General Johan van der Merwe’s alleged meddling in Third force investigations is the real reason behind his resignation, reports Stefaans Brummer
POLICE Commissioner General Johan van der Merwe’s announcement last week that he would retire at the end of March was the result of pressure by Safety and Security Minister Sydney Mufamadi, well-placed sources say.
They point to a number of factors contributing to Mufamadi’s decision, including Van der Merwe’s alleged meddling, or toleration of meddling, in investigations into the Third Force.
Van der Merwe was this week at the centre of a dispute over indemnity applications lodged by him, former law and order minister Adriaan Vlok, former defence minister Magnus Malan and 3 500 others, mostly policemen, shortly before the elections.
Van der Merwe stood by the validity of the indemnities in the face of assertions to the contrary by Justice Minister Dullah Omar, the ANC, and finally Mineral and Energy Affairs Minister Pik Botha, who as acting state president had signed the enabling legislation in 1991.
Since Van der Merwe’s announcement last Tuesday that he would quit, police and judicial sources have told of many more instances where the commissioner allegedly played the role of “godfather” to police elements who would prefer their apartheid sins to remain hidden from public and judicial scrutiny.
Mounting evidence against Van der Merwe which came to the attention of Mufamadi and his cabinet colleagues late last year was cited as a possible reason for Van der Merwe’s unexpected “downfall”.
Mufamadi was not available for comment at the time of going to press. Van der Merwe yesterday responded in detail to most of the allegations against him — saying he found the “attempts to discredit me objectionable” — but he failed to reply on the assertions that Mufamadi had forced him out.
Last Tuesday, announcing he would quit, Van der Merwe claimed there had been no political pressure as he had originally planned to retire before the elections, and had stayed on only at the request of the new government.
The Weekly Mail & Guardian understands, however, that Van der Merwe had been pursuing appointment to the new post of national commissioner, a post which will be at the head of the newly amalgamated South African and former homeland police forces. Technically, Van der Merwe is still commissioner only of the old South African Police component of the South African Police Services.
Information received by the WM&G, which could have had a bearing on Mufamadi’s decision, includes charges that Van der Merwe had obstructed or allowed obstruction of the investigation of Third Force crimes by a special task force under Witwatersrand attorney general Jan D’Oliveira.
The task force was formed after Judge Richard Goldstone exposed police Third Force activities last March. The most notable among its investigations was that into former Vlakplaas commander Eugene de Kock, who faces 106 charges ranging from murder to fraud, theft and illegal possession of war materiel.
It is understood D’Oliveira’s office made an official complaint to Mufamadi in early December about Van der Merwe’s attitude to the investigation.
Included among the factors understood to have led to the complaint are:
* De Kock is to face charges when his trial starts next month that he had received large quantities of explosives and armaments from Armscor subsidiary Mechem in 1993. He signed for receipt of the materiel as a police officer, even though he had supposedly already been discharged from the police (with a golden handshake of R1,2-million). In spite of at least two requests, Van der Merwe allegedly failed to give the investigators confirmation as to whether De Kock had been authorised to sign in a police capacity. Van der Merwe yesterday denied the allegation.
* In the course of their investigation, D’Oliveira’s team had to cross-check information with original police dockets at various police stations. Many dockets were missing. The investigators allegedly found a substantial pile of the missing files in the office of a Colonel Barkhuizen, legal adviser to Van der Merwe. Van der Merwe replied that no dockets had been taken to Barkhuizen’s office “in an untoward way”. He said the movement of files had been recorded, and the issue resolved in May 1994.
* Even though the police officers in the team were transferred to the authority of D’Oliveira, Van der Merwe required them to give him regular updates on the progress of the investigation. Van der Merwe replied the charge was “totally untrue”.
* Members of the investigating team are allegedly being kept under surveillance and their phones are bugged. Van der Merwe said this was “totally untrue”.
* Van der Merwe defended state funding for De Kock’s legal team, allegedly saying the expenditure was in line with treasury instructions. The investigators are said to have strongly disagreed with Van der Merwe on the grounds that treasury instructions required police officers wanting to qualify for state defence to make a statement to the attorney general to show reasonable grounds that the alleged crime was not a common criminal act. De Kock had not made such a statement.
A source close to D’Oliveira’s team said “all those things had been mounting, and at the end of the day they decided to go to the minister”. The final straw had been Van der Merwe’s alleged failure to state whether De Kock had had police authority to acquire the Mechem weapons, the source said Van der Merwe did not respond to the assertion that D’Oliveira’s office had complained to Mufamadi.
About the same time the complaint was lodged, D’Oliveira applied to the Pretoria Supreme Court to have De Kock moved to Pretoria Central Prison from Verwoerdburg police cells – – where he had been enjoying a degree of freedom and privilege not accorded awaiting-trial prisoners.
It is understood the state of affairs — which included De Kock having the use of a cellular telephone — was allowed to continue even after a request had been made to Van der Merwe to “increase the security” of De Kock’s incarceration. This could have contributed to Mufamadi’s decision to ask Van der Merwe to go. What could have been particularly rattling to Mufamadi was the fact that De Kock had been allowed to stay in touch with very senior police officers from his police cell.
Van der Merwe replied that De Kock’s incarceration was under investigation, and that no report had yet been made to Mufamadi. “The alleged failure of police officers to give effect to instructions on the safe incarceration of De Kock forms part of the investigation.”
Van der Merwe said none of the allegations made against him had “at any time been raised to me by the minister of safety and security nor had they been an issue during my talks over my retirement with the president, the deputy presidents and the minister of safety and security.”