OWN CORRESPONDENT, Johannesburg | Monday 7.30pm.
FORMER transport minister Mac Maharaj on Monday dismissed the amnesty applications of five former security branch policemen as “concocted” stories and opposed them on the basis of his own insider knowledge.
Speaking at the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s amnesty hearings in Durban on Monday, he questioned the circumstances surrounding the abduction, detention and secret murder of two Operation Vula operatives 11 years ago.
The amnesty committee heard that Charles Ndaba and Mbuso Shabalala were “arrested” in Durban on July 7, 1990, shot dead a week later and their bodies thrown in the Thukela River.
Five former Port Natal security branch policemen — Major Hendrik Botha, Major Salmon du Preez, Colonel Laurence Wasserman, Lieutenant Casper van der Westhuyzen and their commander General Johannes Steyn — are seeking amnesty for their involvement in the crimes.
Botha last week told the committee he recruited Ndaba as an informer in the late 1980s.
On Monday, presenting evidence on behalf of the Ndaba and Shabalala families, Maharaj punched holes in Botha and Steyn’s evidence by presenting three sets of damning articles compiled over a couple of months in 1988 by Wasserman and Botha.
In the articles, which were circulated to more than 14 security branch groups around the country, Ndaba was listed as one of the most wanted men and his name was not accompanied by a “PN” reference number used to identify police informers.
As former internal commander of Operation Vula, Maharaj disputed evidence that Ndaba had told policemen about the presence in the country of Operation Vula’s top command.
“Even some of the most senior members of the ANC did not know of our whereabouts. “How then would Charles Ndaba have known?”
Maharaj opposed the applications on the basis that the policemen had made false disclosures.
The applicants will on Tuesday attempt to rebut the evidence that they collaborated and concocted a false story and that they smeared Ndaba’s name before killing him.