Chemical and Biological Warfare Hearings

by Truth and Reconciliation Commission, South Africa

TRUTH AND RECONCILIATION COMMISSION

CHEMICAL AND BIOLOGICAL WARFARE HEARING

DATE: 8 JUNE 1998

HELD AT: CAPE TOWN

CHAIRPERSON: Good morning. I just want to apologise for the slight delay. It sounds like Sun Air or SAA. We are just waiting for two passengers.

My apologies again I am very sorry that we have not been able to start at nine 'o clock as we had scheduled. We are waiting for two people. One arrived and we are now missing two others. We may now be able to begin. Will you please sit down. Thank you very much. Can we just have a moment of silence please.

Come Holy Spirit fill the hearts of Thy faithful people and kindle in them the fire of Thy love. Send forth Thy Spirit and they shall be made and Thou shalt renew the face of the earth. Amen.

I want to welcome you all very warmly to this special hearing. It is a special hearing relating to the biological and chemical warfare programme, especially with regard to human rights violations and abuses.

May I introduce my colleagues. My very extreme right is Professor Peter Folb, a pharmacologist, professor of pharmacology at UCT.

Chandre Gould and Hanif Vally and Jerome Chaskalson on our staff.

And then the panel here is Wendy Orr, a Commissioner and Deputy Chairperson of the Reparation and Rehabilitation Committee of the Commission.

Alex Boraine, Deputy Chairperson of the Commission. Dumisa Ntsebeza on my left, Commissioner and head of our Investigative Unit.

Doctor Fazil Randera, Commissioner, member of the Human Rights Violations Committee and in charge of our Gauteng office.

And Denzil Potgieter, advocate, past member of the Human Rights Violations Committee, promoted or demoted to Amnesty Committee based here. I think you want to say something Hanif. Good morning Hanif.

MR VALLY: Good Morning my apologies. I was consulting with my learned colleagues as a fact. Arch there has been indication to me by Professor Haysom that there is going to be an application this morning prior to us starting. I don't know if he wants to indicate the application he wants to make and maybe when he indicates that I will address the panel on the issue of whether it should be in camera or not, the argument. I believe it should not be in camera but I will justify it legally. But maybe Professor Haysom, unless Advocate Gumbi is doing the running.

CHAIRPERSON: Let me welcome the three of you. Professor Haysom, Abdul Minty and Advocate Gumbi, welcome.

MR HAYSOM: Thank you. Do I call you Chairman, Archbishop or do I call you Archbishop, Chairman?

Mr Chairman perhaps I can just introduce ourselves and explain the capacity in which we are here. I am Nicholas Haysom and from the president's office and I am with Advocate Mujancu Gumbi from the deputy president's office. But we are here effectively have been lent to Mr Abdul Minty to assist him. And he is here in his capacity of chairman of the, and it is a long name, The South African Council on Non-proliferation of Weapons of Mass Destruction. It is true that what we will want to do is to put to you a particular proposal regarding the way in which these proceedings are to be conducted. I can sketch out the nature of that proposal now or else do it after Mr Vally has given his explanation as to why this hearing should be in camera. I need to explain that our presentation and all three of us will be presenting on various aspects of our proposal will involve an application under Section 32 that the hearing be held in camera. We had originally thought that such an application could not be brought in public but I am quite confident having looked at Section 33 that it is possible. And we would prefer to bring that application in public rather than in camera. I am in your hands as to whether we proceed to.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very much. Is there?

MR VALLY: Archbishop we would prefer to be heard in public as well if you want me to address you on the shell in terms of Section 33 I think Professor Haysom is referring to Section 33, 1 c, which says: "An application for proceedings to be held behind closed doors may be brought by a person referred to in paragraph b and that is a person who views it will be in the interest of justice or that it is likely that harm may ensue. Let me go on,

"Application for proceedings to be held behind closed doors may be brought by a person referred to in paragraph b and such application shall be heard behind closed doors."

That is what the Act says. If the panel wants me to address them on why we can hold it in public I will do. Unless Professor Haysom wants to do so. I can keep it very short.

CHAIRPERSON: I am advised that it would be better if you did.

MR VALLY: Thank you Archbishop. Archbishop my argument is the shell as set out in 33.1 c is directory rather than preemptory or mandatory. There is an option in that traditional view used to be that provisions which are mandatory must be strictly complied with and in cases where provisions are directory it will suffice if there has been substantial compliance. The changes in approach in modern law is such that in appropriate cases there is sufficient compliance with mandatory requirements even when there is not exact compliance is sufficient. How will we determine this? Again I do not want to go into detail because I believe we are ad idem on this issue. In this case a provision which is cultured in positive language and in which no sanction is specified for non-compliance will generally be presumed to be directory. Which I submit this provision is and I have got case authority to support me on this issue.

The other aspect is if insistence for the need for strict compliance will lead to injustice the provision will be construed to be directory. Again in this case Professor Haysom in making his submissions will want his submissions to be made publicly so that there is no suggestion of any kind of influence being brought upon us.

And finally the history of legislation may shed some light on the matter. As we are very clear in our Act in Section 33. 33. 1 a says the hearings of the Commission shall be open to the public and then it has a proviso when it should be in camera. So the arguments for whether it should be held in public or in camera are such that in the context it is merely directory and in view of our mutual interest being such that this matter should be argued in public I submit that the matter can be heard in public, the argument about whether it should be held in camera or not. Thank you Archbishop.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very much. I would say that we ourselves are relieved that the particular application is going to be heard in public because of our own very deep commitment to a blessed thing called transparency. So over to you.

MR HAYSOM: Mr Chairman what I would like to do is to indicate to you what areas the three of us will be covering. I would like to address you specifically on the proposal we want to put to you and what we believe is the really cast-iron logic which underlines that proposal. But that proposal rests on a particular concern, a particular concern of the proliferation of the weapons of mass destruction. And Mr Minty will speak as an expert of long-standing of many decades on this topic. He has had an enduring concern with the question of proliferation of weapons of mass destruction. And Advocate Gumbi will address you also on the question of the importance of our international relations and the obligation to maintain our international commitment in this regard.

Perhaps I should start off by saying firstly that we appreciate the opportunity that has been given to us to make this particular proposal. But I also need to record our appreciation of the efforts that have prior to this application gone into attempting to meet one another on an appropriate process that would safe guard the Commission's interests and safeguard our own interests. And I need to indicate a little bit about that, of the history of those negotiations. And without going into any detail I might say that for some time members of the government have been meeting with members of the TRC. Particularly with a view to addressing certain concerns. Some of those concerns have dropped out of the picture.

But the pre-eminent concern has always been the danger that a hearing such as this would lead to the proliferation of the technologies of mass destruction. In the course of those discussions, although the proposal we are now going to advance was originally proposed, we had commenced work on examining a proposal which would allow for let us say certain documents, certain areas not relevant to the enquiry or not essential to the enquiry to be excluded. And that fundamentally relied on experts evaluating much of the documentary evidence and in the course of that classifying some of them as documents which would indeed constitute or might constitute a threat of proliferation of the technologies of mass destruction. Some which fell into an intermediate category and some which the experts felt because this is not a matter, I am afraid, in which many of us can address without a level of background in chemistry.

On evaluation of those proposals concerns were expressed to the government by the council and in person by Mr Minty that a mixed enquiry would not deal with deep flaws in that process. Particularly as regards the dangers of proliferation, of information which could be construed as proliferation of the technologies of mass destruction. What is evident is that the TRC were sensitive in those negotiations to the concerns that an enquiry such as this could not be as it were held in a cavalier fashion regardless of the concern over proliferation. Whether the mechanism eventually proposed would meet those obligations is why we are here to address you on what we believe is a process which will address those flaws.

May I just start off in putting forward the proposal by emphasising that this is not a matter in which we are going through the motions to be seen to be dealing with an issue in respect of which we have an international obligation. It is a serious and well-founded fear about serious commitments which the country undertakes in regard to the question of proliferation. Mr Minty will address you in due course but I need to emphasise that the question of proliferation of weapons of mass destruction arise from the government's commitment to a panoply of international agreements, a set of agreements in which the many, many nations of the world have come together since 1930 and collectively known as humanitarian law and which deal pre-eminently with an attempt by mankind to deal with the technologies of mass destruction. And I they break down into two or three important categories. And quite frankly I think that the steps in regards to land mines falls within that broad category of humanitarian law and are obligations under those agreements also for similarly or thought to be treated in a similar way as our obligations not to proliferate chemical and biological weapons. These concerns are expressed seriously in South Africa, this commitment that it is found effect in legislation which established the council and which imposes obligations on citizens which Mr Minty will clarify. It is regarded as one of the most important commitments which South Africa has to prevent the proliferation.

Out of that concern comes the proposal that the hearing should be conducted in a way which places a sieve, as it were, on those hearings to prevent leakage or exposure of the technologies of mass destruction. South Africa is not unique. This is an obligation held throughout the world. And our proposal would run something like this, and this is that the enquiry, including the cross-examination of witnesses and the leading of witnesses and the production of documents, should be held in camera. We would ask you to use your powers in terms of Section 33 to do so.

What we are suggesting then is that the record of that enquiry, the verbatim record is released to the public. We are not asking in any way for the enquiry to be curtailed. In fact I am going to argue that our proposal will lead to a fuller enquiry than that proposed by the, in the TRC proposal. And all we are asking is that the information not be disclosed.

On the contrary our proposal is that the record of that enquiry be made public with one caveat. That the TRC, no other body, that the TRC makes a decision before the release of that record as to whether there is information contained in that record which would amount to a breach of our obligation not to proliferate the technologies of mass destruction. So we are not asking for a simple in camera hearing in order to keep matters out of the public eye. We need to emphasise that we want the fullest possible enquiry without limitation. We want that enquiry and the record of that enquiry to be made public and we want it to be made public not only in your report but as a record of this enquiry.

If there are no matters in that enquiry which would meet our obligation not to proliferate then the verbatim record goes out. If there is matters and either the council or another party is able to persuade you that there are certain matters which should be excised from that record then a considerable harm will have been averted.

In only a week or two ago if someone had put this proposal to me I would also have been relatively sceptical because the natural response is to see that what is being advanced possibly is an attempt to hold in camera an enquiry into very serious matters, and to do so in a way which may protect by failing to disclose those involved what took place. And I think that certainly in my case that view would have been largely shaped by the fact that I never properly understood and properly appreciated our commitment to the non-proliferation of the technologies of mass destruction.

What I need to emphasise is certain features of this proposal. It may be a little bit repetitive. Firstly, we make this proposal in public. We do not make it in camera because we want it clearly understood that we are not looking to hide abuses. We are not looking to construct a procedure in which the public would not have the fullest access to the enquiry and the results of that enquiry. We do not want the media or the community to believe that this application rests on the manipulation of the three of us or government by those who would want to hide that enquiry. It is based on government's concerns independent of what took place in the programme.

And I need to say that we do not and cannot address you fully on what took place in the programme because we do not know. That is for you to decide. Nor can we address you fully on what are the issues that are going to come before you. Nor what matters will be the subject of cross-examination by your legal team. Because and I believe quite properly we have not sought to obtain information from the TRC as to where the enquiry is going. Our application is irrelevant to the actual issues which are going to come before the enquiry. Our application says keep this whole matter under camera until you have an opportunity to excise or at least examine what is in there and then produce it to the public.

The opposite proposal, let us say the one that along the lines of which we are beginning to find each other before a close examination revealed it was a flawed one would effectively bar certain documents from the enquiry in the interests of non-disclosure, those which would likely to lead to proliferation. Would either limit cross-examination if those issues were raised or allow the matter to move into camera to deal with it. And as an issue you have got to confront it because the witnesses themselves are going to raise those issues. They are also going to raise issues around Section 118 of the Defence Act or they may do. The greatest weapon you have to ensure a full and unshambled enquiry is to hold it in camera so that questions can be proceeded with and answered without reference to considerations of non-disclosure of the document for any other social purpose.

So what we are suggesting is that the partial or mixed enquiry where people can raise issues and then the matter would move into camera would lead to a disjointed enquiry, it could lead to a partial enquiry. It would inevitably lead to certain documents not being led because they would lead to applications in camera. And quite frankly many of the documents that do constitute a danger are not material. But much more fundamentally, and quite frankly we have raised this in our discussions and have never had an adequate response to it, you are not in control of that process. You cannot say: "We will be vigilant." The witnesses themselves can rely on documents which constitute a danger, which threaten to proliferate, which threaten to reveal the technologies of mass destruction.

Even documents which on the face of it do not do that may require corroboration and explanation and we understand that may be the case by reference to documents which in passim or directly do reveal those technologies. So what we are suggesting is that the process that allows, which is mixed, which allows you to deal with matters of concern by moving into camera or moving out of camera or by excluding documentation is disruptive. It limits, it self-censors your own enquiry. It is not the best mechanism to get to the truth, which is your fundamental concern.

And the proposal we are putting to you is one which is more effective at getting to the truth, an unshambled investigation without witnesses being able to manipulate disclosure issues in order to move issues off the table or to move into camera.

There are other dangers in the proposal. You have no control over the cross-examination. Even the issues in respect of which we can agree to keep certain documents or that certain documents should be removed. In other words an agreement between, as it were, the council or government and your legal team, does not preclude the documents which the witnesses may lead. Documents of which you have not had sight of, of which you are unaware but which constitutes at least part of those documents which Mr Minty has indicated to him unquestionably would be a source of concern to the council.

If I could just dwell on at least one of those issues. It may be possible, let us hypothetically say that witnesses will want to introduce material which we call proliferatable material, material which leads to proliferation. They may want to manipulate this issue of proliferation either by increasing their own status or increasing the importance of what they are doing. Or else to suggest that the allegations made against them are untrue but reveal what they were involved in relate to issues which would not ordinarily be disclosed. So again I am just underlining a point that I believe the TRC cannot control a process which is held in open but which seeks to sieve out the dangerous technologies of mass destruction.

We do not know exactly what is going to be traversed. What we do know is that a number of scientists are going to be questioned closely about their work in the manufacture of weapons of mass destruction and they will be questioned closely as to whether they were actually involved in that. What the purpose of it was and it appears from the documents they may be asked or to suggest to them if they were not working on this weapon but on another weapon. And it seems to us really obvious that there is a possibility that you will be traversing in the course of your enquiry the technical information which relates to the technologies of mass destruction.

I want to just emphasise two aspects. It is government policy to support the work of the Truth Commission. You have before you three people who collectively spent several decades in uncovering human rights violations. But you have here pre-eminently Mr Abdul Minty who for decades was directly involved in uncovering collaboration with the Apartheid government in the fields of manufactured nuclear weapons in a chemical and biological. And he was head of the world campaign. He does not come here lightly to cover up abuses. He does not come here to cover up abuses at all. And for that reason I want to emphasise that the proposal we are putting before you is firstly designed to have a better and more thorough enquiry and we make no proposal which would limit your enquiry. In fact our proposal is one which is an improved model of enquiry delivery.

But secondly, the second aspect, the second leg of the TRC business is transparency, is reconciliation through publication. If you have a better enquiry and that enquiry is released to the public you also having a more transparent enquiry. So we would take offence at the suggestion that we are seeking to cover up because that is not so. We are simply providing an opportunity at the end of the enquiry, the only way in which you can have an effective mechanism to sieve out the dangerous material. It may well be that there will be allegations that some of the stuff should be sieved out but it is your decision. We are not asking in advance for any coverage. We asking only that there be an opportunity at the end to persuade you that there are elements which should be excised.

So the TRC is in control of the process both now in deciding if it goes into camera and eventually if it disregards the argument that there is dangerous and technical information which could lead to proliferation it itself will decide. It will make the decision to excise that material. And if it disregards it.

CHAIRPERSON: I was suggesting that you are true to yourself. You said you might be repetitive, you have made these points and I am sure we have all taken good note of them. Thank you.

MR HAYSOM: Thank you Mr Chairman.

ADV POTGIETER: But Professor Haysom can I just ask you, I am just trying to understand. Does the issue that you raise does that relate to the technical side of what is before us? Or does it also relate because you see we have got a whole array of witnesses.

MR HAYSOM: No it relates to the technical stuff.

ADV POTGIETER: Is that so?

MR HAYSOM: Ja.

ADV POTGIETER: Because some will be talking about the management of this process, not necessarily about the technical side of it.

MR HAYSOM: I would not want to preclude an issue which somebody may want to raise at the end of the day but speaking before you as I do now it would seem to me that the question of the management, financial systems of abuse of human rights violations are in fact what the Committee was doing. In fact what the programme is about in any abuse. It is not an issue which would contribute to proliferation. An uncovering of abuse cannot proliferate. The only thing which would proliferate is the revelation and many of the documents before you, will be technical documents. They will explain the compounds, how they were synthesised, maybe improvements in the synthesis of those documents. That is the obligation which South Africa has. Remember South Africa, that the current government may well not be the author of those technologies. We are not even arguing that, that technology constitutes an important asset which needs to be protected, which is certainly an issue which has been raised before. We are arguing that as the guardians of that technology we have international obligations as to how we deal with it.

ADV POTGIETER: Alright then it is only in respect of that portion, that aspect of the hearing that you are proposing that we should impose a blanket sort of in camera process?

MR HAYSOM: Yes. What I am suggesting is that this thing cannot be regulated by spotting. You cannot isolate, we will conduct this every scientist may in the course of his own defence and he is entitled to explain anything as fully as he wants, rely on the technical information and the purposes of the project or the purposes of the technologies they were involved in. He will have to traverse some of the technical information.

ADV POTGIETER: I think I understand you.

MR HAYSOM: So what we are saying is you cannot leave it to chance. There are just one or two issues I just want to emphasise at the end there. Lawyers frequently talk about, what we are not talking about is embargo, we are talking about a temporary embargo. The only inconvenience is to the journalists and it is a temporary inconvenience. They have arrived here today whereas they are going to have to come back here next week and get the transcript. And I am saying that what is at risk, what is at risk is so important that many inconvenience to the journalists getting it this week as opposed to next week really cannot constitute sufficient cause to hold this matter in camera and then try and balance it and try and make rulings and allow lawyers to jump up and say "No that should be in camera, that is a proliferation issue," and so. So on the balance of convenience we want to argue that our proposal is the better one. If there is a matrix a other way I would put it in the danger of contravening Mr Ntsebeza ruling, if there was a matrix and there were three objectives there would be truth, there would be transparency, publication, reconciliation. That is the second one. And thirdly there would be the dangers of disclosure. The proposal we make gets full marks on all three. The proposal to hold it in camera does not satisfy adequately the rigorous search for truth requirement. It does not and as a consequence meet the other proposal in regard to full publication because you have got a truncated enquiry. And then obviously it does not deal with the dangers posed by the material with which you are dealing. You yourselves now are going to be the ones in the position of the government. I need to say that it is impossible for the government to abuse Section 21 a to hold this matter in camera, to enforce the in camera holding. Section 21 a of the non-proliferation of weapons of mass destruction Act which specifically empowers the minister to order an in camera hearing in respect of any proceeding other than a court proceeding which is likely to lead to the proliferation. We do not want to approach that because it seems to me evidently a matter which is to be decided by the Truth Commission itself. You are co-responsible now for the technologies which are going to be placed in front of you in the course of these proceedings. Mr Chairman I had indicated that Mr Minty would then, would want to address you on certain of the other issues.

CHAIRPERSON: Can I just find out it may be that some of my other colleagues wanted to get some clarification from you, others jumped the gun. Thank you very much. Professor Abdul?

MR MINTY: Thank you Chairperson, Commissioners and members of the panel. I appear before you in my capacity as Chairperson of the South African Council for the non-proliferation of the weapons of mass destruction, a statutory body established by the non-proliferation of weapons of mass destruction Act of 1993. I assumed responsibility as a chairperson in July 1995.

Under the 1993 Act the council has very wide responsibilities and under the section describing the functions of council article 6.1 states: "The Council shall on behalf of the State protect the interests, carry out the responsibilities and fulfil the obligations of the Republic with regard to non-proliferation." Then in article 6 subsection 3 it states:

"In order to achieve its objectives the Council may:-

a. control and manage all activities relating non-proliferation and provide guidance, instructions and information in connection therewith.

c. Supervise and implement matters arising from international conventions, treaties and agreements related to proliferation affairs entered into or ratified by the government of the Republic.

d. obtain or promote the co-operation of departments of State, other government institutions, representatives of any branch of commerce and industry and other persons concerned."

And then it goes on to state under article 6.3(q): "Take the necessary steps to prevent the contravention of the provisions of this Act."

Chair the subject matter that we are concerned about deals with chemical and biological agents and introduces the grave risk of disclosing information that could result in the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction. When we speak of weapons of mass destruction we have in mind nuclear, chemical and biological weapons which pose enormous dangers not just for soldiers or other combatants but for millions of civilians and indeed for humanity as a whole. The fact that we are concerned today about the possible proliferation of weapons of mass destruction places this matter in a special category where the international community has judged it to constitute not only a threat to international peace and security but to the very survival of life itself on our planet. We cannot therefore speak lightly about the risk of proliferation of weapons of mass destruction. It is a very, very different category from dealing with the category of small arms or other conventional weapons whether they are tanks, frigates, fighter planes or anti-personnel land mines.

Lest there be any misunderstanding let me reassure you at the very outset that in seeking an in camera hearing neither I nor the Council wish in any way to interfere, limit or affect the submission of all relevant evidence or hamper the investigations of the TRC regarding South Africa's chemical and biological weapons programme. Indeed since there is substantial sensitive information which in any case cannot be dealt with in open hearings it would in fact better facilitate the work of the Commission to have a thorough, in-depth and comprehensive investigation in camera so that all the issues can be addressed without any restraint of concern about the risk of proliferation.

Once the investigation is concluded the TRC can decide to disclose all information which does not risk the danger of proliferation. There should be no reasonable objection to an in camera hearing and the investigation which is for the purpose of preventing the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.

In speaking of proliferation let me be precise and quote the 1993 Act and states under article 1.3 that: "Biological warfare agent means living organisms including viruses or infectious material derived there from which can be used to cause diseases or death in humans, animals or plants and which usually depend for their primary effects on their ability to multiply on the organism attacked."

And then article 1.5 states:

"Chemical warfare agent means any chemical regardless of the origin or method of production thereof which poses a real or potential risk of being used as a weapon of mass destruction and which through the specific application of its chemical action on life processes can cause death, temporary incapacity or permanent harm to humans, animals or plants."

Chair why do we appeal for an in camera hearing in order to avert the risk of proliferating weapons of mass destruction? The disclosure of information that could result in the proliferation of chemical or biological weapons would constitute a serious contravention of South Africa's obligations as a leading state party to the chemical weapons convention and the biological and toxin weapons convention. As a state party to the CWC, the Chemical Weapon Convention, South Africa has undertaken not to-

"...develop, produce, otherwise acquire or retain chemical weapons or transfer directly or indirectly chemical weapons to any one." And not to "assist, encourage or induce in any way anyone to engage in any activity prohibited to a state party of this convention".

In addition article 7 of the CWC requires South Africa to -

"prohibit natural and legal persons any where on its territory or in any other place under its jurisdiction from undertaking any activity prohibited to a state party under this convention. Not to permit in any place under its control any activity prohibited to a state party".

And to -

"...extend its penal legislation to any activity prohibited under this convention undertaken anywhere by natural persons possessing its nationality in conformity with international law."

The very clear and specific requirement not to proliferate on any front exists in the words "or transfer directly or indirectly chemical weapons to anyone." The obligation accepted by state parties to this convention is that each state will "never under any circumstances" allow proliferation. In terms of article 3 of the biological and toxin weapons convention South Africa has undertaken together with other state parties- "...not to transfer to any recipient whatsoever directly or indirectly and not in any way to assist, encourage or induce any state, group of states or international organisations to manufacture or otherwise acquire any of the agents, toxins, weapons, equipment or means of delivery specified in article 1 of the convention."

Chair once again the clear obligation not to proliferate exists in the words "not to transfer to any recipient whatsoever directly or indirectly." Besides the fact that any proliferation would constitute a grave breach of our international legal obligations arising out of being a state party to the two international conventions, such proliferation would also contravene (a) the South African non-proliferation of weapons of mass destruction Act 1993. As well as (b) the declared policy of the government on the non-proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.

The 1993 Act was promulgated -

"to provide for control over weapons of mass destruction and the establishment of a council to control and manage matters relating to the proliferation of such weapons in the Republic."

Despite the comprehensive mandate of the Council the question of proliferation is considered to be so serious that the 1993 Act with regard to confidentiality states in article 21.2(a):

"If the minister is of the opinion that the disclosure of certain information may compromise the functions of the Council or the interests of the industry he may direct that any proceedings excluding court proceedings be held in camera."

Like all state parties South Africa has to take its international obligations to treaties and conventions seriously and ensure that nothing is done to undermine or violate them or to jeopardise the maintenance of international peace and security. We should not approach the grave matter of proliferation in such a manner as to raise doubts or concerns about democratic South Africa's commitment to solemn international obligations. We need to be seen not like in the past when the regime acted as an outlaw violating all basic norms of international behaviour but as a new member of the international community that acts as a good and responsible world citizen which will honour and comply with the letter and spirit of our international obligations.

If states unilaterally decide to act in a manner that involves risking proliferation it would not only seem to undermine the provisions of treaties and conventions but also raise questions about the good faith and reliability of those states. Of course any breach of the provisions of treaties and conventions would also create concerns about the value of specific safe guard provisions which are often agreed in painstaking multilateral negotiations on issues that affect international peace and security.

Full compliance with our declared policies and national legislation as well as with international treaties and conventions is critical and there must be no doubt as to whether through our legitimate consideration of human rights violations we are prepared to risk the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction. Democratic South Africa has inherited a terrible legacy including everything associated with the costly and destructive development of nuclear weapons. We are the first and so far only country that has given up nuclear weapons. And in August 1994 the cabinet decided that South Africa should

1 - Be an active participant in the various non-proliferation regimes and supplier groups.

And -

2 - adopt positions supporting the non-proliferation of weapons of mass destruction with the goal or promoting international peace and security.

Chair democratic South Africa is today recognised by members of the non-aligning movement and the OAU as well as by the developed world and the nuclear weapon states as a major player in matters of global disarmament and non-proliferation. South Africa has the standing and the capacity to promote dialogue and interaction at a global level often regarding issues which have hither to divided the north and the south. And our initiatives have led to consensus being reached on the extension of the nuclear non-proliferation treaty which was subsequently followed by Africa declaring itself a nuclear weapon free zone. We are members of the NPT, the CWC and the BTWC. Three areas relating to weapons of mass destruction.

CHAIRPERSON: What are all those?

MR MINTY: The first one, the NPT is the nuclear non-proliferation treaty, the CWC is the chemical weapon convention and the BTWC is the biological and toxin weapons convention.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very much.

MR MINTY: South Africa Chair is also a signatory to the comprehensive nuclear test ban treaty often described as the CTBT and is an active member of the conference on disarmament in Geneva. South Africa is the designated permanent member for Africa of the Board of Governors of the International Atomic Energy Agency, IAEA in Vienna. South Africa has been participating actively in the preparatory commission for the prohibition of chemical weapons and our ambassador in Geneva played a leading role in the preparatory commission of the comprehensive test ban treaty organisation. We are regarded as one of the leading participants in the negotiations of the BTWC, the Biological Toxin Weapons Convention ad hoc group mandated to establish an effective verification protocol for the convention.

I should perhaps point out that the strictest convention that we have with regard to weapons of mass destruction is really the Chemical Weapon Convention. The nuclear non-proliferation treaty has not outlawed nuclear weapons and the biological and toxin weapon convention also does not have proper procedures for verification.

In addition Sir, South Africa is also a member of the nuclear suppliers group and the Sanger Committee which deals with nuclear matters. As well as the Missile Technology Control Regime. In all these and other groupings and structures democratic South Africa plays a major role in efforts to make our world a safer place and our full compliance with our international obligations not to proliferate have never been brought into question. Add to this the central role played by South Africa in chairing the Oslo negotiations which resulted in the adoption of the international treaty to ban anti-personal land mines and it is then possible to acknowledge how seriously and successfully we are discharging our responsibilities to promote global disarmament and non-proliferation.

South Africa's reputation has not been built on rhetoric or general statements about good intentions but on concrete achievements involving highly complex technical and painstaking negotiations through which we have demonstrated not only our commitment but also our capability to make a solid contribution to promote international peace and security.

Chair all these achievements and our future role in global negotiations can be undermined if the international community is to perceive us as not acting with the responsibility in a matter as grave as risking the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction. In asking therefore for an in camera process the Council is not in any way preventing the TRC from obtaining all the evidence and conducting a thorough investigation but simply requesting that precaution is taken not to risk proliferation in breach of our national policy and legislation and our solemn international obligations. Thank you Chairperson.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very much. Any preliminary questions from yourselves? No? Thank you very much Abdul. There was a suggestion that maybe you might let some 10 the copies of your "dinges" be made available.

MR HAYSOM: Yes in fact we can take steps now to have them (...indistinct)

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you. Advocate Gumbi? Obviously all three of you, your submissions I did not ask you because Professor Haysom you did not look like you had a typed script.

MR HAYSOM: No Mr Chairman I did not have a typed script. Both of us were really asked to assist in this matter over the weekend and we have not been able to (...indistinct)

CHAIRPERSON: Yes so I was not discriminating against you. Advocate?

MS GUMBI: Thank you Chairperson. I must say that of the three of us Mr Minty has always been the better organised one. Chairperson very, very briefly I think from what Mr Minty has said it is quite clear that South Africa has taken a leading moral position on matters of non-proliferation. There is no doubt in our mind that there will be quite a number of competitors for that position. And if South Africa is found to have acted in a manner which results in some proliferation in terms of international obligations and international standing it will be very easy to then discredit us in carrying out this policy that Mr Minty has outlined. We have several agreements on confidentiality with many countries relating to this issue.

And Chairperson I really want to address you on the issue, when I say we have the irony of this case is really not lost on us nor on the government. As Professor Haysom said Mr Minty and many others fought very hard to expose some of the activities of the previous government. Fought very hard to ensure that the United Nations and the world community adopts certain measures against the previous government.

The irony of it Chairperson is that it is this government then that has to act in a manner which suggests the protection of those past transgressions. Chairperson the members of the Commission would be aware of many other instances where we have had to go through very painful negotiations on our part which were interpreted as seeking to promote or protect the activities of the previous Apartheid State but which negotiations placed certain obligations unfortunately on this government.

Now we are here talking about activities and programmes that were conducted by the previous government but which as a result of the peaceful transition that we have place obligations on this particular government. We have cases where we are paying civil penalties, we are paying criminal penalties for activities of the previous government. And Chairperson I have been told that part of it is that we are being punished for having had a peaceful transition in South Africa. Because legally in terms of international law if we had had a violent overthrow or a revolution we would then not necessarily become the legal successor of the previous government which means that we would not have had to pay the debts of the Apartheid government for programmes or activities that were directed at us in the past.

We therefore stand here inheriting the sins of the past but which placed certain obligations on us to act as a responsible member of the international community. Chairperson we occupy a specific place in the international community in disarmament.

Part of what Mr Minty was saying was that when the non-proliferation treaty had to be extended South Africa put proposals on the table, a statement of principles which finally brought all the member states around an agreement on proliferation. When those negotiations took place in New York it was clear that there were two terms that were at loggerheads. But we put a proposal on the table which finally got a consensus agreement and a commitment to disarmament eventually. And the reason we were able to do that was because of the way in which the new government has acted in matters of non-proliferation.

We or the South African rather, Chairperson, would really want to continue to take a leading role in matters of non-proliferation, in matters of chemical warfare, in matters of disarmament finally. And for that reason we would not like to lightly be accused of ourselves ignoring those international obligations. We would therefore Chairperson ask the Commission to pause and reflect as you have done in the past when you think about the questions of is this a protection of past activities and to really say to you that as I have said that it is very ironic that we are here to put that case before you.

Finally Chairperson, whatever the decision that the Commission reaches on this matter we would plead with the Commission to give us an opportunity to reflect on that decision before the next step is taken as a government and to reflect on what steps may be taken depending on the decision that you reach. Mr Minty here would be the first one to slap us with an order and those steps Chairperson are not going to be steps that would be out of line with what the Commission decides. I mean it may just be a letter that is sent to Vienna to say well as a government this a position that we took in order to comply with our obligations and we would ask for that opportunity to reflect. Thank you Chair.

CHAIRPERSON: Are there any questions you want to ask? Dumisa?

MR NTSEBEZA: Thank you Chairperson. I just want to ask from the representative of government, any of the three of you on the question of the media. I think your proposal in a large measure satisfies only a section of the media, the print media. In the sense that if we are to be inclined to fall in line with your proposal and to the extent that a transcript would be made available to journalists it would assist in a large measure the print media. But the electronic media in the form of radios, certainly in the form of television would be disadvantaged by that. Would you have any ways in which you think that can be accommodated if it can be accommodated within the framework of your proposal?

MR HAYSOM: Essentially I understand your point to be that if you were to conduct an enquiry over five days you would have regular sound bites and television footage and there would be visibility. Whereas in our proposal the journalist would get too much of it in a rush. They would get a comprehensive report or a comprehensive summary. That may well be the case but I think that there are ways also of dealing if this enquiry is going to be and traverse the issues it intends to traverse it is possible to deal with the release of the document over several days for radio journalists to deal with it perhaps comprehensively and more effectively because it is done when looking at the total picture of whatever emerges rather than in a day by day basis. But I am not sure that one can go so far as to say is because people will get one full picture as opposed to bits and pieces there is prejudice, sufficient prejudice to radio and print. Certainly the fact that it is coming out in the form of a transcript does not preclude it being released in a way which gives at least some visual images and allows radio journalists to comment on it as they would normally do through commentary and interviewing people on the nature of, on the evidence submitted. And even interviewing the people who gave evidence because they will now have that evidence in front of them and they would be in a position to approach them.

MR NTSEBEZA: How would we accommodate television journalists who would like to have footage of the witnesses as they testify in respect of those sections. Let's say for instance at the end of the five day period where there be, were there a mechanism in terms of which we could capture this whole thing on video as well. I am not addressing that. I just want you to reflect on it. Now what happens at the end of the period where we say okay we are satisfied, that is the decision one has to make, we are satisfied that all of these images have nothing to do to proliferate, with proliferation. But you know if it is held in camera I would assume that there would be no television cameras, there would be no photographers and what goes to the transcript would only be recorded in the mechanical recorders. I just wanted some creative ways in which you think you can suggest as how we could accommodate the media.

MR HAYSOM: The fact that it is in camera does not preclude a full tape transcript of the proceedings subject only to the same remarks which would be made in respect of the transcript. In other words if there happens to be an application for an excision of a particular document or a particular chemical formulae and you agree to it then that same excision could be made in the tape recording. And I would understand that you do keep full tape recording of the proceedings. There is nothing to stop the same process, in fact I had assumed that there would be a full TV transcript of the proceedings and the same remarks would apply. So we think, you know that would be a process of dealing with all those particular objections.

MR NTSEBEZA: I just wanted it to be on the record. You will be surprised.

CHAIRPERSON: Any other questions for the panel. Hanif is there anything that you want to say?

MR VALLY: Yes thank you Archbishop. I will be very brief in my response Archbishop.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you.

MR VALLY: Archbishop firstly let's quickly talk about the Act. This is the Act which Mr Minty quoted extensively, non-proliferation of Weapons of Mass Destruction Act number 87 of 1993. The Act defines non-proliferation as meaning the non-proliferation of weapons of mass destruction. Now this is of importance to us. What we are accused of potentially doing if we have a public hearing is proliferating weapons of mass destruction. We will not be doing so, period.

Similarly Mr Minty has quoted a number of international conventions. Most important of which is the chemical weapons convention. Having looked at those we are not in breach of any of those regulations or any of the provisions thereof. South Africa has signed, ratified and incorporated it into our domestic law. Again there is no specific section which anyone can point out to that we are in breach of by having a public hearing.

We are not insensitive to these issues. We have been proactive on this issue from the outset. This hearing is two years in the making. Leading up to this hearing Archbishop we have proactively approached members of government, we have negotiated various issues and we have discussed aspects to the extent of agreeing to withdraw certain documentation from this hearing and making an application which I intend making after this issue has resolved that certain documents do not go out to the media. This is documents with formulae, etc. We are not interested in the details of manufacture or formulae but we are interested in the facts of manufacture that certain things were in fact made and more important were they in fact used. In trying to do this because the definition of non-proliferation as I have just quoted to you does not really help us, we worked on two principles.

One, where technical details appear that will appear others to produce the weapon concern, we agree the technical detail be withheld from the public proceedings.

And two, those documents which represent official exchanges between South African and foreign governments should not form part of the public proceedings. That is a test we used. And on the basis of that test we have withdrawn certain documents which we will not use at all and there are certain documents which after this issue has been resolved we will ask the panel to in terms of Section 33 exclude from public distribution.

This we reached after a long series of negotiations. We did not do this in isolation. A long series of negotiations with Mr Minty's department and other people. Again I want to emphasise we are not averse to the concerns being raised and we are respectful of meeting those concerns. But we do not believe that a public hearing is going in any way proliferate weapons of mass destruction.

On the contrary we are of the opinion that the very fact that we have this kind of hearing is because secrecy breeds proliferation. There is a very important argument internationally that the more these kinds of issues are aired and aired publicly the better chance of non-proliferation. Rather than these things being kept secret. Now I have a respect for many human rights conventions and also humanitarian conventions like the chemical weapons convention is but there is some aspects of it we do not always agree with. Now I am not saying we are in breach, understand this.

I just want to make one small point. If you use teargas in terms of the convention against forces outside the country you must report it. If you use teargas on your own people you do not have to report it. So what I am saying is those conventions are for the interests of states as well. They do not always interact and be responsible towards people of their own countries. Why I am saying this is I am saying that the watch dog on proliferation is not necessarily an outside agency. It is an agency like ours, a Truth Commission which is one of the building blocks of democracy in this country. And why do I say this? We are obliged in terms of our Act to advise the government of what steps should be taken to prevent the future violation of human rights.

And the very fact, and I say this with not total confidence because we have been slapped around by them a little as well, but the very fact of our public and transparent hearings and the conveying thereof by the media has resulted in this unique interaction with our community which I would submit has had an impact on the psyche of our country. And we need to continue with that transparency and interaction which is through the medium of direct and immediate conveying of what is happening through our processes and what we are in fact discovering. Any suggestion of an in camera hearing and then going public will raise concerns what is being concealed, what is not being concealed.

