operated from a house? What do you have to say about that?

MR BELLINGAN: As I have said earlier, they have changed houses from time to time and the time when Mbelo or the other askaris came here and they went in, we went into the squatter camps often, you kicked out the doors and found nothing. We tried to arrest them.

MR B WILLIAMS: But, Captain, this is what I do not understand. Your junior colleague, Mr Mbelo, is able to go to their house and you cannot arrest anybody.

MR BELLINGAN: If we understand Mbelo correctly, in certain cases we did not find weapons with them and if we could then make a prima facie case from that it was another question.

MR B WILLIAMS: Yes, once again you are raising another question, Mr Bellingan, now you are saying, you are raising issues about what the worth would have been of arresting them, not so? That is not what we are talking about at this point in time. I am talking about whether you could arrest them or not.

MR BELLINGAN: Often we went to Guguletu with the Murder and Robbery Branch, I do not have the reports today, I have kept records of everything I did, every minute and then even when the farm was disbanded I destroyed everything and now I cannot say we did this or that. We did try to arrest people. There is an example when we obtained information from Guguletu Branch, we called Bright in, because he was implicated as an informer.

MR B WILLIAMS: You see, I find it difficult to believe that you would, it would appear, without more, decide on the option of trying to apprehend what, according to you, were heavily armed insurgents in a residential neighbourhood. You are saying that that was the only option available to you? You want the Committee to believe that?

MR BELLINGAN: That was not a normal residential area. Crossroads, there were no roads there, it was a total uncontrollable area, there were no numbers on the houses, the streets were not named, it was not a normal residential area like in Goodwood, for example.

MR B WILLIAMS: Mr Bellingan, with the greatest of respect, there were people living there.

CHAIRPERSON: I think what council was asking you about was not where they lived, but where you planned this operation on that morning, which was, as I understand it, just outside a hospital, there are buildings there and that is the area he is referring to.

MR BELLINGAN: Mr Chairman, when Mbane brought the information that they want to attack the bus at that crossing we put our vehicles at various places to arrest them at that section, although I realised it would be very difficult.

MR B WILLIAMS: I am indebted to you, Mr Chairperson.

Mr Bellingan, you are saying that you considered an armed attack and a response, a reaction, an armed reaction by yourself, in a residential area, where there are two hostels, to be preferable to every conceivable effort that you could make to arrest these people beforehand?

MR BELLINGAN: Mr Chairman, during the planning session we decided whether we should rent a lorry, if the bus would come that way and said, please try to keep the weapons under control so that we, with all the police vehicles, so that we can trap them there. There was the idea there first to arrest them.

MR B WILLIAMS: Yes, but the question is that you had already decided that you were going to go ahead with an operation in terms of which you anticipated an armed response, not so?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR B WILLIAMS: And your, in your judgement at the time that was better than trying to effect any other efforts to possibly arrest people?

MR BELLINGAN: Mr Chairman, Mr, Jimmy could not contact us, it was difficult to contact him and to tell him to put them on a wrong track or do something else. Jimmy took, Jimmy said he, they took the leading position. This group had respect for them.

MR B WILLIAMS: I think, Captain Bellingan, you realise the import of the question that I am asking you and you touch upon it in your own evidence earlier today, when you said that when the shooting started you realised that it is peak hour, there are people in the area and you now want to bring the situation under control, not so?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct, Mr Chairman.

MR B WILLIAMS: Now, as a seasoned policeman, as a seasoned Vlakplaas operative, aware of the fact or, at least, in terms of your evidence, that these people were heavily armed insurgents, notwithstanding that you did not anticipate that this would be a problem?

MR BELLINGAN: Mr Chairman, if Jimmy had told them that they should look for another place or another target, if I remember correctly, Jimmy told me that it was not easy to tell them let us do this or that. If I tried to put them on a decoy it would be much more difficult and we continued as if this operation would be completed.

MR B WILLIAMS: Captain Bellingan, that makes things worse and worse, you see, because now you are saying that your information was so uncertain that you were not sure. What if it had happened further up in NY1, closer towards the police station and you would have gone ahead, is that what you are saying?

MR BELLINGAN: Mr Chairman, a week before this incident I saw them, I do not know what happened in those four, five or six days. We acted according, based on the last information conveyed to us.

MR B WILLIAMS: All Right. If I can then step off that point. You had planned to go ahead with this operation. According to you the only information that you had available was that an attack would take place. Am I correct?

MR BELLINGAN: The information we had, according to Jimmy and Eric, was that there will be an attack on a police van.

MR B WILLIAMS: All right and the information ... (intervention).

CHAIRPERSON: Did he tell you what vehicle they would be using?

