Khareen Pech
In an extraordinary display of power, right-wing ringleader Johan Niemoeller and two hefty sidekicks, Jannie Smith and Roy Smith, tasked a private army of about 14 former security cops to intimidate me at a busy Johannesburg shopping mall last week.
Jannie Smith first lured me to a meeting at Eastgate shopping mall by pretending to be an enemy of Johan Niemoeller, whom I had written about in a story on South African involvement in the Congo conflict. He said his name was ”Andre” and he wanted to give me a thick file of documents about Niemoeller. He arranged the meeting by telephone and would not say how he obtained my number.
When I arrived at the meeting place, Jannie Smith, a huge, bald man with fierce blue eyes, was seated at the back of the restaurant with a bearded man who later identified himself as Roy Smith. To my surprise, Niemoeller was with them. They beckoned me over, and I sat down.
Nervous about the meeting, which I was starting to sense was a set-up, I asked after Andre. Jannie Smith laughed and said I had caught him out – he had lied, there was no Andre. Becoming uneasy, I asked him what they wanted. Taking their time, and choosing their words very carefully, they warned me that if I wrote any further stories on Niemoeller I would encounter certain ”obstacles”.
”What obstacles?” I asked. Roy Smith replied that for example, a car-hijacking could be arranged.
”We know everything about you: where you live, your car registration, who you talk to, what you say and who you sleep with,” Roy Smith said. ”Every week we have an intelligence meeting in Pretoria where your latest movements are relayed.”
Roy Smith said that news reports of their activities would threaten their whole plan and divide members of the political movement. He said this was sufficient reason for them to take ”necessary action” against me.
Niemoeller said little, or rather, was allowed to say very little, as Roy Smith kept cutting him off and finishing his sentences. I asked the Smiths, ”Who’s running the show, Niemoeller or you guys?”
This seemed to be Niemoeller’s cue to leave. He stood up and said in Afrikaans, ”I leave the rest to you boys.” Then he walked over to a nearby table and talked to a heavy-set man wearing a cowboy hat. Jannie Smith again began muttering commands into his cellphone.
Roy Smith then ended the meeting and ordered me to depart. ”You’ve overstayed your welcome, you must leave now,” he said. I stood up and left quickly. But as I entered the mall outside the restaurant, I realised that Roy and Jannie Smith were following me and had been joined by a large group of other white men. They fanned out around me.
I decided to remain at the mall and called the Bedfordview police for an escort. Niemoeller’s thugs kept up their vigilance and intimidatory by-walks for more than an hour-and-a-half while I sought safety inside a bank.
The police never arrived, and I was only able to leave the mall after I called a professional security operator for assistance. After the Mail & Guardian laid a complaint with a senior officer of a special police task unit, Jannie Smith called me to say that he was aware of all our actions. He advised me to be cautious as he was monitoring the situation and had tape-recorded the entire meeting.