If we openly exclude certain things with the principles in mind that we do not want to proliferate any weapons of mass destruction or let out any formulae, we have gone much further, let out any formulae which may lead to any drug, etc or chemical compounds being manufactured by any person, we have agreed to exclude.

We must also examine the history of our Act. There was a time when the Act was in its drafting stage there were attempts to close certain hearings to the public and there was a massive uproar by NGO's forcing parliament to change its attitude, resulting in Section 33 being included as part of our Act. Section 33 clearly says that our hearings must be public and transparent with the proviso about certain in camera hearings.

Now what are we talking about, why do we want this in public? We want to show and this will be possibly led through evidence and we hope we can get all the evidence forward, to put it forward but some of the evidence we want to lead is some of the things that happened under the guise of a chemical and a biological weapons programme, and I say guise. What kind of chemical and biological weapons programme produces thallium in beer, sugar with salmonella, whisky with paraquat, baboon foetuses? One can go on. This was part of our chemical and biological weapon programme. What kind of chemical and biological weapon programme is one which is involved in examining fertility rates of black women? Very sinister stuff. And this is what is going to come out we hope in the next few days of hearing. And this is very important for the community to hear in a public hearing openly and transparently.

Just two brief issues I want to finish off with, Archbishop. The one is we live in a new era of information production and accessibility. Just playing on the internet we have got the formula of serrin, of mustard gas, of somen gas. We have got the formula of CR gas which is supposed to be a very important breakthrough for our chemical industry. There is even information here on basic rocket bomb, multiple warhead rocket bombs. This is on the internet. That is the first issue.

The second issue is the names of the persons who are being called as witnesses are already known through the media. They have been widely reported upon and so there is no secrets there as such.

So we are not coming out with any information which will in any way and I say this with respect, impact on our international treaty obligations. The issue then is this and I am, you know with respect to Mr Minty he has quoted a number of the obligations and we were proactive. We in fact went to the proliferation Council, we obtained all our relevant international conventions and our obligations therein and we examined those. We talked to international human rights NGO people who are involved in this particular area to get their views and they do not feel that by holding this hearing we will be proliferating.

I just want to conclude by saying what is the concern. The first concern is we will breach our international conventions. No proof of this and I respectfully submit we will not.

The second one is our hearings may be abused by witnesses to proliferate. I do not believe that this panel will not be able to stop such proliferation if it at all happens. I believe that if there is going to be any sensitivities around those issues and the panel has been sensitised they will be in a position before someone blurts out anything, to stop them.

And thirdly that the hearing may be disruptive. That is par for the cause. We have had a number of hearings where people exercised their rights in terms of the Act, raised objections, raised additional points, etc. That is what we are used to and there is no guarantee that those sorts of disruptions will not take place even if it is in camera. It goes with the terrain. I am trying to see if there is any specific point Mr Chairperson that I have not covered which was covered by my colleagues.

CHAIRPERSON: Learned friends.

MR VALLY: They are my learned friends. In conclusion I would say two things. If there is a commitment to eventual disarmament as a goal then this is a first step.

Number two in respect of, we have heard that there is a bit of a club in terms of Section 21 of the non-proliferation weapon of mass destruction Act which says: "If the Minister is of the opinion," and the Minister we are talking about here is the Minister of Trade and Industry.

"If the Minister is of opinion the disclosure of certain information may compromise the functions of the Council or the interests of the industry he may direct that any proceedings excluding court proceedings be held in camera."

And we respect the fact that I think it was indicated that there would not be, various parties would not be using this section. There has been this request regarding time to reflect, I hope it is simply to send a letter to Vienna or whatever but we are not talking about court applications, especially since we have been involved in negotiations on this issue for over two years. Thank you Mr Chairperson.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very much. Alex wanted to say something and then.

DR BORAINE: Chairperson I want to take up only one issue and it is the one that Mr Hanif has alluded to in his closing remarks. Just so that we can get absolute clarity we want to give due weight to all the arguments that we have heard and I, just so that there is no confusion. Advocate Gumbi at the very end of your submission you made a request that if whatever the decision of this panel would be you would like to be informed so that any necessary steps could be taken and you quoted as one of those the letter to Vienna, which certainly is very innocuous. In the course of Mr Minty's and your own presentation you did refer to certain powers that the Minister has and Mr Hanif has just referred to that. Can you tell this panel is there any consideration at all that if the panel should decide that the proceedings will be in public that the Minister or the government would consider taking action by way of prohibiting the TRC from continuing if it should agree to continue in public?

MS GUMBI: Well perhaps I can respond very directly to that to say that the Minister of trade and industry has certainly not been consulted with that in mind to say you know; "Would you or would the government exercise this particular authority?" All we were asked to request was to just give a short, very brief time to reflect on it. And if the ruling should be that the matter should be held in public then the government would try to move towards protecting itself. And that is why I used an example of a letter. You know if you have a disclaimer in a letter then as a member state you may be found not to have contravened your obligations because you have put it on record with the necessary authority to say you know:

"We disassociate ourselves from this, this is the position that we put as a government but it is a decision of another body. It is not our decision."

So I certainly am unable to say specifically what is going to happen. All I know is that our principals will be in Cape Town today to hear what the result is and reflect on it.

MR HAYSOM: I have to, sorry can I just add something there. It seems to me also that if you take a decision for example that the proceedings should continue in public that the Council may need to secure legal representation at the hearing to attempt in a fashion suggested by Mr Vally to protect its interest as being the only method left to it in the rough and tumble of the enquiry. So that would be one issue which we have not been able to address.

DR BORAINE: Chair there are just two additional comments I want to make. One a large number of witnesses have been brought to this hearing. Notices have been given, a great deal of preparation has gone into this. It would be extraordinarily difficult for us to delay the hearing. And I do not want to in any way anticipate whatever the decision of the panel may be. We will go and talk about this and think about it very hard. But I have to say also that I am even more concerned now having listened to Advocate Gumbi because there certainly does appear to me, and if I am wrong please correct me because this is a factor we would have to take into account, but it does seem to me somewhat ominous that the principals would have to be informed. Of course that is right but there would be need time for reflection, possible taking of legal advice which sounds as if one of the considerations may be the Minister acting on the powers that he has in terms of the Act of enforcing this hearing to be in camera. And I am not sure of you can give me any assurances now but certainly that would assist us in our own deliberations when this panel is adjourned.

MS GUMBI: Well it certainly was not meant to sound ominous Chairperson or Deputy Chair. It is just that it is very difficult for me to jump into the minds of our principals and try and anticipate which way it would go. You know that this matter has been discussed on several occasions with the man and I think our presentation today as you heard Professor Haysom say was as a result of some real detailed reflection now lately after all the processes that we had gone through to examine the 50/50 approach. You know the joint, disjointed hearing and all that. So I am certain that you can hear some real coherent voice coming out to say we have really now had a reflection on the matter.

DR BORAINE: Can I just reassure you that there has never been a suggestion in any of the discussions that, that kind of power would be brought into place. I think neither of us are in a way to say in which way government would respond but certainly when we discussed it this morning and discussed the need possibly to be afforded an opportunity is actually or particularly related to the need to not take legal advice but to have a lawyer here in the proceedings. Because we are not the persons who are going to sit here and monitor.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very much. Dumisa?

MR NTSEBEZA: Thank you Chair. I actually do not seek guarantees from the government. I would be very uncomfortable if I were to be perceived to be acting on a guarantee from government that they will not interfere. My Vally if I could just put the question to you. As I understand the question from the applicants they are not saying that whatever transpires in the course of these proceedings will never be made public. In fact I think that is the (...indistinct) that all the proceedings will be made public when you as the Commission have decided to make them public. They are also not saying that you should not have a full enquiry. In fact they are saying you have decided to self-censor yourselves because you have already decided that certain documentation will not be used because you perceive it to be documentation that might proliferate. They say use the method of an in camera hearing for purposes of using even those documents which you thought were they to be used in public are going to be proliferation. But that it must be your decision at the end of time and yours alone to release whatever you think ought to be released. Without taking the risks of some documents being sprung on you or of human error in the heat of a public hearing allowing certain documents for you only to realise after harm has been done that, that is a document on further reflection that you should not have used. Because in fact it does exactly what you thought it would not do. In other words there can be no guarantee that you could be vigilant and vigilant to an extent that you might be able to prevent witnesses, let alone documents, witnesses from dealing with issues that we are not aware of ahead of time but which you could not stop from circulating throughout the world before you could prevent harm from taking place. That is what I understand to be the essence of their argument. What are you saying to those specific concerns?

MR VALLY: Mr Ntsebeza the first point I want to make is our Act is clear, Section 33 subject to provisions of the section the hearings of the Commission shall be open to the public. That is part of the whole procedure and modus operandi of this Commission. As we enjoined to by parliament.

The second point I want to make is that the documents we are talking about are not documents that we have taken willy-nilly. We have taken a whole set of documents, we have considered it carefully. Thereafter we entered into negotiations with government. And yes we have self-censored ourselves not because we were convinced that these issues would lead to proliferation but to meet the concerns that were raised with us. So we remove some documents from the public domain completely we did not use at all and some documents we agreed and I will make this application to the panel after this is decided that these will not be released to the press to meet the concerns being raised with us.

I have told you our views. Our views are that this information is freely available. And with respect to the scientists involved our opinion is the science is poor. The science is not particularly good.

And then the third point you raised Mr Ntsebeza is the issue of harm by witnesses giving evidence. How much can a person blurt out which they cannot do once they walk out of our doors? If they wanted to do something of this sort then they would have done it. We have already heard stories of certain people going to Libya. Now they wait on a transnet contract, maybe it had nothing to do with chemical weapons. But it is not the fact of them sitting here giving evidence which is going to be the issue of whether they are going to give out information or not. The press is there, there are enough journalists who will be willing to hear anyone whether it is within our premises or outside our premises.

So that issue, with respect that some one in a few minutes will blurt out things I do not believe holds water. I think I have covered all three points you have raised Mr Ntsebeza.

MR NTSEBEZA: But Mr Vally just on what you have said very lastly, do you think that any witness who had been enjoined to confidentiality and actually been ordered by this confidentiality would breach that confidentiality simply because we have no hold over their mouths? Are you suggesting that even if, let's assume that we were inclined to go the direction of having the proceedings in camera and then every witness who came was enjoined and actually sworn to confidentiality. Are you saying that does not matter because they could walk out of here and have press interviews.

CHAIRPERSON: (...indistinct) before. (...indistinct) debate.

MR NTSEBEZA: Can I have a reply?

MR VALLY: Ja it is going to be difficult to say that you will not repeat anything you say here when it is in a public hearing. There will be some documents which we were asked not to be released to the press. But the source of these documents by far the majority if not, by far the majority were obtained from some of the people. They were working with these documents in fact they were found in the possession of some of the witnesses. So this is not new information that we are releasing. But I am not clear as to exactly what the issue is. Thank you Mr Chair.

CHAIRPERSON: Denzil?

ADV POTGIETER: Thank you Chairperson. Mr Vally just as a matter of law do you accept that the obligation not to proliferate overrides the provision in our Act relating to full disclosure public hearings, transparency and so on? What is your position on that one first?

MR VALLY: It is arguable but I suspect simply because apparently there is no provision in our Act which says that our Act supersedes other acts but it is arguable I think it will be question of interpretation. The courts will try and see if you can compromise between the two and if you cannot compromise then they will take the more emphatic provision. But I want to stress Mr Potgieter that we do not want to proliferate. We honestly are committed not to proliferate. And how we are going to proliferate is if witnesses blurt out things. I have not heard anything else. The documents we have gone through extensively with various officials. We have raised (...intervention)

ADV POTGIETER: Sorry, thank you, sorry. No I understand that point, you have made that point. So what we are really talking about is a process, we are in agreement that our proceedings here should not contribute towards proliferation. And we talking of process, how do we cater for that problem? Now the point was raised by Professor Haysom, he said that the question of control in cross-examination for example there is a potential that we might be falling foul of this obligation that we accept not to proliferate. What is your response to that?

MR VALLY: We hoping and we still suggested that the non-proliferation Council as well as the other persons who have concerns about this issue and in fact we would enjoin the panellists themselves. First of all the people with a direct interest and a direct statutory obligation, the non-proliferation Council should have representation where they can stop such things from happening. And secondly the panellists themselves should be sensitive to this issue. That is all I can suggest. I certainly will be sensitive to any notion of proliferation and if I have an opportunity and the issue arises I will certainly also object.

ADV POTGIETER: Thank you Mr Vally.

CHAIRPERSON: Professor do you have any? I gather I have to give you a "woordjie."

MR HAYSOM: Mr Chairman can I perhaps just clarify one or two issues which have emerged. I see the point has been made and I have been rebuked with making it too often but it did emerge again as it emerged repeatedly during our negotiations which is why I repeat it, is that we are not seeking to have the activities of the chemical and biological programme kept secret. We are not allowing you or suggesting that it is up to you as to whether to release it, we are asking you to release all the information about that particular programme.

The second thing is, really the question is what is the most adequate forum in which this particular enquiry can take? And we really put forward the problems associated with an enquiry. And I just want to. You see we have not gone into the details and we do not think that, that would be appropriate here. This is what is going to be questioned, this is what they are going to reply and we do not know exactly where it is going to go. What we do know is this, there is serious difference of opinion between the scientists as to what constitutes proliferation. Your experts would differ from somebody else's experts. So that is a problem in the first instance. So the assessment as to what constitutes proliferation and what should be kept out is itself a difficult problem.

Secondly, as I understand it there are documents and technical documents but some people say this is proliferation and that is not proliferation but even the documents which are not proliferation documents frequently call upon a witness to go back to his laboratory and produce his stuff to prove that it does not have the sinister imputation. And in fact some times to prove that it does have the sinister imputation that he wants to construct in regard to it. It may be alleged that he was doing something, a rogue operation on his own to make money and he may want to come and say: "No, no what I was actually doing was producing this and here is my material." I am not really in a position to say where and what witness and what thing would constitute a danger. All I know is that it is really like rolling the dice.

And our concern and the need to reappraise quite frankly the very helpful work that had been done together between us and your legal team came because of this unpredictable element.

Thirdly, in the course of our debates the issue has been raised the documents have been leaked or there is going to be a criminal trial down the line in which some of the documents would come out. Really it is cold comfort to us to know that certain documents have already found their way into the hands of the press or may have. It is cold comfort that there were documents that some of the potential scientists may have spoken to the press. We are confronted with our obligation to safe guard this dangerous thing, this technology, this information and we have to do the best we have and as I had indicated earlier I think you are in the same position as us.

MS GUMBI: Chairperson just one word to add on that. The obligation is on the government not to proliferate. Now you do not have the same obligation I suppose on leaks. Now the government cannot join that process effectively and become itself the agent which proliferates. That is the difference in Mr Hanif's argument.

MR VALLY: ...(inaudible) different obligation from people who put things on the internet.

MS GUMBI: People who put things on the internet it is not the government. If it is found that in fact it is this government which put those things on the internet then we are going to be censored. So we cannot adopt that attitude at all.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very much. I think we all want to have a cup of tea. Witnesses and their lawyers if you went down to our tea room on the 7th floor whilst the panel tries to work out all these conundrums here. And I think if we resumes at eleven thirty we will try eleven thirty. We adjourn.

COMMITTEE ADJOURNS.

ON RESUMPTION:

CHAIRPERSON: Abdul are your colleagues here, have they disappeared?

MR MINTY: No they are still around. They are reflecting.

CHAIRPERSON: We resume.

R U L I N G

The panel has considered very seriously the points that were put before it by yourselves and we do want to put on record our very deep appreciation.

Advocate Gumbi spoke about the ironies of the situation but we would want to stress that it says a very great deal about our country that the State as represented by yourselves could come before a body such as this one to debate and argue for the position of the State when perhaps in the past it might have been slightly different. We appreciate that very, very much and we are aware too of the very important obligations that you have put before us. The international obligations of the State with regard to the matters that have been canvassed.

We believe that a great deal is being said about the kind of society we want to help see established in this land to have what has been a very important feature of the Commission the openness, the transparency, and therefore we believe that the hearing should continue as an open hearing but with the very important caveats that have been entered.

We are aware of your concern about a disruptive in and out of camera, in camera, in public but I can assure you that the panel and those leading evidence are people who are steeled I think and we would very quickly be able to spot situations where some one was seeking to exploit this hearing for nefarious purposes. We would want to suggest that what was mooted by yourselves that if our decision were to be for an open hearing then the State should be represented by whoever they want to choose obviously but certainly some one with legal training. And in order to enable that to happen we will adjourn until two 'o clock. Thank you.

COMMITTEE ADJOURNS

ON RESUMPTION:

CHAIRPERSON: Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back again. I believe there are legal representatives of witnesses or of the witness was going to be called, and I would ask you to place yourselves formally on the record.

MR CURRIN: Thank you, Mr Chairman, my name is Brian Currin and I am here representing Dr Jan Lourens. I believe he will be the first witness called to testify.

CHAIRPERSON: Maybe - let's have all the other legal representatives placing themselves on record, just in case.

MR CILLIERS: Mag dit u behaag, my van is Cilliers. Ek verskyn in opdrag van Menere Adolf Malan Prokureurs, saam met my geleerde kollega, Mnr van Zyl, vir Dr Basson, Dr Neethling, Dr Swanepoel en Dr Myburgh.

CHAIRPERSON: Dankie.

MNR DU PLESSIS: H J Du Plessis van die firma D P du Plessis Prokureurs in Pretoria en ek tree op namens Generaal Knobel.

MR POLSEN: Mr Chairman, my name is J R G Polsen of firm Ruth & Wessels, and I act on behalf of Doctors Koekemoer, Van Rensburg, Odendal, yes, I think there may be one or two others.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very much, gentlemen. May I just mention that there are simultaneous translation facilities. I sometimes assume, because you have appeared in the Commission for so long, that some of the things are not worth mentioning. Both witnesses and counsel will obviously be entitled to express themselves in the language they are best comfortable with. Mr Vally?

MR VALLY: Thank you, Mr Chairperson. There are three items I want to bring to the attention of the panel. The first item is that we were contacted by Advocate Gumbi, who advised us that they are unable to arrange counsel at short notice, that they hope to have counsel ready by - or instructed by tomorrow morning. There's a number of bureaucratic measures which have to be taken before they can brief counsel. They've asked us if it is possible for us to stand the matter down until tomorrow morning. We've indicated that it will not be practical for us to do so, and in any event, most of the witnesses being called to give evidence today, will not, we believe, deal with matters which will raise any concerns with them. So I have indicated to her that we will be going on today.

CHAIRPERSON: Very well, Mr Vally.

MR VALLY: The other two items are the following, in our discussion with various representatives of Government regarding the documentation which will be made available, we did make some concessions and I want to place on record what agreements we have, and I'll motivate these issues if necessary. There are three categories.

The first category is documents which we will not be using or referring to at all.

The second category is documents that we will be using and referring to, but, and I'll motivate just now, we will ask the Commission or the panel to rule that the information contained therein is not made available to the public or to the press. And thirdly there will be documents that we will be using which will be made available to the public and to the press.

CHAIRPERSON: I didn't get the second category.

MR VALLY: The second category is, I will ask for a ruling in terms of section 33(2)(b), directed,

"No person may in any manner make public any information which may" -

Sorry, ©, I beg your pardon, let me just find the exact section, alright, directed - sorry it's section 33(2), firstly (a), directed,

"No information relating to proceedings or any part thereof"

the part thereof I'm referring to are certain documents which I will indicate to the Chair right now,

"... shall be made public in any manner."

There are certain documents which it is felt, may lead to proliferation, we believe it's necessary for our hearing, but we are prepared to concede that it not be made public in view of the possibility of proliferation relating to those documents. Could I indicate to the panel which documents I am referring to. I would hope that I don't have to argue the issue again, because I think it's been sufficiently canvassed prior to the luncheon break. We're working on two tests, the one is "Will it harm interstate confidentiality", that is vice versa South Africa and other states, and two, "Is there a potential proliferation", more specifically, can people use those documents to make weapons, be they chemical or biological. Could I proceed?

CHAIRPERSON: Yes, Mr Vally.

MR VALLY: Thank you. You should have an index of documents with you. The first document is document - this category are the documents which we will not be using at all, and which should not be made public in any manner whatsoever.

The first document is document 9 - alright, I won't describe these documents, because I've been advised it may defeat the purpose. It involves those two issues, either Interstate confidentiality, or possible proliferation. So it's documents 9, 21 - 23 inclusive, 25 and 60.

The next documents are documents which we will refer to, but there should be a ruling on that these are not in any way published. That is document no 4, documents 9 - 20, sorry, 19 and 20, document 59, document 65, 66, 71, 72, 74, 75 and 81, as well as document no 24. So this is the category which we will be referring to, but which will not be published, and I would like the Commission to make a ruling in terms of section 33(2) that no person will be allowed to disseminate or publish those documents in the second category.

Finally, Mr Chair, whilst we will be using the rest of the documents, there are documents which we believe are in a sense innocuous, but they do have chemical formulae. It doesn't take our case any further, there's no particular public need to know those formulae, I believe it is largely accessible from various chemistry textbooks, but in any event, we should not distribute those documents, and from time to time, when we come to those documents, I will request that the Commission that those not be published as well. Thank you, Mr Chair, that concludes my second point.

CHAIRPERSON: But how are those documents different from documents in category 2?

MR VALLY: They differ from documents in category 2 in that we believe that the proliferation danger contained in there is not even probable, but the fact is that they do have chemical formulae, the fact is that we don't need reference to those chemical formulae for the purposes of our hearing and rather than disseminate those chemical formulae which are accessible elsewhere, it shouldn't be us who does that.

CHAIRPERSON: Are you through, Mr Vally?

MR VALLY: On my second point, yes, Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: Are you through on all the points?

MR VALLY: No, because the third point is a completely different one. The third point, in preparing for this hearing, we've had to negotiate not only the issue of alleged proliferation and potential of interstate breaches of confidentiality, there's also a criminal trial which is pending, and I wanted to draw something to the panel's attention and place it on record.

CHAIRPERSON: Are we dealing with category 3 now?

MR VALLY: Not at all, this a completely different issue.

CHAIRPERSON: Oh.

MR VALLY: The issue we're dealing with, are the criminal charges against Dr Wouter Basson, which trial is still pending. We have discussed this issue with the Attorney-General in that whilst maintaining the format and the purpose of our hearing, we also were circumspect regarding his pending prosecution and in determining which witnesses to use, whilst not losing the integrity of our hearing, we were mindful of the needs of the Attorney-General as well, and the concerns he raised with us. In this regard there are certain witnesses from whom we've received affidavits, but have not called, and I want to read into the record upon an enquiry to the Attorney-General as to what the provisional charges against Dr Wouter Basson were, his response was, they were the following - I have to emphasise that these are provisional charges. I'll read the letter into the record. We received this letter on June the 8th, which is today, and it's dated the 3rd of June 1998,

"RE WOUTER BASSON - Your enquiry of the 5th of May 1998 has reference.

1. The criminal investigation regarding Dr Wouter Basson is not concluded. The provisional charges which are being investigated are the following:

(1) Instigation to murder - This charge relates to the assassination of Mr Orlando Christina and ...(indistinct);

(2) Assault to do grievous bodily harm - this charge relates to the use of the so-called truth serum in the investigation and questioning of the alleged perpetrators in the Orlando Christina matter above;

(3) Manufacture of 1000 kilograms mandrax;

(4) Manufacture of 1000 kilograms ecstasy - MDMA;

(5) Possession of 100 capsules of ecstasy;

(6) Possession of 2000 capsules of ecstasy-MDMA;

(7) Possession of 1040 capsules of ecstasy-MDMA;

(8) Defeating the ends of Justice;

(9) Possession of classified material;

(10) A number of charges of conspiracy to murder (involving the alleged use of poison);"

The letter continues,

"... Once the investigation by the Office of Serious Economic Offences has been finally concluded, a further 10 charges relating to fraud, amounting to approximately R50 million rands will be joined to the above charges. It must be emphasised that these are provisional charges which are being investigated. It is possible that at the conclusion of the investigation some of these charges may not be preferred against the accused. It is also possible that further charges may emerge."

CHAIRPERSON: What are you asking from us, Mr Vally?

MR VALLY: I've read that into the record, Chairperson, for the panel to be aware that whilst we try to maintain the integrity of our hearing, we are mindful of the fact that there are criminal charges pending, and therefor there will be some witnesses where we have received affidavits as opposed to instructing them to be here in terms of section 29. We've don that only in respect of witnesses who will not in any way compromise the integrity of our hearing. So, I wanted to place this on record and bring this to the attention of the panel. Thank you, Mr Chairperson.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Currin?

MR VALLY: Mr Chairperson, this issue has got nothing to do with Mr Currin. These are general issues which I'm raising before we start with the first witness.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes, but I think it is his entitlement to say anything, or to say nothing.

MR CURRIN: Thank you, Mr Chairman. I have nothing to say.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you.

MR CILLIERS: Mag dit u behaag, agbare Voorsitter, ons het net oor die laaste punt - ten aansien van die laaste punt gemaak deur mnr Vally betreffende die feit dat in sekere gevalle eedsverklarings aan u beskikbaar gestel sal word. Daar is vroe?r, net voor die lang etensverdaging aan ons eens so 'n verklaring verskaf deur ene, Dr Immelman. Ons het nog nie die geleentheid gehad om daarna te kyk nie, maar ons gevoel sal aan die einde van die dag wees, as daar enige inkriminerende getuienis was ten aansien van enige van ons kliente, sal ons die versoek aan u rig dat die betrokke persoon viva voce kom getuig voor u en dat dit nie toegelaat word by wyse van 'n eedsverklaring nie, maar ons sal mettertyd ons houding aan u openbaar wanneer ons die geleentheid gehad het om die betrokke redelike lywige verklaring behoorlik deur te gaan. Soos u behaag.

CHAIRPERSON: It is therefore your attitude that you should play it by the ear until ...(intervention)

MR CILLIERS: That is the submission, Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: Any further submissions, Mr van Zyl?

MR VAN ZYL: Nothing, thank you.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Vally, are you wanting us to make a ruling in relation - is there any of the legal teams wanting to make any submissions relevant to category 2, documents which will be referred to, but which we will be asked to rule that they should not be released to the public for publication? No submissions? Mr Vally, you have your ruling.

MR VALLY: Thank you, Mr Chair. Well, we'll proceed now and call our first witness, that's Mr Jan Lourens - Dr Jan Lourens, I beg your pardon.

CHAIRPERSON: Before Mr Lourens testifies, as is customary, we will ask him to be sworn in, and I will ask advocate Denzil Potgieter to administer the oath.

JAN LOURENS: (Duly sworn in, states).

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you, advocate Potgieter. Mr Vally?

EXAMINATION BY MR VALLY

MR VALLY: Thank you, Mr Chair. Mr Lourens will you please tell us what you profession ...(intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: Before you proceed, Mr Vally, I would like to ask the members of the media, whilst we are not curtailing their right to take photographs, it should be done in a way that is not going to be intrusive and make the witness unable to perform the - and I will ask the Media Liaison Officer of the TRC to assist us in this regard. There has been an arrangement for such issues to be dealt with in a way that takes into account the rights of camera persons as well as maintaining the decorum with which these proceedings should be run. I will therefor ask for the co-operation of everybody in this regard. Mr Vally.

MR VALLY: Thank you, Mr Chairperson. Dr Lourens, can you please indicate to us what your profession is and your qualifications?

MR LOURENS: Mr Vally, I am a business man. My qualifications is, I hold a Bachelors degree in Metallurgical Engineering, a Masters degree in Industrial Engineering, and a Doctorate in Biomedical Engineering.

MR VALLY: We haven't asked you whether you have any statement which you want to read into the record before you commence, do you have any statement that you want to read into the record?

MR LOURENS: No, Mr Vally.

MR VALLY: Thank you. Can you tell us what your involvement with Doctor Basson was, from the very beginning?

MR LOURENS: I was a Permanent Force member working in the South African Air Force. I worked in what was then known as One Air Depot. I was the officer commanding of the old Metallurgy and Chemistry Laboratory. During this time I met with an old friend, Dr Philip Mijburgh, who was at that stage based at Special Forces. Philip approach me and asked me if I would be interested in joining Special Forces to work on what was an act of interest of ...(indistinct), the subject field of biomedical engineering. I - the scope of the work at that stage was defined very very widely. It wasn't specific per se chemical or biological warfare, and it was to assist with some laboratory tests and animal testing, some biomedical assistance, and I agreed. I was transferred from the Air Force to a unit called Special Operations based at Special Forces Headquarters in the old Voortrekkerhoogte, and I subsequently met Dr Wouter Basson, who was then the officer commanding. From there came a long relationship with him, all in the subject fields of primarily chemical warfare, to a much lesser extent that the biological warfare side. I don't know if you want me to move on into a sort of a chronological order of where I was involved in which of the projects?

MR VALLY: Yes, but let me just - before we move into the projects, you were involved in the Air Force and then you moved to Special Forces?

MR LOURENS: Yes.

MR VALLY: Can you tell us what program you were involved in when you were at Special Forces - sorry, is it Special Operation, I beg your pardon.

MR LOURENS: That's right, it was a small unit called Special Operations.

MR VALLY: So Special Operations was a small unit within Special Forces?

MR LOURENS: Yes, Special Operations was a very small unit. There were a number of medical practitioners, medical doctors in the unit, and I was the only non-medical individual. My task initially within the group was to supply the medical practitioners with technical assistance. This technical assistance varied from installing and providing a radio net for the group of doctors, at that stage operational in the Reef, the Johannesburg-Pretoria area, supplying them with specific vehicles. These specific vehicles were standard Sedan motors but had been converted to be high-speed vehicles, long range fuel tanks, special radio equipment and the like.

I did assist from time to time in small weapons modifications such as converting an assault rifle with a collapsible butt so that the doctor could carry it in his kit. So really, it was really very sort of basic technical support for the medical doctors.

Now this group of medical doctors, their main role was medical support to various operations, whether that was internal or a cross-border operation. They supplied their support to primarily our own forces.

MR VALLY: Can you tell us why would a group of doctors within Special Forces need an it's radio network, as well as why would they need high-speed cars, Sedan cars?

MR LOURENS: It would be quite frankly difficult to tell you exactly why they needed their own radio network, and why they needed their own specific special cars, because during that era we worked, as you most probably know, on a very strict need to know basis, and I was never exposed to the type of operations that they participated in or supported in. It was never known within the unit that one of the colleagues would be going on an operation the next day, and it would be into Lesotho or Angola, or whatever the case may be. It was just not known to us.

So, I for example, on the radio net, I knew what sort of an area that I had to cover, what sort of frequencies I needed to use, etc, but the exact detail thereof and the application thereof was never known to me. I, for example, was not a participant in the radio network. I didn't have a radio, only the group of medical practitioners had radios.

MR VALLY: Did the programme that you were involved in, and we're still talking about the Special Operations programme within the Special Forces under the command of Dr Wouter Basson, did it involve animal experimentation?

MR LOURENS: Yes, it did involve animal experimentation, but not within the unit Special Operations. What we had, at Special Operations we had a small chemical laboratory, so-called Block C at Special Force Headquarters, where we manufactured a teargas, but there was no other chemical biological work done within Special Forces. During the early days of my exposure to the programme, I was taken to a farm, just north of Pretoria, near the Roodeplaat Dam, and at this dam, or at this farm they developed an extensive biological warfare come animal experimentation facility.

MR VALLY: Okay, we'll come back to that in a short while. Can you tell us what period we're talking about now? You joined the Air Force, I believe, in 1982.

MR LOURENS: Yes, I was transferred to Special Forces in '84, and my exposure to both the chemical side, being Delta G Scientific in Roodeplaat, could commence in 1985.

MR VALLY: Alright, in 1985, and this is the sight you were telling us about a short while ago,

MR LOURENS: Yes.

MR VALLY: At this stage it was the Greenfields Development, there was nothing happening there?

MR LOURENS: No, at that stage what was on the sight was an old farmhouse and a small lab complex and some animal cages. There, for example, at that stage had been one chimpanzee at the farm, but there was no extensive animal facilities and animals available at that stage. As far as I can recall, there was some baboon cages, even at that early stage.

MR VALLY: Now, this farm you say was located near the Roodeplaat Dam.

MR LOURENS: Yes.

MR VALLY: How far from Pretoria is that?

MR LOURENS: I'd say it's about 15 - 20 kilometres north from Pretoria.

MR VALLY: Who took you to this farm?

MR LOURENS: Philip Mijburgh took me to the farm.

MR VALLY: And who did you meet at the farm?

MR LOURENS: At the farm I met three individuals, Dr Daan Goosen, who was at that stage the man managing the facility, Dr Andre Immelman, and Dr James Davies. All three of them were Veterinary Surgeons and both Dr Immelman and Dr Davies was Toxicologists.

MR VALLY: Now what were you told about this sight at Roodeplaat? Why were you taken there?

MR LOURENS: I was told at that stage absolutely nothing about this sight. It wasn't a normal procedure that I would be taken to a sight and - or that I would be, you know - the full detail of the project or what they were doing at that stage, would be told to me in detail.

MR VALLY: At that stage, were you told anything?

MR LOURENS: Well, I was aware of the fact that they were doing animal experimentation, and I was aware of the fact that they were evaluating this new generation teargas, but I was never briefed formally by either Dr Basson or Dr Mijburgh in terms of this is the actual programme and you know, this is the evaluation process procedures, whatever the case may be, and as a matter of fact, I, in none of the aspects of the projects were I ever briefed formally, but it wasn't an abnormal practice. That's the way, sort of, things roll. It was a very loose structure, it was a very loose programme.

MR VALLY: Were you - and I'm still talking at this stage when you're still a member of the Special Operations group within Special Forces - were you ever personally witness to the animal experimentations?

MR LOURENS: Yes, I was.

MR VALLY: Can you indicate what you witnessed to?

MR LOURENS: Well, the first exposure that I witnessed was an explosive device - evaluation of an explosive device, it was a sort of a stone grenade, and it was in - that particular evaluation wasn't done at Roodeplaat, it was done at one of the military test sights, I think it was Walmansthal, where the Roodeplaat scientists provided the animals, and at that stage it was rats, to a company which it's now called Medchem, it was Dr Vernon Joint at that stage. So that was my first exposure.

Subsequently at Roodeplaat I witnessed the exposure of baboons to the substance called CR, which is a teargas.

MR VALLY: We'll come back to that. Whilst you were in the Special Operations grouping, you were still a member of the Permanent Force?

MR LOURENS: Yes.

MR VALLY: Did you hold any rank?

MR LOURENS: Yes, I was a Captain.

MR VALLY: Now, was this a formal military unit like other military units were, where people were in uniform, went around saluting each other?

MR LOURENS: Absolutely not. As a matter of interest, this is that I think the only time that I was in uniform during my attachment to Special Operations, was in cases when I was sent to the border. For the rest we were always in civilian clothes, and there was in actual fact, practically no rank structure. It was a very very informal structure and it was relaxed environment.

MR VALLY: Now before this laboratory at Roodeplaat was developed, you mentioned a Block C.

MR LOURENS: Yes.

MR VALLY: This Block C, where was it located?

MR LOURENS: Block C was located in Special Forces Headquarters, on the eastern side, on the ground floor of Special Forces Headquarters. It was a small lab.

MR VALLY: What was it used for?

MR LOURENS: It was used for the manufacture of this teargas called CR. They manufactured CS as well, but that was a previous generation teargas. The focus at that stage was on the development of this new generation product called CR.

MR VALLY: Can you tell us who else where members of the Special Operations?

MR LOURENS: Of the medical unit the members at that time was Dr Basson, as officer commanding, Dr Swanepoel, although he joined a little later, he was basically the admin officer, Dr Philip Mijburgh, Dr Chris Blunden, Gerrie Odendal, a doctor as well, Deon Erasmus, Hennie Bester and Ben Steyn, and that was basically the group at that time, and of course myself.

MR VALLY: This unit, the Special Operations unit, who did it report to?

MR LOURENS: Dr Basson reported to the then General in command of Special Forces, which was General Kat Liebenberg.

MR VALLY: Did the Surgeon General at the time, General Nieuwoudt, have any role here?

MR LOURENS: Yes, the medical staff was allocated from SAMS, the medical services, to Special Forces. The moment you started to move outside the grouping of special operations, in other words towards the projects, being the biological and chemical warfare projects, these projects resorted directly under the Surgeon General, so Dr Basson had dual reporting structure, on the one side to General Liebenberg, and the other side to the Surgeon General, General Nieuwoudt.

MR VALLY: Was this the situation throughout your involvement with Dr Basson, that he had a dual reporting structure, to the Surgeon General, as well as to General Liebenberg?

MR LOURENS: Mr Vally, it's difficult to answer the question in the sense that I don't think any one of us fully knew who Dr Basson reported to. Dr Basson had a wide range of roles and duties that he played within the South African Defence Force, amongst them Military Intelligence as well, so I think at least into two channels did Dr Basson report into.

MR VALLY: Did Dr Basson have any reporting structure that you are aware of, or any contact directly with politicians?

MR LOURENS: Not that I'm aware of at all. I was - Dr Basson is a private man, and the only relationship that I knew of in terms of him and any politician was with the State President, Mr P W Botha, because Wouter acted as his physician and he saw him from time to time, but I have no intimate knowledge in terms of the type of relationship.

MR VALLY: Thank you. At some point Special Operations evolved into a different unit. Can you tell us about that?

MR LOURENS: During Dr - General Knobel having taken over from subsequent to the death of General Nieuwoudt ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: Sorry, do you remember when that was?

MR LOURENS: No, I don't, it is late eighties.

MR VALLY: I think it's 1988, I think that General Knobel took over. Please go on.

MR LOURENS: Then the Special Operations unit was transferred from Special Forces back to South African Medical Services and it became what was known then and still is as Seventh Medical Battalion Group.

MR VALLY: Now, at which stage did you relocate from Special Operations, I'm talking about physical relocation?