MR BELLINGAN: Mr Chairman, they said they were going to steal a little van and Liebenberg later found out that it would be a little panel van. A little panel van was stolen in Guguletu.

MR B WILLIAMS: And you were aware of the fact that it was going to take place approximately in the region of the bridge to the intersection?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct. I cannot remember who enquired how the, late the little bus would leave and what route it would follow. One of the people during the planning session had to do this.

MR B WILLIAMS: What was your communication to Jimmy when he conveyed this, if it was Eric or if it was Jimmy, you are not quite sure? No? That you spoke with, that made this information available to you?

MR BELLINGAN: I think it was Jimmy.

MR B WILLIAMS: All right and Captain Liebenberg was present at the time that this was said to you?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, Captain Liebenberg was there.

MR B WILLIAMS: And what was your response, would you tell the Committee?

MR BELLINGAN: We decided to tell the various branches, if we did not do that and something happened the onus was on us, that we did not convey the necessary information.

MR B WILLIAMS: Yes, but the question is, what was your response to Jimmy?

MR BELLINGAN: I told Jimmy that he should try to obtain more information, he must contact us. We still worked by ways of radio contact and if something should happen, he should control the vehicle, if they should steal that, he had to control the weapons so that no shooting should occur. It was, he, it was a difficult lot of people, it was not easy to control them. They were well versed in what they wanted to do.

MR B WILLIAMS: Right and that was the sum total of what you could convey to Jimmy at that time?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR B WILLIAMS: And between that time and the time that the incident occurred you had not spoken to Jimmy again?

MR BELLINGAN: As far as I know he did not contact me again.

MR B WILLIAMS: I think you must think very carefully now, Mr Bellingan, because you have said that you did not have a chance to speak to him again.

MR BELLINGAN: He should, he had to make contact with me from his side. From his side he had to go to a, make contact via telephone.

MR B WILLIAMS: And your evidence is today that that never happened?

MR BELLINGAN: As far as I can remember, it did not happen.

MR B WILLIAMS: Now, can you and you also had no contact with Eric Maluleka?

MR BELLINGAN: He was part of Jimmy's group and they were still inside. I had no contact with him.

MR B WILLIAMS: And the only further word that you had was a comment from Liebenberg's source on the Sunday, if I remember your evidence correctly?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR B WILLIAMS: And that information was that the plan was going to proceed?

MR BELLINGAN: According to Liebenberg, yes.

MR B WILLIAMS: Right. Now, will you explain to this Committee when you told Jimmy that he must drive the vehicle up the pavement?

MR BELLINGAN: That happened when we saw him the first time before, the week before the incident. I would have told him try anything possible. He was not a stupid askari, he was a very intelligent person and I would have told him do anything to try to get him to stop so that we can ...

MR B WILLIAMS: No, no, no, you see, Captain Bellingan, you said earlier that it was a specific instruction that Jimmy Mbane must drive the vehicle up the kerb on that corner, that was your evidence earlier today.

MR BELLINGAN: I stand by that, Mr Chairman.

MR B WILLIAMS: Yes, I know you stand by that. Now, I am asking when did you convey that to him?

MR BELLINGAN: That must have been at the last meeting that I had with Jimmy, Mr Chairman.

MR B WILLIAMS: But that cannot have been, Captain Bellingan, with the greatest of respect. I asked you a few moments ago what was the extent of your information or your instruction to Jimmy and all you said was, if I remember your evidence correctly, was that he should take control of the vehicle and he should try and get, and he should try and keep the weapons out of the way. Am I correct?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct, Mr Chairman.

MR B WILLIAMS: There was nothing as specific as an instruction to drive a vehicle up a specific kerb in a specific intersection.

MR BELLINGAN: Mr Chairman, I could have told him just do something to bring the vehicle to a standstill, ride up the kerb, just do something, drive into a pole, that is debatable, I cannot remember all my words specifically. It might have been that time, Mr Chairman.

MR B WILLIAMS: You see, Captain Bellingan, one gets the impression here, you can tell me if I am right or wrong, that this operation was planned with a lot more precision than you are prepared to recall today.

MR BELLINGAN: Mr Chairman, as I said to you, if I had all the documents today of all the reports I wrote, I would have had a better idea. I am only trying to remember things, I am not hiding anything. Why? If I had to plan it with more military precision I accept it, I cannot remember every word, every instruction I told Jimmy and Eric.

MR B WILLIAMS: If we look at your involvement in this operation itself, if I understand your evidence correctly, you were driving in a vehicle with Sergeant Grobbelaar, not so?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR B WILLIAMS: Mr Chairperson, I hope the Commission can follow me, plan, and you at some stage had been travelling in a northerly direction down NY1 and then turned right into NY3. Am I correct?

