Riquadeau Jacobs
Kwazulu-Natal learned this week that in the early 1990s it had its own version of the infamous Vlakplaas torture camp at Camperdown in the Midlands.
Suspended policeman Colonel Andy Taylor has been fingered as the man who headed the camp — effectively a subsidiary of Vlakplaas — in an investigation by a magistrate Ashin Singh, now working for the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.
Taylor, who is suffering from cancer, is one of the five policeman accused of murdering lawyer Griffiths Mxenge in 1981.
The farm — which housed ANC operatives who were tortured and then turned into the police agents called Askaris — is believed to have been the springboard for a host of assassinations, torture sessions and cross-border raids, according to an investigation published in the Natal Witness.
The paper quotes one of the camp’s former Askaris, who is now providing information. The Natal Witness is also in possession of a number of documents about the farm’s activities.
Investigators have linked Taylor to the death of Askari Neville “Goodwill” Sikhakhane — one of the people convicted mass murderer Eugene De Kock was accused of murdering.
A list of the camp’s top men includes Sergeant Larry Hanton, an explosives expert and Captain “Spyker” Myeza, believed to have been Taylor’s right hand man.
The Askari said the farm was leased in Taylor’s name. The camp’s operatives acted on intelligence reports from police security branch units across the province. The Askaris and the black policemen at the camp would infiltrate the area, posing as MK operatives. Once they had identified their target they would either eliminate them or kidnap them.
Some of the information about the Camperdown operation and other farms leased by the police for anti-insurgency activities emerged in the De Kock trial and at the recent Motherwell hearings in Port Elizabeth, which lead to the conviction of several policemen.
The Transvaal attorney general is in possession of an impressive amount of information about Taylor and his colleagues, and prosecutions may ensue.