MR LOURENS: In 1985. What happened in 1985 is, there was - there were two facilities being built. One was the big biological research facility on the same farm at Roodeplaat, and the other was a chemical facility in Midrand, called Delta G Scientific, and at that stage there was a number of, not really problems, but there was a requirement for an engineering input at the Delta G sit, and I was transferred to Delta G to work as a site engineer on the construction phase of this plant. During this time, though, I remained working at Roodeplaat, and I assisted a number of the scientists in manufacturing various types of equipment that they would use, and the equipment was all related to animal experimentation.

MR VALLY: What was the biological facility at Roodeplaat called?

MR LOURENS: It was called RRL, being or standing for Roodeplaat Research Laboratories, and the Afrikaans version was RNL, Roodeplaat Navorsings Laboratoriums.

MR VALLY: Were these official wings of the Defence Force, or were they constituted differently?

MR LOURENS: No, it was not at all - as a matter of fact, it was strongly denied that there was any links with the Defence Force. It was front companies, and there was no evidence of anything military, other that the security systems in place.

MR VALLY: When you say "front companies", can you be a bit more explicit?

MR LOURENS: Well it was a front company in the sense that it had a - it was registered as a PTY Limited. There was a board of directors constituted, they operated in a manner as close as possible that you could - close to a private company with some sort of funding, and the image that was projected into industry was that it was in actual fact a private company.

MR VALLY: Let us first talk about RRL, Roodeplaat Research Laboratories. Who were the Directors of RRL?

MR LOURENS: When I introduced to the company initially, the Managing Director was Dr Danie Goosen and the only two Directors that I can recall at the time, was a Dr Schalk van Rensburg and a Dr Andre Immelman. Dr Danie Goosen left the company round about '85/'86 and he was replaced by Dr Wynand Swanepoel, one of my ex-colleagues from Special Forces.

MR VALLY: And Delta G, who were the Directors of Delta G?

MR LOURENS: Delta G initially the Directors were - the Managing Director was Mr Barry Pithy - no, untrue, the Managing Director at the time was Dr Willie Basson. Barry Pithy was a Director, Dr Gerrie Rahl was a Director, and there was a Mr Andre Redelinghuys. Dr Willie Basson left the company as well at roughly the same time was Dr Goosen left, and he was then replaced with Dr Philip Mijburgh.

MR VALLY: What role did Dr Wouter Basson play in the establishment of these two companies?

MR LOURENS: Well, Dr Basson was the Project Leader of the then Project Coast, and he was absolutely instrumental in the establishment of these two companies, he was the driving force, he was the man that created the - in conjunction with people such as Dr Willie Basson and so forth created the concept, the design everything was Dr Basson's. It was Dr Basson's brainchild to a very large extent.

MR VALLY: If he was not the Director of either of these companies, how did he exercise any control over these two companies?

MR LOURENS: Well, on a project basis in the sense that there was a holding company, a company that basically acted as the channel of funds from the South African Medical Services into the project, being Project Coast, and this was a company called Infladel Pty Ltd and they were based in Hatfield.

MR VALLY: And who were the Directors of Infladel?

MR LOURENS: It was a Mr Ben van den Berg and initially Dr Philip Mijburgh, but Dr Basson was not a Director. As a matter of fact, I don't think Dr Basson was a Director formally in terms of the South African requirements of any of the companies at any stage.

MR VALLY: You stated that Infladel was the means by which these companies were - had funds channelled to them.

MR LOURENS: Yes.

MR VALLY: Who channelled the funds through to the companies? Where did the funds come from?

MR LOURENS: The funds came from South African Medical Services, as far as I know, there may have been other sources as well. It may have, you know, there may have been a source from the Army, or whatever the case may be, but as far I know it was funded by SAMS.

MR VALLY: Can you indicate to us how much was spent in establishing these facilities, Delta G as well as ...(intervention)

MR LOURENS: I have absolutely no idea.

MR VALLY: Now, were you still member of the Permanent Force at the time?

MR LOURENS: No. What happened is, I retained my conditions of employment in terms of salary, etc, etc, but I was paid by the front company.

MR VALLY: Were the two companies, as far as you are aware, still reporting to structures in the then South African Defence Force?

MR LOURENS: Absolutely, absolutely. No, the interface between both Dr Mijburgh and Dr Swanepoel with Dr Basson and the research in general and so forth were regular. Yes, there was a formal reporting channel.

MR VALLY: Was this both the situation under General Nieuwoudt as well as General Knobel?

MR LOURENS: I cannot comment on the General Nieuwoudt era because I didn't know General Nieuwoudt, I met him once, I never interfaced. That was the early days of the project and my exposure was very limited to the running of the project at that stage.

MR VALLY: And General Knobel?

MR LOURENS: Undoubtedly, undoubtedly, that there was a strong interface with General Knobel.

MR VALLY: What was General Knobel's role visa vis these two companies?

MR LOURENS: Well, General Knobel was again responsible from the South African Defence Force's side for the project, the Project Coast, as such, although I have to admit that there had been in my discussions with General Knobel, grey areas in terms of what he knew about - what he bore knowledge of, and what he didn't. I had at one stage, right at the end of my involvement in this project, I had a discussion with General Knobel about the aspects of the project that I thought was going very wrong, and he denied having any knowledge of the offensive part of the project, and he made it quite clear to me that Dr Basson had more that one reporting channel and that that part may in actual fact exist elsewhere, but he denied knowing anything about the programme. So that leaves us ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: Can you indicate to us when this conversation took place, the period?

MR LOURENS: Early '93.

MR VALLY: We'll come back to that shortly. What was your understanding of what Project Coast was about?

MR LOURENS: My understanding of Project Coast was in essence three components. The one component was a offensive chemical ability, and if I have to define that, and the first part thereof would have been the manufacture of CS and CR, that's two types of teargas.

The second part would have been a large research ability in terms - research facility being able to research chemical substances and the ability to manufacture these on small scale. Now, in terms of the - there's a grey area between chemical warfare and biological warfare, and it would include areas such as biochemistry, etc, etc, and that would have been part of the chemical project.

As far as the biological project is concerned, the research was directed towards biological warfare substances. My involvement and exposure to the biological side had been minimal, so I am not able to give you accurate examples, I mean I can speculate about the type of projects as a function of the type of equipment that I supplied them, but I cannot tell you accurately or specific projects that they were working on.

MR VALLY: If I was to use a lay person's definition, and if I was to say that,

"Biological warfare should be distinguished from chemical warfare which uses agents such as chlorine, mustard gas, nerve gases, hallucinogenic drugs, etc, the essence of biological warfare is the use of living organisms to produce pandemics of disease spread by national means throughout whole populations."

Would - I'm reading from A lay person's guide to family health, would that be accurate?

MR LOURENS: Yes, I think so, although I think that the subject field is much more complex that - but in essence, yes, it's true, but it's truly a complex subject field.

MR VALLY: So the one - the biological facility dealt with living organisms, anthrax, botulism, bubonic plague, those kinds of issues - those kinds of organisms as opposed to chemical substances?

MR LOURENS: Yes, but the biological facility did a great deal of work on, for example physiological studies such as virility and fertility and so forth as well, which is difficult to classify in the subject field of purely biological warfare.

MR VALLY: Let's touch upon that issue for a while.

MR LOURENS: Yes.

MR VALLY: This research into fertility and virility, can you tell us more about this?

MR LOURENS: I can't tell you a great deal. What I can tell you is that the work that was done, was done by a scientist by the name of Dr Borman, Dr Riana Borman, and she was working on primates, baboons, I don't know if the work ever moved onto the chimpanzee level, into ways in which she could influence the virility and fertility of the animal. Speculation has it that a part of this work was directed an ethnic issue in terms of to be able possibly manipulate ethnic virility or fertility rather, but I know no more that that as far as that specific project is concerned.

MR VALLY: Referring to the speculation, you're referring to - and to be more direct, was the speculation that this work was aimed at reducing the birth-rate amongst black people?

MR LOURENS: Well, Mr Vally, I assume so, and again it's one of those situations that we never ever discussed a project in detail. You know, I would for example, in this particular case I was responsible for the manufacture of a stimulator that is used to stimulate and draw sperm from the male animal and in this discussion with some of the junior scientists, you know, you discuss it vaguely, but I was never briefed formally and said this is the project, this is the extent, this is the scope, this is the objectives, etc, so please accept it as speculation.

MR VALLY: In you informal discussions, and I accept that you were not formally briefed and you were not party to it, were any - were you aware of any research into specific delivery mechanisms regarding the inhibition of fertility amongst black people?

MR LOURENS: No, no, Mr Vally, not at all.

MR VALLY: Nothing about introducing it to water systems, etc?

MR LOURENS: No, no, at the time that I was exposed to this project, it was right at the start of the project, so, you know, delivery systems would have been a long way down the road.

MR VALLY: When were you aware of this project being initiated, I'm talking about the period, the date?

MR LOURENS: If I - I'd have to say it was '86/'87 roughly.

MR VALLY: And how long did this project last, how long did it run for?

MR LOURENS: I've not idea. During the '86/'87 period I to a very large extent withdrew from the biological project. At that stage Roodeplaat was on it's own feet, it was fully staffed, it had an own engineering department. I still from time to time, even up till '91 supplied specialist equipment, but I wasn't involved in routine animal experimentation equipment at all.

MR VALLY: Did you provide equipment for routine animal experimentation prior to that period?

MR LOURENS: Yes, I supplied them with a number of what is termed, a restraint chair.

MR VALLY: Can you just describe it for us, please?

MR LOURENS: Basically a restrain chair is a chair in which an adult baboon would be strapped into so that experimentation can be done the baboon. The baboon would sit in it and his arms and legs would be tied down. It's a see-through perspex chair so that the baboon can be monitored as the baboon is experimented on. What experimentation as such implies, means, I've never witnessed an experiment, so I've no idea. I supplied them with a gas chamber, and what the gas chamber basically was, was a chamber that - it's a box if you want, again constructed from a see-through material, as far as I can recall it was polycarbonate, and it was of sufficient size that you could in actual fact move the restraint chair into this box and the box allowed you to introduce substances into this box by whatever means, and if I can define this a little bit more clearly, is that it had a septum, so you could inject through the septum, or you could spray a substance through the septum and it was self-contained, it had an air filtration system so that there would be minimal exposure to the outside, but you can expose the animal on the inside to whatever substance you wanted to.

MR VALLY: Who was this equipment, the restraint chair, the gas chamber, who were they supplied to, which structure or which company?

MR LOURENS: To Roodeplaat Research Laboratory at - the biological lab.

MR VALLY: Experiments regarding biological agents, where were they carried out?

MR LOURENS: I've absolutely no idea. I would assume, speculation, it would have been Roodeplaat, and the only assumption, or the reason for the assumption would be since I installed a filter system at Roodeplaat, which - it's not totally true, I didn't install the system, I was party to the design and specification of the filter system to be able to remove chemical and biological substances, and I have to say to you removal of a biological substance is a reasonably simple procedure, chemical substance is more complex, but biological substance, or particle removal was part of that design, and there was facilities to be able to do that type of experimentation contained - decontaminate, etc, etc.

MR VALLY: Just then briefly, where was Delta G situated, where was the factory?

MR LOURENS: In Midrand.

MR VALLY: Coming back to the gas chamber, who gave you the specifications in terms of which you built it?

MR LOURENS: I interfaced, as far as these projects were concerned, with primarily only two people which and they - Dr Andre Immelman and Dr James Davies.

MR VALLY: What were their roles in either RRL or Delta G?

MR LOURENS: They were both based at RRL and they were both toxicologists, so to a very large extent, especially James, James was responsible for the animal experimentation side.

MR VALLY: Now, to go on, did you move on from RRL at some stage?

MR LOURENS: Yes, I was never in the employ of RRL, I moved on from Spes Ops to Delta G, I worked as a site engineer, and I from time to time as RRL required my services, I simply just did the work for them. I moved on from Delta G at the end of the chemical site being completed. Once we'd gone into commissioning faze and the staff moved into the building, I had the option of staying on as a site engineer, or leaving, and at that stage I approached Dr Basson and requested that I be allowed to leave with a part of the project, and the part of the project was the part that looked at the chemical defence side. Chemical defence side centred around material studies, engineering studies around the protection of man and of vehicles and systems, so it had to do with gas masks, special filters, special clothing, gas detection, etc, etc, which was a subject field that existed within the project, but which was at really an early stage of development and after a period of time between Dr Mijburgh and Dr Basson, they agreed thereto, and I left with that part of the project. Now, if I say I left with the project, it was really just me and one scientist that left from Delta G, and we started this project from scratch.

MR VALLY: What was - did you form a company?

MR LOURENS: Yes, I formed a company called Systems Research and Development. We were based in Randburg and in this company I had three or four scientist and myself initially.

MR VALLY: Was this also a front company?

MR LOURENS: Yes.

MR VALLY: Who was it financed by?

MR LOURENS: It was financed by the South African Medical Services via Infladel and the system worked as follow, it's is that I would draft a series of project proposals in terms of, for example, the evaluation of textiles from Europe to be used in, to the manufacture of chemical warfare suits, do a formal scientific proposal, do the costing of this particular scientific proposal and then submit it to Dr Basson. The project would be split into fazes, and as we complete a faze, submit a report, we would be paid for that particular part of the report, and it ran in that manner for a number of years.

MR VALLY: And who would you report to?

MR LOURENS: I reported to Dr Basson, although I have to qualify this and say, Dr Basson was never involved in the day to day running of the project, or the month to month running of these projects, he was busy and had a lot of other things on his plate. He in turn appointed a consultant to verify the scientific integrity of the projects and this consultant was again Dr Willie Basson. Dr Willie Basson being the man that initially started Delta G. He had left Delta G, he was working at Protea Chemicals at the time, so as far as the scientific integrity was concerned, I reported to him.

MR VALLY: You've mentioned some of the project proposals that were approved involved protective textiles.

MR LOURENS: Yes.

MR VALLY: Can you tell us what else was involved, what else did you manufacture?

MR LOURENS: Yes, very briefly, I'll give you an overview of what we ended up eventually, not what we started with, the areas of technology that we were looking at was firstly, protection of the body, that being boots an over-boot and a textile for a chemical suite. Secondly, would have been the protection of the respiratory tract, in other words, gas masks. We looked at detection devices and the detection technology we separated into two groups, one being proximity protection, and one being long distance detection, and the technologies between the two was very very different. And then we looked at test methods, quality control methods and test methods to be able to verify quality of these products being manufactured.

Now, the process of verification in our case was one of actually testing the protective clothing with the test substance, and the test substance was chemical warfare substances. So we had the ability to manufacture chemical warfare substances across the total spectrum on a very small scale, small scale being 1 - 5 millilitres. Oh, and then of course the last area which I neglected to mention, was filtration media. Filtration media, the key to filtering chemical substances from air is a product called activated carbon, and this activated carbon is impregnated with specific metals to be able to selectively remove these chemical warfare agents, and that was a big project for us.

MR VALLY: Were you ever given directions as to certain projects that you had to complete, or follow up?

MR LOURENS: I was not given formal directions in the sense of being briefed of the strategic direction that we should pursue, it was really we worked from scratch, it was like starting a new research project for a doctorate, it was really working from scratch. We aligned our processes from time to time with Dr Basson, but really that would have been once or twice a year, no more than that.

MR VALLY: Was there anything specific that Dr Basson asked you to look into or research - prepare research on?

MR LOURENS: As far as the defensive capability is concerned, no. What did, however, happened in this era, was that the company SRD developed into, or branched out into two other areas. One was Dr Basson needed an ability in terms of ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: Sorry, Dr Lourens, just to warn you that if you do want to talk to your lawyer, switch your mike off, because it is picked up through the headphones.

MR LOURENS: Okay, no, that's find, I was just looking for a word, so it's no problem.

Surveillance equipment, you know electronic surveillance equipment. So, we developed a specific ability to develop surveillance equipment and counter-surveillance equipment.

MR VALLY: Was this at the request of Dr Basson?

MR LOURENS: It was a specific request of Dr Basson, yes. And then, what happened as well, is I was requested in this time to accommodate two individuals in our little company. Accommodate, being giving them a place to work, and these were two gentlemen that - I was introduced to the one by via General Lothar Neethling, and the other one by Dr Basson, and their requirement was for a mechanical workshop, which was set up in our facility.

MR VALLY: I'll come back to that in a short while. Since you were financed via Infladel, we assume that that was money from the South African Medical Services,

MR LOURENS: Yes.

MR VALLY: Did they in any way supervise your work?

MR LOURENS: Well, they didn't supervise my work in terms of having regular project meetings, or whatever the case may be, the quality control of the project was done via their representative, which was at that stage Dr Willie Basson.

As the project grew, and as the project ran for a number of years, the control mechanism became a lot better, became much more intimate and the extent to which South African Medical Services interfaced with us became a true working relationship, for example, at the end of the project, or when I left the project in the early '90's, there was a strong SAMS team working with us on a weekly/monthly basis discussing the projects, the development of the project, etc. So by that time - but initially it didn't exist, but eventually it became a very very structured and a very orderly process, and all aspects thereof would have been monitored, whether it was equipment acquisition, whether it was the integrity of the science being performed, etc, and at that stage early '90's Armscor was involved, the project had been transferred from SAMS to Armscor, so we were running to the formal Armscor systems, if you want, which was totally controlled.

MR VALLY: Would you say that at all times that SAMS was aware of the work you were doing?

MR LOURENS: Not necessarily SAMS, but SAMS and/or Dr Basson, yes.

MR VALLY: You're talking about Dr Willie Basson?

MR LOURENS: No, Wouter Basson.

MR VALLY: Dr Wouter Basson?

MR LOURENS: Yes, and can I perhaps just separate the issue here. The surveillance equipment and the mechanical facility that existed within the then SRD was not known to Dr Willie Basson. I reported in to Dr Willie Basson only as far as the chemical warfare defence project was concerned. As far as the other two was concerned, I spoke to only Dr Wouter Basson.

MR VALLY: Let us briefly talk about the other two projects that were introduced into your company. You mentioned one by Dr Lothar Neethling and one by Dr Wouter Basson.

MR LOURENS: Yes.

MR VALLY: Can you tell us about these two?

MR LOURENS: Basically what happened there is that I was introduced by Dr Neethling to a man by the name of Bart Hetima and what Bart Hetima did is he brought into the mechanical facility, if you want, we called is cubie laboratories, he brought into cubie laboratories a skill, an ability to pack aerosols and aerosol cans of various sizes and the focus was at that stage, packing teargas for use by the security forces, primarily the South African Police, into these aerosol cans. The other individual that ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: Sorry, who had introduced Mr Bart Hetima to you?

MR LOURENS: General Neethling.

MR VALLY: General Neethling.

MR LOURENS: With of course the consent of Dr Basson, I mean there was a close relationship between Dr Basson and General Neethling, so it was ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: Did they ever see you jointly, Dr Lothar Neethling and Dr Wouter Basson?

MR LOURENS: Did I see them jointly?

MR VALLY: Yes, did they ever come and see you jointly?

MR LOURENS: No, no, they - without exaggeration, if Dr Basson was at any of the premises that I occupied more than three or four times, it would have been a lot, and with General Neethling, no more that twice, although I must say since I saw them at their premises regularly, yes.

MR VALLY: How often did you see Dr Wouter Basson and Dr Lothar Neethling?

MR LOURENS: It varied - it varied as a function of Dr Basson's availability. It was not unusual for Dr Basson to be away for extended periods of time, so really, it wasn't a regular meeting. General Neethling, I at one stage saw him regularly, once every two weeks, but on a completely different level. It was quite frankly a strange sort of meeting process in the sense that it was a social visit. He partook in the formal research meetings two or three times, and then it died down, and then his participation stopped, and he didn't - that's now the chemical warfare defence side, and otherwise I saw him from time to time, and it was really, we were having a coffee together or drinking a whisky together, or whatever the case may be, but it was, it wasn't an active technical interface at any stage.

MR VALLY: Let's talk about these two aspects, cubie labs as well as the electronics aspect.

MR LOURENS: Yes.

MR VALLY: Dr Lothar Neethling introduced Bart Hetima to you and his special capabilities were packing aerosol cans.

MR LOURENS: That's true.

MR VALLY: Did he have any other special capabilities?

MR LOURENS: Not that I know of.

MR VALLY: Did Dr Lothar Neethling ask for you to do anything else besides letting Mr Hetima pack aerosol cans with teargas apparently?

MR LOURENS: No, Dr Neethling in terms of, even issues such as the packing of aerosol cans, did not interface with me. He interfaced with Hetima. He didn't ask me for any other ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: Would you know what was in the aerosol cans?

MR LOURENS: Well, the, in the cases that I know of, it was either CS or CR, but the fact, you know, I wasn't party to the packing processes, they occupied a facility in my building, so for the rest, I could only speculate.

MR VALLY: Which period was this?

MR LOURENS: '86/'87.

MR VALLY: You mentioned Dr Basson also introduced you to a person who started working at your facility.

MR LOURENS: Yes.

MR VALLY: Can you tell us who that was?

MR LOURENS: The man was an armourer by the name of Phil Morgan, and Phil used to work at a company called EMLC, which was based as Special Forces Headquarters.

MR VALLY: Can you indicate to us what this gentleman did?

MR LOURENS: Well, this - what we did, or how this process worked, was the following, this is that Mr Morgan manufactured mechanisms that could be utilise to apply chemical substances to individuals, in other words, it was a variety of mechanisms that can be used to apply the chemical, the chemical warfare agent in, whether it's in a powder or a liquid form to individuals.

MR VALLY: Who was doing this primarily?

MR LOURENS: Phil Morgan.

MR VALLY: Was this with your assistance?

MR LOURENS: No, it was never with my assistance, but I need to clarify this quite clearly, is what would happen here, is just that this would be a process of a number of people being involved. The process would be the following, is this that a requirement would be set by, for example the toxicologists that would evaluate the piece of equipment, whether that would be Dr Immelman or Dr Davies, and let me give you an example, they would say, listen we need to inject 5ml of a watery substance into a body, and then there would be certain constraints, it must be quiet, it must be concealable, or whatever the case may be. That would be defined to me.

MR VALLY: Who would give you this instruction, who would ask you this?

MR LOURENS: Dr Immelman, Dr Davies or Dr Basson, and ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: Dr Wouter Basson?

MR LOURENS: That's Dr Wouter Basson, yes. This project, this programme, Dr Willie Basson never knew, or was never party of this part of the project. I then in turn would go back to Phil and give Phil the basic requirement, and then leave him, and he would work and sketch and draw and come back with a piece of equipment which I would then hand over to the toxicologists, which they would evaluate, and then they may come back with some refinement, and this is the process that sort of ran over a period of time.

MR VALLY: Can we call these applicators?

MR LOURENS: Yes, applicators is a good word.

MR VALLY: Did Mr Morgan make anything else besides these applicators?

MR LOURENS: No, the applicators was quite a range of equipment, it wasn't - there wasn't one single piece of equipment, they varied, let me give you an example, it started off with for example a ring, a ring that would be worn by an individual that would have a compartment and a coin that concealed the chemical substance, and as the coin would be swung away the substance can be decanted into a drink, or whatever the case may be. And then it progressed, it progressed then onto a mechanism such as a knife, a knife-like mechanism that would be ejected from a cigarette box, a substance - the knife for example was shaped roughly in the shape of a spoon, and this spoon-like subject, or object, could contain a chemical substance as well. Some of the applicators, for example, screwdrivers, now it really is a screwdriver ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: Sorry, maybe it would be opportune to show you some of these instruments. These were obtained by the office of the Attorney-General, with your assistance.

MR LOURENS: Yes.

MR VALLY: And we'll come to just now as to where they were buried. If I could take one of these instruments, and you took us through it, here we have what looks like a screwdriver.

MR LOURENS: Yes.

MR VALLY: Can you tell us about it?

MR LOURENS: Well, the principle in all cases had been exactly the same. You have in the front end the needle-like section, and at the very tip of it would be a hole. In the handle would be a cylinder that would be spring-loaded. The principle always was the following, you would suck the substance into the cylinder via the front end and then you would lock it into a position. Now it would be spring-loaded. The operator that uses the piece of equipment would stab the person being attacked, and in the stabbing process, the piston would be released and the chemical substance would be injected into the individual, and those would all to a lessor or greater extent work in the same manner. Now, the - in terms of those particular units that you have in front of you, there was two varieties. The one variety was a basic screwdriver, the other variety is a needled unit, so what it would have at the front was rather than a screwdriver, a single probe, it would have a number of needles, but the principle would be exactly the same.

CHAIRPERSON: Are these exhibits safe for handling?

MR LOURENS: Absolutely.

CHAIRPERSON: I would not touch the front end if I was you, Mr Chair.

MR VALLY: What did you understand that these screwdriver applicators were being used for?

MR LOURENS: Mr Vally, I was never told what it was used for, but it was quite obvious in terms of, you know, the sort of thing that was devised, I mean it was never told - I was never again brief and said, you know, give me a screwdriver that can inject a poison into whoever, so that was never discussed with me, but from the job that, I mean from the weapon that you have there, it's quite obvious what it was used for.

CHAIRPERSON: Excuse me, you said there were two varieties, ordinary screwdrivers, and then the other variety?

MR LOURENS: The other was exactly the same type of unit, but instead of it having the screwdriver end, it would have a number of needles, syringe needles at the front end of the, let's call it the piston end. Now, what I need to say is, well, is this is that these units were packed in different formats, in other words for example, there was an example of a needled unit packed into what looked like a bicycle pump. So, in essence what you would have in your hand would be a bicycle pump. You'd have the ability to slide it back and then you would expose the needles. It was packed into a walking stick, into an umbrella, so there was a number of different ways in which it was packaged.

CHAIRPERSON: Rather like a James Bond movie, wasn't it?

MR LOURENS: Unfortunately.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Vally?

MR VALLY: So, we have a series of screwdrivers both with working with a stabbing mechanism and some working like a syringe with a needle mechanism.

MR LOURENS: Yes.

MR VALLY: With some item in the handle. There is a document, I'm referring to TRC '96, it should be with the section 29 notice, if I could just read it out to you, I'd like to know how this works. This appears to be an issue regarding quality control, it says,

SKROEWEDRAAIER:

1. Die skroewedraaier het 'n paar probleme opgelewer.

1.1 Die suier klink om op die agterkant en sit dan vas in die silinder as gevolg van die slag op die aluminium suier;

1.2 Slegs 2 tot 2.5ml van die ongeveer 5ml van die silinder mates word uitgespuit.

2. Die lawaai is baie sag omdat dit 'n geslote kamer is. Dit is aanvaarbaar.

AANBEVELING:

1. Dat die silinder van 'n harde metaal gemaak word, soos byvoorbeeld, vlekvrye staal.

2. Dat die silindervolume verklein word na ongeveer 2.5ml sodat alles met een skoot uitgespuit kan word."

Do you know the document I am referring to?

MR LOURENS: No, well, I've seen it since you've issued to me, but not before.

MR VALLY: What we are curious about, is it seem to be signed by - do you recognise the signature at all?

MR LOURENS: Yes, it's Dr James Davies.

MR VALLY: And it seems as if Dr James Davies is doing an assessment of these screwdrivers.

MR LOURENS: Yes.

MR VALLY: Who would communicate this to you? Who would tell you the screwdrivers are not working properly?

MR LOURENS: He would.

MR VALLY: He'd tell you personally?

MR LOURENS: Yes.

MR VALLY: And then you would improve on them?

MR LOURENS: Well, I would tell Morgan, listen it didn't work so well, try something else, then he would try something else.

MR VALLY: Was this something which happened regularly?

MR LOURENS: No, no, as a matter of fact this is that this particular incident in terms of having had a problem with the technical aspects thereof is completely new to me. There were one or two cases, it wasn't an active process of feedback and continued development at all.

MR VALLY: So, Dr Lourens, by this stage, when you started being a conduit for making such instruments, you could call them potential instruments of death, you probably realised that, or were more involved than you were when you first started with the project?

MR LOURENS: Yes, but I was involved with - at that stage I was driving the chemical defence project. I - my only involvement in terms of anything offensive at that stage, was acting as this conduit between Phil Morgan on the one side, and the users, and the users was really, I either gave the units to Dr Basson or I gave the units to Roodeplaat Research Laboratories, and that was my only involvement. I really was just the handler and payer of the equipment.

MR VALLY: So you personally gave this to either Dr Basson or to Dr Davies?

MR LOURENS: Yes, absolutely.

MR VALLY: Did you ever give them to any other person?

MR LOURENS: Never - no, no one incidence, I was asked once by Dr Basson to move one of the screwdrivers and two vials filled with a chemical substance to the UK, and I then took it to the UK. I ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: Do you know when this was?

MR LOURENS: Sure, late '80's, maybe 1990, but I don't recall accurately. I then moved the screwdriver, and I must be honest with you, I cannot recall whether that screwdriver was mailed across to a mailbox, or whether I hand-carried it. What I do know is that I hand-carried the two little glass vials, if that's the correct word, with me when I travelled to the UK. I then had to meet a man ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: Let's start at the beginning. Who asked you to travel?

MR LOURENS: Dr Basson.

MR VALLY: And what did he say the purpose of your travel was?

MR LOURENS: I had to hand over this mechanism and demonstrate the mechanism to an individual.

MR VALLY: And did he tell you who the individual was?

MR LOURENS: He didn't - he told me I would meet a man at the station, and he told me that I had to be at a certain time at a certain station, and that this man would meet me, and this is exactly what happened.

MR VALLY: And did he tell you what were in those glass vials, the ampoules?

MR LOURENS: No.

MR VALLY: What did you suspect was in there?

MR LOURENS: A poison.

MR VALLY: Oh, I see. Did you ever - by this stage you felt your involvement, did you ever question that, or why did you agree?

MR LOURENS: I didn't question it at that stage. I did question it at a later stage, subsequent to this hand-over, but at that point I didn't question it at all.

MR VALLY: And why not?

MR LOURENS: Mr Vally, it's a difficult situation to answer you. You know on a hindsight we have all this wisdom, but at that point in time, I mean, it was this closed project, we were fighting this great enemy, it was this absolute total secret, super-secret project and we worked on such a strict need to know basis that we questioned practically nothing. I didn't question it at that stage.

MR VALLY: Who funded your trip?

MR LOURENS: I don't know, I can't remember, because some of those trips I funded, and some of the trips was funded by the company that I was working for at the time, but eventually the South African Medical Services funded it, yes.

MR VALLY: Was there more that one trip?

MR LOURENS: No, there was many many trips, but there was only one trip in terms of hand-over of this type of weapon.

MR VALLY: We're coming back to the handing over of these items. What were the other trips about?

MR LOURENS: On the chemical defence side, I travelled to Europe very very often to try and acquire technology, or products with respect to chemical warfare clothing, we negotiated a gas mask transfer, a technology transfer project into South Africa, activated carbon, all kinds of aspects around the pure defence project.

MR VALLY: And all these trips and, including the work of Mr Hetima and I believe you said Mr Coleman?

MR LOURENS: No, Morgan.

MR VALLY: I'm sorry, Morgan, I beg your pardon. These were all carried out by or under the company's systems research and development?

MR LOURENS: Initially, yes, and, but I left the company in 1987. What happened in 1987 is that I left the company to focus only on the chemical protection side, on the defence project. So, I left the SID electronics side and I left the cubie laboratory side. That was taken over by a man by the name of Johnny Koertzen, a Special Operations Psychologist, he took over from me, but as far as the interface - as far as the screwdrivers is concerned, I remained involved as far as that specific part is concerned, and that I remained involved in for quite some time.

MR VALLY: Alright, let's just go onto the screwdriver that you were asked to take with the two ampoules to Britain, what happened there?

MR LOURENS: What happened is, I met the man, by the name of Trevor, I was just introduced - I was told that his name is Trevor, and I met him as Trevor. We went to a cottage that belonged, or that was rented by Dr Basson, just outside Ascot, that little place called Warfield. I drove him there, and at the cottage I demonstrated to him how the mechanism worked. I opened the vile, one of the vials, sucked the substance into the unit locked it into it's - it had a safety lock mechanism. I somewhere spilled some of the substance on my hand and I don't know how it happened, but I wiped my mouth and I lost consciousness very quickly. There was a bathroom, I recall going into the bathroom, and I recall there being a bottle of Dettol, which I drank. Again, in hindsight, I have absolutely no idea why I drank the Dettol. At that stage, I to a large extent lost sight, and of course the Dettol induced a lot of vomiting etc, etc, and I woke up a period later.

MR VALLY: This item that you were asked to transfer, can you describe it to us?

MR LOURENS: Mr Vally, I must tell you this, I don't have a good recall, I can't recall whether it was a screwdriver or a needled unit, but it was one of the two. I don't have a very good recall of that particular day and that incident, but it was definitely a hand-held unit, and it was either a screwdriver or needled. I've thought about it, trying to recall the memory, and one of the issues that I can't recall, you know, for example I can remember the vile was a glass vile, and it's a smallish vile, and if you have to such up the liquid with the average screwdriver unit that was in front of you it would be difficult, so I assumed it to have been a needled unit?

MR VALLY: Was it an item manufactured at ...(intervention)

MR LOURENS: By Phil Morgan, yes.

MR VALLY: Yes. Just to go back very briefly, who were the Directors of Systems Research and Development, SRD?

MR LOURENS: It was myself, a man by the name of Bernard Zimmer, based is Luxembourg, a man by the name of Charles van Remoortrere, they'd been working with me quite closely on the acquisition of materials from Europe, but it changed subsequently when I left.

MR VALLY: Were these all South Africans?

MR LOURENS: No, Mr Zimmer is a - both Mr Zimmer and Van Remoortrere are Belgian citizens?

MR VALLY: Were they aware of the screwdriver project?

MR LOURENS: Absolutely not.

MR VALLY: Alright, after your delivery of the screwdriver, did you have any other mission in Britain, or did you return to South Africa?

MR LOURENS: I returned, yes.

CHAIRPERSON: And did you report this?

MR LOURENS: I reported it to both Dr Basson and Dr Mijburgh, and the reaction was one great scepticism about my story and their response to it was that it was highly unlikely that even if I had only a drop in my mouth that I would have lived, and we never discussed it again. Not that particular incidence, the poisoning of myself, no.

MR VALLY: Did you ever see experiments on animals carried out with any of these screwdrivers?

MR LOURENS: No.

MR VALLY: Were any reports ever made to you on experiments?

MR LOURENS: No, never. Not written reports, James Davies and I had discussions about the equipment, but written reports, never. It was never made available to me.

MR VALLY: Did Dr James Davies ever tell you that this had been used on animals to test it's effectiveness, or whatever?

MR LOURENS: Well, he - what he said to me was that they had evaluated the mechanism and you know, we never discussed it in detail in terms of what the evaluation meant, whether it was an animal, or whatever the case may be, they had used different models at different stages, so no, the details was not discussed with me, but there was an evaluation. I was aware of the fact that there had been an evaluation, yes.

MR VALLY: This evaluation, did it ever involve a discussion as to the effect that this weapon had had on a human-being?

MR LOURENS: No.

MR VALLY: Are you aware of whether this was ever tested on any person?

MR LOURENS: Not at all.

MR VALLY: Let's go back to SRD, can you advise us of what the further developments at SRD were?

MR LOURENS: I was - I moved away from SRD. The Chemical Defence Project had become a substantial project in terms of the number of sub-projects that we were running as scientists, etc, etc, and to the extent that we - it was necessary for us to move from our premises which was based in Randburg at that stage, we had to move into a bigger facility. The project had developed to the extent that it was decided that I would carry on with the Chemical Defence Project, and at this stage Armscor had become involved in this project, and that Johnny Koertzen would remain involved with the other companies.

MR VALLY: Let's understand that when you carried - when you hived off from SRD with the Chemical Defence Project, you also went with the screwdriver project.

MR LOURENS: I had remained responsible for the screwdriver project, yes.

MR VALLY: And who did you take with you?

MR LOURENS: Nobody, nobody went with me. Morgan stayed where he was, and the mechanism operated in the same that I would interface with Morgan, and Morgan would supply the stuff to me, and so the routine remained, but he, and quite frankly, I know that he moved out of the SRD facility with his equipment at some stage, his and Hetima's paths parted, but you know, I still phoned him up and he carried on doing the work.

MR VALLY: Besides the screwdriver facility that we're talking about, were there any other offensive items, weapons, or whatever that SRD were responsible for making?

MR LOURENS: Not that I know of, no. I at one stage received a - right at the end of my period, just before I left the organisation, I met with a man by the name of Joe Verster, who was the head of the CCB. I was introduced to Joe by Dr Basson, and the reason for the introduction was, is that the two of us would have started to work closely together. I met Joe only once, subsequently I was introduced to a man by the name of Danie Wahl who was Joe's second-in-charge, and at one of the meetings, which was the second or third meeting, Danie gave me a number of parcels. There was a number of sheet explosives, which is basically it looks like a piece of cardboard, there was a number of letter-bomb mechanisms, there was two boxes of washing powder, OMO washing powder that had an explosive mechanism packed into them, and I was asked/told to keep the equipment in a place of safekeeping, but this didn't come from Phil Morgan, this didn't come from SRD, it came from another source, but that had been my only interface in terms of other weapons.

MR VALLY: These items, so there were the screwdrivers, there were two OMO washing powder boxes, with explosives in them already?

MR LOURENS: Yes.

MR VALLY: And a triggering mechanism?

MR LOURENS: It was separate, it was - the trigger - was literally just a box of triggering mechanisms, yes.

MR VALLY: I see.

MR LOURENS: But the boxes, the soap boxes were - had the explosives, they were primed, they were, you know, ready for use.

MR VALLY: Why were they left with you?

MR LOURENS: I have no idea. It was left with me at the time, you know, the discussion that I had with Danie Wahl, and at that stage the situation was that we were going to work quite closely together in the future, and the stuff was given to me, and I left quite soon thereafter, so there may have been a particular reason for this, or a particular project to which I had not been exposed, but I was never briefed at that time of what it was for.

MR VALLY: Amongst the items dug up, it looks like a few pieces of rusted metal, was this item - these pieces here, can you just briefly tell us what that was?

MR LOURENS: That's a letter-bomb mechanism. That's a mechanism that is basically used, it contains a cap, it's triggered, it's a mechanical device. It's attached to an explosive, it's packed into a letter, and as the letter is opened, the mechanical device is triggered and the bomb explodes.

MR VALLY: And the explosive material would be this flat sheet ...(intervention)

MR LOURENS: The flat sheet, yes.

MR VALLY: I don't know if you are aware of these photos, I know that ...(intervention)

MR LOURENS: Yes, yes, that is the photo of the flat sheets.