MR BELLINGAN: It was after our first planning decision, yes.

MR B WILLIAMS: Right and you say that you passed a group of men on that corner who looked suspicious to you?

MR BELLINGAN: There were people there who looked suspicious.

MR B WILLIAMS: You did not, at that stage, see any of your askaris?

MR BELLINGAN: We are looking down in one, NY11, the motor has been turned round. I saw Eric standing there, I do not know how far from the corner. No, I did not.

MR B WILLIAMS: But they looked suspicious to you.

MR BELLINGAN: No, things did not seem normal.

MR B WILLIAMS: And you had also just been told on the radio, and you cannot recall by whom, that the people were in the area?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR B WILLIAMS: And you were in the area on that corner, not so?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct. We returned to this environment and we were busy withdrawing before that.

MR B WILLIAMS: And you had Captain Brazelle in your car?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR B WILLIAMS: He was armed with a shotgun?

MR BELLINGAN: I think he had a shotgun, yes.

MR B WILLIAMS: All right and then it was yourself armed with a R1 Rifle?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR B WILLIAMS: And your sidearm?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR B WILLIAMS: And then there was your driver, Mr Grobbelaar?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR B WILLIAMS: Whom it would appear also had a shotgun?

MR BELLINGAN: I think he had a shotgun, yes.

MR B WILLIAMS: When you were on that corner, Captain Bellingan, was that not the opportune time to get out of your car and arrest those people?

MR BELLINGAN: At that moment we could not think of that, we did not stop in the middle of an ambush when you think there is an ambush, rather try to get away, to get coverage. We did not think of that. Everything went so quickly, we never thought of that at that stage.

MR B WILLIAMS: So, if I understand you correctly, there seems to be so much resistance to arresting these people, if I understand you correctly, at that stage you were preparing to engage them, not so?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, I would say that is correct.

MR B WILLIAMS: So, you go further down NY3 and you turn around and make ready. Am I correct?

MR BELLINGAN: No, I went down NY11 and then I saw Eric standing on the left-hand side of the road. I got out, I spoke to him and he said be careful, they are everywhere.

MR B WILLIAMS: All right, Captain, I know that these events took place a long time ago. I am going to try not to belabour you with the specifics of the shootout, but if we could just capture some of the main elements. You say that you then moved further up the road with Captain Brazelle in the car, slightly further up, once again back towards the intersection.

MR BELLINGAN: No, after we have talken to Eric Maluleka, he referred me to the crossing and I and Sergeant Grobbelaar made a U-turn and we were looking in the direction of the crossing again.

MR B WILLIAMS: All right and then at some point you stopped the car?

MR BELLINGAN: He stopped at the side of the road, there was an explosion, we heard shots ringing out and I got out of the car.

MR B WILLIAMS: Right and then you took up a position behind that vehicle?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR B WILLIAMS: And from there you tried to fire your R1 Rifle?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR B WILLIAMS: And you fired one shot?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR B WILLIAMS: And you could not use it again?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR B WILLIAMS: Now, immediately after that, sorry. When you were firing you were firing at a person who at that stage was running through the intersection?

MR BELLINGAN: It looked, at that stage, as he had something in his hand. It happened very quickly.

MR B WILLIAMS: All right, but this is not the person that you ultimately shot, not so?

MR BELLINGAN: No.

MR B WILLIAMS: Right and then you threw away your rifle after you could not shoot any longer and you then proceeded to the intersection with your firearm, your 9mm firearm?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR B WILLIAMS: And as you approached that vehicle which stands at point H?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR B WILLIAMS: You noticed a person getting out of the vehicle?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR B WILLIAMS: And you say that as he got out of the vehicle you thought that he was throwing something at you?

MR BELLINGAN: Mr Chairman, it all happened so quickly. It looked as if he threw a hand grenade at me and I shot at him very quickly. I was relatively near to him.

MR B WILLIAMS: All right. Can, if you can just remember that scene, that, I am going to ask you just to try and recall that particular scene. You say this person is facing you and he is throwing a, what you thought at that stage, was a hand grenade?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR B WILLIAMS: And that is the point at which you fire at him?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR B WILLIAMS: And at that stage you are approximately, if I remember your evidence correctly, so many years ago, you said that you were approximately two, three, maybe four metres away from him?

MR BELLINGAN: Mr Chairman, it could have been nearer.

MR B WILLIAMS: All right. I will not press the point. The point is that this person was facing you, he was about to throw this hand grenade at you and you fired, not so?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR B WILLIAMS: In other words, this person was standing, as he was getting out of that vehicle, he was standing with his back to that particular, I think it is E20, if I am not mistaken?

