The apartheid state’s most efficient killer wants his murder trial put on hold so he can tell all to the truth commission, writes Eddie
Eugene de Kock is ready to talk. The former Vlakplaas commander — dubbed “Prime Evil” by former colleagues because he is reputed to be South Africa’s most effective assassin — will provide explosive evidence to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission about the role of serving police and army generals involved in Third Force violence during the apartheid
The Mail & Guardian has learnt that the former Vlakplaas commander, currently on trial in the Pretoria Supreme Court on 121 counts of fraud, murder and unlawful possession of weapons, plans to ask the Transvaal attorney general and the judge presiding over his case for the proceedings to be interrupted so that he can testify before the truth commission. His other option is to talk to the truth body after
The police colonel was involved in the supply of truckloads of weapons — assault rifles, rocket launchers, landmines, rockets and ammunition — to members of the Inkatha Freedom Party during the early 1990s. He also helped train the IFP’s self-protection units at secret bases in KwaZulu-Natal.
His testimony will implicate senior members of the Zulu nationalist movement in gun-running and covert operations. These include Senator Philip Powell, who co-ordinated much of the illicit weapons supply to Inkatha’s paramilitary units in KwaZulu-Natal, and also Transvaal leaders Themba Khoza and Humphrey
The former Vlakplaas commander’s information will give the truth body the single most important collection of material about human rights violations committed by members of the security forces during the 1980s and early
His decision will send waves through the ranks of security force officers who issued commands to police and military death squads and also senior IFP leaders who took part in Third Force activities during this period.
The colonel has told colleagues he decided to appear before the commission because it has become clear he has no way of escaping a lengthy prison sentence in the current murder and fraud trial.
Colleagues say he may eventually try to obtain a pardon from the executive, hoping his information to the truth commission will pave the way.
De Kock’s come-clean move is also motivated by the fact that a number of his former colleagues who have already given evidence in his trial will also be going to the truth commission. De Kock is outraged because he is taking the rap for many human rights abuses carried out under instruction from men who still hold high office in the security forces or who have retired with fat pensions.
De Kock will provide first-hand information about the way scores of anti-apartheid activists were killed by himself and members of his death squads. He will also be able to say who gave orders for the bombings at Cosatu House and Khotso House in the late 1980s.
This week a member of the Vlakplaas police unit, Joe Mamasela, refused to give the supreme court details about more than 50 political murders committed between 1981 and 1988 for fear of implicating himself (see accompanying story). “I know for a fact that some of the murders were committed on the instructions of police generals,” said
De Kock was also a confidante of police and military officers involved in other covert units, including the former South African Defence Force’s Civil Co-operation Bureau, and will be able to provide reliable information picked up from these operatives about other killings and projects, including assassinations and bombings carried out outside the country.
He supplied weapons to Inkatha leaders — including an arsenal of assault rifles, rocket launchers, rockets and landmines — which are believed to be still stockpiled in Ulundi. He also took part in the training of Inkatha paramilitary units at the so-called Mlaba camp near Hhluhluwe in KwaZulu-Natal.
De Kock has first-hand information about scores of murders, including the unsolved shooting of anti-apartheid doctor Fabian Ribeiro and his wife in Pretoria, and the assassination of three civic organisation members in Port Elizabeth in 1985.
He is likely to testify about the murder of human rights activist David Webster and pass on important details about the murder of Port Elizabeth civic leader Mathew Goniwe in the
The Vlakplaas commander is also a veteran of the bush war in Namibia, where he learnt the skills that turned him into the security force’s most effective assassin and covert operations planner, and it is expected that he will talk about atrocities committed by the police’s Koevoet counter-insurgency units with which he served during this war.
It is understood that De Kock is consulting his lawyers about how best to handle his decision to come clean — and that he is aware that he will be required to make a full disclosure about involvement in human rights abuses if he hopes to be indemnified from
De Kock has sent informal messages to members of the truth commission indicating his willingness to apply for amnesty and to reveal everything he knows about the dirty tricks
Truth commission deputy chairman Alex Boraine told the Mail & Guardian he was aware De Kock was preparing a strategy to give evidence before the commission.
“But we have received no formal application, either directly or through his lawyers, and we will have to wait until he does this. If he applied to appear before the human rights violation committee and offered to give information like anyone else, I do not see that the committee would refuse to see him,” said Boraine.
An application for indemnity would have to be placed before the amnesty committee and this could happen only if Judge Willem van der Merwe and Transvaal attorney general Jan d’Oliveira agree that the current trial be interrupted for these proceedings to take place. If they refuse, it would still be possible for De Kock to make truth commission applications after the court has made a ruling. De Kock will not be able to interrupt his present case and apply for amnesty for the 121 cases for which he is currently charged. This case will have to run its course.
Truth commission legislation states that human rights abuses of a particularly heinous nature — a category that De Kock’s activities clearly fall into — do not qualify for
But the colonel is aware he is unlikely to obtain an indemnity from prosecution for all the other political murders not dealt with in the current trial, but is hoping to make some deal around clemency or a mitigated sentence in exchange for co-operating with the truth