MR VALLY: These flat sheets?

MR LOURENS: Absolutely.

MR VALLY: They would look like the back of your exam pad?

MR LOURENS: Yes, it's slightly thicker, Mr Vally, but it looks like the back of an exam pad, yes. It looks like a floor tile, you know the sort of square floor tiles, it looks like those square floor tiles.

MR VALLY: It was just left with you by Danie Wahl without indicating to you what it was for?

MR LOURENS: No, it wasn't indicated to me at all what the usage was going to be for.

MR VALLY: Are you aware of any of these letter-bomb mechanisms being used?

MR LOURENS: No, no, Mr Vally, you know I know that people have been badly harmed, hurt and killed, maimed by letter-bomb mechanisms that have been - you know, what I've read in newspapers and what I've read subsequently. I was never told beforehand that - I was not involved in the manufacture of letter-bombs at all, I was just the custodian, if you want, of that parcel.

MR VALLY: And do you remember when this was given to you?

MR LOURENS: Early 90's. No, I can be more specific, I left Protechnic in March 1993, and it would have been just before, late '92 early '93.

MR VALLY: Okay. Let's just talk about some of the items that you were aware of that Mr Phil Morgan manufactured. We've got the screwdrivers, both the stabbing mechanism as well as with the needle mechanism.

MR LOURENS: Yes.

MR VALLY: You've mentioned a bicycle pump.

MR LOURENS: Yes.

MR VALLY: Which contained a needle unit?

MR LOURENS: Yes.

MR VALLY: You've talked about in the early stages rings with a coin,

MR LOURENS: Yes.

MR VALLY: Which I assume conceal a secret compartment in which poison was put?

MR LOURENS: Yes and it would be manufactured primarily for a powder substance, not a liquid.

MR VALLY: Were there any other items that you can recall?

MR LOURENS: Walking sticks.

MR VALLY: And what were the walking sticks used for?

MR LOURENS: There was two models, the one model was a walking stick that concealed a needled unit in the front, and the last model that Phil worked on was a walking stick that would shoot a little ball, it's a polycarbonate ball, and this ball had a number of holes drilled through it, so you would be able to pack your toxic substance into this little ball and at close proximity, the idea was to be able to shoot the person in the back of his leg, and the ball would penetrate the person's body and the chemical substance would dissolve into the body of course, and kill the individual. The ball was small, so it was sufficiently small not to draw a hell of a lot of attention in the sense that the person being shot would experience something like a bee sting, and the reason why polycarbonate was suggested, was it's a hard substance, and secondly, it was a substance that was very difficult to pick up under x-rays.

CHAIRPERSON: Excuse me, Mr Vally, we are at 15h55, and I just wanted to have a sense of how long you think you are still going to be with this witness, given that there will be cross-examination and ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: A conservative would be about half an hour, on my part, Mr Chair.

CHAIRPERSON: You see, because we didn't start at 09h00, there are witnesses who were supposed to be testifying today. We have to have a sense of who we should hold over, who will be called, who can be called, who will not be called.

MR VALLY: I will discuss with my colleagues, and maybe we can arrange to move at least one of the witnesses over to tomorrow, but I would ask that we sit a bit late, if possible.

CHAIRPERSON: How late?

MR VALLY: We can take a break. Well, if our presents are anything to go by, at least until 18h00.

CHAIRPERSON: I see, do you want us to go on, or do you want a small adjournment?

MR VALLY: I will not object to a small adjournment then I can ...(intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: I think we need to get a sense, maybe if we take the adjournment now, and know that when we resume we will run until 18h00. You need to confer with your learned friends and to get a sense of how long the cross-examination is likely to be so that we can pace ourselves. I don't want to limit cross-examination, especially when we have not limited your examination in chief, but it seems to me that you are not unaware of precedence where we had to impose time limits in order to get through with the schedule, and we may have to revert to that sort of formula, but I can't just spring it on the other legal representatives. I think it should be clear now, now that we know that we are going to be sitting, and in this sort of fashion that we need to have arrangements which will be announced ahead of time for all legal representatives as what sort of limit we place on the examination and cross-examination of each witness.

MR VALLY: I hear you, Mr Chair and maybe we can discuss it during the adjournment, but there will be some witnesses who will be very quick and some witnesses, like Dr Lourens, who cover a whole period, and the knowledge is such we'll take longer.

CHAIRPERSON: Let's take an adjournment now and let's resume at 16h10. There's one question that ...(intervention)

MR CILLIERS: Dr Lourens, can I just ask one question, all these mechanisms that you've mentioned, and the ones that we see in front of us, are these prototypes that we're seeing, and how many of these were actually manufactured? Was it just in special situations that you were asked to produce a ring and Mr Phil Morgan would then produce it for you ...(intervention)

MR LOURENS: Yes.

MR CILLIERS: Or would you actually manufacture several ...(intervention)

MR LOURENS: No, we never manufactured several. The only units that we manufactured several of was the screwdrivers. You know, when I decided to testify on this issue I had a long discussion with him, and my recall and his recall of numbers had in actual fact been very different, for example, the rings I can clearly recall that we made a few, two, three, four, five, he says one maybe two, but it was never a mass volume production at all. On the screwdrivers there was quite a number manufactured. It may have even been twenty, but I could be out by five either way, but we never manufactured hundred.

MR CURRIN: Thank you.

CHAIRPERSON: Can we take the adjournment now and resume at 16h15.

HEARING ADJOURNS

ON RESUMPTION

CHAIRPERSON: We are about to resume if you could all be seated. Dr Lourens. Mr Vally?

EXAMINATION BY MR VALLY (cont.)

JAN LOURENS: (s.u.o)

MR VALLY: Thank you, Mr Chair. Dr Lourens, we were just going through the weapons that you were aware of that you were aware of that were manufactured. You talked about rings with coin on top, screwdrivers with syringe-like mechanism, you talked about a bicycle pump. I believe we were talking about the umbrellas and the walking sticks. Could you just briefly tell us again how these ...(intervention)

MR LOURENS: The - both the umbrellas and the walking sticks we had two variations. The one variation was the needled unit, so it would be a normal umbrella that would have a protection cover, if you want, and then the needle, a normal needle cylinder that could project the chemical, and then the last model that we worked on, that Phil made was the umbrella and the walking stick that could shoot this little projectile that could carry the toxin or the toxic substance.

MR VALLY: In terms of the projectile, I just want to know, since you did make some chemical products at your plant for purposes of testing your equipment, did you ever pack it there as well?

MR LOURENS: Never. The sort of substances that we manufactured were the conventional chemical warfare substances so it was mustard gas, nerve gas and this type of substance. No, the - your application of those substances on such a small volume would not render - would not have the ability to kill the human-being. No, it was never packed.

MR VALLY: Why did you use polycarbon balls?

MR LOURENS: For two reasons, number one, it's a hard ball, and the second reason was that I was advised by either James or Dr Immelman that says that this is the type of substance that you would not be able to pick up on an X-ray. Now, if I say I was advised by Andre or James, I cannot actively recall the discussion, but those had been the people I had interface with.

MR VALLY: Who would normally give you specifications, for example the umbrellas or the walking sticks? Who would tell you I'm looking for an item of this kind?

MR LOURENS: That would have - a specification per se was never given to me, neither Dr Immelman, Davies or Dr Basson would give me a special request or a specific specification. You know, it would often be a very loose discussion, they may have evaluated a piece of equipment and said, look, it works well, but perhaps we could look at something else that could shoot the little ball over three metres, or whatever the case may be, but my contact in terms of the manufacture thereof came from Dr Basson.

MR VALLY: So would Dr Basson give you the specific specifications?

MR LOURENS: He never gave me specific directions, you know, it would be a discussion, he wouldn't tell me give me an umbrella that can shoot a ball three and a half metres at 400 metres per second, no, that he would never do, and he never did.

MR VALLY: I want to move on to another item, which is the issue of the investigation into a possible chemical attack in Mozambique in 1992. Can you just tell us about this, who brought you into the investigation, and what the investigation did in fact do?

MR LOURENS: I was contacted by Dr Basson. He instructed me that I was to be contacted in due course by Dr Brian Davies, and that we at Protechnic, at this stage I'd left SRD and I'd worked at Protechnic, running Protechnic on the Chemical Defence Programme, that I would be contacted by Dr Davies and we needed to investigate an alleged incident of a the application of a chemical warfare substance in Mozambique. We at that stage had developed ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: Let's just understand this, the application of a chemical warfare substance Mozambique, can you spell this out for us, please?

MR LOURENS: Well, we didn't know. We were told that there is an allegation, that there was some sort of chemical substance applied to people in Mozambique and ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: The chemical attack?

MR LOURENS: Yes, well, it wasn't, you know it was not stated as an attack, there was a chemical incident. A chemical incident didn't refer to a situation of ...(indistinct) of a hazardous chemical, in other words, it wasn't an industrial incident, it was a military type of incident, but we didn't have the detail. It was never told to us that it's ...(indistinct) and applied mustard gas on a civilian population. We were just told there's an incident, were going to have to do a verification on this incident.

MR VALLY: Go on, please.

MR LOURENS: We had at that stage done a lot of work on verification in terms of what you basically do, is you investigate the particular chemical substance, let's say it's mustard gas, bad example, let's say it's nerve gas, so you would investigate nerve gas and say, okay, if nerve gas had been applied, what would it break down to. So you wouldn't look necessarily for nerve gas, you may look for breakdown products, you may look for sweat and tell tale signs of particular chemical substances, and we developed collection procedures, we collected, we developed protective systems to be able to go into areas to be able to verify the particular incident. We set the team together, from the laboratory and it was - we were three or four from the laboratory, and it was, we were three or four from the labs and three or four colleagues from South African Medical Services, Seventh Medical Battalion Group. We were then instructed to move into the Kruger National Park, into a specific camp and we had to wait, where we would have been met by Dr Davies. We moved out equipment into the Kruger Park and waited at this particular camp for Dr Davies. He arrived late afternoon, they flew in with a South African Air Force helicopter ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: Just so we don't get confused, this Dr Davies, who is this?

MR LOURENS: Dr Brian Davies was the man, he worked at a - he's a medical doctor, he was working at a company called Lifestyle Management and he acted as a consultant for the South African Medical Services on biological and chemical warfare issues.

MR VALLY: Lifestyle Management, was that also a front company?

MR LOURENS: It was also a front company, yes.

MR VALLY: And this is Brian Davies, as opposed to Mr James Davies.

MR LOURENS: Yes, he's Brian Davies.

MR VALLY: Fine, sorry, please go on.

MR LOURENS: And then Brian, they flew in by helicopter and Brian had with him, as far as I can recall three or four individuals from Mozambique. These individuals were Government individuals, and they were there to accompany us on this verification exercise, to look for the site. We slept the night, we got up the next morning and we early morning packed out and got ready for the verification exercise, and we moved out, we drove out into an area alongside the fence between the Kruger Park and the Mozambican Border. We got into the helicopter, we flew a distance, we came back and that was it. We went no further. It was said at that stage, and there was difficulty communicating with the Portuguese speaking Mozambican individuals is that the site cannot be identified, the territory is sort of the same everywhere and we packed up and we went home, we had a cold drink and we went home, that was it.

MR VALLY: Was any report done?

MR LOURENS: Apparently there had been a number of reports done. I didn't see any of it, of the reports, but the South African team, we were not the only team, there was another team, I think from the UK, and another team from either France or the Netherlands, that investigated the same incident. Brian Davies definitely did generate a report, but I never saw the report, no. We did not collect any substances, we didn't perform any science at that point.

MR VALLY: Did you determine what the chemical incident was after you went to the Kruger Park?

MR LOURENS: No. What happened there is that this is that you know, we were not fully briefed in terms of the incident, the apparent situation or discussion or allegation was that it was an aircraft that flew over from the South African territory into Mozambique, disposed of a substance and a variety of variations was explained here to, and a number of soldiers, by that time identified to be soldiers, was in actual fact killed. The aircraft in itself, there was more than one story of what it was, one was that it was a remotely piloted vehicle, the other was that it was a small aircraft, but in terms of the conclusive evidence conclusive, finalisation, I don't know, I was not made part of it.

MR VALLY: Do you have any knowledge of any chemical substance other than these screwdrivers, walking sticks, etc we're talking about, which were used on people?

MR LOURENS: No, Mr Vally.

MR VALLY: At some stage, you left SRD.

MR LOURENS: Yes, I left SRD and I then went to Protechnic and then I left, eventually I left Protechnic, yes.

MR VALLY: Are SRD and Protechnic separate companies?

MR LOURENS: The chemical defence part of SRD became Protechnic and it grew into a full scale chemical defence facility, currently owned by Armscor.

MR VALLY: Was it also a front company?

MR LOURENS: Yes.

MR VALLY: Protechnic?

MR LOURENS: Well, it was a front company in the sense - no, let me rephrase that, it was a front - it didn't belong to Armscor and our shareholders were private, but the private shareholders were me, the company Sharburn(?) based in Luxembourg and Medchem, Medchem being the company that was run by Dr Philip Mijburgh then and Medchem was the holding company of Delta G, etc, etc. So as far as the majority shareholder was concerned, it was still Medchem which was, as fare as I'm concerned, a front company.

MR VALLY: I see. Sorry, where does Medchem fit in, I thought the holding company was Infladel?

MR LOURENS: No, it changed. What happened there is that over a period of time the biological and chemical programmes were separated in full, and Roodeplaat functioned on its own, acquired it's funds directly from the South African Medical Services and Delta G functioned on it's own. Delta G happened to have developed a holding company, they called the holding company Medchem, and within this group there was a number of other companies there, for example Lifestyle Management was in this group, there was a company called Kowolsky International, there was a company called Medchem Pharmaceuticals, so there was a - it was a small group of companies.

MR VALLY: Just SRD, to your knowledge, how much money was put into it between the period that you were there?

MR LOURENS: Mr Vally, off the cuff, I would say the company costs roughly two, two and a half, three million rand per year to run. Protechnic was a different ball-game. Protechnic when we started operated the Armscor then funded projects. We started of with total projects of about four, four and a half million per annum and it ended up in the vicinity, as far as I can recall, about eighteen, twenty million, but I must please tell you, sir, I'm not accurate on these figures.

MR VALLY: In your conversations and dealings Dr James Davies, were any other delivery mechanisms other that the screwdrivers and walking sticks, syringe type mechanisms, were any other mechanisms discussed regarding delivery of poisons?

MR LOURENS: Not discussed. One of these typical sort of corridor discussions, mention was made by James of poison being introduced into cans and alcohol or bottles, I shouldn't say alcohol, because I'm not sure what it was, whether it was a alcohol bottle, and as far as I recall that particular discussion it was James that was in actual fact responsible for it for the transfer of the chemical substances into the cold drink cans and/or bottles that was discussed.

MR VALLY: And these were sealed cans or sealed bottles?

MR LOURENS: I assume so, Mr Vally.

MR VALLY: There's another issue that I want to raise with you regarding certain requests you had for the production of weapons by a foreign purchaser. Can you talk to us about that, tell us what it was all about and how you were introduced tot he person?

MR LOURENS: I had - I interfaced on three occasions with weapons systems or potential weapons systems for foreign entities, individuals. The first case it was my partner at the time in Protechnic, Charles van Remoortrere had a potential customer. I know him as Mr Mombar and he wanted a binary weapon developed. Binary weapon is a weapon that you'd have two chemicals that would be separated in some sort of a, let's call it ammunition for lack of a better term, word, and once you fire this, the two chemicals would mix by whatever mechanism and there's a lot of mechanisms that can be utilised herewith, and as the shell explodes it delivers the toxic substance. So we worked on this concept in actually developing the shell and the two chemicals, it's a substance called VX, and that was it.

MR VALLY: What is VX?

MR LOURENS: VX is a nerve agent. It's a binary nerve agent. The unit was given to Charles, I left, and as far as I know the programme never went anywhere. It was developed mentally, it wasn't proven ability, it wasn't proven skills, it was really just, we were looking at the concept, and we never really got to the point of having a workable solution.

MR VALLY: This binary weapon, did you supply the VX as well?

MR VALLY: We manufactured the chemicals at Protechnic.

MR VALLY: And this person called Mr Mombar, do you know who he represented?

MR LOURENS: Absolutely no, I have no idea, I never met the man, I never made contact, my partner made contact with him.

MR VALLY: Do you have any - can you speculate in view of your informal discussions with your partner possibly?

MR LOURENS: I know he was met in Europe, but I - that would be impossible for me to speculate in terms of where - we never discussed it to the extent that I would be able to make a deduction or speculation in terms of his nationality.

MR VALLY: Did you ever get consent or report this to anyone within South African ...(intervention)

MR LOURENS: No, absolutely not.

MR VALLY: Military structure?

MR LOURENS: No, no, I discussed it with nobody. It was an internal project. I didn't discuss it with any of my military colleagues.

MR VALLY: So there was a binary prototype with VX which was in fact sold to some foreign person?

MR LOURENS: No it wasn't - as far as I know it was never actually sold. You know, I at that stage left the organisation and as fare as I know it was never - due to the fact that it was developmental technology it wasn't proven technology, it was never sold.

MR VALLY: Was it delivered?

MR LOURENS: Not that I know of. As far as I know, no.

MR VALLY: Where you head-hunted by anybody after you left Protechnic?

MR LOURENS: What happened is, as I left I was approached by a man by the name of Ters Ellers. Ters Ellers requested a meeting with me at his offices. I went to his offices in Sandton. I met with a man by the name of Shloogie. We discussed a number of issues, and it was quite evident that he was interested in acquiring chemical and biological technology. I met with him on a number of occasions, trying to define exactly what he wanted. Finally it was clear that the man basically wanted - he was Syrian, and he was quite open about it, he said to me he was from Syria and he wanted technology for Syria. He went as far as enquiring whether having left the company if I thought it was possible for him to purchase Protechnic, which of course it wasn't. He wanted to know if I could introduce him to key scientists, because I'm not a chemist, you know it was difficult for me, synthesis for example I could make absolutely no contribution to his requirements, whether there was any interest and could I assist him in finding the necessary people. I introduced him to one individual, I introduced him to Dr Andre Immelman, and they had certain discussions, and I wasn't party to those discussions. Once I had introduced Dr Immelman, that was it. As far as I know Dr Immelman did travel to Syria. On the chemical side I introduced him to nobody, I just backed off and left him. That was it.

MR VALLY: I'm just curious about one thing, you have a number of foreign people involved with the project, for example Mr van Remoortrere, he's Belgian, why were they allowed to have part ownership of companies which had the ability, even though in small quantities, but to manufacture chemical agents, was there any kind of procedure by which they were vetoed?

MR LOURENS: It was abnormal in terms of the security system at the time, it was totally abnormal, you know, in that particular area if you were not white, Afrikaans, male, you could not have been vetoed, or highly unlikely. Charles's situation was different in the sense that Charles allowed us access into Europe and access into particular technologies in Europe, and I, you know, their security system was quite a rigid system at the time, so I assumed that Charles was vetoed, nevertheless, the fact that Charles eventually became the owner of Protechnic, even by today's standard would be abnormal, it would be strange, but it happened and it was done with the support of the project office at the time.

MR VALLY: Did Mr Bart Hetima do anything more than just pack substances into aerosols?

MR LOURENS: Not that I know of, but Bart Hetima had a long history of association with the South African Police and I know that at various stages he did various different types of jobs for the South African Police. Bart was very close to General Neethling, but I'm unfortunately not able to give you specifics in terms of particular other projects that he ran for the South African Police.

MR VALLY: Did you at any stage raise your concerns about the kind of things you were asked to do with any senior military people, or politicians?

MR LOURENS: Yes, I - that had been a number of incidents and I had to incidences where I discussed the matter with firstly, Dr Basson. Just after the incident of my handing over the screwdriver in London I was on a train, I got onto a train between London and Ascot and it was co-incidental that Dr Basson was in the same train. It's not the same trip, it's a completely different trip, but it's subsequent to it, and I sat down with him, I asked him, I said to him doesn't it bother him, and how does he justify, how does he sort of make peace with himself. His answer to me was quite clear, and in Afrikaans he said to me "Ek het my saak uitgemaak met die Grootbaas, wat jy doen is jou saak" he's sort of been able to settle his mind, his relationship with God and whatever, if I hadn't it was my baby. I once again later had a brief discussion on this issue with him and we actually didn't even discuss it. I raised it and it - we didn't go into discussion, it was sort of an old subject. Just before I left the organisation, I made an appointment to see General Knobel. I was, I just felt that the project was going wrong, it was going to strange directions. Once before when I'd asked Wouter on a particular aspect, and I would lie if I would tell you what the aspect was, because I can't remember, I asked him whether the Surgeon General knew about this, and he was really annoyed with me for even asking him whether the Surgeon General knew about this, so I went to see the Surgeon General and I said to him, but you know - I asked him, I said do you bear knowledge of these chemical weapons, these applicators as you call them, that we were being manufacturing, and there was a money aspect at concern, I mean the life that was being lived by the project group, inclusive of myself, was an abnormal life, I mean it was a life of great luxury, and this great luxury varied from person to person, but nevertheless. And General Knobel replied to me, he said I had to bear in mind that as far as the offensive is concerned he bore no knowledge of it, it's not his project. Wouter had another reporting line. As far as the other aspects was concerned, money, etc, etc, it was something that he would look into, and that was it. When I - when Charles bought into the company, what happened was the following, is Charles never knew of my running the so-called screwdriver project and Charles's auditor/bookkeeper stumbled onto this unknown fund, these payments and he questioned it and I simply said to him is that I am not going to disclose to you what it was about. Being a businessman he insisted on knowing what it was, and I just said to him, I'm going to have to talk to my senior officers about this and I'll come back to you. I'll talk to the people. At that stage, unfortunately, my relationship with my colleagues was not a comfortable one anymore. I had to a large extent made up my mind to leave. I did approach Philip and Wouter and I must again be quite honest, I cannot recall whether it was Philip or Wouter, but I had no joy, and I decided to be arrogant enough and just go and see the Minister of Defence.

MR VALLY: Just before you go on, when did you tell

General Knobel about the Surgeon General, when did you tell him about the offences?

MR LOURENS: It was late '92, early '93.

MR VALLY: And his response was it wasn't his project.

MR LOURENS: It wasn't his project. Offensive stuff was not his project and he didn't know about it and he quite frankly didn't want to know about it.

MR VALLY: Okay, go on.

MR LOURENS: I approached a friend that was a university with the then Minister of Defence, Mr Roelf Meyer. We got an appointment the next morning. We flew down to Cape Town. I briefed my friend. The Minister wouldn't see me, but he saw my friend. He discussed the situation with him, and he referred us back to see the Surgeon General that afternoon. We flew back to Jo'burg, we saw General Knobel that afternoon at 16h00. General Knobel just said to us, guys I'm not going to talk to you, you going to have to see General Kat Liebenberg, then Head of the Defence Force, and we went to see General Liebenberg. We arrived at his office, and he said to us there's no story to be told. His words were, "You must remember those toys are mine, I want them back" and that was it.

MR VALLY: What was he referring to?

MR LOURENS: He was referring to the screwdrivers, because I discussed the situation, when he reached his point, he'd already been briefed, when we reached him he had already been briefed about what the situation was and then there was no issue in terms of money, he was aware of the screwdrivers, he was aware of what I had done, of the stuff that I had been involved in and we had two whiskies and we went home. And that was it.

MR VALLY: When was this?

MR LOURENS: '93, February/March '93.

MR VALLY: When he asked you for his speelgoed, his toys, had you had possession of it?

MR LOURENS: Yes, at that stage, what I had in my possession was a number of screwdrivers, the two OMO boxes, the sheet explosives, in other words the stuff that Phil Morgan gave me, the stuff that Danie Wahl gave me. The sequence of events was the following, I left, I had a meeting with Charles one evening and he asked me, I at that stage has resigned, he asked - I resigned and I said I was willing to stay on for a sixth month period to hand over to whom ever. Charles asked me to vacate my office the next morning, and I vacated my office, but I removed all of the equipment that I had, all of the weaponry, and I - at that stage we owned a farm in the Northern Transvaal at a place called Steenbakpan. You know, I was very uncomfortable, and I dug two holes and I buried everything in the two holes, and I left it there. Then, last year, I decided to tell the story. I, after I had discussions with Dr Tobie Pretorius of the offices of the Attorney-General in the Transvaal, and he requested me to go and fetch to stuff, and we went back and we fetched it. We were able to recover the screwdrivers. All of the explosive devices were in a total state of decomposition and very unstable, and they decided to detonate after having taken photos, to detonate the equipment on site, and I obviously gave it all to him then.

MR VALLY: Are you aware of any other sales besides the prototype of the binary chemical weapon to foreign buyers?

MR LOURENS: No, Mr Vally. You know, at the time that I left there, there had been one technology agreement with Taiwan. I was party to the initial stage in which we were transferring or negotiating the transfer of testing facilities. Testing, meaning defensive equipment evaluation testing and so forth to Taiwan, and that project was as far as I know finalised and executed between Armscor and Taiwan and executed fully, but I don't know the details thereof.

MR VALLY: Did you ever see any experimentation carried out on baboons with teargas.

MR LOURENS: Just once.

MR VALLY: Can you tell us about it briefly?

MR LOURENS: Mr Vally, it was right at the beginning. It was as far as I can recall, it was CR. It was applied as a sort of a grenade to the baboons in the very original set-up at Roodeplaat Research Laboratories, and that was it. It was a - it wasn't a fantastically scientific experiment in the sense of particular measurements or blood samples being taken, or whatever the case may be. But, I did not stay the total experiment, so they may have done it afterwards, but that was my only exposure.

MR VALLY: Just very briefly you say the original set-up, just, was it the restraining - the box ...(intervention)

MR LOURENS: No, no, it was in the open.

MR VALLY: So what happened, just very, very briefly?

MR LOURENS: Just very briefly there was a cage, there was a baboon in the cage, this smoke grenade was chucked in the cage and it released the teargas. That really was the extent of the experiment. I never witnessed any experiment in terms of baboons or other animals in the contained environment that existed at Roodeplaat Research Laboratories, and that was really the serious scientific stuff. I never worked with any of those.

MR VALLY: There were a number of animals kept at the Roodeplaat Research Laboratory?

MR LOURENS: Yes, there was a number of dogs, there was a chimpanzee, there was a number of baboons kept. I don't know if they ever worked on the chimpanzee, but I knew the worked on the other animals, yes.

MR VALLY: And the restraining chair was used for these animals in the gas chamber as far as you're aware?

MR LOURENS: The restraint chair was used for the baboons.

MR VALLY: Thank you, Dr Lourens.

MR LOURENS: Thank you, Mr Vally

CHAIRPERSON: Just before you go onto cross-examination, can I just clarify something in my own mind. Did you say that after you met General Knobel in 1992, firstly, was his attitude if I can summarise it, one that said that was not his project and got the impression that he just didn't want to know.

MR LOURENS: Mr Ntsebeza, Dr Knobel had always been very accommodating in terms of listening to me, etc, etc. It wasn't an arrogant or aloof attitude, in other words, he didn't sort of dismiss me and say listen, go away, it's not my project. He listened to me and he said quite clearly to me that as far as he was briefed this was outside the scope and he didn't - it wasn't his project. Dr Knobel never said to me, I know noting, I don't want to know about it, go away. If I created that impression, it was the wrong impression, he didn't do that at all.

CHAIRPERSON: But in the end, that was if one could summarise his attitude, I take the point that he was not, you know, arrogant and dismissive, but in the end you got the distance impression that he didn't want to know, he didn't want to discuss this thing.

MR LOURENS: True.

CHAIRPERSON: Right. Now, the Minister you went to, did I get you correctly that it was Minister Meyer?

MR LOURENS: Yes, it was Roelf Meyer.

CHAIRPERSON: Roelf Meyer. And, had you indicated to him, if you recall, what it was that you wanted to talk to him about?

MR LOURENS: Yes, I went to this common friend, a lawyer, and I just said to him, well you know, there's - I have this problem. I had spent funds from a company, I'm - my partner is now questioning what had happened to these funds, and I'm not in the position to disclose what I'd done with the funds. I'd - and the lawyer friend obviously said, but what did you do with the funds, and I told him about the screwdriver projects and the walking sticks, etc, because I had to take him in my confidence, and then ...(intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: Are you saying in substance you told him more or less about the screwdrivers, what you've told this Commission here?

MR LOURENS: Yes.

CHAIRPERSON: And your impression - and you did that because you wanted it to be conveyed to Minister Meyer?

MR LOURENS: Absolutely.

CHAIRPERSON: And was it his response - did he respond to you in any way?

MR LOURENS: Well, he didn't meet wit me. What happened is that I waited in the foyer, my friend went up to see the Minister. He spoke to the Minister and explained the matter to the Minister, and of course what I'm telling you now is hearsay, and the Minister then immediately said go back to General Knobel, and we saw him that afternoon.

CHAIRPERSON: And at what stage did you meet - was it General Knobel you said, or General Liebenberg?

MR LOURENS: No, we met General Knobel and then when we arrived he said, gentlemen, this is not my project, this is not in discussion with me, you're going to have to carry on to General Liebenberg, and we then went to see General Liebenberg.

CHAIRPERSON: And it was he who said "daai speelgoed"?

MR LOURENS: Yes. What then happened in terms of the, just to clarify the situation as far as the financial aspect was concerned is that the next morning, or very soon thereafter, General Knobel in turn discussed the issue with Charles and said forget it and leave. And that was it, that was the end of it.

CHAIRPERSON: I see. Cross-examination? Mr van Zyl

MR VAN ZYL: Thank you, Mr Chairman. At this stage I am not in a position to cross-examine for the following reasons, this morning I spoke to Mr Vally together with Mr Chaskalson, specifically regarding the matter of incriminating evidence against any of my clients. What was told to me was to the effect that they are not specifically aware of witnesses because they have not been given statements from witnesses such as, for example, Dr Lourens that has testified now. Statement was given to us of Mr Andre Immelman. I understand that he will not give oral testimony. The summonses that they have received, there is no notification that my clients have been implicated. As a result, there is no preparation that has been done in this regard. I have not consulted with my clients. The evidence, 80% thereof that I have heard here today, from Dr Lourens, are aspects of which I only became aware for the first time, and I do not know whether my clients have any knowledge of this. As a result of this I am in the position that I am going to request from you, Mr Chairman, that I be given the opportunity to consult with my clients in this regard to take instructions from them. As I've indicated to you, I do not want to say that there is going to be cross-examination, it depends on my instructions. These specific aspects have not yet been discussed with my clients and I ask for an opportunity to do this with them. Thank you.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you, Mr van Zyl. I do not know if you were placed on the record.

MR CILLIERS: Yes, I have been placed on the record, and I have no questions.

CHAIRPERSON: No questions, thank you. Mr du Plessis?

MR DU PLESSIS: We are unaware of certain aspects and I am also reserving Mr Knobel's right until I have discussed it with him.

CHAIRPERSON: There is an indication that these legal representatives want to reserve their rights on the basis that have been set out. What's your attitude?

MR VALLY: I have no objections to them reserving their rights for a limited time also depending on Dr Lourens' availability and his attorney's availability. I do confirm that Mr van Zyl and I had that conversation. I believe that we have complied with our legal obligations. I'm not sure exactly which client I'm talking about, but if you talk about Dr Wouter Basson, if you look at item 18 on his subpoena, we say,

"the planning and/or execution of operations directed at the assassination or incapacitation of persons by the use of poisonous substance or any other means."

I also refer to TRC 96, a document which we gave to Dr Basson and therefor to his attorneys. We've talked about the problems of the screwdriver which wasn't shooting out enough of the assumed poison. Clearly we have raised - we have met our obligations in terms of Du Preez v Van Rensburg, page 41. I'll just read the relevant part,

"He or she's at the same time informed of the substance of the allegation against him or her with sufficient detail to know what the case is all about. Application of poison or mechanism not being properly effect."

If that's not a substance of allegations, what is? But I don't have an objection to their requests, dependant on Dr Lourens' legal representative. Thank you, Mr Chairman.

MR BORAINE: Mr Chairman, we would obviously want some idea as to when they will be ready. I don't think that Dr Lourens should have to sit here day after day waiting for the moment when counsel are now ready to cross-examine him. They must indicate and say look, we'll do it tomorrow or we'll do it on Wednesday so that he can then make himself available for that cross-examination, but we need to know when it's going to be.

CHAIRPERSON: And I think it is fair to say that even from the Commission's side, this hearing is scheduled for this week. We are constrained, as everybody else knows, to bring to Commission to a conclusion. Mr van Zyl, do you have an ability to indicate when, that would go for Mr du Plessis as well, when more or less in the week, is it possible to indicate in the week preferably when it will be possible for you to examine cross-examination.

MR VAN ZYL: Thank you, Mr Chairman, of course we will try and inform you as soon as possible. I am in a position to make contact with my clients. I can get instructions during the course of the evening. There's only aspect that might be a bit of a problem, although I have made notes, during the evidence of this, I will have to depend on my notes in order to inform my clients what the exact evidence against him was. It would have been of course of great help if we could have had the record of the proceedings very soon, I don't know how soon it is available, and how soon can get it. If it's at all possible that we can get it within the next day or two, because that will help, if not and you inform me that it will only be available, say for example next week, we have to deal with the problem with what we have at our disposal. We don't want to delay any of your proceedings here, for any purpose whatsoever, but we will in the meantime with what we've got at hand advise our clients and give them what we've got and get instructions from them. I can suggest that my attorney who is present maybe get a telephone number of Mr Vally or someone that we can maybe call after-hours or whenever and then we can give an indication, and I can assure you that we will do it as soon as possible. It's unfortunately not possible for me at this point in this to tell you we will be ready tomorrow, or the day after tomorrow, or whenever, before I've got instructions from my client.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Currin, can you indicate?

MR CURRIN: Mr Chairman, what I would suggest is that Dr Lourens be excused today, and that I'll be here the whole week, that we be given 24 hours notice. Say for example they feel they going to be ready to do him on Thursday, on Wednesday morning they must say to us we can cross-examine tomorrow, I'll get hold of Dr Lourens, and he can fly back to Cape Town.

CHAIRPERSON: I think it should be a sort of triangular arrangement. It should also incorporate and involve Mr Vally.

MR VALLY: Oh, absolutely.

CHAIRPERSON: So that he can slot it.

MR DU PLESSIS: Mr Chairman, I don't have an objection. This is an agreement we will abide to and ...(indistinct) will also abide to that decision.

CHAIRPERSON: Now, the panel, before I ask members of the panel to put questions to the witness, may I just find out if any of the legal representatives is representing General Lothar Neethling.

MR CILLIERS: Mr Chairman, I'm also - he's also one of my clients. Just for the record again, it's General Neethling, Drs Swanepoel, Mijburgh and Basson are my clients. Mr Du Plessis is here for General Knobel.

CHAIRPERSON: Okay, and your remarks would therefore include Dr Neethling.

MR CILLIERS: Yes.

CHAIRPERSON: Any members of the panel. Dr Boraine?

MR BORAINE: Thank you, Chair. Dr Lourens let me start with the point of departure that the Chairperson himself went onto, in connection with your discussion and attempts to contact the then Minister of Defence, the then Surgeon General and the then Head of the Army, General Liebenberg. Now, clearly when Charles van Remoortrere bought into that company, this really spilled the beans in so far as you had to give account of what had been happening, where the money had been spent, is that right?

MR LOURENS: Absolutely right, Dr Boraine.

MR BORAINE: Thank you. This clearly must have sent alarm signals in your own mind because after all, you had to account for it, and I assume it was for that reason that you decided that you'll really have to talk to the people at the very top so as to get an indication of exactly what you could say and how you could explain it and so on, is that right?

MR LOURENS: Yes, Charles and I had been very close and we've worked very closely together for a long period of time, and at no stage was any aspect of the project discussed with Charles from my side. If Charles had been briefed by anybody else in terms of this type of work, and he could have been briefed by only one or two individuals, he never made it visible, so we never discussed this part of the project, so at the time that the money issue became available, of became known, it was quite obvious to me that it was news to him, or new to him, and yes, I was frankly petrified at that stage, because I didn't know where to go to.

MR BORAINE: Thank you. What sort of sums of money were involved?

MR LOURENS: I can't recall exactly, but it was in the vicinity of R190 000.

MR BORAINE: So that's more or less the kind of costing for the screwdrivers and other ...(intervention)

MR LOURENS: It was all the projects. It included a few trips to Europe for example, the walking sticks and umbrella and so forth to not to be able to trace it back to South Africa, and that was purchases especially for the particular project. So yes, it was for all those applicators, if you want.

MR BORAINE: And Dr Lourens, you must have known that those walking sticks were not meant for walking, or the umbrellas for the rain, I mean you must have been pretty, pretty upset, or disturbed or agreed with the need to supply to someone, we assume assassins, the necessary cover weapons so that they could use them in - to assassinate?

MR LOURENS: Dr Boraine, I had at not stage been under the illusion that it was for anything other to assassinate human-beings, fact, there's no ways one could even contemplate that excuse. On the other hand is, there's I never applied my mind in that era, and I must be quite honest with you, in terms of who it would be applied to. It's something that I - in hindsight it's a strange experience in not looking back and actually questioning and saying, but who would be applied to, there's wasn't a face that I could attach it to, or a republic enemy that publicly ...(indistinct) would say that this is potentially ...(indistinct), and I didn't question it. And I'd like to be able to say to you yes, I went through the moral - I went through the total moral process in terms of thinking it through at the early stages, it doesn't happen at a late stage.

MR BORAINE: Alright, and precipitated by the fact that you now suddenly going to have to explain what this fund was and what this account was all about, you've already said that that is the case, now your friend who is a lawyer, have you given that name to Mr Vally at all, do we know who that is?

MR LOURENS: Well, his name is Kobus Bekker.

MR BORAINE: Thank you. And Kobus Bekker was someone that you could confide in and you asked him to gain access to the them Minister?

MR LOURENS: Yes.

MR BORAINE: Yes, but the Minister said no, he wouldn't see you, but he would see Mr Bekker?

MR LOURENS: What happened there was is that after I'd consulted with Kobus he contacted the Minister and we flew down that same evening to Cape Town and until we actually went to the Minister's office, I had been under the impression that I would see the Minister. He went in, and I really have to recall, I'm not all that clear, he went in and he had a discussion and came back and said, listen the Minister is not going to see you, wait, and he went in to discus the - but he had all the data, the details etc with him, yes.