MR BELLINGAN: I think it was a panel van, E20 Kombi, Mr Chairman, a Nissan.

MR B WILLIAMS: And you are, at that stage, entering the intersection from NY3?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR B WILLIAMS: I would imagine that you are running with your, pointing your firearm at him?

MR BELLINGAN: I think was the direction I ran.

MR B WILLIAMS: Yes, now, will you explain to the Committee how it was possible that that person was shot on the right-hand side of his head at the back?

MR BELLINGAN: Mr Chairman, during the inquest they confronted me with that aspect. Up till today I cannot explain that. Whether he looked to the left or to the right, I cannot remember. I was shocked, my eye was bleeding and I shot him. I cannot remember the finer detail.

MR B WILLIAMS: So, do I understand you correctly that you concede today, as you have conceded in other hearings, that you cannot explain how the man is shot on the right-hand side of his head, at the back of his head, above his ear?

MR BELLINGAN: No, Mr Chairman, I cannot say how that did happen.

MR B WILLIAMS: Will you also concede that from the position at which you were firing at that person, and bearing in mind that he is facing you and attempting to throw something at you, as you say, it is simply impossible that that person could sustain a shot to the back of his head on the right-hand side, you will agree?

MR BELLINGAN: I do not want to comment on technical points. I cannot explain it and I am not going to say this or that. I cannot say with 100% certainty how that person was shot.

MR B WILLIAMS: Yes, Captain Bellingan, that is rather unhappy, because, you see, there is another witness and you are aware of him, at the time, who had indicated that you had fired at that particular person, and his name is Mr Konile, you had fired at that particular person while he was lying on the ground. You are aware that there was such evidence, not so?

MR BELLINGAN: I can remember that allegation, yes.

MR B WILLIAMS: And you are also aware that the evidence of the pathologist who had been called to testify in one of the trials had been to the effect that your evidence was simply inconsistent with Mr Konile's injuries. You remember that?

MR BELLINGAN: I have not read it again, but it was a long time ago, but I think, yes, there was such an allegation. What I must add here is that I accept full responsibility for the person that I shot. If I shot him whilst he was lying on the ground I would have said so, if I could remember it. I am applying for amnesty for several other incidences which I believer are far more controversial than this one and I do not, I cannot see why I would try and conceal something here. He was not lying on the ground when I shot him, that I can remember, but I cannot recall, perhaps, how his head was turned when I shot. Details like those I cannot recall.

MR B WILLIAMS: The point is very simple, Mr Bellingan. The man looked at you and you looked in his direction and you shot him. That is the basic point, that is what you can recall.

MR BELLINGAN: If you say so, then that is correct.

MR B WILLIAMS: Now, Captain Bellingan, the problem that one has with that concession and bearing in mind what is, in our opinion or in the opinion of the families, a poor attempt to arrest these individuals and bearing in mind that in the opinion of the families, you had set out to counter-ambush these individuals, it would appear that you, in fact, succeeded in doing so. What do you say about that?

MR BELLINGAN: If, after we set up the original ambush for them, we then withdrew from the operation, thereafter they shot at us first, they attacked us and we were simply just a lot more successful in actually countering this attack. That is the way I see it.

MR B WILLIAMS: Yes, Captain Bellingan, that is one perspective. The other perspective is that these individuals were simply unaware of the fact that you were going to launch this attack on them. What do you say about that?

MR BELLINGAN: I cannot comment on that. Whilst I was running towards the intersection both sides were shooting and there was, it was a major drama. So, I actually cannot recall the finer details.

MR B WILLIAMS: You see, in your Section 28 application you said the following and I quote at page 128 of the first bundle,

"Technically, yes, technically speaking, I suppose, yes, it would amount to an ambush."

Do you recall having stated that?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, I said that, but I cleared it with my legal team later and they explained to me that our original ambush which we had planned, if one can call it an ambush, that that was not successful, that we withdrew and they then launched an attack on us. Therefore, it no longer constituted an ambush by us.

MR B WILLIAMS: So, you will agree that your counter-attack was, in fact, ... (intervention).

MR BELLINGAN: More effective.

MR B WILLIAMS: ... a counter-ambush. You concede that?

MR BELLINGAN: I cannot get too technical, I think we were simply more effective, that is all.

MR B WILLIAMS: But, Captain Bellingan, that is what you said at the time. You said,

"... technically speaking, I suppose, yes, it would amount to an ambush."

MR B WILLIAMS: Yes, but after speaking to my legal advisers ... (intervention).

