TRC Final Report

Volume 6

Section 3

Chapter 3

Subsection 13

111. Christie testified that Shoesmith instigated the plan to raid the Flagstaff police station and that he, Harry Jardine, Corrie van der Westhuizen, Shoesmith and Patrick Pedlar discussed it at a meeting. Christo Brand was not at the meeting. About two weeks later, Pedlar told Henry Jardine and Morton Christie that they should assist the IFP with the operation and involve James Zulu of the IFP. In the meantime, Warrant Officer Ferdi Wentzel of the Security Branch had instructed Pedlar to ensure that the operation went ahead.

112. Christie testified that they were followed by a red Cressida on their way to the police station and had the impression that its occupants were trying to count the number of persons in the car. When they arrived, Howell went into the charge office but came out saying he believed that they had been ‘set-up’ as there were armed policemen on the premises. Inspector Mkhondweni, who was parked outside the police station, arrested the men. It was then that the shoot-out began.

113. Christie testified that, during the trial, the Port Shepstone Security Branch was unable to explain why, having had knowledge of the operation, it did not attempt to stop it and why it took nine months to arrest the known suspects. Pedlar was not charged and his role emerged for the first time at the amnesty hearing. Mr Barry J a rdine [AM5864/97] of the AWB had this to say about Patrick Pedlar:

It later transpired, at the Criminal Case at the High Court in Bizana that Patrick Pedlar was a Security Police informant and that he revealed our plans to Inspector Wentzel. Inspector Wentzel informed the Flagstaff Police Station that APLA would attack the Police Station on the evening of the 5th of March 1994.

MR DE KLERK: Can we just have some clarity here? Patrick Pedlar was your Commander ? MR JARDINE: T h a t ’s correct . MR DE KLERK: According to your information was he the man that said that you had to get the weapons? MR JARDINE: T h a t ’s corre c t . MR DE KLERK: And later it became apparent that he was a Police informer because he conveyed to the police that you would fetch the weapons on a specific time? MR JARDINE: Th a t ’s correct, that APLA would attack the Police Station. As a result of this an ambush was set for us and that is why there were so many a rmed policemen at the Police Station. Here, I wish to refer to the judgment of Judge Beck, on page 1054, when he put forward his doubts as to why Inspector Wentzel allowed the attack to proceed, and did not try to prevent it. (Hearing at Durban, 24 April 1998.)

114. The surviving victims objected to amnesty being granted on the grounds that the applicants did not disclose who killed the deceased and wounded the other victims. However, the Amnesty Committee found that Christie shot Mzinigizi Mkhondweni and was satisfied that the other applicants could not testify who shot the other victims as it was dark when the shoot-out occurred. The applicants w e re granted amnesty.

115. In another incident, Mr Boy Vusumuzi Gwamanda [AM1972/96] applied for amnesty for the conspiracy to murder former Mpumalanga premier, Mr Matthews Phosa whilst he was incarcerated in Barberton prison in 1990. The applicant testified that he was trained by AWB-linked warders at Barberton prison in the use of firearms and hand grenades. Mr Gwamanda was granted amnesty.

MOTIVES AND PERSPECTIVES

116. In summary, the Amnesty Committee heard that most of the acts for which members and supporters of the Inkatha Freedom Party applied for amnesty w e re motivated by a sense of loyalty to an organisation which had embarked on what it perceived to be an alternative strategy for bringing about an end to apartheid. While senior members of the IFP claimed that there had never been an Inkatha decision to employ violence in this aim, amnesty applicants claimed that their use of violent means to achieve these aims were both authorised and sanctioned by the political leadership of the party.

117. The Commission took cognisance of the views expressed by leaders that the original source of the conflict in the then Natal and Transvaal lay in the opposition to the IFP’s adoption of this alternative strategy.

118. In its 1998 Report, the Commission found that the IFP was responsible for gross violations of human rights committed in the former Transvaal, Natal and KwaZulu against persons who were perceived to be leaders, members or supporters of the UDF, ANC or its alliance partners, and persons identified as posing a threat to the organisation or whose loyalty was doubted¹⁹³. It was a further finding of the Commission that such violations formed part of a systematic pattern of abuse which entailed deliberate planning on the part of the organisation¹⁹⁴ .