MR BORAINE: And in substance, what the Minister said, well, this is not something I know anything about, or I can't deal with it, go and see the Surgeon General, is that right?

MR LOURENS: The way in which I recall it was that the Minister said that he bore no knowledge of this project at all and that it was - he would open the way for us to talk to people that may be able to give some sort of a clear direction on this project, yes.

MR BORAINE: So you went then to General Knobel?

MR LOURENS: Yes.

MR BORAINE: Just tell us again, very briefly, you obviously must have told him that you had been through your friend to see the Minister and that you're now seeing him and that this plot had been uncovered, if you, and you were concerned, and what did he say to that?

MR LOURENS: By the time that he had arrived at his office, it was quite obvious that the Minister had already spoken to him. He knew exactly why we were there. He received us in the manner in which he always does, cordial, we may even have had a cup of tea, and he basically said to us that this particular project is outside of his scope of control or jurisdiction and we would need to see General Liebenberg, and he set up the appointment for us.

MR BORAINE: And he was in no way sort of worried about the fact that you were worried or concerned, or that you'll maybe cause an embarrassment to anybody else?

MR LOURENS: Not that I can recall, but I must tell you, I was reasonably pre-occupied with myself at that point, I wasn't particularly sensitive to other people's ...(indistinct)

MR BORAINE: Yes, that's understandable. And then you had the discussion and a couple of whiskies and quite a pleasant chat with General Liebenberg?

MR LOURENS: A very pleasant chat, it was - we in actual fact didn't discuss it at all, we didn't discuss the project, the toys at all. He was briefed, I told him what it was in terms of screwdrivers, etc, etc, and that was it, and we did not discuss the details when we were going to go to, what we were going to do, what was going to happen, and he just said, forget it, it's over, don't worry, I'll handle it, and that was it. It was as simple as that. And very cordial, very well received.

MR BORAINE: Now, did you actually believe him, that he was going to handle it, and that was that, the problem was over?

MR LOURENS: I desperately had hoped so, yes, I did believe him.

MR BORAINE: And yet you went along and buried it, why didn't you give it back to him then?

MR LOURENS: Well, you know, I wasn't going to give anything back to anybody until I've had some sort of proof. I mean, by that stage, my - the extent of my disillusionment was number 1 myself, and second the sort of environment that I was operating in with was to such an extent that I'll be honest with you, at one stage I thought that I was going to land up in jail, I thought this is it, I'm going to be caught with this horrible stuff, I won't be able to justify, there's money missing, jail, jail's it. So it was to a certain extent a trump card that I decided to bury.

MR BORAINE: So you took out some insurance?

MR LOURENS: I took out some - it was the proof of that particular project.

MR BORAINE: Okay, so not to push the point, but you didn't really feel that Liebenberg, General Liebenberg could really solve the problem and deal with it, even though he had given you that assurance, otherwise clearly you would have said, well that's fantastic, let me hand the stuff over to you and you deal with it.

MR LOURENS: I think what we need to bear in mind is that, you know, during '93 a lot of things had changed in this country and things really started to move, and I did not feel that I had this unqualified promise that would be kept at all costs, no, so yes, there were some reservations from my side, and as a matter of interest, this is that the final conclusion thereof in terms of that I was never phoned by anybody that said, listen, it's okay, don't worry, it's all over. I was just not - it was never discussed with me again, so I just kept my evidence hidden and that was it.

MR BORAINE: You will appreciate, Dr Lourens, that one could ask an enormous number of questions, but I do have colleagues that are also dying to ask questions as well, so let me not take that any further, and just conclude by asking, two much more briefer questions. One, you talked about the other thing that disturbed you after a while, and that the was the life of luxury that the project team enjoyed. Now, was that in terms of salary, or houses, or cars, or what, what sort of lifestyle was that?

MR LOURENS: Dr Boraine, I cannot reply in terms of salary, other than my own, but it was a very comfortable life that we lived in the sense that we travelled - all of us travelled to Europe frequently, perhaps even excessively so. We always travelled business class, and in certain cases, people even travelled first class. We stayed in excellent hotels at all cases, we had a good lifestyle. I earned a reasonable salary, I earned a good bonus, bonus as a function of profitability of Protechnic especially, and in terms of the life that we were living, I obviously have had to measure myself, and obviously my colleagues, in terms if my peers, and it was a comfortable life, yes.

MR BORAINE: Last question, you mentioned your visit overseas, which clearly was a distressing experience personally. You mentioned that you met Trevor. Was he South African?

MR LOURENS: Yes.

MR BORAINE: What sort of age and description, I mean how - what is your recollection?

MR LOURENS: Trevor was at that stage I would have judged him about 45, greyish, shortish man, no distinct features, not a big nose or whatever the case may be. South African in terms of, I judged him to be South African in terms of his accent, we spoke Afrikaans, so he was South African, and his clothes, I mean, when I saw Trevor at the station, he was South African.

MR BORAINE: Just one other question about this whole handing over what of course was a deadly weapon, as you yourself experienced, did it occur to you either during or after that time that you were travelling specifically to Europe with this weapon in your possession that you were going to hand over to someone, dit it occur to you that, you know, he must have been an agent who was going to use that one someone in Europe? I mean, did you discuss it with him at all?

MR LOURENS: No, it did occur to me, and it's not the type of occurrence, you know, to manufacture the screwdrivers and hand it over to a scientist whose going to test it and evaluate it, is really, it's at arm's length, it's not an issue, it's not an interlace with somebody who would pretend to you, this is my first interface with - and I knew it, with somebody that would potentially kill somebody else, and it didn't dawn on me until I actually woke up after the poison exercise, and then it was real. I was in England for a few days thereafter, and I can't remember how many days, and I remember very well buying every single newspaper that I could my hands on to try and find out, you know, had somebody died mysteriously, and so on. So, yes it - I was very aware of that aspect then.

MR BORAINE: And that was in when, what year?

MR LOURENS: About '92.

MR BORAINE: Okay, thank you very much.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you, Dr Boraine. Any other questions? Dr Orr?

MS ORR: Dr Lourens, the question that I'm going to ask is perhaps not easily answered, and I ask it because part of the TRC's mandate is to attempt to understand the perspective of people who were involved in human rights violations, and although you yourself were not directly involved, I think you yourself would acknowledge that you were most certainly involved. And I ask, what kind of environment, background, education produces a scientist, and you are a scientist, who does not question what were undoubtedly very dubious assignments, who does not ask for what purpose his research is going to be used, who even when it becomes blatantly obvious from the poisoning episode, that science is being perverted for abuse? How is it that such a person is, doesn't take any action? How was it that you didn't question, what was it about the social environment that enabled you to simply carry on and close your eyes, until really quite late in the whole process?

MS ORR: Obviously, you know, once you're out of the system and you look back, you ask the questions, you'll have to ask yourself these questions ...(tape ends)

MR LOURENS: The first issue is that the performance of science is a drive in itself. If you look at the manufacture of a chemical substance, difficult synthesis. At the end of the day it poses a challenge.What the substance is may to some extent be irrelevant, whether it's a protein or a poison it's a complex chemical substance, and you would often find that scientists have a particular focus towards this particular end goal, this objective in achieving that, without thinking of its application. It's like nuclear fusion. Nuclear fusion is a phenomenal, it's phenomenal science. And a scientist working on nuclear fusion is not necessarily going to have the atom bomb in mind. And unfortunately I think it's a character of individuals as scientists to often not think about the application or the consequence. That's the first part. I mean that's the easy part.

The second part is that why don't we question, why didn't I question? Unless you've been in that system you wouldn't know, and the manner in which we operated, within that system, you know we have this term which we call the need to know basis, and it was an excuse utilised by the system to not tell you. And you become used to it. You simply just live in this environment. I lived in that environment for four, five, six years where I knew quite well, being an intelligent individual that I was seeing a small segment of a big picture, and I believed that the people that knew what was good for me, and thus would expose me to the right things at the right time. It's a naive, it's a practically stupid approach. But that was the way it went. And it doesn't happen overnight.

You know a scientist is not taken from university as a bright young lad and said tomorrow morning you will start manufacturing chemicals to kill people. It just doesn't happen like that. It happens over a period of time and all of us have been gradually drawn into the system and over a period of time questioned less and less and less. Those were the harsh realities of it all. It's not just a fable I know, but this is the way it happened. I don't know if I have answered your question.

DR ORR: It is a difficult question to answer, you have gone some way. Thank you.

One more question. When you decided to approach the Attorney-General and/or the Truth Commission did you discuss this decision with any of your colleagues, Knobel, Basson, Mijburgh, Swanepoel?

MR LOURENS: Dr Orr can I make a statement, please. I take grave offence to the statement made by the gentleman on my right by calling me a martel gat, and I expect him to withdraw that immediately.

CHAIRPERSON: Was that said now, here?

MR LOURENS: Here directly now, a few seconds ago.

CHAIRPERSON: Who is the gentleman?

INTERPRETER: A martyr.

MR LOURENS: Defending Gen Knobel.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr du Plessis.

MR DU PLESSIS: It wasn't meant to be offensive. I withdraw it.

CHAIRPERSON: Did you say that?

MR DU PLESSIS: I made a remark to Mr van Zyl.

CHAIRPERSON: Did you say that in these proceedings?

MR DU PLESSIS: Yes I said it.

CHAIRPERSON: Martel gat.

INTERPRETER: A martyr.

CHAIRPERSON: Did you say he was a martyr? ...that we take these proceedings seriously. Mr du Plessis I don't know where you come from. I respect you as a lawyer and as a legal representative. I need to indicate that if you don't display to this Commission the sort of respect that is due to it, but once more if you do not, with due respect, refrain from intimidating witnesses, because whatever you meant, or whatever you wanted to do, that is an intimidation of a witness. And I think the witness has every reason to take offence at what you said, and I think you should apologise to him.

MR DU PLESSIS: I have already withdrawn the statement and I apologise to him.

CHAIRPERSON: I think the Commission reserves all rights that it has in regard to what you have done Mr du Plessis. Dr Wendy Orr.

DR ORR: I will repeat my question. When you decided to approach the Attorney-General with the information which you had and come to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission did you speak to any of your colleagues, your previous colleagues from the project, about it? And if so, what was their response?

MR LOURENS: Let me try and explain something to you. This is despite the attitude of several of the gentlemen on the right, I had a very strong association to my ex-colleagues, and I had an excellent relationship with them, and they had been responsible for a fantastic part of my life, and thus it was very, very difficult to actually turn against them, because that's exactly what I did, and I have no illusions about it.

I discussed it with Brian Currin at the time. I said Brian what am I supposed to do? And Brian said to me, the right thing to do is to phone them and tell them that you've turned State witness or that you are going to disclose the facts.

The first person that I phoned, I phoned James Davies. James' reply to me was, he says that Jan we've met with lawyers, the group on our right, they discussed that they were scientists, they had done nothing wrong; that they were on the right side of the law, so they were not going to apply for amnesty and not disclose anything. At that point I - and I asked him, I said James, had all people been party thereto? And he said Jan, Wouter was there, Wynand was there, Philip was there and I phoned nobody else.

DR ORR: Thank you. I have no further questions.

CHAIRPERSON: Dr Randera.

DR RANDERA: Mr Lourens I want to come to this question of front companies that were set up. I think in the time that we've been listening to you and in the period that we are looking at you must have set up about ten or eleven different companies that you mentioned. Companies that were involved in producing if not destructive, certainly very dangerous substances, biological or chemical. The perception that I have is that all you required was some money and a few scientists of like mind, because you had to be of a like mind to be involved in as exciting as you may say the work was, to be involved in what you were doing, were there no obstacles? Were there no checks and balances even within the period that we are looking at to setting up these companies?

I ask this question because we want to look at the future, and if the same sort of situation pertains today, then I am very concerned, because what is to stop us from doing the same tomorrow what you did in the last ten years or in the ten year period that we are looking at, because I mean you started with Special Ops in 1982 and by the time you finished in 1993 it was almost a ten, eleven year period. Can you give us an idea?

MR LOURENS: I think what you need to do is you need to look at the project in terms of two aspects. The first part is the big project, Project Coast being Roodeplaat and Delta-G etc, etc, which was very formally funded, set up, run, managed and audited, despite the fact that it had come from largely secret funds.

The smaller units, such as the units that I had set up and run, was much more sort-of, there were no fixed structures. You know I didn't have fixed guidelines from any authority, military or otherwise, in terms of these are the checks and balances. And other than having a private auditor there was practically no checks and balances, no.

DR RANDERA: And would you like to comment as to what these checks and balances should be today, having been involved in the sort of work that you were involved in?

MR LOURENS: I think that there are two issues that you need to take into consideration. The one is an ethical issue and the other one is one of financial application. I think the principle of having large-scale secret funds that are controlled and used by single individuals is extremely dangerous and we've seen it in terms of the wastage.

In terms of the ethical side is that I believe that there will always be a role to play in terms of particular defensive systems and you know in chemical defence, as an example, there will always be an offensive part. You will always look at new generation toxic substances that you need to protect yourself against. But if you have the right scientific balances, and I believe that those scientific balances should be outside the military. They should be in academic institutions that people that can, from a liberal point of view, question what the purpose and what the objectives, what the final direction is. And those checks and balances need not to be totally transparent, in other words it need not be public, but it needs to be transparent to a wider community, which we never had.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you Dr Randera. Advocate Potgieter.

ADV POTGIETER: Thank you Chairperson. Dr Lourens you gave some idea about the operations that you were involved in, but is it correct that was part of, it slotted into this CBW programme?

MR LOURENS: That's correct.

ADV POTGIETER: Whatever it was called, Project Coast or whatever name was given to it, but it was part of that overall project?

MR LOURENS: Yes.

ADV POTGIETER: Now often in a hearing like this there is a tendency to get stuck in terminology and so on, but can I ask you just for a comment. Taking into account your experience, taking into account the kind of equipment that you said you had assisted in producing, what would your response be to a statement that this programme, the CBW programme was purely defensive in nature? What response would you have to that sort of statement?

MR LOURENS: I would respond to you and say to you that's typical rhetoric that we've heard on a number of occasions from the previous military dispensation and it's absolute nonsense - unqualified absolute nonsense.

ADV POTGIETER: Was there ever any doubt in your mind that any of these things, any of the screwdrivers, whatever, this whole lot of equipment, that any of this was anything but murder weapons really?

MR LOURENS: No, it couldn't be.

ADV POTGIETER: And that they were clearly intended to be used against human beings?

MR LOURENS: Absolutely.

ADV POTGIETER: And that they had the clear potential to kill?

MR LOURENS: Advocate there is no doubt in my mind that that was the application. So I - and I think any normal human being of reasonable intelligence would have reached the same conclusion.

ADV POTGIETER: And that it seems to me also that they were meant for covert action, for covert operation?

MR LOURENS: Yes.

ADV POTGIETER: Thank you very much.

CHAIRPERSON: Whilst you are on covert operations it has now become notorious or common cause that there was an element of the South African Defence Force called the CCB which was a covert operation. Did you ever have any dealings or links with the CCB?

MR LOURENS: I had dealings with two individuals, Joe Verster and Danie Wahl, very, very briefly. But what I must tell you is that at the time that I dealt with them the name CCB was unknown to me. So I didn't deal with them knowing that they were part of a covert operation. I knew both Joe Verster and Danie Wahl from Special Forces headquarters, and not in terms of their CCB role.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes, no that's just a matter of detail. But it was Joe Verster and Danie Wahl ...(intervention)

MR LOURENS: Yes.

CHAIRPERSON: Joe Verster, as you now know ...(intervention)

MR LOURENS: Yes.

CHAIRPERSON: ...was the Chairperson, or the managing director of the CCB. And do you still recall what sort of encounter you had with Joe Verster?

MR LOURENS: I was introduced, I met Joe and Joe - basically the reason for the meeting was is Joe introduced me to Danie and Danie and I was going to work together on some projects and they never materialised.

In a subsequent meeting that I had with Danie he gave the explosives and the letter bomb devices and so forth to me and that was it.

CHAIRPERSON: And you do not know if any of your "speelgoed" was ever passed on to them for usage in the operations?

MR LOURENS: No, not that I know of.

CHAIRPERSON: You were never the person to do that even if it did take place?

MR LOURENS: No, no absolutely.

CHAIRPERSON: No we have been taking evidence from CCB operatives and there are indications from some of them, certainly one of them who we last heard, that a substantial amount of these chemical and biological warfare chemicals were used by them in the CCB, but you wouldn't be the person to have passed them on to them?

MR LOURENS: No. I never interfaced with the operators. I interfaced with Trevor and that was a single, single incident, and other than that I never interfaced with any of them.

CHAIRPERSON: I see. Since you left the project have you had any links or contact with Dr Wouter Basson?

MR LOURENS: Yes he phoned me once about a year, eighteen months ago. He phoned me on my cellphone. He said to me - he was friendly, as he's always been, he said to me that he was told that I was applying for amnesty and he wanted to tell me that both him and General Knobel are most disappointed at my going this road. At that stage I had not applied, I had not approached anybody and I denied it. And since then the first time that I've seen him again was last night at the airport.

CHAIRPERSON: You see this brings me again to the question that was raised by Dr Wendy Orr, the whole question of the motives and perspectives. You see what worries us, and especially in view of what continues to take place so many years in what should be a democracy, and what should be a democracy that should not be undermined by all the people who, as we understood, had reconciled themselves to the reality of a changed South Africa.

You see the rallying cry was always this "rooi gevaar", the Communist threat. If we are to take into serious consideration, for instance, the reasons given by former Minister of Foreign Affairs, Pik Botha, as having been the basis for some of the operations that were carried out by the South African Defence Force, namely, that there was always this Communist threat. Now by 1989, if my history serves me well the Berlin Wall had fallen.

Secondly in this country, from the 2nd of February there had been a major announcement made by De Klerk which we thought was heralding a new era, an era of negotiations and an era that sought to say now that Communism is away, now that there is no more terror on our borders, we should start to negotiate a way of life that is going to cause us to live side-by-side. What worries me is that for well up to 1993 you, on your own evidence, were part of the process that was still manufacturing dangerous murder weapons, in what should be conceived against the backdrop of what was happening, to have been a complete undermining of the peace process, and a complete undermining of a democracy that was sought to be brought into being.

Now what again causes people who know that a new mood is being endeavoured to be brought into being, but continue to do things of the nature that we are talking about?

And I would like you to also indicate, what do you think was going in the minds, it's a difficult question, in the mind of a Minister of State who was charged with maintaining law and order in his portfolio but notably one who was foremost in the negotiations process?

Now what sort of people are we dealing with here and what do you think is the future of this country, if on one hand we have people who talk peace and on the other manufacture weapons of mass destruction?

MR LOURENS: As an individual that lived within the security community for a long period of time the only thing I can say to you is that I think that most of us were, and I left that system before the '94 elections, my perception of the experience or the perception of my old colleagues was one of being ready for the great war up to the '94 elections, and the great fear of the outcome.

I mean we have to be quite honest about it, we didn't expect the President to be the kind-hearted man that he is or was at that time. We didn't expect to be treated in a fair manner by the new black government. We expected to be chased into all kinds of dark corners of South Africa. So I don't think that anybody, from the security community, the white security community, moved into the elections feeling comfortable despite the overtures for peace etc, etc.

Even today, this little interesting episode we've just gone through, I mean it shows you that even after the proof of 1994 we still have a lot of people, white people, that resent this change, that did absolutely resent the change and can't make peace with whatever we did in the past. I cannot run from what I did in the past. I can't run away from the fact that I was in the military and I do carry it with a certain amount of pride, but I have to say that I've done the wrong things as well. So the change of heart is there, to some extent in some of the old securocrats, but not in all of us.

CHAIRPERSON: Now with the benefit of the background which you have indicated, there was this war that was expected to be taking place in 1994 it never came, do you think there's a war that is coming in 1999? I am serious about these questions ...(intervention)

MR LOURENS: Ja, I know that you are serious.

CHAIRPERSON: Because we have, on your own evidence, somebody who knew exactly what you all were about, on your evidence you say he says "I and General Knobel are very disappointed with you", what do you think they were disappointed with your what? For applying for amnesty or for revealing the truth?

MR LOURENS: Most probably especially revealing the truth. Applying for amnesty at that stage was - it's an early days issue. I don't believe that there's another war, and the reason for that is that I think a great deal of the white community have changed their minds and have seen that there is some simple concepts, such as living together, since 1994, so I think that the amount of people that today view this political dispensation with hatred and the drive to try and overthrow and live in this fool's paradise should just - it's a small community, it's a very small community.

CHAIRPERSON: Now lastly you said you heard - you people were travelling to Europe etc, etc, I am not particularly concerned with the lifestyle for the moment, but did you ever in your travels get an impression, apart from meeting that Syrian, that some of the people that you were meeting might well have been agents, foreign spy agents? Did it ever occur to you that that might be so and that this was also you know a programme that involved other foreign states and therefore you dealt with foreign agents?

MR LOURENS: Ja. I never, never got the impression that I was interfacing with foreign agents. But having made the statement you have to bear in mind that I was never trained to be able to detect, so I was in actual fact a sitting duck. If they wanted to approach an individual I would have been the perfect target in the sense that you know - and none of us went through this sort-of surveillance, counter-surveillance, national intelligence programme. That's not true. Some of the people did in actual go through. But I was not in the league of, for example, Dr Basson, in terms of skills to be able to identify, etc, etc. So it may in actual fact have happened, yes.

CHAIRPERSON: You are saying you were not a Craig Williamson for instance?

MR LOURENS: No, no, no absolutely not.

CHAIRPERSON: And it may well have been that Trevor, for instance, could have been a CA agent, a Mosad agent, a KGB agent?

MR LOURENS: Yes I suppose so, although my introduction or the process was - of my setting up of this particular trip was done by my officer commanding, which was Dr Basson, so there was a trust component there.

CHAIRPERSON: Anymore questions. Thank you Dr Lourens. Oh Mr Vally.

MR VALLY: I am sorry Dr Lourens there is one issue we want to canvass which is, what role did Dr Lothar Neethling play in any of the front companies you were involved in, other than him coming to meet privately with Mr Bart Hetema about aerosol cans?

MR LOURENS: Dr Neethling played, as far as my exposure to him had been concerned, and I must really tell you, strange as it may seem, is that I had a great deal of exposure to him, played no role. There was numerous opportunities in which we could have discussed intricacies of Project etc etc, and it never, ever occurred, never. So I have to say to you, no role as far as my participation was concerned.

MR VALLY: Thank you Dr Lourens.

CHAIRPERSON: I have to thank you Dr Lourens for having made yourself available. Subject to the arrangements that still have to be made for your further availability, you are excused.

MR LOURENS: Thank you very much.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you Mr Currin. Mr Vally.

MR VALLY: Thank you Mr Chair. We call Mr Charles van Remoortere.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Vally do you have an indication of whether Mr van Remoortere will be over with by six o'clock, at ten to six?

MR VALLY: I did have that indication Mr Chairperson until you started questioning the last witness.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes, in which event I think whatever arrangement you had made with us for that reason now flies out of the window. We adjourn now until tomorrow morning.

MR VALLY: We will not be longer than half an hour with Mr van Remoortere.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes I appreciate that but I know your half-an-hours Mr Vally. Nine o'clock

MR VALLY: Okay. Mr van Remoortere is not available tomorrow. He has spent most of today here. If we can hear him because we have got a very little, small area to cover with him.

CHAIRPERSON: It's difficult. But Mr Vally are you sure that if he's going to be cross-examined you have canvassed this with your learned friends? Is there going to be a cross-examination of this witness?

MR LOURENS: I haven't canvassed this specifically with my learned friends but he's not giving evidence, as far as I am aware, relating to them at all.

CHAIRPERSON: I am reluctant to allow it Mr Vally but I suppose if he's not available tomorrow and he's kosher I will assume let us entertain him.

MR VALLY: Thanks.

CHAIRPERSON: And only relevant cross-examination in-chief. I will have to curtail this.

MR VALLY: Mr Chair we are trying to make up time. This witness will not take long. I suggest we complete with him.

CHAIRPERSON: Okay Mr Vally.

CHARLES VAN REMOORTERE: (sworn states)

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Vally.

MR VALLY: Thank you Mr Chair. Mr van Remoortere you are a Belgian citizen, is that right?

MR VAN REMOORTERE: Yes that's right.

MR VALLY: When did you come to South Africa?

MR VAN REMOORTERE: In 1982.

MR VALLY: When did you get involved in the company that Dr Lourens was talking about, SDR?

MR VAN REMOORTERE: I got involved in, I started getting involved in the companies in 1988/9. I was involved before that in helping Dr Basson getting some information in Europe and helping Jan Lourens getting some information in Europe and I was already trading in some of the products that they required. But I was involved in the companies, the companies really got operational from '89, '88-'89, the Protechnic/Technotec issue.

MR VALLY: What sort of information were you getting for Dr Wouter Basson?

MR VAN REMOORTERE: In 1986 when Dr Basson contacted me he required to have information in relation to protective products for soldiers, and information regarding the possible testing through the process of manufacturing these items in South Africa. And therefore the whole base of the SRG/Protechnic, scientific base, had to come from somewhere. And because of my background and my relationship I could secure a great part of that scientific knowledge, technical knowledge.

MR VALLY: When you say you could secure it, how could you secure it?

MR VAN REMOORTERE: Well I had contacts in Europe that supplied me the information and that information was paid for by Dr Basson.

MR VALLY: Were you involved in what was commonly called the "sanctions busting" for the South African government in those days?

MR VAN REMOORTERE: Yes, absolutely.

MR VALLY: Did you provide Dr Basson with any information on offensive chemical and biological warfare?

MR VAN REMOORTERE: Sorry I didn't get that question.

MR VALLY: Did you, besides the defensive clothing manufacturing, did you provide Dr Basson with any information on offensive chemical or biological warfare programmes?

MR VAN REMOORTERE: Never.

MR VALLY: When you - did you buy Protechnic from the Defence Force?

MR VAN REMOORTERE: No. I bought Protechnic when Protechnic became available on the market from a company called Medchem, which at the time I did not know was part of a whole, was a front company and was part of the whole system.

MR VALLY: Did you know that Protechnic was a front company?

MR VAN REMOORTERE: No Protechnic was not a front company - well when I bought it it was a front, but under my management it was not anymore a front company. The only link that was still in that company that was a front was Dr Lourens, and because he couldn't explain to me why money was missing when he resigned I accepted and he left. There was no more front company at the time. For the two years that I kept the company it was run as a proper business.

MR VALLY: You also own Hazmat.

MR VAN REMOORTERE: Yes.

MR VALLY: Now why would ostensibly front companies for the military allow a foreign national to become the majority shareholder?

MR VAN REMOORTERE: I think we have to go back to the circumstances that led a Belgian citizen get involved in this process. When I was here in South Africa for the three first years I was hired by a Belgian banker to set up a factory in Uitenhage and that's my job. I am a project manager, I am an entrepreneur. I did that with the technology, I am an expert in transfer of technology, I did that with Belgian technology from a Belgian company. That same company was involved in Belgian in the manufacturing of protective products for Nato forces for those 15 years. So they had a great know-how and a nice range of product in that particular field. Only protective products, the suits, the boots, the gloves etc. As I was using their technology to set up a wide-width(?) PVC coating plant in Uitenhage the owner of that company in Belgian asked me, totally openly with the consent of the Belgian banker, to see if the military in South Africa needed these products. And so I did. Every time I was in Pretoria I visited them, Armscor, which was at the time right in the centre of Pretoria, and I tried to sell the product.

I was always told that there was no need for such products in South Africa until in 1986 we were invited to witness in Jamba people, soldiers, who had been hurt by chemical weapons, or so we were told. I am not a doctor. But we did see some people who were hurt and we were shown and asked if we could help in bringing, in spite of sanctions, in bringing the technology to South Africa.

And so it's circumstances, I believe, that have led, because of sanctions, this government to realise that there was somebody who had the technology available. The Belgian company was totally supportive of going around sanctions because of the protective nature, and I say this because that's important, because for the first four years of this project it has never been mentioned, nor to the Belgians nor to myself, that there was anything else involved. So we were manipulated in this of course.

And this is why I believe that even though it's not normal they allowed this, especially with the project being a secret project with Dr Basson being in charge of it, they allowed this situation to continue.

Now one thing that wasn't supposed to happen is I wasn't supposed to buy Protechnic, Protechnic had nothing to do with me. Protechnic was the institution that was organised by the military as I understood it, through Jan Lourens, to check that what I supplied or manufactured or traded, actually did give the right level of protection. So when one day Medchem decided to sell that company to my great surprise I had very little choice. We were totally involved in contracts. We had this company that had the ability to manufacture, in small quantity, these chemicals that we needed for the tests, and it was frightening for me to realise, being in the middle of these contracts, that this company could go to anybody on the market.

And that situation was discussed a few times with the Surgeon General, to whom the - and actually initially I refused to buy it because it's very difficult for a businessman to go into an environment which is totally, totally, let's call it scientific, with scientists, okay, and take over a company with contracts that I had nothing to do with. So I didn't want to buy it actually.

After a long process with my auditors, Kessel & Feinstein, we actually decided to buy it and immediately started trying to sell it back to the government, which we succeeded a year and a half later. So these two things - so I actually bought Protechnic not to leave it outside of our sphere of influence and control and I immediately started approaching the Surgeon-General, and Armscor for them to buy it. And two years later not only did I sell back Protechnic but Hazmat too, because Hazmat also, with the impregnation of activated charcoal that we were doing, was an integral part of that strategic arm that a country normally has within it's nationals, not with two Belgians and business people.

MR VALLY: Was Hazmat also a military front company?

MR VAN REMOORTERE: Not at all. Hazmat was one of the departments of Technotech who got so big that we decided to make a separate company, but it had nothing to do with - it was fully owned by myself.

MR VALLY: So Hazmat was making protective equipment and Protechnic was quality testing it?

MR VAN REMOORTERE: That's right, but that only lasted for a year and a half and - until Armscor bought it back and by that time our systems were extremely well developed, so I was not worried at all with proper control that things would go wrong there. Remember that we had a double checking system with Belgian, and for instance, on the fabric of the suits we would cut our samples in two, always send one sample to Belgian to their lab, and one sample to Protechnic, and the conclusion of both was taken into consideration then to approve the suits. Remember that these suits, they are still in stock, are - protects soldiers ...(indistinct) life, so there was no way any chances could be taken as far as that was concerned. Hazmat did not only do that, they also impregnated activated charcoal, made the canisters for the mask, assembled the Huberin Suner(?) Swiss mask that was delivered to the military as a part of the protective gear.

MR VALLY: Just a few more questions. The first one is, when you were taken to Jamba, that's in Angola.

MR VAN REMOORTERE: Yes.

MR VALLY: This was at the time when South African forces were still occupying Angola?

MR VAN REMOORTERE: Yes. Well I don't know if they were occupying it, but I mean we took an helicopter and we flew there. So obviously there was some facilities of....

MR VALLY: The allegations regarding a chemical attack in Angola, were they also not publicised by a Belgian called Orben Hendriks?

MR VAN REMOORTERE: No that was after. Professor Hendriks came after into this thing. I think he was used by Brian Davies, Dr Brian Davies for further examination and publicity probably. But that came after. We were the first one to go. Now I cannot tell you if what we saw were people who had been hurt by chemical gases. I can't. I am not a doctor, I am not a scientist. But it never came to my mind that it wasn't, except since we have been discussing these issues recently.

MR VALLY: This Dr Hendriks who publicised claims of chemical attacks in Angola, he has been convicted of fraud in Belgian ...(intervention)

MR VAN REMOORTERE: Yes....

MR VALLY: Has he not?

MR VAN REMOORTERE: Yes, absolutely.

MR VALLY: And of academic fraud as well?

MR VAN REMOORTERE: Sorry?

MR VALLY: Of academic fraud?

MR VAN REMOORTERE: I believe so, yes.

MR VALLY: I want to ask you about this binary weapon, this prototype.

MR VAN REMOORTERE: Yes.

MR VALLY: That was ordered via you.

MR VAN REMOORTERE: Yes.

MR VALLY: Do you know who this Mombar(?) was?

MR VAN REMOORTERE: Well I met the man three times. I was introduced to Mr Mombar through a gentleman called Mole, I think, in England, who actually seems to be also in contact with Dr Basson, and seemed to be one of his colleagues or whatever. Now this man we, this man was actually wanting - initially what I understood is he wanted storage of binary agents, not projectiles. Now I checked again because we discussed the issue and it's a long time ago, it was very clear that in the supply of a principal, because that's all they did at Protechnic, there was never a question of supplying agent. There was no sample taken. Mr Mombar did mention once, and it was refused, flatly, so we never agreed to have anything to do with the agent.

What we were interested in is to develop, which was at Protechnic's level quite an interesting challenge, initially a storage system of the binary agent that could then be utilised as a delivery system. Now the minute this - it became clear that what we were talking about with Mr Mombar was the delivery system, we backed off completely, because we realised we were dealing with strange people and strange business.

MR VALLY: Was Mr Mombar suspected of being a member of a foreign intelligence agency?

MR VAN REMOORTERE Yes I think - my impression, and I never had any proof to that, but I think he had something to do with the Israeli state, if I am correct.

MR VALLY: So you suspect that he was the Mosad agent for Israel?

MR VAN REMOORTERE Probably, but we had backed-off from that completely by that time.

MR VALLY: I understood Dr Lourens, and I maybe wrong but you were here as well, as saying that there was a prototype built with VX, a nerve agent?

MR VAN REMOORTERE No. There was never a prototype built with VX agent. There was a prototype built, and it wasn't a prototype, it was a - how do you call that, in a process of developing a piece of equipment, there's an initial concept design and they do a few parts to prove that it's, the project is on the right way. It's actually - when seeing this, and seeing the work that Protechnic had done that Mr Mombar started doubting our ability to do what we said we could do, and he started becoming very worried and that's when he started talking about ...(indistinct) and that's when I started to understand that he wasn't talking about storage but projectile and I backed off.

MR VALLY: Was anything ever delivered to Mr Mombar?

MR VAN REMOORTERE No, nothing. Well no sorry, there was a report and some drawings, but they were the initial phase of that conceptual design on which he reacted very negatively and that's where we stopped.

MR VALLY: What can you tell us about your dealings with Dr Wouter Basson, other than the protective clothing issue? Were you involved with Dr Wouter Basson in other respect other than manufacturing of protective clothing?

MR VAN REMOORTERE No I wasn't, but initially Dr Wouter Basson used me to open the way, to facilitate the way to travelling, to financial transaction and to information in Europe. And that was on the basis - at that time Dr Wouter Basson was a colonel of the army. He had come and made his credentials in Belgium. He was supported by the Surgeon-General at the time, and there was no question whatsoever that we were dealing with anything else but a solid motivating project where we had to bust sanctions to get the South African military to protect themselves against chemical attack and the whole reasoning was that the Russians, through Cuba, were using the Angolan war as a live testing ground. And that was the motivation behind this thing. So there was a great enthusiasm at that time. There was absolutely no question of irregularities, of involvement in all the things we are hearing today. It's only a few years later that the whole thing came out and eventually turned very sour.

MR VALLY: You did visit the facility at Roodeplaat, RRL?

MR VAN REMOORTERE Yes when - but that's at the very end of the construction of the new building, and it's Dr Wynand Swanepoel who invited myself and my wife to look at the building, and we did go in the building and we saw baboons in cages.

MR VALLY: And you knew what it was for?

MR VAN REMOORTERE No, not at all.

MR VALLY: And what did you think the baboons were there for?

MR VAN REMOORTERE I believed it was an animal, it was presented to us at that time - we weren't at all in that project. I didn't even know the word "Project Coast" that you are using. At that time that front was completely front. It was Wynand -he's a dentist, was a dentist, Dr Wynand Swanepoel, and he had recycled himself into animal research. And we were showed this building as a total social get-together and well, unfortunately if I had been a scientist maybe I would have been more able to see that what we were being shown was something else. We didn't stay very long because the animal in the cage didn't appeal to my wife at all and she decided that we should leave.

MR VALLY: When did you become aware that Dr Wouter Basson was involved in more than just looking for protective clothing?

MR VAN REMOORTERE Late, I would say, I can't say exactly when but it's between '89 and '92 when Mr Jan Lourens started - actually Mr Jan Lourens started telling me these things and I wouldn't believe them. And I thought it was a reflection and a result of his fighting or whatever he was involved in, that made him say things about Dr Basson that were a bit negative, and I wouldn't believe it. But unfortunately with time evidence came out and then we started hearing about the CCB, about all sorts of things which just proved the manipulation and the willingness to get out.

MR VALLY: Last two questions. From your personal knowledge to what extent did Dr Knobel, the Surgeon-General, have knowledge of what was happening at Protechnic at the time it was still called SDR? Did he know all the programmes involved, excluding the screwdriver one?

MR VAN REMOORTERE No I don't believe that - my experience with Dr Knobel, we have a term in French for this, sorry I am French, we call it the "Pigeon". The "Pigeon" when you organise a game of cards is the person that is going to lose, and the others make an agreement and he's the "Pigeon". I think Dr Knobel was the "Pigeon", because Dr Knobel didn't seem to know a lot of things that was happening around, even though it was in his projects, he seemed to be very well manipulated by the system.

MR VALLY: Was it a question of did not know, or did not want to know?

MR VAN REMOORTERE That you are going to have to ask him.

MR VALLY: Finally, what did you think about the security and the efficiency of the companies you looked at and eventually acquired?

MR VAN REMOORTERE Well the efficiency after I took over Protechnic and before it was sold, we just put back into a scientist company some very straightforward business management processes. Today Protechnic works very well. Hazmat works very well in a new building on the highway. They are still providing the services that an organisation like this demands, so I am quite happy with the efficiency of the companies.

In terms of security what was happening before was, if I say it was a joke I wouldn't be lying, because I know that my security level with Dr Basson was very clear. He said you cheat us, we kill you, and I thought it was always a joke until recently I realised it wasn't that much of a joke. But I never had the intention to do anything wrong to him and to the system. Remember in the beginning it was a wonderful project, and he had good motivation and a good reason to be. But after that the security lacked because - I was also approached by two South Africans that came from nowhere and asked if they could buy ...(indistinct) again, Protechnic at a certain time, and when there was resistance they just disappeared and it was -

I mean there was this company with all that knowledge that could have been sold, I believe, for a lot of money to the wrong hands. So I think coming from the era of sanctions I can understand the process, but the problem is when you leave too much to one pair of hands it gets out of hand.