MR BOOYENS OBJECTS

MR BOOYENS: My learned friend should read this in context from page 127,

"Why did you put armed people inside the bus and allowed it to drive through the intersection at that particular time? No, but why. Major Dolf Odendal (...indistinct). Why was it an ambush scene? Technically speaking, I suppose, yes, it would amount to an ambush."

That answer related to the initial plan with sending the Kombi with the policemen in it through. That was that technically, it would amount to an ambush. It does not relate to the shooting incident. That is the context I see it in, Mr Chairman. I do not know whether my learned friend sees it differently.

MR B WILLIAMS: Yes, Mr Chairperson, I am afraid I do not agree with my colleague and I would like the witness to actually answer that question as to whether he considers that it was, in fact, let us leave aside the contentions made in the Section 29 application. Does Captain Bellingan consider that he had counter-ambushed these individuals? What is his answer to that?

MR BELLINGAN: What stage are you referring to now?

MR B WILLIAMS: If one can take you back a second. You said that you had received information that an ambush was being planned on the police. Can one assume that your response, that your planned response was effectively a counter-ambush?

MR BELLINGAN: Let us compare it to the case where you are actually trying to apprehend bank robbers. It is not actually an ambush, it is a counter-operation and if the operation is not successful and you withdraw, then you actually have to face their ambush. So, the one group then falls into the ambush of the other group.

MR B WILLIAMS: Do I understand you to be conceding that it was, in fact, a counter-ambush then?

MR BELLINGAN: No, I think we went over to the attack. I do not think it was an ambush. They attacked us and we then returned fire. It was not an ambush.

MR B WILLIAMS: What else would you call it? Captain Bellingan, you have been in combat, what do you call it when you know of an attack or the enemy, as you would call it, coming to a certain position and you position yourself, heavily armed, around that position? What do you call that? I mean in combat terms, I think it is called an ambush.

MR BELLINGAN: As I said, our first group did sort of take up position and it was a sort of an ambush, but we withdrew, because the Kombi did not pass us at the exact time and place, things were not going according to plan. So, we withdrew and as a result of that we then entered their ambush and then there was a counter-attack and we attacked each other. I think these are all technical points.

MR B WILLIAMS: I will not belabour the point, Mr Chairperson. So, you have planned an offensive response to the information that you were, that an ambush was going to take place, you also anticipate, in terms of your information and your evidence, that these individuals are trained insurgents or, at least, some of them are trained insurgents and some of them are kits-insurgents. Am I correct?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR B WILLIAMS: You arm yourself and all your colleagues and all those who are on the scene to the teeth. Is that correct?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct. Members chose their own weapons, as those in the bush had R1's and shotguns, some of the Murder and Robbery people only had their pistols. So, each and everyone was not actually armed to the teeth. I think I was fairly well armed and some of the people with their shotguns were well armed.

MR B WILLIAMS: If I remember the scene on the video, Captain Bellingan, I think that you were wearing an ammunition belt around your waist?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, we call it a chest webbing. I was very fond of wearing that and I carried four R1 magazines in it plus a hand grenade plus, possibly, a smoke grenade, because I came from a culture where we were always well prepared for whatever could happen. I did not ever wear a bullet-proof jacket. This is what I wore instead. That was my normal practice whenever I went out at night or whenever during the day.

MR B WILLIAMS: And you will agree, then, that at that particular point where you are about to respond to your information that there is going to be an ambush, when you are in position, at that stage there is absolutely no question that these people are going to be arrested. Do you agree?

MR BELLINGAN: I agree. I knew that if a shooting erupted then based on the information which I got from Jimmy Mbane, that the chance of actually showing your appointment certificate and saying this is an arrest, well, that would have been ... (end of tape 3A) a miracle.

MR B WILLIAMS: Yes, Captain Bellingan, you will recall at the time of the various trials which had taken place in this matter, that that concession was not actually very verily forthcoming, not so?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR B WILLIAMS: In fact, yourself and your colleagues had maintained all along, who were involved in that operation, that there was still an intention to arrest people, not so?

MR BELLINGAN: I believe that that is what the people thought and believed, but I knew that based on the information which I had that it would be extremely difficult to arrest them and I was actually preparing myself for a fight.

MR B WILLIAMS: So, in other words, the only elimination that was going to take place on this particular day, in terms of your Vlakplaas modus operandi, was the death of these individuals, not so?

MR BELLINGAN: We did not have a modus operandi simply to shoot people. If I wanted to shoot them then I would have found out where they lived or I could have done it in any number, one of a number of ways. I think what is important there is what the individual thought. It was not a Vlakplaas modus operandi.

