A private political and security consultant for various companies in Africa told the Pretoria Regional Court on Wednesday he had compiled two reports for the South African government after receiving information about a planned coup to overthrow the government of Equatorial Guinea.
Johannes Smit, a former member of 32 Battalion and Military Intelligence, said he learnt in November 2003 that several of his former colleagues were involved in this plan.
His evidence came after Raymond Stanley Archer, Victor Dracula, Louis du Preez, Errol Harris, Mazanga Kashama, Neves Tomas Matias, Simon Morris Witherspoon and Hendrik Jacobus Hamman pleaded not guilty to a charge of contravening the Foreign Military Assistance Act.
Smit testified that he met Matias and Dracula while he served in 32 Battalion. He also knew Hamman.
As he had helped with Equatorial Guinea’s election in 1996, he also knew that country’s ministers and president and helped several South African companies to get contracts there.
When a certain ”Neto”, also a former South African Defence Force (SADF) colleague, informed Smit about the planned coup, he drew up a report. This report was submitted not only to the South African government, but as widely as America and Britain.
”I was concerned that if this [the coup] happened, a lot of innocent people might be killed. And I don’t believe in overthrowing governments by military means,” the witness said.
He added that South Africans were well-respected in Equatorial Guinea.
He had asked Neto to keep him informed and also received information from other sources about the coup.
Saying that he did not receive payment for this report as it was part of his duties to his clients to keep them informed of political and security issues in Africa, Smit said he was concerned, as it would be easy to topple the government of Equatorial Guinea.
”I felt I must monitor the situation,” he said.
However, he did not inform the government of Equatorial Guinea, as he feared they might overreact.
In January/February 2004 an upset Neto told Smit that he had missed the recruitment drive for this coup at the Hotel 224 in Pretoria.
He said he would now be part of the ”second-batch recruitment”.
Smit compiled another report.
Then he heard that some of his former SADF special-forces colleagues had been incarcerated in Equatorial Guinea, including Nick du Toit.
”That is an enigma to me. Nick du Toit had access to the report. Yet they still went through with it [the coup plans],” Smit stated.
Although he helped with negotiations between the Equatorial Guinea and the alleged coup plotters, the witness said he was several times threatened with death after their arrests.
The case continues on Thursday when the defence will cross-examine Smit.
Before the men pleaded not guilty, defence advocate Margie Victor applied for the charge sheet to be quashed.
If this could not apply to the whole charge sheet, she argued, then at least for those charges against Archer and Harris.
She said that no offence was disclosed in the charge sheet, as there was not a recipient of the alleged military assistance.
Without a recipient, such as former opposition leader Severoa Moto, who is in exile, there was no proof of a service rendered, Victor claimed.
Referring to Archer and Harris, the advocate said the only evidence against them was that they were on the plane, which she argued was not an offence.
State advocate Torie Pretorius, however, asked what Archer and Harris were doing on a plane heading for a coup.
He replied that one could not now evaluate their defence before hearing all the evidence. He continued to say that there were many ways to prove the state’s case without calling the recipient.
Magistrate Peet Johnson found that the charge sheet did indeed disclose an offence.
”The fact that a recipient is not mentioned does not mean there was not a recipient,” he said.
He said it would be unwise and impossible for the court to prejudge the accused and that the court could only reach a conclusion about the accused’s intent at the end of the case.
He said the defence application had no merit and turned it down.
The eight accused are part of a group of 61 who returned to South Africa in 2005 after spending more than a year in a Zimbabwean prison for violating that country’s immigration, aviation, firearms and security laws.
The charges are related to an alleged plot to topple Equatorial Guinea’s long-time dictator, President Teodoro Obiang Nguema.
The men were among a group of 70 arrested in March 2004 when they landed at Harare International Airport, allegedly to refuel and pick up military equipment. — Sapa