MR VALLY: Were you still in charge of Protechnic on the 28th of November 1997?

MR VAN REMOORTERE In 1997?

MR VALLY: The 28th of November.

MR VAN REMOORTERE Well I know when I sold it - I sold, I purchased Protechnic in 1993 and I sold it in 1994, June.

MR VALLY: And did you make a large profit?

MR VAN REMOORTERE Did I make a large profit - reasonable.

MR VALLY: I asked you that last question because in the ten year report of Protechnic there's a message from Lt Gen D P Knobel who pretends that it was established as a private company, but you won't have any knowledge of that?

MR VAN REMOORTERE No, I don't.

MR VALLY: Thank you, I have no further questions.

MR VAN REMOORTERE Thank you.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Currin any cross-examination?

MR CURRIN: There will be no cross-examination from Dr Lourens.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you. Mr van Zyl?

MR VAN ZYL: Nothing thank you Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr du Plessis?

MR DU PLESSIS: Nothing Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: Dr Boraine.

DR BORAINE: Chairperson I only have one question. Dr Lourens gave evidence immediately before you, were you here?

MR VAN REMOORTERE Yes, yes I was sitting right in the back.

DR BORAINE: Okay. So you know that he told us that when you bought the company you were very worried when you discovered that there was some, apparently money, unaccounted for, let's put it that way. And he was you know very alarmed by that, and you've heard all he said. Did he tell you, at any stage, as to where the money had gone?

MR VAN REMOORTERE No he didn't want to.

DR BORAINE: Did you ever hear at any stage that it was actually money used for the manufacture of these screwdrivers?

MR VAN REMOORTERE No much later, much later.

DR BORAINE: So what - I mean so he must have given you some reason why the money was missing?

MR VAN REMOORTERE No he didn't. What happened is that my group financial manager started finding out about this amount of money missing being paid to an account which was actually an account owned by Mr Jan Lourens and I immediately expected fraud. And when I confronted him on that issue, since he couldn't give me an explanation, nor could he - because he couldn't, I have never been in all these plans and these things so I mean I would never have accepted that a company that we just bought now has all these parallel activities that we know nothing about, and that cost money over and above. So no, he didn't want to tell me and that is the reason why we separated, because there was a lot of pressure during two months while our financial manager, group financial manager was examining the accounts he felt more and more insecure and then he confronted me and I confronted him back and then he resigned and I accepted his resignation the next morning. Because I could not accept to work with a managing director that could not explain to me where R200 000 left.

DR BORAINE: So you cut your losses.

MR VAN REMOORTERE I cut my losses, yes. No I didn't cut my losses, I asked the Surgeon-General, I said I believe that I have a problem here because Jan Lourens is an excellent managing director and he ran this company in a wonderful way. So it was a big problem for me to lose him. And it was a problem I believe for the system, so I had to go, my main customer at Protechnic being the medical forces I went to my main customer and I discussed these issues with him and he told me to leave it. Cut my loss. And since he was my main customer at Protechnic, and he was responsible for more than eighty percent of the turnover of the projects that were tackled on a yearly basis, if he sees "leave it" I said I am going to leave it. So it's again not the sort of thing that I could push on to.

DR BORAINE: So Dr Knobel either didn't know or decided not to take it any further but just said let's leave it?

MR VAN REMOORTERE I think he just wanted peace and I think he was maybe starting to realise that there were a number of things that he didn't know about that was getting embarrassing.

DR BORAINE: Alright. The very last question on this, who bore the loss then, the R200 000?

MR VAN REMOORTERE Who?

DR BORAINE: Who carried the loss?

MR VAN REMOORTERE It stayed in the books.

DR BORAINE: Okay, thank you.

MR VAN REMOORTERE I carried it. (Laughs)

CHAIRPERSON: Dr Randera.

DR RANDERA: Can you just clarify something for me Sir. Earlier on you said, when you were asked about front companies and whether Protechnic was a front company, you said no, absolutely not. Then later on you said Mr Lourens actually started talking to you in 1989.

MR VAN REMOORTERE Yes.

DR RANDERA: ..as to the various activities he was involved in. I would assume part of that would be the front companies he was involved in. Can we just hear from you what is it that you are telling us, did you know about this? Did you not know about it? Because clearly there must have been more to it than what you are actually telling us.

MR VAN REMOORTERE No not at all. I think that was a process. When I say between '89 and '92 is simply because these things happened during the time and Mr Jan Lourens just made remarks or said things in a context of the discussion that clearly indicated that there was something else happening, and the confrontation on what he thought that Dr Basson was doing came much later. Really at the end I would say, '91, '92. Remember I was still very close to Jan Lourens and I still am, okay, so there was a dispute there. There was him feeling cheated because I was now thinking that he was a crook and him not being able to tell me or not wanting to tell me and then him starting to tell me things that I didn't really believe, so it's a whole sequence of events in time.

DR RANDERA: Two more questions. Again we asked your - the gentleman that we - Mr Lourens, earlier on about motivation as to why he became involved in that year, and I would like to ask that of you. I mean here you are a businessman from Belgium, you knew sanctions were in existence against this country. The United Nations had said apartheid was a crime against South Africa, you come to South Africa and sell equipment, I presume this was not on the list of your own country to be selling to South Africa; you break sanctions; you go off to Angola with the South African Defence Forces, can you explain to us what your motivation - was it to do with business, it's about business, or was there other motivations involved?

MR VAN REMOORTERE No I think there was a very strong different motivation. When I moved in this country, I have travelled all my life. I have never stayed more than three or four years in a country because of my father's work. My father is a retired general in the Belgium army. I myself I am a rookie lieutenant in the Belgium army, in the paratroopers, and I am very sensitive to - when I came in this country after three years I decided to stay here. It was for me a first move into a country which I am still am after fourteen years. So it was a great challenge, I must say, that all of a sudden I could actually, as a businessman take a very interesting line of project, which is totally in my field, on the one hand. On the other hand do something that I felt was necessary.

When I was a young lieutenant in the Belgium army we were fully trained on chemical warfare, fully. So it made very little sense for me for an army not to be equipped, just for the defensive reason, against possible attack or terrorism for that matter.

So when, after presenting my product for more than two years to the military and always having a no, it was eventually suggested that we could supply it was a very exciting project for me. And that's only in these terms that I - I actually cleared the moral issue with my father in Belgium and we decided that there was no reason to see that in the list of products that were sanctioning South Africa, there should be a protective product against chemical warfare. We discussed it with the Belgium company and we came to a decision that it was right, so it was quite a challenging, exciting project for the first three years.

DR RANDERA: Mr van Remoortere my last question. Is your main customer still the army?

MR VAN REMOORTERE Not at all. I am not involved with the military at all. What happened is that we closed once - these projects should have been still running now. In the manufacturing of the mask with the Swiss we were supposed to go on a 15 years plan here, and when things starting degenerating and Dr Basson started cancelling his contracts we just accepted that it was not the right thing to continue. So you know I am not - I've sold Protechnic, I've sold Hazmat and I have nothing to do anymore with the supply of any product to the military until maybe they need me again.

DR RANDERA: Thank you.

CHAIRPERSON: Advocate Potgieter.

ADV POTGIETER: Thank you Chairperson. I am just trying to understand why you were taken to Jamba. You were trying, you were quite anxious to sell this product, the protective clothing.

MR VAN REMOORTERE Yes.

ADV POTGIETER: But the military was not interested in the product. Now eventually you managed to sell it to them, but why did they take you to Jamba?

MR VAN REMOORTERE Maybe because the Belgium company have to be - that was the first time that this gentleman came over and he was taken by Dr Lothar Neethling and Dr Basson and myself straight to Jamba and I think there was maybe an effort there to motivate us, which it did, me, it motivated me. Maybe it was solely for the sake of securing the motivation.

ADV POTGIETER: But that's the difficulty I mean you were very well motivated. You were - they blocked you for a few years ...(intervention)

MR VAN REMOORTERE Two three years, ja.

ADV POTGIETER: Two three years. You were anxious to sell this to them, they didn't want to take it, so you didn't need much motivation on that ...(intervention)

MR VAN REMOORTERE Yes but we were talking about a different level of co-operation now. From what I was doing I was trying to sell, to trade these products. What happened is that they were convincing us to transfer technology and so that the company, the Belgian company had to get fully involved behind it. I think it was quite a different level of involvement, and maybe they thought - and it worked because the Belgian gentleman was very, very you know convinced that the Russians were using - I mean that was the explanation, now maybe it's not true. I mean that was the explanation, ja.

ADV POTGIETER: Yes well that will be probably one of your question marks. But just finally, what kind of business did you establish in Uitenhage?

MR VAN REMOORTERE In Uitenhage, it's a wide-width coating plant. It's PVC coating on woven polyester or nylon which was woven by Industechs on wide-width Susner loom.

So the company in - the reason why the Belgian company has that is because it's part of the treatment of fabric. They weave, they make yarn, they weave, they treat, and on the same coating line you can treat fabric and impregnate it with all sorts of things and you can put PVC on the tarpaulins. So they had a diversity of technology which was good for Industechs. But they also had, because of the weaving, the manufacturing of the yarns, the weaving and the treating of fabric they could make the special fabric for the protection against chemicals, and that's where that company has all these abilities.

ADV POTGIETER: Oh I see. So that was really an extension of that ...(intervention)

MR VAN REMOORTERE Absolutely ...(intervention)

ADV POTGIETER: ...protective clothing business.

MR VAN REMOORTERE Absolutely, ja.

ADV POTGIETER: Thank you.

CHAIRPERSON: He is originally from Uitenhage you see. He wants to know whether..... (General laughter)

Well thank you very much Mr van Remoortere.

MR VAN REMOORTERE It's a pleasure.

CHAIRPERSON: And you are excused.

MR VAN REMOORTERE: Thank you.

WITNESS EXCUSED

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Vally, who are you calling?

MR VALLY: I was thanking you Mr Chair.

CHAIRPERSON: You are welcome Mr Vally. We are adjourned until nine o'clock.

COMMISSION ADJOURNS

ON RESUMPTION 9TH JUNE 1998

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Vally?

MR VALLY: Thank you Mr Chair. There are a couple of items I just want to put on record. The first item is that General Knobel has contacted us and he said that if his attorney doesn't put it on record when we begin, his apology for the comment his attorney made yesterday. We should expressly put it on record on his behalf and he apologises for what happened yesterday.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr du Plessis has already indicated to me that he wants to have an opportunity to do so Mr Vally.

MR VALLY: Thank you Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: I don't know whether it should be formalised by Mr du Plessis.

Mr du Plessis, perhaps this is a convenient time to indicate?

MR DU PLESSIS: As it pleases you Mr Chairman. I just want to apologise again for the remark I've made and place on record that my client disassociates him as well with the remark. Thank you very much for the opportunity.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you Mr du Plessis.

That takes care of that Mr Vally.

MR VALLY: The second item is that the legal team of Doctor Wouter Basson have indicated that they will object to him giving evidence here. They can indicate the basis therefore. We are of the view that we should have that argument earlier rather than later. And I'm advised that as Mr Cilliers is not available today, he's researching this point at the moment. We should have that argument at the latest by tomorrow morning when Mr Cilliers will be available in order, that if there is any further legal action contemplated by Doctor Basson's legal team, we are not crowded out of this week.

CHAIRPERSON: Were we going to be hearing Mr Basson tomorrow?

MR VALLY: Well, initially we scheduled him for tomorrow, we then scheduled him for Thursday. However, I would ask the panel to hear the legal argument regarding Doctor Wouter Basson because there is the outside possibility that Mr Basson could begin on late Wednesday depending on how fast we get through the witnesses we have. So if he can, after obtaining the views of Doctor Wouter Basson's legal team, have the legal argument regarding the issue of him giving evidence tomorrow morning, by agreement.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr van Zyl?

MR VAN ZYL: Thank you Mr Chairman. Mr Chairman, we've indicated yesterday to Mr Chaskalson that, I don't want to use the word: "object", but we would put a request to you regarding Doctor Wouter Basson's evidence, the view of the pending criminal case. And the basis for that, the basis is Mr Chairman, that at this stage he is being forced by legislation to give evidence about a matter related to his pending criminal case and the charges against him and consequently he has a right to keep silent according to the Constitution and he must not be pressurised to show his hand at this stage.

Yesterday you saw that we've received a note from the Attorney General regarding the various charges against Doctor Basson. This was done by Doctor D'Oliveira's investigative team. This is also a charge regarding conspiracy. We will argue this in detail and will refer to the necessary authority.

At this stage I want to mention that we discussed this with Mr Vally yesterday and I and Mr Cilliers, we together appear for Mr Basson, and Mr Vally felt that the correct time to pose argument is when Mr Basson is supposed to give evidence. Mr Vally said that perhaps they could do it earlier but Mr Cilliers is not available today. I cleared with Mr Vally before these proceedings. He is still doing research about this matter. We haven't made a final decision. He will be back this afternoon. He's available tomorrow morning and I think we will be in a position to argue the matter. Mr Cilliers might have one or other problem but we will be able to proceed tomorrow morning. Thank you Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you Mr van Zyl.

Mr Vally, are you calling further evidence?

MR VALLY: The final issue which I want to place on record Mr Chairperson is, Professor Finkhuizen is here from the office of the State President. His concern is the issue of proliferation. He has indicated to us that in the event of any witness producing any documents which are not in the bundle presently in the possession of the Commission, which has been made available to the various parties who are involved in this matter, that there be an opportunity to study these documents with a view to curbing any possible proliferation, and we have no objection to this.

CHAIRPERSON: Very well Mr Vally.

Professor Haysom, are you going to - Professor Haysom, do you want to formally place yourself on the record?

PROF HAYSOM: Mr Chairman, I'm here currently, although as indicated previously, from the office of the President but nominally representing the Department of Foreign Affairs in our role as I have described perhaps light-heartedly as proliferation policeman. We have not had an opportunity to engage other counsel although we expect counsel to assume my function shortly and he will, Advocate Arendse will be placed on record when he arrives.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you.

PROF HAYSOM: I also want to confirm that arrangement that I have made with Mr Vally, that we would be given an opportunity in the event of surprise documents that we haven't had an opportunity of as it were, screening it in case there is any danger of proliferation. And also to record that in respect of those documents which are before you they have in fact been the subject of considered and considerable joint scrutiny and we are quite happy with the arrangements that were made yesterday afternoon in respect thereof.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very much Professor Haysom.

Mr Vally, does that take car of the preliminaries?

MR VALLY: Thank you Mr Chair, yes it does.

CHAIRPERSON: May I then welcome everybody to this second day hearing on the CBW Programme and I believe everybody has been placed on record. Mr Currin, you are already on record but I don't know whether you are for IMSA or for ... but here I believe you are for what you are.

MR CURRIN: ...[inaudible]

CHAIRPERSON: I nearly thought as much when I saw you. M Vally, your first witness please.

MR VALLY: My first witness is Doctor Johan Koekemoer.

CHAIRPERSON: Doctor Johan Koekemoer, welcome to these proceedings.

DR KOEKEMOER: Thank you.

CHAIRPERSON: You are represented by Mr Polsen I believe.

DR KOEKEMOER: That is quite correct.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Polsen, you did place yourself on record yesterday?

MR POLSEN: I did so yesterday Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: Ja, you can formally place yourself in respect of this particular witness.

MR POLSEN: Thank you.

CHAIRPERSON: Before you testify Mr Koekemoer I will ask Advocate Potgieter to swear you in formally.

ADV POTGIETER: Doctor Koekemoer, are your full names Johan Koekemoer?

DR KOEKEMOER: I am Johannes Matteus Koekemoer.

JOHANNES MATTEUS KOEKEMOER: (sworn states)

CHAIRPERSON: Of course Doctor Koekemoer, you are free and entitled to express yourself in a language you are best comfortable with.

DR KOEKEMOER: I don't care to talk in English Chairperson.

CHAIRPERSON: It's your choice, thank you.

Mr Vally?

MR VALLY: Thank you Mr Chairperson. I just want to enquire if Doctor Koekemoer has any statement he wishes to hand in before I commence with my questions.

DR KOEKEMOER: No, Mr Vally, I won't be handing in any statements.

EXAMINATION BY MR VALLY: Thank you Doctor Koekemoer. Doctor Koekemoer, what was your occupation prior to joining Delta G?

DR KOEKEMOER: Prior to joining Delta G I was Professor of Organic Chemistry at the Rand Afrikaans University. I have a BSc in Chemistry, MSc in Organic Chemistry and also a DSc in Organic Chemistry.

MR VALLY: How did you come to join Delta G?

DR KOEKEMOER: I was recruited by Doctor G L Lourens who was early in 1986 head of the Research Unit at Delta G Scientific and I have worked with him previously at a private company and I also knew him as a student.

MR VALLY: Did you know what Delta G was?

DR KOEKEMOER: I was informed that, when I joined Delta G in April 1986, that we would be developing an analytical capability, defensive analytical capability towards Chemical Warfare Agents and that we would be doing some work on potential ...[indistinct]

MR VALLY: Were you aware that it was a military front company?

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes, I was aware. I only actually became aware at a later stage when I was asked to sign a document relating to the Official Secrets Act.

MR VALLY: What was your function at Delta G?

DR KOEKEMOER: I started in April 1986 as a Chief Researcher and at that stage I reported to Doctor Lourens who was the head of my department. At that stage Doctor Mijburgh was Managing Director of the company, Doctor Rahl(?) was Technical Director. There was a Mr Andr? Redlinghuys who was Administrative Director and a Mr Barry Pithy who was involved in marketing.

MR VALLY: At the stage you joined Delta G, where was it located?

DR KOEKEMOER: That was in the Weldegraan Forum in laboratories and offices near Weldegraan in Pretoria. We later that year in '86 moved over the present Delta G site on the Corner of George and Old Pretoria Road in Midrand.

MR VALLY: What specifically were your duties at Delta G?

DR KOEKEMOER: When I joined Delta G in 1986, they had just started developing CR. The original process developed by Rahl and his colleagues only contained about 15% of this active. I actually at that stage assisted Doctor G L Lourens and Doctor Hennie Jordaan in developing an improved process for making CR and when we moved over to the Site at Delta G Scientific in Midrand I was eventually practically alone, did the final scale up research on this project.

MR VALLY: We may come back to CR but just for the record, CR is a new generation teargas as opposed to CS which was the old teargas.

DR KOEKEMOER: That is quite right. I also actually did develop an improved process for CS2 but this project was also initiated by Doctor Lourens.

MR VALLY: When you say Doctor Lourens, what's his first name?

DR KOEKEMOER: Gert Lourens, it's not Jan Lourens.

MR VALLY: Thank you. Now, was work assigned to you or did you determine your own projects?

DR KOEKEMOER: Well, can I handle this chronologically if you don't mind Mr Vally?

MR VALLY: Certainly.

DR KOEKEMOER: I developed, and as I said in the final stages I was mostly involved alone in the development of a scaled up process for making CR. Following that I then started doing some commercial development and in this case I worked on compounds like Betahistine Terpeniol. I worked on Simpi-retroid work, Phenadone, Chlorhexidine Gluconate, so these were normal commercial projects.

At that stage Doctor Lourens was still the active head where the CBW work was concerned. I probably became head of this CBW unit only in about August/September 1989 but I must mention this that the Analytical Department reported to me up to about February 1988 when Doctor Claus Psotta became head of that department until at least about January 1990.

When I finished this work in 1989, about August 1989 there was a more formalised system of reporting introduced where CBW work was concerned and we had to report to Doctor Basson on a regular basis both in written form and we also on about a quarterly basis used to present our research results to Doctor Basson and also when Doctor Mijburgh was present at the offices of Medchem Consolidated Investments at Henopsmeer.

MR VALLY: We're going to come back to the involvement of Doctor Philip Mijburgh as well as Doctor Wouter Basson.

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes.

MR VALLY: What I want to know is this, when you - I'd like to know this chronologically as well, it doesn't have to be in great detail but you can give me periods in terms of a few years, when you commenced your employment with Delta G, did you determine your own projects or did someone else determine them for you?

DR KOEKEMOER: When I commenced working there I was told to work on the CR Project with Doctor Jordaan and Doctor Lourens. Then I was told to start developing commercial projects and we obtained leads where commercial projects were concerned, from the Marketing Department which was Mr Barry Pithy's department at that stage, before he became Manager of Delta G Scientific.

Afterwards when I took over the CBW research, I inherited some projects from Doctor Lourens and this included the BZ analogues. There was an Kanamodite Project and also CR analogues that was involved. When I was doing commercial work I did have a project going as, for incapacitation which we called the Narcotics Project and this project was, if you would, I think I've got the project number here somewhere, I think that was, eventually became R43900688.

MR VALLY: This is the code name of a project involving narcotics?

DR KOEKEMOER: Narcotics, analgesics and there were some piperidine derivatives and so on involved with this too and also some Indole alkaloid amines.

MR VALLY: Won't you give us that number again please?

DR KOEKEMOER: That was R439006/88. And there's also in these documents ...[intervention]

MR VALLY: Sorry, '98 or 88?

DR KOEKEMOER: 88.

MR VALLY: 88, right.

DR KOEKEMOER: This had another code number previously, I think it was a 42 number.

MR VALLY: Alright, and this was part of the CBW programme?

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes.

MR VALLY: It wasn't the commercial side of it?

DR KOEKEMOER: To a certain extent it was a commercial side too because some of the work that I did there and the research data obtained for this enabled us eventually, after the take-over by Sentrachem in August '93, to actually implement a commercial project in the narcotics field. But I, basically I developed four primary new phentanyl derivatives which had a potential as narcotics incapacitants.

MR VALLY: Was any research in biological warfare done?

DR KOEKEMOER: No. At the stage when I joined Delta G Scientific, when we had moved over to the new site, there was also a Biochemical Division at Delta G. That Biochemical Division was started by Doctor Henni Jordaan and amongst other things he actually formulated a Petite Project there which eventually, when I took over in August 1989, we formulated it to be an anti-HIV sort of project.

Some of these projects, there was a so-called Somnogenic Mirimeal Peptide that he had attempted to synthesise, which is some sleep inducing Peptide. I also know that they had a project going which they tested personnel from the Army for drugs of abusive. We had a full-time pharmacist there, Mr Steven Beukes who handled the MCC part of this and the scheduled drug registers.

When I took over from Doctor Jordaan, I'm not an expert on higher chemistry, Doctor Lucia Steenkamp who actually did this work on the Peptides obtained a PhD actually on the work and most of this work, as far as my involvement was concerned, was trying to develop Peptides and I think she eventually managed to do five of them which could couple onto the so-called CD4 lymphocytes and the idea was then to add an anti viral agent onto the backside of this peptide in order to see whether we could combat AIDS.

MR VALLY: What do you understand to have been the mission of Delta G?

DR KOEKEMOER: Funny, I've never been informed about the Project Coast, I've received these documents from the TRC and a lot of us at Delta G have never been informed to the full extent of Project Coast and what the objectives were.

We were actually doing work on a need to know sort of basis. I knew that where the CBW work was concerned, that we were not to work on any lethal agents but to specifically work on potential incapacitants of which CR was one example of them.

We at stage, I think that it was AECI that actually manufactured CS for the government and they moved out of this and then I was, Doctor Lourens was requested to develop a process for CS because the process that we obtained or we were told were used by the previous company were not very effective, I think it gave a yield of about 60.

Doctor Lourens started working on this and then I completed the work and we developed a process for making CS with very high purity and high yield.

MR VALLY: Were you aware of the facility at Roodeplaat, the RRL laboratories?

DR KOEKEMOER: I was aware to the extent that Doctor Lourens at a stage submitted a request for testing some of our potential incapacitants. In his case I think it was specifically BZ. I also submitted a request for testing some of these fentanyl derivatives and also a number of the CR analogues that we made. I did give a couple of samples of the narcotic derivatives for them to test but they were charging us an arm and a leg for this and the results were not very successful.

I think the quantity of materials they gave, it was a normal tail flick test for narcotic analgesia which has been published by Jansens Laboratory which we requested and that was not very successful because the dosage that they gave these animals were too low.

I'm not sure, I know that one of my assistants did also request having BZ tested there but I'm not sure whether she ever sent in samples to that purpose. As far as Roodeplaat was concerned I did go and see the people there to discuss the testing of my materials and specifically Doctor Wynand Swanepoel but that is all contact I ever had with Roodeplaat Research Laboratories.

MR VALLY: Were you ever present at these tests into the chemical substances at Roodeplaat?

DR KOEKEMOER: No, never.

MR VALLY: Did you ever get reports on a testing?

DR KOEKEMOER: I only a report on Narcotic Analgesics which was not successful.

MR VALLY: And the testing was done on baboons?

DR KOEKEMOER: No, no, no, not baboons, it was a mouse flick tail test which they did on rats I suppose.

MR VALLY: What was the role of Doctor Wouter Basson?

DR KOEKEMOER: Well, Doctor Basson kept a very low profile where Delta G was concerned and I said, from August 1989 I had more regular contact with him because we had to report to him on a quarterly basis.

Prior to that you would see him sometimes in the evenings coming to Delta G but you never knew whether you had to greet him or not to greet him and so on. So he was - we actually called him: "The Skim", in that regard.

I know, I've heard that he also from time to time on an informal basis, requested some of the analysts to do some analytical work for him but it was never a formal sort of thing, with the exception of two projects.

One was a project where Brian Davies brought some pieces of metal in there which he said was a bomb that had exploded in Angola and which could potentially contain Chemical Warfare agents. We did a lot of work, probably 1000 man-hours went into that search and I eventually, we did manage to establish that Adamsite was involved in that specific case.

In the second case there was some grey powder that was brought to us that they also said was some material that was obtained from Angola and we analysed this and, the sample wasn't very big, and we could tentatively identify that it was one of the mustard gases but the sample was so small that we never could confirm it with a gas chromatography mass spectometry to actually establish that it was HM2.

MR VALLY: When you say you didn't know whether to greet Doctor Basson or not, what did you mean by that?

DR KOEKEMOER: Can you repeat that question please?

MR VALLY: When you say you did not know whether you should greet Doctor Wouter Basson or not, what did you mean by that?

DR KOEKEMOER: Well what I meant was, you would walk into a restaurant for example and because he kept a low profile we were never sure whether we should show the people around us that we recognised him and greet him for example.

When I had to report on this Adamsite I was called to Military Headquarters there at Henopsmeer and I was introduced to a number of people which he said were from outside the country involved with this CBW and I had to give a pseudo name in that case and just give my report, so it was very 007.

MR VALLY: So it was all very secretive and you knew he was involved in a manner in which he didn't want his involvement known publicly?

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes, but I do think too that he kept a low profile in the case of Delta G Scientific because we were a front company and he didn't want to compromise our situation for obtaining chemicals and so on from outside the country, imported chemicals. And this would also influence our commercial activity which we were supposed to be doing.

MR VALLY: What contact did you have with other military personnel besides Doctor Basson?

DR KOEKEMOER: The only contact I ever had with other military personnel was with Commandant Ian Joubert who brought us some urine and blood samples and said we must attempt to analyse. There was apparently some toxic substance that had poisoned a number of Koevoet people and they wanted to find out what this was all about, so we did analyse and we found some Thallium in these blood and urine samples.

And then he brought us blood and urine samples over a period of time to do the analysis and I was then asked to supply them with Prussian Blue. There was no Prussian Blue, a very small quantity, 25 grams I think was available from Merck in this country so I took actually some technical material and purified this for this purpose and then gave it to them.

MR VALLY: What was the nature of your daily interaction with Doctor Philip Mijburg when he was the Managing Director?

DR KOEKEMOER: Well Doctor Mijburgh was Managing Director of Delta G Scientific initially and then when Medchem Consolidated Investments, I don't know the history of Medchem, but when Medchem Consolidated Investments was established in 1990, he became Chairman of this group but he still retained what he called being Chief Executive Officer of Delta G Scientific. And we, I did my research work and we reported this to Doctor Basson in his presence normally and at a certain stage, I believe it was in 1990 about May, I was asked to develop a pyrethroid synergist and this was apparently a prelude to making MDMA Hydrochloride, developing a process for making MDMA Hydrochloride for them.

MR VALLY: Who was this who requested it?

DR KOEKEMOER: This was Doctor Mijburgh that requested this.

MR VALLY: Now let's just understand what the MDMA analog is.

DR KOEKEMOER: Well MDMA Hydrochloride is commonly known as Ecstasy. I was relatively reluctant to develop Ecstasy for him for the simple reason that it was, I told him that is a drug 1 scheduled in the United States and a drug of abuse but he insisted upon this.

I went so far as, at that stage I was also promoted to being Director of Research at Delta G and Mr Sybrand van der Spuy had joined Delta G at that stage as a Technical Director. Doctor Mijburgh told me that he had obtained an official order from the Surgeon General for this compound and that it was envisaged that it would be used as potential incapacitant. So in order to try and remain on the legal side where this was concerned, I and Mr van der Spuy actually went to see Doctor Lothar Neethling in this regard. We had a discussion with Neethling concerning this.

Neethling was, during that meeting, very non-committal concerning this so-called Baxol Project, which was MDMA Hydrochloride but he started arguing, he asked me what chemistry I envisaged and so on and we argued about the chemistry and from our discussion I deduced that we had his tacit approval although he didn't want to commit himself to this project.

I then went back and eventually developed quite a novel process for making MDMA Hydrochloride. This was implemented on plant scale and materials, the pure materials, and it was very high purity, it was 99.5% plus pure material, was delivered by myself over a period from the 4th of February 1992 to about the 5th of January 1993, to Doctor Mijburgh's offices at Henopsmeer, that is Medchem Consolidated Investments.

Apparently the delivery notes were made out to Kowolsky International. The Finance Department had done that sort of thing so I'm not sure why it was made out to Kowolsky International. I heard that Doctor Mijburgh was also involved with Kowolsky International and that he was part owner or involved as a Director there.

MR VALLY: Do you know what happened to this - first of all, what quantity of Ecstasy was delivered by you in this period between the 4th of February '92 and the 5th of February '93?

DR KOEKEMOER: 5th of January '93.

MR VALLY: 5th of January, I beg your pardon.

DR KOEKEMOER: I believe it was about 912 kilograms.

MR VALLY: Do you know what happened to the - sorry, in what form did you deliver this?

DR KOEKEMOER: This was delivered in pure crystalline form, white crystalline form, it was not in encapsulated form at all. It was pure white crystalline material packed in white drums that could contain about 12 kilos at a time.

MR VALLY: And how did you deliver this?

DR KOEKEMOER: I delivered it by car because they insisted that we keep a high confidentiality about this project, so they didn't want other people involved except on one case where we had quite a lot, I think it was about 200 kilograms where I used transport, a bakkie from Delta G and at that stage I think that Mr Philip Mouton helped me to transport the material there and pack it into a sub-basement store.

MR VALLY: What were you told that this Ecstasy was for?

DR KOEKEMOER: I was told that it was to be - they just decided that it will be a good incapacitant, so I actually said to Doctor Mijburgh: "You know Doc, I don't want to love my enemy if I want to use an incapacitant on him. And as far as I know where the pharmacology of MDMA is concerned is that it enhances interpersonal communication and empathy and I would not like to kiss my enemy but I would rather work on his central nervous system and disorientate him to such an extent that he can't operate properly".

MR VALLY: And what was his reaction?

DR KOEKEMOER: He said that they have considered this to be a good potential incapacitant and that was that.

MR VALLY: Now what delivery mechanism was intended for this Ecstasy?

DR KOEKEMOER: They claimed that they would put it in some pyrotechnical mixture in the form of a gas grenade or something like that. I've never been informed about the particulars of this.

The only particulars where this is concerned was in the case of CR where I did do a number of pyrotechnical studies, working together with Swartklip Products where CR and CS was concerned.

We did develop a pyrotechnical analysis process for these people in the case of CR but we've never worked - and CS, but we've never worked on pyrotechnical processes for any of the other so-called incapacitants that was mentioned in these TRC documents that you gave me. Neither do I know of a thousand kilograms of BZ that was made.

MR VALLY: Talking about what you said just now relating to CR gas, since Delta G was the chemical laboratory surely you would be involved in delivery systems in terms of how the incapacitant like CR gas was to be effectively distributed to have the most effect.

DR KOEKEMOER: We were never given that brief at all. They said there were other departments in the Army that would handle that side of the affairs because Swartklip assisted and I don't know what other departments existed within the Army that had knowledge about dissemination techniques and so on. We never specialised or read up about dissemination techniques where this is concerned, no.

MR VALLY: Did you determine what happened to that 912 kilograms of Ecstasy which you delivered?

DR KOEKEMOER: No, what it did lead to was to a lot of grief for me in this case because at a certain stage, I believe it was in '92, '93, Medchem Pharmaceuticals which is one of the front companies in Medchem Consolidated Investments rented some space from one of our plants, Plant 3 there, and a Mr Steven Beukes who was a Managing Director of this company actually conducted his business there, either amongst other things, developed a process for making Chloroquine Sulphate which is an anti-malarial.

And I know that he formulated these capsules in that designated area but nobody ever came into that building and we simply ignored it. And when Mr Beukes moved out of there, Mr Pithey and myself went on an inspection there and we came upon a bottle with a mixture of capsules.

I took a handful of these meaning to ask Mr Beukes why he had left actives there, put it in a little bottle and early in February 1997 police came to my office and found these capsules there and arrested me for the possession of Ecstasy. This case was subsequently withdrawn against me on the 5th of May.

MR VALLY: Now Mr Beukes that you referred to, what was his position?

DR KOEKEMOER: He was Managing Director of Medchem Pharmaceuticals and from the record from the Medical Control Council I could deduce that he was appointed around September 1990 as Managing Director or Medchem Pharmaceuticals.

MR VALLY: I'll come back to Mr Beukes in a short while. So there were facilities at Delta G for the encapsulating of substances?

DR KOEKEMOER: Not at Delta G, at Medchem Pharmaceuticals.

MR VALLY: I see, sorry. And did you have regular contact with Medchem Pharmaceuticals? Is was the holding company of Delta G?

DR KOEKEMOER: Medchem Consolidated Investments was the holding company of Delta G. Medchem Pharmaceuticals was one of the sub-companies in this holding company.

MR VALLY: And did you regularly deliver items to Medchem Pharmaceuticals?

DR KOEKEMOER: No. We were informed by a circular in November 1992 by Doctor Mijburgh, that's how I came to know about this whole set-up of Medchem Consolidated Investments, that these companies, that was Medchem Consolidated Investments consisted of Delta G Scientific, Medchem Pharmaceuticals, Lifestyle Management Services and Pro Technique at that stage. That was in November 1992.

MR VALLY: So you were aware that at least some of this Ecstasy was in fact encapsulated?

DR KOEKEMOER: I only heard about this in 1997, not before.

MR VALLY: Did you hear about this independently of the fact that you were arrested for having those capsules?

DR KOEKEMOER: I only heard about it, that those capsules that were found in my possession contained Ecstasy, from the Forensic Department. Captain Koch I believe, told me that at a stage.

MR VALLY: Independently of that, were you ever aware that they had encapsulated the Ecstasy?

DR KOEKEMOER: No, I was not aware that they had encapsulated Ecstasy or any other drug of abuse there.

MR VALLY: Were you able to determine whether the Ecstasy that was found in your possession was the same Ecstasy that you had produced?

DR KOEKEMOER: Well that would be rather difficult. I didn't do any analysis, I mean the Forensic Department did those analysis. They said that it exceedingly pure Ecstasy and I did make a very pure Ecstasy. Well, not me myself but the Production Department under my direction.

DOCTOR RANDERA: Professor, can you just tell us, in tablet forms, the 912 kilograms.

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes?

DOCTOR RANDERA: How many tablets would have been able to be produced out of that?

DR KOEKEMOER: Well, I have articles here ...[intervention]

DOCTOR RANDERA: And what would be the street value of that at that time and today if you like?

DR KOEKEMOER: Well what I could deduce, there was an article in Chemical and Engineering News on a drug of abuse and if you look at the activity of MDMA Hydrochloride there's probably this, about 150 milligrams would go into a capsule. Now you can calculate milligrams, 150 milligrams, how many capsules you can get from 912 kilograms of this. It's quite a large, I think that it's probably about 600 to 100 million rands, if I have to guess quickly.

MR VALLY: We're trying to get clarity on that. How much - what would you say the value of the said Ecstasy was?

DR KOEKEMOER: Well, I've heard that these things have probably a street value of about R100 a capsule or a pill or whatever, on these rave parties.

MR VALLY: I see. We will have to do our sums but it's a considerable sum of money.

DR KOEKEMOER: It's a considerable sum of money yes.

MR VALLY: Sorry, the total estimate that you gave us a short while ago?

DR KOEKEMOER: I said about 600 million but this is only a guesstimate, I ...[intervention]

MR VALLY: 600 million ...[intervention]

DR KOEKEMOER: I haven't got a calculator here.

MR VALLY: I understand that. What would you have used Mercuric Oxide for?

DR KOEKEMOER: Well, initially when I was asked to develop a process for making Ecstasy or Baxil or MDMA hydrochloride we started with a Safrome which a constituent of the oil of Sassafras and this a substituted three for methylene dioxi.. ...[intervention]

MR VALLY: Sorry, I don't need the exact formulae.

DR KOEKEMOER: Okay, but we could start from oil of Sassafras and in this case we needed Mercuric Acetate to convert this Oil of Sassafras precursor to an intermediate which could eventually then be converted to an MDMA Hydrochloride. This process was not very successful. It gave low yields and I then eventually switched over to ...[intervention]

MR VALLY: You don't have to tell us. Sorry, we're trying not to proliferate.

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes, I'll try not to either.

MR VALLY: Just coming back to the Mercuric Oxide, was this delivered by Mr Allan Kidger?

DR KOEKEMOER: I don't know, I honestly don't know.

MR VALLY: Do you know who you obtained the Mercuric Oxide from(?)?

DR KOEKEMOER: Look, I was involved with the development, small scale development of this process and for this I used Mercuric Oxide which you buy commercially from normal chemical agents. I did not make use of Mercuric Oxide on a large scale where Ecstasy was concerned. It was not a very promising approach.

