The amnesty application by three former security policemen for their part in the 1989 Motherwell car bombing murders has resumed at the Port Elizabeth High Court on Monday.
The hearing, set down for two weeks, was aborted last Tuesday when the lawyer representing the four victims’ families, Advocate Dumisa Ntsebeza, withdrew at the last minute, after a conflict-of-interest claim by one of the applicant’s lawyers.
Advocate Kessie Naidu, the evidence leader at last year’s Hefer commission, has been hired to represent the families.
Judge Ronnie Pillay, chairperson of the amnesty panel hearing the application, granted a postponement to Monday to allow the families to appoint another lawyer.
The applicants, Gideon Nieuwoudt, Marthinus Ras and Wybrand du Toit, have admitted to their role in the death of three black colleagues and an informer whom they say they suspected of being African National Congress sympathisers.
They were convicted of the murders in 1996 and sentenced to between 10 and 20 years in jail. They applied to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission for amnesty, and were refused.
However, the High Court then ordered that their application be heard again by a fresh panel. — Sapa