WEDNESDAY, 4.00PM:
THREE security policemen drugged the ‘Pebco Three’ and then shot them in the back of the head while they slept, the Truth and Reconcilliation Commission heard on Wednesday .
Former Port Elizabeth security policeman Captain Sakkie van Zyl said in his amnesty application he and two colleagues — Colonel Gideon Nieuwoudt and Major Gerhardus Lotz — took turns to execute Eastern Cape activists Sipho Hashe, Champion Galela and Qaqawuli Godolozi in May 1985.
He recounted how police had led the Pebco Three into a trap, abducted them and burnt the bakkie they had been travelling in. He said the men had been taken to a disused police building in Post Chalmers, outside Craddock, and kept alive while the he and his colleauges waited for further orders.
”Major [Herman] Du Plessis arrived at 12 o’clock that day. He said the situation in Port Elizabeth was positive… and that the operation to eliminate these activists should go ahead,” Van Zyl said.
He then laced the activists’ coffee with sleeping tablets and when they were all asleep, he took a .22mm pistol and shot one of them. ”I can’t remember who it was I killed. I spoke to Mr Nieuwoudt yesterday and he gave me an idea of who it could have been. I think it was Mr Hashe.”
Niewoudt and Lotz then used the same gun to kill the other two activists. Van Zyl said they went to great lengths to make sure no one discovered the deed. The pistol was sawn into little pieces and thrown into the ocean, the bodies were burnt, and after six hours they were little more than ashes. The ashes were swept into a bag and dropped into the Fish River.
Van Zyl said he had hopes of getting ”forgiveness from God” for his confession. Du Plessis, Niewoudt, Lotz and other officers, Gerhardus Beeslaar and Roelf Venter have also submitted amnesty applications with Van Zyl.