Now there were other complications where people were involved at trying to make, I just received a document here in this regard, where people tried to make some of this precursor, PMK for making Ecstasy in their own private capacity but I was never involved with that and I only heard about. I would not like to comment upon this except if you really want me to.

MR VALLY: Yes, we would like to know that but not right now. The reason I'm mentioning Mercuric Oxide is we understand from our investigations that it was Mr Allan Kidger who was responsible for delivering this Mercuric Oxide and a short while after this was delivered, we're talking days, he was in fact found killed. Do you have any knowledge of Mr Kidger?

DR KOEKEMOER: No.

MR VALLY: Do you know who Mr Kidger was?

DR KOEKEMOER: No, I've never met the man before in my life. If he had any dealings with Delta G, it was probably with our Buying Department.

MR VALLY: You have heard of his death?

DR KOEKEMOER: No, I have heard that he was cut up and found or something and found in a BMW, that's what I read in the newspapers.

MR VALLY: That's right. Do you have any other knowledge of it besides that?

DR KOEKEMOER: No, I don't.

MR VALLY: Do you have any knowledge whatsoever as to what happened with the 912 kilograms of Ecstasy?

DR KOEKEMOER: No, Sir, I don't.

MR VALLY: Have you ever enquired about it?

DR KOEKEMOER: Well, I just heard that it probably would be eventually destroyed in the presence of police but whether this was ever executed or not, I don't know. And I've also then read some aspects, some recommendations from these TRC documents, and I don't know whether you want me to comment upon them.

MR VALLY: No, but have you ever, even in ...[indistinct] talk informally amongst your colleagues, asked: "Whatever happened to all that Ecstasy I produced"?

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes, I have asked things like this but I never got any answer.

MR VALLY: Who did you ask?

DR KOEKEMOER: Well, I asked some of my colleagues whether they knew about it, that worked directly with me.

MR VALLY: Can you give us some names?

DR KOEKEMOER: I asked Doctor Lourens, Doctor Jordaan and those people and they said they don't know what has happened to it.

MR VALLY: Did you ask Doctor Mijburgh?

DR KOEKEMOER: No, I did not ask him what happened to it.

MR VALLY: Did you ask Doctor ...[intervention]

DR KOEKEMOER: I actually did say to Mijburgh, at a stage when I had to develop this thing, that if I ever found out that he was smuggling with this stuff I'll have his skin.

MR VALLY: Did you ever ask Doctor Wouter Basson what happened to it?

DR KOEKEMOER: No, I did not.

MR VALLY: Why did you ask Doctor ...[intervention]

DR KOEKEMOER: I had very few contacts with Doctor Wouter Basson. The last contact I did have with him, and that was one of the reasons that some documents were found by the police at my house, I believe it was in November 1994.

I didn't know that he had left the Army at that stage, and he phoned me up and said that I must come and see him at the Protea Hotel there in Midrand and he requested from me that I do a costing of the Baxil Project for him because he said there was still some outstanding accounts he had to settle with the people that supplied him with the raw materials and he wanted to know exactly how much Baxil costs.

MR VALLY: Baxil was the code name for Ecstasy?

DR KOEKEMOER: That's right.

MR VALLY: And when was this?

DR KOEKEMOER: That was in November 1994.

MR VALLY: And this is Doctor Wouter Basson?

DR KOEKEMOER: That was Doctor Wouter Basson, yes. He had Advocate Chris Marlow with him on that day.

MR VALLY: Did you not find this strange since you had very little dealings with him prior to that date?

DR KOEKEMOER: No, as I said I had in my CBW research, had a quarterly contact with Doctor Basson but then he came up with this but I knew that he was the one that supplied some of the raw materials that was not readily available to us for manufacturing Ecstasy.

MR VALLY: Doctor Basson sourced the raw materials?

DR KOEKEMOER: He sourced some of the raw materials. Some that were available in open context we obtained

even from overseas or locally.

MR VALLY: Now when you told Doctor Mijburgh that if you heard he was smuggling or dealing in Ecstasy you would have his skin, why did you suspect that he may be doing so?

DR KOEKEMOER: I was just a bit suspicious about the fact that I - you know we did make a study of potential incapacitance at Delta G and I did not consider Ecstasy as to be a very good incapacitant in Chemical Warfare sense although I don't know what the effect of Ecstasy would be when you inhale a large quantity of this. It could be as it was put in one of these documents, that it would be very "berustend".

MR VALLY: Did you have any basis for suspecting Doctor Mijburgh would smuggle these items?

DR KOEKEMOER: No. No, I did not have any basis for that.

MR VALLY: So why did you threaten him?

DR KOEKEMOER: Well I was just ...[intervention]

MR VALLY: Maybe it was a polite threat but still, why did you threaten him?

DR KOEKEMOER: Well maybe I just said it because I was suspicious of the fact that here late in the day I'm asked to develop an incapacitant which has the potential of abuse and I did not see the reason why so late in the day they would want to have such a large quantity of incapacitant available.

From our studies and data that we've obtained from Porten Downs and Edgewood Arsenal and so on, we never, I never saw that Ecstasy was part of this. Although MDMA, MDA, one of the analogues had hallucinogenic properties which could be considered as a potential incapacitant.

But apparently from the literature that I read is that MDMA Hydrochloride hasn't got that property, it just enhances your empathy and interpersonal communication and as a matter of fact psychiatrists used this, gave this to patients when they wanted to talk to them about traumatic experiences.

MR VALLY: Can you tell me in your opinion why do you think it was a poor - of course we have discussed it, but in your view it was a poor incapacitant to be used for military purposes?

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes, as I said, no studies were done as far as I know, on the pyrolytic properties and the thermal stability of this compound and suddenly we had to make a large quantity of this, so there was no data available concerning the stability of this material, how it could be disseminated, whether it could withstand the temperatures in a smoke grenade for example, as we did in the case of CR and CS.

MR VALLY: How did you - Porten Down was the British Chemical and Biological Warfare facility, is that correct?

DR KOEKEMOER: That's correct.

MR VALLY: How did you get the information from them?

DR KOEKEMOER: Well, apparently during the early days, I wasn't involved in that, prior to me joining Delta G there was a number of files in the library made available to us and amongst those documents there were documents from these groups.

MR VALLY: The other ...[intervention]

DR KOEKEMOER: Some of them were apparently released, it was not still highly secret or something like that but it was available. I don't know how they obtained it and how it came into those files.

MR VALLY: The other facility you referred to, I think it was, was it Ashbury?

DR KOEKEMOER: Edgewood Arsenal.

MR VALLY: Edgewood Arsenal, I beg your pardon.

DR KOEKEMOER: I think that is an America.

MR VALLY: And do you know what the nature of the relationship was with Delta G?

DR KOEKEMOER: No.

MR VALLY: No, what is the code name for Mandrax?

DR KOEKEMOER: They called it - when I joined Delta G I knew Doctor Lourens was working on a compound called Mx and that was what the code name, and I also know about a thermal stability study that was done in the Analytical Department under the Direction of Doctor Psotta on Mx which is, that was the code name for Mandrax or Methaqualone.

MR VALLY: Alright. Methaqualone is the active ingredient and Mx, the M small x was stamped on the tablets when it was still legal. What ...[intervention]

DR KOEKEMOER: Mx was the code name for Mandrax.

MR VALLY: For Mandrax. And Mosrefcat?

DR KOEKEMOER: I wasn't aware of this. There are two documents that you have supplied me here, one was I think Document TRC 65 and the other one is 66, if I'm correct.

MR VALLY: We'll check it up. But are you aware that ...[intervention]

DR KOEKEMOER: Sorry, it's 62 and I don't want to proliferate.

MR VALLY: 62 and 63.

DR KOEKEMOER: 62 and 63. These are the first times that I ever saw these documents in my life. I was never involved with any research done on Methaqualone.

MR VALLY: When was the first time that you became aware that research was being done into Mandrax?

DR KOEKEMOER: Well, Gert once mentioned to me that he and Steven Beukes did some work, small scale work on Mx and I was given to understand that was Mandrax but that's all I know about it.

MR VALLY: When was this?

DR KOEKEMOER: That was before I actually officially became head of the CBW unit there, so it must have been about '87 or so, '88.

MR VALLY: Are you aware of any quantities of Mandrax which were produced at Delta G?

DR KOEKEMOER: No, I wasn't aware of this. These projects that we have referred to had been kept a very closely guarded secret and none of us that were not properly directly involved, if this was executed there, but we did not know about it.

MR VALLY: So let me understand, exactly who was involved in this project regarding Mandrax?

DR KOEKEMOER: I cannot say but what I do know, what I can deduce from these documents, 62 and 63, is that there had been a research protocol for this specific compound that was written by Doctor Lourens and it was dated that the work was completed in November 1988 and then there is apparently an unsigned document in the middle of 1988 or something that refers to the production of this material. There's no signature or anything to that and as I say I was not aware that this stuff was made there.

MR VALLY: Just for the record, whenever you say: "Doctor Lourens" you're always talking about Doctor Gert Lourens?

DR KOEKEMOER: Doctor Gert Lourens. Please, I have never had, I have had no contact with Doctor Jan Lourens in any of this regard.

MR VALLY: Thank you. There is an allegation, did you ever share facilities with Mr Steven Beukes?

DR KOEKEMOER: Steven Beukes once did some small scale work in the laboratory with Doctor Lourens and I believe, and I am not sure about this because I wasn't involved, that this was part of the Mx project.

MR VALLY: What do you base your knowledge on?

DR KOEKEMOER: I beg your ...[intervention]

MR VALLY: That Steven Beukes was involved with Doctor Gert Lourens as part of the Mandrax project?

DR KOEKEMOER: Well he drank tea with us and he carried on in one of the laboratories but I was working in Laboratory 3 which a different laboratory at that stage.

MR VALLY: Yes, but what is the basis of your knowledge that they were working on the Mandrax project?

DR KOEKEMOER: I know that Gert told me that him, Steven and himself were involved in the Mx, not the Mandrax project but working on small scale development of Mx.

MR VALLY: Right. And do you know why it was being done?

DR KOEKEMOER: I thought it was part of the normal CBW programme.

MR VALLY: What is your opinion on Mx as an incapacitant?

DR KOEKEMOER: It could possibly be a good incapacitant because hypnotic sedative as far as I know and could be used as a potential incapacitant.

MR VALLY: Did you at any stage instruct Steven Beukes to produce a quantity of Methaqualone? Do you know why he would allege such a thing, if he did?

DR KOEKEMOER: No.

MR VALLY: Can you indicate to us whether CR gas was produced on a mass scale at Delta G?

DR KOEKEMOER: It was made in ton quantities. I know that there was a yearly report or something of Delta G Scientific year and by that time about 2.8 tonnes or something was produced. That is TRC 61.

MR VALLY: I just want to go back to TRC 62 and 63.

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes.

MR VALLY: Have you studied those documents?

DR KOEKEMOER: I had a look at them yes.

MR VALLY: Can you confirm that it relates to production of what you call Mx?

DR KOEKEMOER: That's quite right.

MR VALLY: Both TRC 62 and 63?

DR KOEKEMOER: Well, TRC 63 actually, there's some reference to the RMO's written in handwriting on page 143 of TRC 62, which they gave code names to some of the starting materials and that is also referenced I believe in TRC 63, yes.

MR VALLY: So they do relate to the manufacturing of Mandrax with the code names in them?

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes, I would say that they do.

MR VALLY: And TRC 62 says:

"Date completed: February 1988"

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes.

MR VALLY: TRC 63, the date at the bottom of the page is:

"31st of August 1988"

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes.

MR VALLY: Are there any quantities reflected in either of those documents?

DR KOEKEMOER: Are there any?

MR VALLY: Quantities.

DR KOEKEMOER: I haven't had to go to such depths where this is concerned, I'm not sure Mr Vally.

MR VALLY: I'm looking at ...[intervention]

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes, they do, they give you load x of this and that of that and so on, so they do give it. That is on page 2 of TRC 63 for example.

MR VALLY: And based on that would you be able to estimate how much was produced?

DR KOEKEMOER: Well I have to go and sit and work out the molecular masses and so on.

MR VALLY: Right.

MR VALLY: But I mean they start off with a quarter ton of the one starting material and so one assumes that you could end up with at least that quantity or a bit more because you add weight in the process.

MR VALLY: Right. I'm looking at TRC 63.

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes?

MR VALLY: And page 125. I won't mention the chemicals but it talks about 250 kilograms of something, 400 litres of something else, 151 kilograms of something else, 400 litres of something else and it goes on.

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes.

MR VALLY: So if I was to say that close to a ton probably was produced, a metric ton, would you agree that it is possible?

DR KOEKEMOER: I wouldn't say that these quantities would give rise to that.

MR VALLY: Yes.

DR KOEKEMOER: I doubt that very much.

MR VALLY: Well give me a guesstimate.

DR KOEKEMOER: I would say that if you had to take purity into account, this would probably be equivalent to about, starting with chemical number one, you would probably end up with at least 250 kilograms of the pure product at the end of the day. Probably if you wanted to make a ton you would have to four fold increase this quantity.

MR VALLY: And at the top of page, TRC 63, just underneath what is in handwriting, it says:

"Mosrefcat: M-O-S-R-E-F-C-A-T"

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes?

MR VALLY: So can we assume that this was the code name used for Mandrax?

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes, I've never had any - it's the first time I heard about this. I wish to remind you that Doctor Klaus Psotta became Manager of the Analytical Department in February, end of February 1988 and this is dated about August '88, so if that project was done there I would not have known about it through the Analytical Department because they didn't report to me at that stage.

MR VALLY: I see. Just to get clarity. Are you aware if you had permission from the Medicines Control Council for the holding of for example Ecstasy?

DR KOEKEMOER: Well, Ecstasy wasn't illegal at the stage that we made it, it was only classified as a scheduled drug on the 7th of May 1993.

MR VALLY: And the precursors?

DR KOEKEMOER: Not as far as I know.

MR VALLY: What about Mandrax?

DR KOEKEMOER: Mandrax has always been an illegal, a drug of abuse according to what I know about Law 140 ...[intervention]

MR VALLY: Did you people have any exemptions?

DR KOEKEMOER: I beg your pardon?

MR VALLY: Regarding the production or the holding of Mandrax?

DR KOEKEMOER: I don't know what the legal implications are there. I don't know what the legal implications would be if a government unit or an army unit tells its people to make something, to what sort of extent people working on that project would be exempt from legal proceedings.

MR VALLY: Who would Doctor Gert Lourens have required clearance from to produce Mandrax?

DR KOEKEMOER: Probably from the Managing Director of the Company who Doctor Mijburgh at that stage I believe.

MR VALLY: Are you aware of whether such consent was obtained?

DR KOEKEMOER: No.

MR VALLY: Are you aware of who - and I'm going back to Ecstasy, who placed the order for Ecstasy?

DR KOEKEMOER: I'm aware now and I was told at the board meeting that the order for Ecstasy was placed by General Knobel and I was also then shown a document at the Office of Serious Economic Offences by Advocate Dawie Fouch?, I saw this order of Knobel.

But I want to point out that the name for Ecstasy that is mentioned in that document does not coincide with the name that is, the actual name of 3,4- methylenedioximethamphetamine which MDM Hydrochloride. And in both that document and also in the quote that is supplied in the TRC documents here by Doctor Mijburgh, the name for Ecstasy, although they called it Baxil, was not quoted correctly.

It's not chemically correct, the name they give there, and neither does it coincide with the name that is given in Act 101 of 1965 of the ...[intervention]

MR VALLY: That's fine. The document you're talking about where there is reference to the manufacture of Baxil and it's got this, as you put it, incorrect title DMA - what's it called?

DR KOEKEMOER: Dimethril Phenathril ...[indistinct]

MR VALLY: That's the one. Was that, as far as you are aware, Ecstasy?

DR KOEKEMOER: That was Ecstasy. I was told it was Ecstasy and I was told so by, probably Doctor Mijburgh made a mistake in the name of this compound but I was told in no uncertain terms what Ecstasy was and what I had to make.

MR VALLY: Do you have a copy of TRC 77(a) in front of you?

DR KOEKEMOER: Can you just hold on please? 77?

MR VALLY: (a), that's correct.

DR KOEKEMOER: Hold on Mr Vally, hold on please. 77, yes.

MR VALLY: Who is it addressed to?

DR KOEKEMOER: It's addressed to Doctor Basson.

MR VALLY: No, I'm sorry, I'm referring to 77(a).

DR KOEKEMOER: Oh.

MR VALLY: Small a.

DR KOEKEMOER: This is addressed to Doctor Mijburgh coming from Doctor Knobel, Surgeon General.

MR VALLY: And at the top of the letter it says:

"Navrae"

Would you read the name? "Navrae" meaning enquiries.

DR KOEKEMOER:

"Enquiries: Brigadier W Basson"

MR VALLY: Whom we've been referring as Doctor Wouter Basson?

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes.

MR VALLY: And what is the date of this letter?

DR KOEKEMOER: 7th August 1992.

MR VALLY: Can you read this into the record for us please?

DR KOEKEMOER: Do you want me to read the whole letter?

MR VALLY: That's right.

DR KOEKEMOER: It is addressed to:

"Doctor P A Mijburgh, Medchem Technologies, West Street 265, Verwoerdburg. 0157

Dear Doctor Mijburgh,

PRODUCTION OF DMA Dimethyl Phenetol Amine (Baxil)

MR VALLY: Can you just stop there. For the record, you understood that this code name Baxil referred to Ecstasy?

DR KOEKEMOER: Definitely yes.

MR VALLY: Will you read the letter please?

DR KOEKEMOER:

"Your quotation dated 30 July 1992 refers. With this I want to confirm the production of 1000 kilograms of abovementioned product at your plant. Regarding your request to the protection against criminal prosecution, I can say that it is only within our ability to give this as regards the supply of raw materials and successful delivery to our supplier. Any irregularity which arises during the production as well as any supplying to other clients directly or indirectly through means of theft from you plant will be the full responsibility of the ...[No English translation] Signed: Knobel - Surgeon-General"

MR VALLY: So this was a formal order placed by the Surgeon-General.

DR KOEKEMOER: Surgeon-General.

MR VALLY: And you were concerned about this. You went as far as talking to Doctor Lothar Neethling about the production of Ecstasy?

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes.

MR VALLY: What was Doctor Neethling's former position at the time?

DR KOEKEMOER: He was head of the Forensic Department.

MR VALLY: Of?

DR KOEKEMOER: Of the Forensic Department and I suppose that ...[intervention]

MR VALLY: Of which branch of the ...[intervention]

DR KOEKEMOER: At Pretoria, at Silverton

MR VALLY: Was this the Army?

DR KOEKEMOER: No, it's the police.

MR VALLY: The police. So he was the head of the Forensic Department of the South African Police at the time?

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes.

MR VALLY: And instead of saying: "That's terrible and it shouldn't be done, he started discussing ...[intervention]

DR KOEKEMOER: Chemistry with me.

MR VALLY: Production methods. I just want to - I'm still busy with section 77, sorry document 77(a). That chemical name at the top next to Baxil, what does it refer to?

DR KOEKEMOER: Well, it hasn't really any chemical meaning, it's a Dimethyl Thinethol Amin, so this would be a Dimethyl substituted Phenethol Amin which would be a compound similar to but not, definitely not MDMA Hydrochloride. The small d would probably refer to some Dextra, in other words that would be a specific stereo isomer.

MR VALLY: So in layman's terms this doesn't make sense?

DR KOEKEMOER: It really doesn't make sense. I have never seen these documents, I have never seen these quotes so I couldn't correct any of these names even if I wanted to.

CHAIRPERSON: It doesn't seen to make sense to scientists Mr Vally, let alone lay persons.

MR VALLY: If someone was to say that this is some product that is not Ecstasy which was used for something else would you refute that?

DR KOEKEMOER: Let me just make sure. So this would be a Dextro m Alpha Dimethyl Phenethol Amin, yes, it could, no it could make sense, chemical sense.

MR VALLY: And what would it be used for?

DR KOEKEMOER: It would be one of the Amphetamine series of compounds.

MR VALLY: But as far as you understand, once you see code name Baxil you know it is MDMA, Ecstasy?

DR KOEKEMOER: That's right.

MR VALLY: If you look at - stay there with the documents please, the document before that, TRC 77.

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes?

MR VALLY: That is for Medchem Technologies.

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes.

MR VALLY: And it says:

"Dear Brigadier Basson"

It's addressed to:

"Brigadier W Basson South African Medical Services, Sevamus Building Verwoerdburgstad.

Dear Brigadier Basson,

OFFER FOR THE MANUFACTURE OF BAXIL

CHAIRPERSON: Excuse me Mr Vally, where are you reading from, what document?

MR VALLY: 77. I beg your pardon, TRC 77. Do you see that?

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes, I see that.

MR VALLY: It talks about a thousand, point to 1000 kilograms, again mentions that same chemical compound and in brackets: (Code Name Baxil).

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes, that's probably why General Knobel actually also spelt it the same way in his formal order of this material.

MR VALLY: Right. Was this, as far as you understand, if he talks about:

"1000 kilograms of this substance, Code Name Baxil at R2.800 per kilogram, delivered to your premises in Verwoerdburg"

Is this the product that you understand you personally were responsible for manufacturing?

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes, I was personally responsible for the development of this work and I kept an eye on the manufacture but I wasn't personally ...[intervention]

MR VALLY: You did run the machines?

DR KOEKEMOER: It was done by the production personnel, just to put it in perspective.

MR VALLY: Fair enough. So if I was to say this is a document which was used for ordering Ecstasy, would you confirm this? Offering to deliver Ecstasy, would you confirm this?

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes, that's the way that I would understand it.

DR RANDERA: Professor can you just, Professor over here. Hello? Can you just clarify something for me?

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes, Doctor Randera.

DR RANDERA: The order talks about 1000 kilograms, if somebody orders 1000 kilograms one would expect that to be delivered at one time and I would have assumed that Medchem would then also have asked you to produce 1000 kilograms of Ecstasy but I heard you say earlier on that you delivered this in small amounts.

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes, because the reason for this is because this material wasn't made, the capacity of the reactors available for us for the purpose of manufacturing Ecstasy was too small to produce a large quantity at one time so we had to do it in batches.

And apart from that, in order to obtain the purity required of the product we had to have a high vacuum distillation of one of the intermediates which required rather sophisticated equipment and we did not have large scale equipment to do this. So this material was actually distilled in 20 litre glass flasks in one of the plants.

DR RANDERA: So did you get an order from Medchem asking for a thousand kilograms?

DR KOEKEMOER: I was told to produce a thousand kilograms and this went via the normal financial channels of the company.

DR RANDERA: And how long does it take to produce a thousand kilograms in your unit?

DR KOEKEMOER: It took us quite a few months to make that.

DR RANDERA: Thank you.

DR KOEKEMOER: It took the Production Department quite a few months to make it.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Vally?

MR VALLY: Thank you. If you could stay with the documents. I want to go to TRC 62 and TRC 63.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Vally, are you going to be quite long on these two documents, otherwise this would be a convenient stage to take the tea adjournment.

MR VALLY: I think we can take tea now Mr Chairman.

MR WILLS: We will take the tea adjournment now and we will resume at 11 o'clock.

COMMITTEE ADJOURNS

ON RESUMPTION ...[inaudible] if you don't start. Thank you. Doctor Koekemoer, you are reminded you are still under oath.

JOHANNES MATTEUS KOEKEMOER: (s.u.o.)

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Vally?

MR VALLY: Thank you Mr Chairperson.

Doctor Koekemoer, I want to talk to you about TRC 62 and TRC 63.

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes, Mr Vally?

MR VALLY: Firstly, TRC 62, now this is the document that I've raised with you just now and you confirmed that this was for the production of what you call Mx.

DR KOEKEMOER: That's correct.

MR VALLY: Now firstly, I need to know from you, in terms of the format of this document, it says at the top of the document:

"Delta G Scientific Research"

It says:

"Product Research Information"

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes.

MR VALLY: It says:

"Researcher: G J Lourens"

and he give a product code:

"FPOOMO1"

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes.

MR VALLY: It's a standard document which has items such as synthesis, raw materials etc.

DR KOEKEMOER: That was the standard format that we used at that time.

MR VALLY: So, this would be the normal research document that you would produce, working on any chemical compound, something similar?

DR KOEKEMOER: This would be something that we would actually use normally for commercial products.

MR VALLY: Right. Commercial products?

DR KOEKEMOER: The format that we use for commercial projects because the Production Department insisted on this sort of formal in order to enable them to evaluate the process.

MR VALLY: That's important for us. So from TRC 62 it appears as if this wasn't a secret production taking place in one of the corners of the laboratory, this was a formal normal document which you would produce for purposes of providing it to your production people?

DR KOEKEMOER: That's correct, yes.

MR VALLY: So the impression one would get, because of the format of the document and how the information is laid out in TRC 62, is that it was intended to produce Mx or Mandrax?

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes, that is correct.

MR VALLY: And if I could extrapolate from what you are saying, this was for purposes of the Production Department, then this was for purposes of commercial production?

DR KOEKEMOER: If you want to read it in that context, yes. It would look as if it's a normal, it would appear that it is a normal production protocol which was valid at that time. We changed the format at a later stage.

MR VALLY: Okay. This is what would be handed to the Production Department, or would something else go to them if you needed to produce these items?

DR KOEKEMOER: Well for normal commercial projects we would for example hand in a document like this to the Production Manager at that time, he would then evaluate the document and then he would come back with questions relating to any aspect which he found was either obscure to him or not feasible to carry out on a large scale.

MR VALLY: Okay. We've already talked about possible quantities but I want to go to the very last page of 62.

DR KOEKEMOER: Is that page 165.

MR VALLY: That's correct.

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes?

MR VALLY: H3 double lined plastic bags in a sealed container.

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes?

MR VALLY: This seems to imply that it wasn't(?) ...[indistinct] small test quantities?

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes, it would imply what you said now.

MR VALLY: Did you have standard size steel containers?

DR KOEKEMOER: No, it depended on the type of project we handled and so on because if you made Copper Hydroxide for example the method of packing this would be completely different then for say, crystalline organic compound or so.

MR VALLY: Okay. Now, how did you distinguish between commercial products and products which were secretly for the CBW Project?

DR KOEKEMOER: Well the commercial projects were normally handled and channelled to us via the Marketing Department whereas a CBW Project would come directly from either Doctor Basson or in most cases from Doctor Mijburgh.

MR VALLY: Other than that, were there any internal procedures which you used to distinguish between products you made for commercial purposes and products you made for CBW purposes?

DR KOEKEMOER: There was a computer data base which actually gave specific numbers to our CBW projects and also our projects referring to the commercial aspects and where they got these numbers from I don't know. The 88 or something at the end, as I pointed out to that 43900688, was probably the date of origin but these were just given to us and we normally just attached it to our reports, the naming of these compounds FPO51 or whatever.

MR VALLY: What I want to take a bit further is the whole notion of whether Mandrax, Mx as you call it, was produced for commercial purposes or not?

DR KOEKEMOER: I have no idea. As I said this project was honestly, as far as I'm concerned, kept under very close wraps, nobody of us knew about this aspect of the production of Mandrax. No, I didn't know about it.

MR VALLY: Were you aware of whether Delta G Scientific or Medchem Pharmaceuticals or one of the other facilities had the production capacity to encapsulate or produce in tablet form?

DR KOEKEMOER: I knew that Medchem Pharmaceuticals had an encapsulating machine when they rented space at Delta G.

MR VALLY: Alright.

DR KOEKEMOER: And I know that they made Chloroquine Sulphate, encapsulated Chloroquine Sulphate there. And from my trial and tribulations with the police concerning the Ecstasy capsules that was found in my office, those were not the only capsules, there was also schedule 4 antibiotic, Ampicillin or something. There were 56 capsules found in my possession of which about half of them were another colour and they contained I think Ampicillin. That I was told by Captain Koch of the Forensic Department.

MR VALLY: Okay. If you go to TRC 63.

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes?

MR VALLY: It says on the 1st page:

"Delta G Scientific (Pty) Ltd"

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes.

MR VALLY: Immediately after it says:

"Production"

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes.

MR VALLY: Now what would this imply by having a statement like that on it?

DR KOEKEMOER: This would imply that it is probably a document generated by the Production Department. We did not write out our production protocol in the format that this document is presented here.

MR VALLY: So by this stage, this will be a report from the department which is mass producing the Mx regarding the processes used and the results?

DR KOEKEMOER: That is possible, yes.

MR VALLY: Just looking at the format of the document and the fact that it says production on the front page, would that confirm your view?

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes, it would confirm my view. This

format I must just say Mr Vally is rather incomplete as far as I would expect a production record to be, for the simple reason that if production did produce a record of this nature, batch numbers, batch tickets etc would be attached to it as part of the total production record so I would say this is a very incomplete production protocol from the production department.

MR VALLY: But batch numbers and batch certificates would be used as regards quality control for you to follow up any complaints?

DR KOEKEMOER: That is quite right, yes.

MR VALLY: And if you didn't expect to follow up you wouldn't need batch certificates and batch ... (intervention)

DR KOEKEMOER: I suppose so yes, but I have never been involved in a scheme where I didn't have to follow up even with the baxil or ecstasy that I made, I had a complete batch record of each production batch that we ran, the quantities and also - so it was very tightly controlled and I would expect even in a case like this that there would be tight control over the quantities produced with each batch, if only the quantities mentioned on page 124 of TRC 63 was used, you would expect from a record like this that you have obtained so much of the material and I don't see anything of this nature here.

MR VALLY: Alright, I need to move on to a few other items. Can you advise us what Madresco, what company was Madresco. Have you heard of Madresco?

DR KOEKEMOER: Well Madresco as far as I'm concerned was the company that was controlled by Dr Basson and which was actually the company responsible for accepting our research results and we actually paid the company for our research work in CBW context.

MR VALLY: Have you heard of Infadel?

DR KOEKEMOER: No.

MR VALLY: So as far as you know, the company through which money was channelled to Delta G Scientific was Madresco.

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes.

MR VALLY: Did it play any other role?

DR KOEKEMOER: No, not as far as I know.

MR VALLY: Do you know how much money was channelled into Delta G?

DR KOEKEMOER: I know from certain of our - especially the document referring to Delta G's reports that our research contract was worth about R7.55 million and this was allocated to different aspects of the CBW research.

MR VALLY: You had three fives, is this seven and a half million or is it much more?

DR KOEKEMOER: No, I just checked in the document, that's the quantity that's written in there.

MR VALLY: Seven point five, five, five?

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes I think so.

MR VALLY: Okay. There are certain code names which I'd like you to assist us with.

DR KOEKEMOER: I will try, can I just go to the relevant document because I think I did write some of them down which I could remember? Okay, it's document TRC 61.

MR VALLY: Right.

DR KOEKEMOER: This is a quarterly report for 1982 Delta G Scientific. On page 1473.

MR VALLY: Yes.

DR KOEKEMOER: Research Projects ... (indistinct) ...

MR VALLY: Yes I do.

DR KOEKEMOER: Now R42210087 was my narcotics CBW programme which eventually became 43900688.

MR VALLY: Okay.

DR KOEKEMOER: The forty five numbers refer to some biochemical project. Dr Jordaan was head of that department at this stage, I'm not sure what they were working on.

MR VALLY: Alright.

DR KOEKEMOER: I think that this R22910088 was probably an information gathering project that was run by Dr Klaus Psotta.

MR VALLY: Right.

DR KOEKEMOER: R43410087 was the so-called Incos Data System which referred to the analysis data base for CBW agents.

MR VALLY: Alright.

DR KOEKEMOER: And R42220087 was a pyrotechnical study on CS and CR which I was also involved in as far as I can recall, I'm not exactly sure about this, but I think so. Most of our - we had to destroy our data so I have to work from memory here.

MR VALLY: Sure. Are there any others that you can identify in terms of the project numbers?

DR KOEKEMOER: I beg your pardon?

MR VALLY: In terms of the projects numbers, are there any other projects that you can identify?

DR KOEKEMOER: No. There's reference in this document to an amount of four hundred and ninety thousand rand (R490 000,00) or some contact with Roodeplaat Research Laboratories which I have no ideas what it was about.

MR VALLY: Alright, now in the same document there are references to other code names, I'm referring to the code names beginning FP/003.

DR KOEKEMOER: FP/003 was the code name CR.

MR VALLY: That's CR. And FP/00 ... (intervention)

DR KOEKEMOER: 4.

MR VALLY: Is there a 4 as well, yes.

DR KOEKEMOER: There's a 4, that was CS.

MR VALLY: And an FP/00T52?

DR KOEKEMOER: No I have no idea, can't remember.

MR VALLY: FP/00B50.

DR KOEKEMOER: No sir, I can't remember.

MR VALLY: FP/00MO1?

DR KOEKEMOER: No, I know from these documents that it referred to the so-called Mosrefcat or MX and so on, but I wasn't involved in that project. I assume it's that one.

MR VALLY: So the code appearing on the Mosrefcat document is FP/00/MO1?

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes.

MR VALLY: Now in TRC 61 can you show us reference to that?

DR KOEKEMOER: Can you just hold on a minute? Not where the research projects are concerned.

MR VALLY: Okay.

DR KOEKEMOER: On page 1473, I don't know. There's no reference to this as far as I could remember.

MR VALLY: Alright.

DR KOEKEMOER: I'm not sure about some of these, I tried to identify those that I was involved in and I know that Code 45 referred to the Biochemistry Department.

MR VALLY: Let's move on to another substance. At some point you referred us to research into canabinoids?

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes.

MR VALLY: For the lay person, because we know cannabis to be dagga.

DR KOEKEMOER: That's dagga, yes.

MR VALLY: Can you tell us exactly what this research was and for what purpose?

DR KOEKEMOER: Well I know that when Dr Lourens was head of the Research Division, that they did obtain some dagga plant material from the Forensic Department, I assume it was from Dr Neethling's department and they also refer in this TRC 61 to an extract that they made there. I know that Dr Klaus Psotta did some work on cannabinoids or dagga at that stage and one of the objectives was also of this project and again, at that stage, it was Dr Lourens' responsibility, Gert Lourens, to run the CBW programme and one of the objectives was to do a SAR study, a Structure Activity Relationship Study and he did a detailed one on this. I know that Mr Chard Henning worked on this cannabinoid project and he actually obtained his MSc on it and I only took over the cannabinoid project in August 1989 when Dr Russell Thompson was put onto that project as a potential incapacitant and he attempted to make some of these compounds, but he wasn't successful in that regard and the research documents with my name and Thompson's on it here in relation to that refer to that.

MR VALLY: I see. And can you tell us what pyrethroids are?

DR KOEKEMOER: Pyrethroids are insecticides. You get cypromethrine and so on which is used to kill off mosquitoes for example.

MR VALLY: Was this used or researched into for purposes of using against people?

DR KOEKEMOER: No, definitely not - not as far as I'm concerned or any work that we did, that I know about. I used that sulphoxide document as a front for the baxil and this is a synergist that is added to pyrethroids to enhance it's knockdown capabilities for house flies for example.

MR VALLY: You've mentioned quarterly meetings with Dr Wouter Basson at a time where you were, I believe the head of research, is that right?

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes. We switched over roles around the end of 1989 and Dr Lourens started doing commercial work again and I took over the role of being head of the CBW unit.

MR VALLY: Can you tell us what you discussed at these meetings?

DR KOEKEMOER: We would normally supply our research results in written form to Dr Basson and the senior scientists that were working on the different projects went along with us to this meeting and we had a general discussion on the progress of each project and Dr Basson would sometimes make suggestions on which way to go because we were all in a learning phase, especially where the pharmacology of these potential incapacitants were concerned. We are not pharmacologists, most of us were straightforward organic chemists so we had quite a steep learning curve to go through and I suppose that Dr Basson gave his ideas also from a medical sort of perspective where this was concerned.

MR VALLY: What was your view on the feasibility of using cannabinoids and incapacitants?

DR KOEKEMOER: It is not improbable although, as I said, this was only made on small scale, the synthetic work at Delta G and I don't think this was ever followed up apart from a pyrolysis study that I saw that I became aware of that was done under Klaus Psotta where they mixed, I think it was cannabis and mandrax and diphenal amine or something, in cigarettes with a smoke machine and they did some analysis on that. I think that programme was run by Mr Steenkamp, one of the analysts in that department.

MR VALLY: You do know that the abuse of mandrax takes place in the form of mandrax being mixed with cannabis, with dagga and then smoked?

DR KOEKEMOER: Well I'm not so au fait on that part of the - sorry I ... (intervention)

MR VALLY: Well I can give you that bit of scientific advice. Was this research aimed particularly, to your knowledge, the whole notion of mandrax and cannabinoids, dagga, and the smoke machine you're referring to, aimed at seeing the effects on human beings?

MR VALLY: I honestly don't know Mr Vally, as I said I wasn't directly - I wasn't involved in that part of the project, because Gert Lourens was still head of the department at that stage. I didn't handle that sort of thing, I took over in 1989 and what I did was do straightforward synthetic work on cannabinoid analogues after a Structure Activity Relationship Study, theoretical one that was done by Klaus Psotta and we started to attempt to synthesise some of these compounds with a view of using them as an incapacitating agent.

MR VALLY: In TRC 61 there is reference to Project Indigo, the costs of which required an upgrade of something close to thirty million rands (R30 000 000,00) to the Delta G factory in 1987?

DR KOEKEMOER: At that stage I was still not very much involved in the senior management of this so I can't really comment on it.

MR VALLY: Are you aware of the upgrade to the Delta G factory shortly after that period?

DR KOEKEMOER: No, I can't comment on it, I can't remember it, honestly.

MR VALLY: Okay. We've got something like thirty million rands (R30 000 000,00) allocated for that.

DR KOEKEMOER: Fifty million (R50 000 000,00)?

MR VALLY: Thirty. Precisely twenty nine million nine hundred and ninety three thousand rands (R29 993 000,00).

DR KOEKEMOER: No I'm not aware of it. There were some upgrades on the CR plant from time to time, because when we came there, the plant was in place and there was a plant 2 which was used actually for manufacturing purposes where they did some work for Carbo Chem and Sasol and that sort of thing, but that's a substantial amount, I'm not aware of this money.

MR VALLY: Are you aware of what Project Indigo is?

DR KOEKEMOER: No.

MR VALLY: Have you ever heard of it before?

DR KOEKEMOER: Not as far as I can recall, no. Can you tell me what page this refers to?

