Apartheid-era minister of law and order Adriaan Vlok and former police chief Johann van der Merwe will be charged with attempted murder next month.
National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) spokesperson Panyaza Lesufi said on Monday that papers were filed with the Pretoria High Court and the matter will be heard on August 17.
The charges relate to an alleged plot to kill Frank Chikane, at present Director General in the Presidency. Chikane was secretary general of the South African Council of Churches when his underwear was lined with a poison that attacked his nervous system in 1989.
Vlok and Van der Merwe were meant to stand trial in the Pretoria High Court in 2004 after failing to apply for amnesty at the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, but the NPA reversed its decision to prosecute them.
The authority has since had discussions with lawyers for the two, which Lesufi described as meaningful. ”We, however, decided that due to the nature of this case it cannot be solved in a boardroom and it must be dealt with in the public domain in open court,” he said.
In February this year, the NPA informed three security police officers that they were to be prosecuted for apartheid crimes. The case related to the attempts to poison Chikane. The decision to prosecute the police officers paved the way for the prosecution of Vlok and Van der Merwe.
Forgiveness
Last September, Vlok asked for Chikane’s forgiveness and washed his feet.
President Thabo Mbeki thereafter lauded Vlok’s gesture and said that South Africans should learn to listen more closely to each other across the boundaries of apartheid.
A prosecution policy on apartheid crimes was tabled in Parliament last year. It includes a clause that gives the NPA discretion on whether to prosecute, if it is not ”in the national interest”. One of the factors to be taken into account is whether the apartheid victim wants the prosecution to go ahead.
Chikane has repeatedly asked others to come forward and reveal what happened in 1989, but has never called for prosecution.
In October last year, Chikane said he knew the identity of police officers who poisoned him in the late 1980s. A statement from the Presidency noted that Chikane had revealed at his church in Soweto ”that he now has information about his poisoning, starting from its authorisation from the highest levels of the apartheid government, through the military and police command lines, up to the operational unit which sprayed his clothes with a chemical meant to induce a heart attack, with the intention of killing him”.
The statement added: ”The affected officers of the apartheid security police are said to have made submissions to the NPA on details relating to the attempt to kill Reverend Chikane in terms of the prescribed guidelines to deal with post-Truth and Reconciliation Commission matters.”
Following Vlok’s plea for forgiveness, ”the information I was looking for relating to my near-fatal poisoning has been brought to my attention”, explained Chikane. ”I now know the chain of command to eliminate me. I know the people who were involved and how they did it. I am also told that the people involved, including those who are part of the command structure, are ready to meet me and ask for forgiveness for attempting to kill me.
”Once the NPA has given a green light for them to talk to me, we will do so immediately,” said Chikane in the address to his congregation.
At the end of last month, Vlok only said: ”At this stage, no comment at all. I am in good spirits. The Lord will take me through, but I have no comment on this matter.”
Comment
Commenting on the decision to prosecute Vlok and Van der Merwe, former president FW de Klerk said on Monday he had no further information regarding the NPA’s reasons for its decision, or the views of Vlok and Van der Merwe.
He accordingly did not want to make any further comment at this stage, except to say that he would monitor the situation closely and comment more fully if and when this might be necessary.
However, he repeated his view that any prosecutions related to the conflict of the past should be approached with the greatest sensitivity and circumspection because of the negative consequences that unbalanced action might hold for national reconciliation.
”Insofar as prosecutions are considered, they must be even-handed and take into consideration the peremptory requirements of the 1993 Constitution as well as the spirit of the negotiations and other developments that preceded it,” De Klerk said. — Sapa, I-Net Bridge