/ 23 June 1997

Hani killers: amnesty hearing postponed

MONDAY, 5.30PM

THE Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s amnesty committee on Monday postponed the amnesty hearing of the killers of SA Communist Party leader Chris Hani to August 11.

The decision, announced by committee chairman Judge Hassen Mall at a hearing in the Benoni town hall, was greeted with cries of “viva SACP” by party supporters waving placards. Mall apologised for the delay to Hani’s killers, former Conservative Party politician Clive Derby-Lewis and Polish immigrant Janusz Walus, who are serving terms of life imprisonment in Pretoria central prison for Hani’s assassination.

The committee took about ten minutes to make its decision after hearing legal argument from lawyers representing the two killers and the Hani family.