MR B WILLIAMS: Captain Bellingan, I know that your evidence has previously been that you were not involved in some of the shootings which had taken place in respect of the rest of the deceased on that scene that day. Am I correct?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR B WILLIAMS: Did you not find it strange that practically all of the deceased had head wounds?

MR BELLINGAN: If you find yourself in a terrorist situation and I think also if we look at the post mortem report, there were also many leg wounds. I actually cannot comment on that. The policemen were possibly just, they just were better marksmen.

MR B WILLIAMS: Yes, you see, it is rather remarkable that at least three of the deceased have execution style wounds behind their ears. What do you have to say about that?

MR BELLINGAN: I cannot comment on that. Each particular individual who shot must answer that question.

MR B WILLIAMS: Captain Bellingan, I actually want to put it to you, and I put this to you on behalf of the families, that you had planned, and I must agree, successfully planned to eliminate these individuals.

MR BELLINGAN: I could not have planned it without the approval of the other members, but I as an individual felt that if a shooting erupted then we most definitely would not have wounded people, it would have been a free for all. So, I did not say beforehand we are going to shoot them. Those were, some of these people were strangers to me on the force, I did not know them all.

MR B WILLIAMS: I also want to put it to you that the fact that not a single policemen, of all the policemen that were on the scene that day, was shot apart from yourself who suffered, according to you, shrapnel wounds and the fact that every single one of the guerrillas died on that day is no coincidence. What do you say about that?

CHAIRPERSON: Is that true? I thought we heard evidence that somebody was supposed to have run away.

MR BELLINGAN: Some of them did, in fact, run away. Captain Kleyn, who is now Brigadier, he was also wounded and Mr Williams can say these were shrapnel wounds, but, perhaps, if it was just a millimetre more to the right or the left I, perhaps, I would also have been dead. So, it was just as a result of the Lord's Mercy that I survived.

MR B WILLIAMS: If I can just respond to the comment that there was one that got away. Will you agree that the evidence of the police, and including yourself, all the operatives on the scene on that day, has always been that no one got away?

MR BELLINGAN: I cannot comment on what the other people said and how the inquest was handled, but I think today we can say that some people got away. I think there is a statement from a former terrorist, Ditana, and he also refers to people that he met later who were involved in that incident.

MR B WILLIAMS: Do you agree, Captain Bellingan, sorry your Worship.

MR BOOYENS: I am not sure if my learned colleague is busy with ...

MR B WILLIAMS: Do you agree, Captain Bellingan, that it is strange that after 11 years after this incident, this Amnesty Committee only has one individual, one policeman who is, of 20 policeman who were on that scene, who is today prepared to concede that a person was shot who was giving himself up?

MR BELLINGHAN: I came down to Cape Town and I told each and every member there involved that I was going to apply for amnesty and they all said that they felt that they had not done anything wrong, so they were not going to apply. So, I cannot comment on other people's actions.

MR B WILLIAMS: You maintain until this day that you did nothing wrong on that day in respect of the killing of those individuals, you acted in self-defence, do you maintain that?

MR BELLINGAN: No, no shooting or infiltration such as that goes 100% according to plans, so whatever the allegations against me and whatever was done that was wrong, I will take full responsibility for that, whether it was the person shot in the intersection, whether it was the arms that had been brought down to infiltrate with and the whole use and method of the ajan provocateurs, I will take full responsibility for all of that.

MR B WILLIAMS: Yes, but, Captain Bellingan, that, with the greatest of respect to you, that seems to be hedging your bets, hardly appropriate here.

MR BELLINGAN: Please repeat that question.

MR B WILLIAMS: You seem to be hedging your bets. In other words, you are not admitting specifically that you did anything wrong, but you are maintaining that if you have done something wrong, then you are applying for amnesty. That remains your position?

MR BELLINGAN: As I said in my amnesty application, my position is that if I shot that person unlawfully then I apply for amnesty for that, that is the man I shot in the intersection, but I was not entirely in my sound and sober senses at the time that I shot him, that I add in my application.

MR B WILLIAMS: If Mr Chairperson will just give me one moment. I realise that we are running short of time. If I could just have a moment to consider my notes.

If I could just ask you, Captain Bellingan, about the, just two questions about the planning of the operation the night before. You have mentioned in your evidence that Captain Liebenberg and Major Odendal had been involved in the planning of things on the ground. Is that correct?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, that is correct.

MR B WILLIAMS: But is it not correct that you as the Vlakplaas operative had, in fact, taken control of the situation?

MR BELLINGAN: No, I was a Sergeant and I could not give orders to Lieutenants and Colonels. I was part of the planning section and we also took part in the gathering of intelligence and so forth and we involved the local commanders of the various branches, but I did not have the last say. I could not get up and say I, Bellingan, say that we are going to shoot people dead today. That is just simply not the way it worked.

MR B WILLIAMS: Yes, but it would appear as though you hand picked all the people for this operation, not so?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct. I had spoken to these members well before, from the time that I had first met them, because the Riot Squad, the Murder and Robbery, Vehicle Branch, etcetera, I showed all these branches the vehicles that my members drove and I spoke to them and so forth, because those were the people who would be on the streets that night and who were actually, who could foil my whole operation if they arrested my people. So, I picked the people who came from certain cultures, who had been in the border wars and so forth and were disciplined. Same with Murder and Robbery and Detective Branch. I did not go to each and every individual and say to him you must come with me, because you are so good.

CHAIRPERSON: Did you deliberately say, as I recorded you saying, they could foil my whole operation? So, you regarded it as your operation.

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, the security branch and my operation. For instance, if they seize my Kombi tonight or they apprehend my people at a roadblock or they find an AK47 magazine in the Kombi and those people are with them in the Kombi, then they would have arrested him, them and what am I left with then?

CHAIRPERSON: You would have had some people arrested, which you have been trying to do for a long time. That is what you would have been left with.

MR BELLINGAN: I agree, but they were not always in the Kombi together. Sometimes it was only my people in the Kombi. So, it was not as if they were all, all seven or all eight in the Kombi at a particular time.

MR B WILLIAMS: Thank you, Mr Chairperson. Captain Bellingan, with regard to the investigation of the matter, your emphatic answer to my learned colleague here was that you were not involved in the investigation at all.

MR BELLINGAN: What investigation are you referring to?

MR B WILLIAMS: I am talking about the investigation of the case itself.

MR BELLINGAN: No, I was not involved at all.

MR B WILLIAMS: All right. Now, that one finds a little bit difficult to believe and hear me out and then you can respond to it. This was a Vlakplaas operation. This was an operation that arose out of a Vlakplaas infiltration. Am I correct?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, in conjunction with the local security police.

MR B WILLIAMS: Under no circumstances could it be allowed that information may come out that there were other individuals who were askaris, perhaps, involved in this. Am I correct?

MR BELLINGAN: That is correct.

MR B WILLIAMS: Under no circumstances could it also come out that or that it could appear that you had planned this particular counter-ambush in the detail which you had?

MR BELLINGAN: Please just repeat the question.

MR B WILLIAMS: Under no circumstances could it come, could the information be made available that you had planned this information, this operation to the extent that you had? In other words, that you were using askaris as informants, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera.

MR BELLINGAN: No, it would not come out that it was askaris, but the people that I trusted and the other specialist units, they were well aware of the fact that these were people from Pretoria and, perhaps, the word "askari" was not mentioned, but that they were people who came down here to infiltrate, but Liebenberg was fully aware of what was going on.

MR B WILLIAMS: I find it difficult to believe that you would not make sure that the investigation into this matter followed a particular course or stayed on course, better said?

MR BELLINGAN: It was not within my competence to ensure that that happened, it was not for me to tell a person at Murder and Robbery to do this or that.

MR B WILLIAMS: But if I could just take you to the comment that the learned Chairperson, respectfully, raised with you earlier. A thorough Murder and Robbery Detective could undo your entire operation. He was a man on the ground. You agree?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, it may be.

MR B WILLIAMS: So, you had to make sure, to some extent, that whatever was coming out in this investigation was not going to prejudice your position as a Vlakplaas operative or your informers?

MR BELLINGAN: The idea was to give the full credit and honour to the Murder and Robbery Branch. I think that is clear from newspaper clippings. Mr Kleyn and some of his colleagues are shown or depicted in the newspaper with all these weapons and the idea was to take away the credit and the spotlight from the security or from Vlakplaas.

MR B WILLIAMS: Yes, you see, because one of the things that came out at the criminal trial which had taken place in this matter was that the evidence of the bullets and pellets that had been extracted from all the deceased in this matter had disappeared.

MR BELLINGAN: I cannot comment on that. I have absolutely no knowledge of that. Major Brits and I, the, Major Brits was the Investigating Officer and we knew each other, but I, as a Sergeant, did not have knowledge of the contents of the docket.

MR B WILLIAMS: Can I ask you a hypothetical question? Would you agree that Vlakplaas would be capable of such a disappearance?

MR BELLINGAN: Not as far as I know. I was never involved in anything like that. I suppose anything is possible, but I would have known of that and then I would have admitted it.

MR B WILLIAMS: Are you also aware that there were some independent witnesses who lived in those hostels who gave testimony at the time?

MR BELLINGAN: Yes, I think at the inquest there was such evidence and in the civil claim there was evidence to that effect, yes.

MR B WILLIAMS: And are you aware that there were suggestions, at the time, that the investigating officer in this matter had tampered with these peoples' statements?

MR BELLINGAN: I am not aware of that.

MR B WILLIAMS: You cannot recall that?

MR BELLINGAN: I was simply asked why my statement was handed in so long afterwards and to this day I do not know why it was handed in 23 days later.

MR B WILLIAMS: Your Worship, at this stage, I am not sure that I am going to be too long, but, perhaps, it might be appropriate at this stage to adjourn. I am not sure how the Committee feels.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes, I think some of us have had a long day sitting in boxes and working very hard and I think the time has come when we should adjourn. I would like to know whether nine o' clock tomorrow morning would suit.

MR BOOYENS: Mr Chairman, there is still the issue of the inspection. My, I have got a view about it that it is a complete waste of time, we have got, I do not know whether you have been ... (intervention).

CHAIRPERSON: I suggest that you all talk about it.

MR BOOYENS: No, we have.

CHAIRPERSON: You have.

MR BOOYENS: I do not know whether you have been supplied with these photo, aerial photographs as well. We have been supplied with an album showing some aerial photographs of the scene, we have seen a video at the time. I am, it, by the sounds of things, I am the only, think I am the only one who had visited the scene beforehand and in my humble submission, but, obviously subject to what my colleagues say, in my humble submission, we would be wasting valuable time going out there. I think any Commission or Court, for that matter, would have been able to form a fairly good idea, having looked at that video, and if you look at the aerial photographs as to what the scenery looked like and to walk there and have a policeman say, no, there you can see it on the aerial photograph and this is where I stood on the ground and the whole scene looks different. It is 12 years or eight years later.

CHAIRPERSON: Well, what puts me off the idea is what you said earlier that the place has changed so much that one will no longer get a picture of what was happening, what it looked like at the time, but I think you are wrong in saying you are the only one. I think Ms Patel went, did you not?

MS PATEL: That is correct, honourable Chairperson, and it is my respectful submission that an in loco is invaluable to the proper assessment of the evidence that is being led in this matter. Having looked at the video initially and having had sight of the photographs before I went there, I was actually shocked at the size of the area in which this operation took place. It is a lot smaller than one thinks, it actually is and I think from that point of view, it is crucial that members of the Committee have sight of the area itself, but I will ... (intervention).

CHAIRPERSON: Well, what arrangements, if any, have been made?

MS PATEL: Well, the arrangements, from a logistical point of view, the arrangements are now in order for tomorrow morning.

CHAIRPERSON: Oh, what time?

MS PATEL: At 09H30.

CHAIRPERSON: What are your views gentlemen.

MR P WILLIAMS: Mr Chairman, I am entirely in the hands of this Committee. We have no objection to that.

MR HUGO: Mr Chairman, I was going to ask you to excuse Mr de Kock. He can make absolutely no contribution whatsoever.

CHAIRPERSON: He was not at, there is no suggestion he was at the site or saw anything. I think that that is...

What do the victims feel?

MR B WILLIAMS: I would support the submission of Ms Patel, that we actually view the scene. I am not, mindful of what my colleague says on behalf of Mr Bellingan, it, you know, I do not want to waste the Committee's time, but I think some purpose would be served by a brief view of the intersection itself.

CHAIRPERSON: I think you have been outvoted. Nine thirty, now will there be transport here?

MS PATEL: There will.

CHAIRPERSON: And will we all go in one vehicle?

MS PATEL: I have just been informed now by the Logistics Officer that there may be a problem with security with Mr Bellingan who has requested extra security. So, they are in the process of arranging, I think, two vehicles instead of one, but by tomorrow morning it will be in order.

CHAIRPERSON: What I really mean is we do not expect everybody to come here with their own car and go in a long caravan. We will all go together as much as possible.

MS PATEL: No, that will definitely be arranged, thank you.

CHAIRPERSON: What time do you think, how long do you think it will take?

MS PATEL: The reason that it has been arranged for 09H30 is the Security Officers have made that decision and, apparently, from that point of view, 09H30 is suitable for them.

CHAIRPERSON: No, I am not trying to change the time, I just want to know how long it will take.

MS PATEL: About 20 minutes.

CHAIRPERSON: A hour.

MR BOOYENS: Hour and a half. Hour and a half would be more, I think it is about 20 minutes to drive there, I am not sure from the City centre.

CHAIRPERSON: A hour. I just want to say this, the other people who do not have to go, they need not come here till 10H30 at the earliest. That applies to you too.

MS PATEL: Would everyone please rise.

HEARING ADJOURNS