MR VALLY: It's in TRC 61.

DR KOEKEMOER: Page what?

MR VALLY: Oh the page, sorry. On page 1445 and if you see the last sentence on that page, "the total expected costs of the project is twenty nine million point nine nine three (R29 993 000,00).

DR KOEKEMOER: Oh, but isn't that - yes I think this is the original building and erection costs of Delta G Scientific. This refers to Van Niekerk's business, he was the guy involved in that.

MR VALLY: Yes, ... (intervention)

DR KOEKEMOER: I think the Delta G Scientific eventually cost about thirty million (R30 000 000,00) to build. So this was the Indigo, I wasn't involved in that project, Mr Corrie Botha and the other guys were but I moved in there after they built the place.

MR VALLY: You see what's strange is that this was after you were already at the Delta G factory I understood.

DR KOEKEMOER: I don't know what sort of financial arrangements they had made with the company and the groups involved in building this place.

MR VALLY: Alright. Ja, because at this stage you had already been at Delta G ... (intervention)

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes, they were still busy ... (intervention)

MR VALLY: For two years. Sorry.

DR KOEKEMOER: Oh yes. No I find this funny, I suppose the guys would have asked for their money prior to this. I cannot give you an answer there.

MR VALLY: Yes, I would have thought so.

DR KOEKEMOER: How was Delta G Scientific financed?

DR KOEKEMOER: I have no idea, I assume it was financed by the army, but I wasn't involved in that aspect at all.

MR VALLY: Do you know who funded the secret projects that Delta G was involved in?

DR KOEKEMOER: No I don't, I assumed it was the medical arm of the army, but nobody ever told me.

MR VALLY: Were the salaries and the perks being paid at Delta G much better than in the commercial environment or academic environment?

DR KOEKEMOER: Not much so, the salary that I was offered at Delta G was not very much more than a Professor of Organic Chemistry got at that time and we normally got about nine, maybe 10 percent (10%) increase a year and during the time that I was there a got few merit bonuses for good work done, but I don't think that our salary structure was so much higher than the average. I believe that the people involved with the CR plant got paid relatively well because of the fact that it's not very nice to make CR. It is about 10 times as active as CS so it burns the blue devil out of you.

MR VALLY: Just on the CR gas that was produced, did it have long term effects on people on whom it was used?

DR KOEKEMOER: It's actually, CR is actually a solid compound with which can be disseminated by a pyrolytic technique and there was a study done by a guy called Ballantyne and I believe it was in Journal Pharmacology or something that he published this, and CR is actually much less toxic that CS, it's probably about one third as toxic as CS and I think the toxity level on inhalation is about seven point five (7.5) grams per kilogram.

MR VALLY: Now, it's a third less toxic on people, but what about the environment?

DR KOEKEMOER: It has a very persistent effect on the environment that's why I can't see that it can be used as a riot control agent, because if you have contaminated an area with this material, for the next five years anything - if you come in contact with soil it will still have an irritant effect on you.

MR VALLY: Are you aware of whether it was used for crowd control at all?

DR KOEKEMOER: No I'm not. I was told it was a harassing agent that was, with a view of using it as a chemical warfare agent.

MR VALLY: Could you control it's toxicity in a sense that in some, for some uses you could make it purer and other uses you would dilute it. Is that possible?

DR KOEKEMOER: Not the purity, if a chemical compound has a certain purity it doesn't matter what the dilution factor is involved there and the material that we did make was in the very high nineties, because we had quality control on this material. Sometimes they produced it in a bit of a lumpy form, the crystal material - crystalline material that was obtained wasn't always - the particle size wasn't always uniform, but it was very high quality material as far as I am aware.

MR VALLY: You see there was a witness that we were supposed to have called yesterday and due to time problems he wasn't available to come today, he's gone overseas. I want to show you something which I haven't given you before because we were going to ask the other witness to lead this evidence. It talks about production quantities and this comes from Swartklips, this is where they weaponise it or put it into delivery systems - you're aware of the Swartklip products?

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes.

MR VALLY: This is where CR gas and CS gas possibly were put into delivery systems, is that right?

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes, we had a pyrolysis contact with Swartklip and specifically Enslin Smit to look at the thermal stability of these compounds ... (intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Vally, in terms of our agreement with Prof Haysom, has he seen the document?

MR VALLY: I don't believe Prof Haysom has seen this document, no.

CHAIRPERSON: Then he must see it if we're going to be in line with our agreement.

MR VALLY: I think Mr ... (indistinct) will ... We don't intend releasing this to the public.

CHAIRPERSON: That may very well be so Mr Vally.

MR VALLY: Yes we will show it to him immediately, but if I could ask questions without going into scientific detail?

CHAIRPERSON: Prof Haysom, what's your attitude?

PROF HAYSOM: In all fairness I'd prefer to see the document before we question it's properties just from ... (intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: I would have thought so Mr Vally.

MR VALLY: We'll adjourn for two minutes.

CHAIRPERSON: We'll adjourn for two minutes.

CHAIRPERSON: Are we ready to resume Mr Vally?

MR VALLY: Yes thank you Mr Chairperson. Mr Chairperson I would ask that this Affidavit and more specifically the Annexure to it of Mr Enslin Smit, not be publicised in terms of Section 33 subsection 2. Could I get that ruling Mr Chairperson?

CHAIRPERSON: No, what constitutes the Annexure you are talking about? Oh, Mr Van Zyl do you have a copy of this document?

MR VAN ZYL: Mr Chairman no not at the moment, I told Mr Vally when he's got one at hand he can give me one. He didn't have one available for me but he said he will give me one if he's got one available.

MR VALLY: We have no objection to giving it to him on the same basis that we asked that it not be publicised at all, I'm waiting for - we didn't believe it impacted on Mr Van Zyl's client, but we have no objection to him getting it, provided it's not published further.

CHAIRPERSON: It's just that if you are asking me for a ruling, I have to ask all the parties if they have anything to say.

MR VAN ZYL: Mr Chairman I've got a copy now, thank you.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Polsen, do you have any objection to the ruling that is being asked for by Mr Vally being made.

MR POLSEN: I have no objection Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: Prof Haysom, I would assume that you're supporting Mr Vally in that ... (indistinct).

PROF HAYSOM: No objection, I support Mr Vally in his application Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Van Zyl?

MR VAN ZYL: No objection Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: You have your ruling Mr Vally.

MR VALLY: Thank you Mr Chairman. I'm sorry for all this, there's just one aspect that I want to ask you about. The Affidavit that I've shown you and the first page, the Annexure, do you see it?

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes.

CHAIRPERSON: Are we talking about the thing that says "Production Quantities"?

MR VALLY: That's correct.

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes, I've got it.

MR VALLY: I don't want you to go further than this, but there's two things I want to read to you, number one and number two. Number one says "Grenade Hand Anti-Riot" and number two says "Grenade Rifle Anti-Riot". It seems to imply that CR gas was put into a delivery system for riots, crowd control.

DR KOEKEMOER: Crowd control system, I wasn't aware of that. We did pyrolysis studies on CR and on CS, but we normally received the material either in powder granulated form mixed with kaolin and perchlorides and so on in order to test for the thermal stability of this or in pill form but never in a form like this which can be - in a device form which can be used for that dissemination purposes so I do not know about this and I was never told by my superiors about this.

MR VALLY: They do say and I refer to paragraph 5, that the teargas products were manufactured at Delta G CS and supplied ... (indistinct) ... this company.

DR KOEKEMOER: We made probably about two hundred (200) kilograms of CS as an experimental batch and we also received from Swartklip Products a CS formulation mixed with kaolin which we had to re-extract to get the CS back due to the fact that it was wrongly formulated. That I do know about.

MR VALLY: Alright, that's all I want to deal with regarding this particular Affidavit. I want to put to you there's a possibility that CR gas has been used for crowd control purposes in South Africa based on the Annexure and the points one and two of the Annexure that I referred to.

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes, but I wasn't aware of that. I do know that CR was actually initially developed as a riot control agent and not so much as a CBW agent and I don't think it's actually covered by the CBW Convention.

MR VALLY: Yes it is, it's a point I made yesterday when - CR gas I'm talking about.

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes.

MR VALLY: Yes, if used on your own people you don't have to report it to the international authority, if you use it in a warfare situation, you do have to report it.

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes.

MR VALLY: Alright, that's what the International Convention says. I want to ask you another question relating to BZ. Can you briefly tell us what BZ is?

DR KOEKEMOER: BZ is a ... (indistinct) ... (intervention)

MR VALLY: Don't tell us about the chemical formulation ... (intervention)

DR KOEKEMOER: No, I'll just tell you ... (intervention)

MR VALLY: Just tell us what it does.

DR KOEKEMOER: BZ was a incapacitant developed by the Americans, chemical warfare incapacitant and I believe that it was used for example in Vietnam in about 1966 or so.

MR VALLY: It appears that in 1989 there was a three year contract to produce BZ analogues and I quote: "with optimal psycho ... (intervention)

DR KOEKEMOER: Psychotomimetic properties.

MR VALLY: Oh right. Sorry, yes. What was intended and why?

DR KOEKEMOER: That was intended as a potential incapacitant in which you would have, which would have an effect on the guy that you make war against by working onto his central nervous system and disorientating himself either through hallucinogenic effect or similar central nervous effect so that he couldn't operate properly, but we had very strict conditions which we had set or objectives we had to set concerning the toxicity and lethality of these materials. If I can remember correctly it should have a high minimal effective dose of about 1 mg but the ratio of minimal effective dose to the lethal 50 dose should be relatively high and it should be effective at around ... (intervention)

MR VALLY: Ja, we don't need those details.

DR KOEKEMOER: Whatever.

MR VALLY: Who authorised that project?

DR KOEKEMOER: This was authorised by Dr Wouter Basson, but there's also reference in these - since we're on the subject of BZ now, there's reference in these TRC documents of one thousand (1 000) kilograms of BZ that was made. I have never seen BZ made in that quantity. We have only made small lab quantities of these materials.

MR VALLY: Okay. What was the relationship, your relationship and the relationship of Delta G to General Knobel?

DR KOEKEMOER: I had never had anything to do with General Knobel, normally Dr Mijburgh had contact with him so I can't say what sort of relationship existed.

MR VALLY: Were any of the products manufactured at Delta G, to your knowledge, tested on people?

DR KOEKEMOER: No.

MR VALLY: Even in a war situation?

DR KOEKEMOER: I am not aware of it.

MR VALLY: Were you aware of an incident in 1992 in Mozambique where it's alleged that a chemical weapon was used against Frelimo troops?

DR KOEKEMOER: If - it is possible that that refers to the analysis that we did on - I refer to that Dr Brian Davies brought back some scrap metal pieces there which he said was some device that had exploded there and had caused adverse effect.

MR VALLY: Was this Mozambique?

DR KOEKEMOER: Oh not Mozambique, sorry that was ... (indistinct).

MR VALLY: Now I'm talking about an alleged attack on Mozambican troops in 1992.

DR KOEKEMOER: No, I'm not aware of that, sorry. I was referring to Angola.

MR VALLY: Did you ever do tests to see if certain chemicals could be masked in mundane items and I can give you some examples, LD Carb in orange juice?

DR KOEKEMOER: No.

MR VALLY: Did you people ever manufacture LD Carb?

DR KOEKEMOER: I don't think we manufactured LD Carb. There was one attempt to synthesise organophosphate for commercial purposes, but it never came off the ground. I think that Mr De Leeuw, one of the researchers there, was involved with that. I can't remember the exact name, but it is a normal commercial organophosphate.

MR VALLY: Thallium?

DR KOEKEMOER: All I know about thallium is the analysis that was performed on the urine and blood samples, and I heard that on an official basis, Dr Basson once asked for one of the analysts in the analytical department to analyse for a sample that contained this.

MR VALLY: You don't know of Delta G Scientific either manufacturing or sourcing thallium?

DR KOEKEMOER: No.

MR VALLY: Sodium cyanide?

DR KOEKEMOER: I used small quantities of sodium cyanide to prepare PCP, phencyclidine, which was a product that we made for Fischer Vet and I eventually made probably about five hundred and sixty (560) grams of this material. This was on our schedule books and I eventually let Mr Van der Westhuizen of the Medicine Control Council write if off our books and he destroyed it personally.

MR VALLY: Paraquat?

DR KOEKEMOER: Paraquat?

MR VALLY: Yes.

DR KOEKEMOER: I know we did some analysis on paraquat and so on for outside groups because they also did some outside analysis for commercial purposes. Paraquat and Parathion and so on.

MR VALLY: Was it available from your facility?

DR KOEKEMOER: No, we used reference substances which we bought through normal channels.

MR VALLY: If Dr Wouter Basson or RRL or anyone else was to ask for any of these items I have mentioned, could they access it from your facility?

DR KOEKEMOER: Well it's not impossible that this could occur, but I am not aware that any of my personal or myself have given such compounds to Dr Basson.

MR VALLY: Did you ever do any experiments as to how it would mix with item like orange - any of these substances, orange juice, whisky?

DR KOEKEMOER: No. I don't believe that any of my people, as far as I know at least from 1986 onwards when I was there, was involved in any sort of dirty tricks, sort of material compositions or supplying poisons like histrionicotoxin which I referred to in one of my, or some of the trichotezines or anything like that, I'm not aware of it.

MR VALLY: Sodium azide?

DR KOEKEMOER: Sodium azide is a normal common reagent to bring in nitrogen groups into organic molecules. You can't manufacture it, it's rather dangerous to make that so we haven't made sodium azide on large scale at Delta G.

MR VALLY: But it was at - you had quantities at your ... (intervention)

DR KOEKEMOER: We had lab quantities available, yes.

MR VALLY: Right. Cyanide?

DR KOEKEMOER: Cyanide you would always have available, it's a common reagent.

MR VALLY: Digoxin?

DR KOEKEMOER: Digoxin is a cardiac glycocide, I believe that there was small quantities of Digoxin on that was - Stephen Beukes was in charge of that, of those pharmaceuticals.

MR VALLY: Colchamine?

DR KOEKEMOER: Colchamine? There could have been colchamine there, ja.

MR VALLY: Catharidine?

DR KOEKEMOER: Cantharidin?

MR VALLY: Cantharidin, I beg your pardon.

DR KOEKEMOER: That is a constituent of the Spanish fly which is supposed to enhance one's male attributes, but no I'm not sure that we had cantharidin there. It is possible that it could have been, but that would have been under the control of Mr Stephen Beukes.

CHAIRPERSON: Would it have been something stronger than Viagra?

DR KOEKEMOER: Cantharidin is supposed to be a love potion that you can give to a lady.

MR VALLY: I wouldn't recommend it Mr Chairperson from what we've read about it.

DR KOEKEMOER: It irritates your urinary tract and is quite poisonous.

MR VALLY: Finally, when did you first discover - or let me rephrase this, in retrospect, do you believe that ecstasy and mandrax will be manufactured on a large scale for purposes other than chemical and biological warfare purposes?

DR KOEKEMOER: I could envisage that mandrax could be manufactured on large scale for incapacitation purposes, but from my personal point of view I don't think that ecstasy is an ideal compound to use as an incapacitant and I differed from my superiors where that was concerned, and I told them that.

MR VALLY: Have you seen any studies or any projections by anyone involved regarding the possible usage of mandrax as an indirect control mechanism by introducing it into certain areas which were possibly prone to political uprisings so as to create addiction to it?

DR KOEKEMOER: No, I was never given that impression and I doubt whether one can get addicted to Ecstasy, not as far as I know.

MR VALLY: I'm talking about mandrax.

DR KOEKEMOER: About mandrax, no.

MR VALLY: You haven't seen any studies or documentation in that regard?

DR KOEKEMOER: No, sir no I haven't.

MR VALLY: Have you ever studied the literature on the issue?

DR KOEKEMOER: No, I have studied things like mandrax and the analysis of that because that was part and parcel of our Incos Data System and we had permits to keep small quantities of mandrax for analytical purposes and for this purpose we, I obtained quite a number of publications by the relevant authorities that analysed for these sort drugs of abuse. I've got these papers in my possession, but I haven't seen any studies that relate to the other things you have referred to now.

MR VALLY: Is there an issue of concern to you, as a chemist, the possibility that such an addictive drug which is allegedly been responsible for fuelling a lot of the crime in this country which has enslaved so many of our youth, was possibly produced in laboratories where you were head of research?

DR KOEKEMOER: It does concern me, although as I said, I didn't know about a large scale production of mandrax. It did concern me that we produced such a large quantity of ecstasy and following the newspaper reports and so on afterwards, only in hindsight I could say it concerns me more now.

MR VALLY: The thinking prevalent in terms of being involved in a secret project in chemical and biological warfare programmes etc, within the parameters of that kind of total onslaught mentality, and I'm basing it on your experiences within Delta G and discussion there, is it possible that people who were in senior positions would consider using mandrax on a large scale so as to neutralise the potential for rebellion amongst youth?

DR KOEKEMOER: No discussion has ever arisen in my presence which led to the premise that mandrax for example would be used to calm crowds or anything like that, no.

MR VALLY: Well I'm not talking so much about calming crowds as much as introducing it as a potentially recreational drug and thereby creating addiction?

DR KOEKEMOER: It would have gone against my grain, I don't like drug abuse and I would not have approved of it in the first place and secondly, it was never discussed in those terms in my presence, no.

MR VALLY: And when you raised your concerns with higher ups when you were asked to manufacture ecstasy and they - I think you mentioned General Neethling, he in fact tried to get you to improve your production facilities, processes.

DR KOEKEMOER: Well he discussed the chemistry with me and we differed violently where the chemical approach was concerned.

MR VALLY: The point I am making is that the issues which pricked your conscience, and you were thereafter overridden by more senior authority, would issues which pricked the conscience of your seniors, that's the impression we have?

DR KOEKEMOER: I suppose it should have, but on the other hand if it was earmarked for the pure purposes of conventional incapacitation and chemical warfare context, I don't think it would have pricked anybody's conscience.

MR VALLY: But the fact is you did find some encapsulated ecstasy?

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes, but that was only after the fact. This only occurred in 1997, in February 1997.

MR VALLY: And you were surprised at the request that you manufacture large scale quantities of ecstasy because it wasn't a very good incapacitant in terms of chemical and biological warfare?

DR KOEKEMOER: From my personal point of view, but on the ... (intervention)

MR VALLY: No, no from a scientific point of view.

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes, from a scientific point of view and what I have read in the papers, but I was overridden by my superiors where this was ... (indistinct).

MR VALLY: That's what I'm saying.

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes.

MR VALLY: And you not only were concerned about it, you did something about it, you went to see General Neethling.

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes and I also said that I would like to see that this does come from the Surgeon General, that this order and that's why I think that official order was written out.

MR VALLY: And did you do any research papers on the lack of effectiveness of ecstasy as an incapacitant?

DR KOEKEMOER: It hasn't been described in any of the papers that I had at my disposal at Delta G, as an incapacitant. Some of the amphetamines such as MDA has been described in the literature as Psychotomimetic compounds which could be used as an incapacitant, but not ecstasy per se, no.

MR VALLY: Which is what you made?

DR KOEKEMOER: That is what I made.

MR VALLY: Was this not unusual in that you would be asked to research an item before production of that item started? In this case you were asked to produce it immediately without having to research it.

DR KOEKEMOER: Well I was given a chance to investigate the possibility of making this and I was also told that I must make this sulphoxide compound as a front for this project and then I was asked to make it and at that stage too, Delta G was rather in financial difficulty to an extent that a large number of our contracts had been cancelled and they had financial problems so I went ahead and did it.

MR VALLY: Thank you very much Dr Koekemoer.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you Mr Vally. Mr Van Zyl?

MR VAN ZYL: Thank you Mr Chairman, I have no questions for the witness at this stage. I want to reaffirm my position. I can't foresee that there will be any questions, but should there be any, I will inform Mr Vally. Thank you.

CHAIRPERSON: Prof Haysom? No questions from Prof Haysom.

MR VALLY: Mr Chairperson I realised that was what happened yesterday regarding Mr Jan Lourens. Mr Van Zyl's client is in Cape Town, he has been subpoenaed for the whole week. I do not want us to be in a situation where Dr Koekemoer has got other obligations, is leaving Cape Town that we have to call him back you know either there are questions or there aren't questions but we do not want to be, whether intentionally or not, put in a situation where we're told we have to produce a whole lot of people on Friday or whatever. We have made that concession regarding Dr Lourens but it should be made very clear, Dr Koekemoer is flying out I believe this afternoon and he has got other obligations, we cannot leave it open. In terms of our subpoena we have to excuse witnesses, so I really would urge that there be clarity obtained on this viewpoint of we will be advised at a later stage whether they wish to cross examine persons or not. Does it mean we have to fly with Dr Koekemoer back at a later stage? Thank you.

CHAIRPERSON: Do you want to respond Mr Van Zyl?

MR VAN ZYL: Thank you Mr Chairman. Mr Chairman yesterday I explained the position regarding giving notice to my clients when incriminating things are said. Nothing was said of an incriminating nature against my clients and that's why I do not have any questions to ask at this moment. Regarding my clients, should there be incriminating things, my point of view is still the same regarding all the witnesses that not one of my clients were giving notice of factual incriminating evidence here. I can give you the assurance that we will not ask people to recall witnesses, but I can't give up the rights of my clients. This person only testified today but I can give you the assurance we do not want to call witnesses back if it is not necessary.

CHAIRPERSON: In any event, there would be an opportunity if findings are going to be made which are going to be detrimental to certain people, that in terms of Section 13, notices will be sent out and the relevant provisions of Section 13 would apply.

MR VAN ZYL: Thank you Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Du Plessis?

MR DU PLESSIS: Mr Chairman I do not foresee any questions at this stage, but I have to consult my clients.

CHAIRPERSON: Members of the panel? Adv Potgieter?

ADV POTGIETER: Dr Koekemoer why exactly did you go and discuss the question around ecstasy with General Lothar Neethling?

DR KOEKEMOER: Well in the first place this was declared a drug of abuse in the early 1980's in the United States and I just felt a bit uncomfortable about making such a large quantity of material which could possibly be a drug of abuse and that places actually an actual burden on whoever is developing that and manufacturing it to control that substance and I just wanted to make sure that everybody on the authority side was aware that we were involved with this project.

ADV POTGIETER: Yes, I think I understand your motivation for wanting to raise it outside of Delta G, but the question is directed specifically at General Neethling, why did you go to him specifically?

DR KOEKEMOER: Well he was head of forensics and I suppose that the ... (indistinct) also reported to him.

ADV POTGIETER: I'm sorry, just repeat that?

DR KOEKEMOER: The ... (indistinct) police, the narcotics bureau also probably reported to him so I just wanted peace of mind that this was a genuine legal project. For example, if I was asked to make mandrax at Delta G I would have refused.

ADV POTGIETER: Alright, we're going to speak about that in a minute, let's just stick to the ecstasy issue. What did you, did you want to get clearance from the police, did you want to get reassurance from the police that what you were doing was not in breach of the law or what?

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes, yes I wasn't exactly sure at that stage, I'm not knowledgeable about the law, whether ecstasy was a classified substance or not. I didn't even bother to try and find any documents where this was related so I just went to Neethling and asked him.

ADV POTGIETER: Was Neethling an acquaintance of yours or a friend of yours?

DR KOEKEMOER: I've know Dr Neethling since the early 60's because where I used to work at the Roodeplaat Horticultural Institute, not RRL, but the one nearby, the government institute and Neethling was also stationed there although I think he was paid by Onderstepoort, I worked for Research and Irrigation at that stage, I was working on toxic plants ... (indistinct) so I've known Neethling for many many years.

ADV POTGIETER: So was it on that basis that you ... (intervention)

DR KOEKEMOER: It's on that basis.

ADV POTGIETER: Approached him as an acquaintance, not so much in his official capacity as member of the police?

DR KOEKEMOER: Well yes, he was a member of the police, he was a very senior policeman and he would listen to my story without being prejudiced.

ADV POTGIETER: Yes but I must get clarity unfortunately.

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes.

ADV POTGIETER: What did you expect, did you expect an opinion of an acquaintance/friend or did you expect an authoritative position from a police person?

DR KOEKEMOER: No I took a guy with me, Mr Sybrand van der Spuy and I wanted an authoritative opinion whether we could get the go ahead with this project or not from a legal standing point of view.

ADV POTGIETER: So you saw General Neethling in a dual sort of capacity as an acquaintance but also as somebody who could give you an authoritative view on behalf of the police?

DR KOEKEMOER: That is correct.

ADV POTGIETER: Were you happy after that discussion with him?

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes, I got the distinct impression that he was relaxed about this project otherwise he would have told me this. Dr Neethling is a very straightforward guy when it comes to things like that and he would have given a strong opinion so I just got the idea that he didn't want to be involved with the army projects, but that we had his tacit consent where this was concerned.

ADV POTGIETER: But did he create the impression that he's aware of this issue that you were raising?

DR KOEKEMOER: No he didn't create the impression that he was aware from the start that this project was going on, no.

ADV POTGIETER: No, but when you discussed it with him. What impression did he create in you mind?

DR KOEKEMOER: Well he discussed the chemistry of ecstasy with me and from that I could deduce that he at least knew about ecstasy and how it was made.

ADV POTGIETER: And about the project?

DR KOEKEMOER: The project as such he didn't discuss with us. As I said, he was non-committal where that was concerned, honestly.

ADV POTGIETER: But why were you then satisfied after that discussion, I don't follow that?

DR KOEKEMOER: I just got the idea from him that he didn't want to talk about this. I got the impression that he didn't want to talk about this, he discusses the chemistry with me and from this I must just quietly assume that he knows about this project and that he approves of it.

ADV POTGIETER: But I mean ... (intervention)

DR KOEKEMOER: That's the impression I got.

ADV POTGIETER: Yes, I mean but wasn't that an unsatisfactory situation, I mean you were concerned about this, you were told that you're expected to be instrumental in producing quite a large quantity of these things ... (intervention)

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes, it was ... (intervention)

ADV POTGIETER: And you were suspicious about it?

DR KOEKEMOER: It was unsatisfactory to me but Dr ... (indistinct) Neethling can be overbearing in his attitude towards people so I didn't want to put up a fight, I've had differences of opinion with this guy in previous years and I just didn't want to put up another fight with him.

ADV POTGIETER: Wasn't there a residue of doubt in you mind after all this?

DR KOEKEMOER: Not really, because I was assured by Dr Mijburgh and so on that this was straightforward army project with a view of making an incapacitant and that was that.

ADV POTGIETER: Well scientifically you were not persuaded, from what you tell us you were not persuaded at all that ecstasy or MDMA was an effective incapacitant even. You were not persuaded that that would serve that purpose, not so?

DR KOEKEMOER: To this day I would still say it isn't, but as I say I am not a pharmacologist and maybe these guys that had more insight into what real incapacitants should do and not do.

ADV POTGIETER: Were you suspicious that this substance would be used for illegal purposes, for making money, selling it?

DR KOEKEMOER: At that stage no, I wasn't really suspicious about that. I actually trusted that the people that was put in charge of me and so on were ethical people, I mean they were medical doctors and so on and we had the Surgeon General as the head of this group and I assumed that all these people are ethical in this approach.

ADV POTGIETER: And after you found that it was encapsulated?

DR KOEKEMOER: Well I started having my doubts about that but I mean this is an alleged offence and I cannot at this moment really make up my mind. What I do know is that capsules that I've taken from that area, which was what Medchem Pharmaceuticals operated in, I was told by the police that they have analysed this material and that some of those capsules did contain ecstasy.

ADV POTGIETER: If we come to this MX, the mandrax situation?

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes.

ADV POTGIETER: In order to produce mandrax, the methaqualone, the active ingredient has that to be bought elsewhere or how do you obtain that?

DR KOEKEMOER: Well you know I believe that the active start - the materials for making this are actually controlled substances and I think that the police watch out very carefully whoever sells these starting materials for making mandrax and if Delta G did obtain it and manufacture this material, then I don't know how they came about it that they did obtain it. As I said I wasn't involved in this mandrax project so I can't comment on that.

ADV POTGIETER: You mean you either need the co-operation of the police or the blessing?

DR KOEKEMOER: Or alternatively, you must obtain the starting materials clandestinely, in some manner. I have never operated on that level so I can't really tell you.

ADV POTGIETER: Ja, fair enough. How persuaded are you, because you had said to us that in your view there is a possibility - I don't even know whether you referred to it as a probability - of MX, of mandrax being used as an effective incapacitant. Now ... (intervention)

DR KOEKEMOER: I think it could be quite a potential incapacitant because as I said, it is a hypnotic sedative and this could have a drastic influence on your central nervous system so it could influence the way that you operate and can react in a war situation, so I do believe that mandrax can be used as an incapacitant.

ADV POTGIETER: But is there any authoritative study or anything else that you rely upon for that or is it just your view?

DR KOEKEMOER: No it's just taking the structure activity, the type of compound into consideration.

ADV POTGIETER: So you say it's a possibility that it could be used as an incapacitant?

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes.

ADV POTGIETER: But we also know that it's abused?

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes.

ADV POTGIETER: It's sold and abused and so on.

DR KOEKEMOER: But I do believe you know that drugs of abuse gets a bad name because of it's abuse and not necessarily because it's that drug. It could have other potential applications.

ADV POTGIETER: So in other words, I mean would you go along with a suggestion that one could view the large scale production of mandrax in the same light as one views the production of ecstasy?

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes.

ADV POTGIETER: It could have been for the same kind of purpose that you were fearing in respect of ecstasy?

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes, because I mean any personal reservations I have about the end use of these materials are purely personal in respect, but as I said I was aware that I was working with ethical people, they were medical people. I didn't know about any dirty tricks or anything involved in this whole CBW programme, so that was my view.

ADV POTGIETER: At about what time - just finally in connection with this - at about what time did you become aware of the tests with mandrax and cannabis, cannabinoids as it seems to be called here and cigarettes and so on?

DR KOEKEMOER: I actually - after I got arrested by the police, that was I believe on the 4th of February 1997, I got released on bail and then I went back to work and so on and I scratched around and I came across a report on this that was written Drs Psotta and Steenkamp.

ADV POTGIETER: At about what - what was the date of that report, roughly, if you can recall?

DR KOEKEMOER: It could have been 1987, about 1987.

ADV POTGIETER: Thank you doctors.

CHAIRPERSON: Dr Randera?

DR RANDERA: Prof I just want to understand motivation. Here you are professor of organic chemistry you said, at RAU, is that right?

DR KOEKEMOER: That's right.

DR RANDERA: You join a company that you come to find out, subsequently because you had to take the officials Secret Act oath that it's a front company for the army.

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes.

DR RANDERA: That - first of all before that, was there any link between your department and the army, I mean in the time that you were at RAU?

DR KOEKEMOER: No.

DR RANDERA: Did you ever do any work for the army?

DR KOEKEMOER: No, we did some work for AECI who funded us where instruments and so on was concerned, but this was purely with a commercial company - we had no link with the army, no.

DR RANDERA: But you then joined this company ... (intervention)

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes.

DR RANDERA: You know it's a front company. You're producing, or you're involved in research on substances - I mean you say, you're implying that it's for defensive purposes that you were involved in this, but potentially the substances you were investigating, researching were destructive, harmful substances, whether it was CS gas, whether it was ecstasy. In all that time what was it that motivated you to join this ... (intervention)

DR KOEKEMOER: Well .. (intervention)

DR RANDERA: You said at one stage - sorry just let me finish - at one stage you talked about the enemy. Can we just understand who this enemy for you, as a professor of organic chemistry, was?

DR KOEKEMOER: Well initially when I joined there were already rumours that chemical warfare agents were used in Angola against our South African forces. This was exemplified at a later stage by newspaper articles that appeared around 1988 I believe and I eventually went forward with this purely from the chemical challenge point of view because the projects that we formulated were nice chemical challenging projects.

DR RANDERA: Sorry professor, what I'm trying to determine is that you see, when ... (intervention)

DR KOEKEMOER: I had one .. (intervention)

DR RANDERA: You play with molecules ...(intervention)

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes, but where ... (indistinct) (intervention)

DR RANDERA: Eventually your molecules end up in some persons body or in the environment. Now you talk about ethical standards of these doctors, I assume that you too as a professor, had ethical standards ... (intervention)

DR KOEKEMOER: Oh yes, I also have a certain moral stance.

DR RANDERA: Now where was the ethics, can you try - that's what I'm trying to understand as I've been listening to you for the last three hours?

DR KOEKEMOER: My moral stance in this was that if you go in for CBW work, the idea here and I was told right from the start that we were doing work in a defensive capacity, in other words the idea was that if you had an enemy that would chuck chemicals on you, you could chuck it back on them and that's the stance that I took with this so I never saw my CBW work as an offensive thing that you would take this and on an unsuspecting enemy who hasn't got the capability of using CBW, going and chuck it on them.

CHAIRPERSON: Dr Randera, there was a question that you asked to which I have not got a reply from Dr Koekemoer. Who in your eyes was the enemy when you're accepting, as we should, for purposes of this questioning, that you began to believe that this was going to defend whoever against an enemy. Who in you mind was that enemy?

DR KOEKEMOER: That was the Angola confrontation that occurred between the South African forces and UNITA which we apparently supported and which I did analysis from samples and I found out that some of those samples did contain chemical warfare agents.

CHAIRPERSON: Now let's examine that. Are you saying that the enemy, as you saw them, were the Angolans?

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes.

CHAIRPERSON: And the Angolans which - you've mentioned Angolans and then UNITA?

DR KOEKEMOER: Well you know, the Cubans were also involved in this confrontation and that was part of the enemy as far as I am concerned.

CHAIRPERSON: And UNITA?

DR KOEKEMOER: I beg your pardon?

CHAIRPERSON: UNITA, you mentioned UNITA?

DR KOEKEMOER: Well I understood that UNITA was actually supported by the South African government.

CHAIRPERSON: So did you see the UNITA movement as an enemy also?

DR KOEKEMOER: Not really. I didn't actually think in that context Mr Ntsebeza.

CHAIRPERSON: So who were the enemies, because I really - did you think about the African National Congress for instance, as the enemy?

DR KOEKEMOER: No, I didn't see it in that light. What I saw was that we had to develop a defensive capability for chemical warfare purposes so ... (intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: Against whom?

DR KOEKEMOER: Whoever started chucking stuff against us. If ever we would get into a confrontational situation where chemical warfare agents were used against us, we would in the first place have the analytical capability to test for those compounds and then retaliate if it was necessary.

CHAIRPERSON: Dr Randera?

DR RANDERA: Professor, I find this very difficult to understand accept I mean you referred several times to reading in newspapers, we're talking about 1986 to 1990, 1992 period, we're not talking about a peaceful time for South Africa. We're talking about a time when the country was almost burning, we'd had in that period that we're talking about in 1986 to 1990 period we'd had two states of emergencies declared already, so who was the enemy for you professor I mean people were throwing things inside the country?

DR KOEKEMOER: Ja, I never considered that the army would ever utilise any of it's CBW programme aspects internally against it's own people. Let me put that quite clear, it never entered my mind.

DR RANDERA: Professor, I want to come back to this need-to-know basis that you've been talking to, talking about and several of the questions.

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes.

DR RANDERA: As a scientist where scientists have the ability to investigate, research they don't really want to have obstacles in their way and yet it appears to me that when you take on this issue of need-to-know basis, you're almost becoming like an agent. You're deciding, or somebody's deciding for you that this is the area that you can research and no further can you go and I want to follow that up by - so I want your comment on that and then just to say to you, my perception having listened to you is that here you were, yes you were at one stage the head of this research department at this company, but even within your company you didn't know who was doing what research and what other areas of work was being done. Within your company you were producing almost a thousand kilograms of ecstasy and you didn't know where that was going to. You were producing CS gas, you say to us yes that it hadn't been used by the army but clearly - well when we look at that other report that was shown to you earlier on, it may well be have been used. Now it seems to me that you were part of a machinery, you produced substances but you didn't really know where those substances ended up or what they were used for. So, my first - I would like you to comment on this question of scientists versus need-to-know basis and secondly whether you actually knew where the products that you were researching and eventually making, whether you actually knew where that was going. Repeatedly you've said that you wouldn't believe that this could have happened, but clearly these things were taking place and you didn't know about it.

DR KOEKEMOER: Well, let's take CR for example. I developed, I was involved in the development of the process of making this compound. This was then implemented on plant scale. People made a couple of tons of this material and this was taken away by the army. I did not know to what extent they wanted to formulate it and what sort of mechanisms they would put this stuff into. CS was developed on a small scale and as far as I know, we produced about one ninety eight (198) to two hundred (200) kilograms of CS on plant three. That is what I do know about that we did make CS and that was a scale a batch to establish the method of making this and as far as CR was concerned, that was such a need-to-know highly confidential sort of thing, we were not even supposed to talk about this outside and discuss this at all so they had this cloak of secrecy around this project and we tended to ignore the whole situation.

DR RANDERA: Just one last question that I just want to come back to, General Neethling, and I'm also a little concerned why you decided to go and speak to someone who's head of forensics in the police services when you were employed within a front company for the army and therefore I would have thought you would have gone to - if you didn't want to speak to Dr Basson or Mr Mijburgh, you would have gone to General Knobel for example as a line functionary?

DR KOEKEMOER: Can I just say something about this? This whole question of ecstasy was actually discussed at the board, at that stage I was promoted to Research Director at Delta G and the board there didn't decided that we should clear this out and Mr Van der Spuy was also insistent that we do go and clear this out with Dr Neethling.

DR RANDERA: General, sorry professor just to for my own satisfaction, you became director in 1989. The issue of ecstasy came up in 1992?

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes.

DR RANDERA: So it's not, I mean there's a three year difference between you becoming a director and ... (intervention)

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes but this issue wasn't taken up with Neethling after we have made the ecstasy.

DR RANDERA: When was it taken up, when was the discussion?

DR KOEKEMOER: I can't recall exactly what time, but I think it was prior to making ecstasy that we took this up.

CHAIRPERSON: Dr Orr?

DR ORR: Thank you Chair. I want to pursue a little further the line that Dr Randera has raised. Both yourself and Dr Lourens, and I'm sure witnesses that are yet to come, constantly say I didn't know or I wasn't aware, not to my knowledge and I'm concerned about what it is in our society, our educational system, our work environment that produces scientists, people of obvious intelligence and supposed integrity and ethics. What is it that makes scientists who don't ask why, for what purpose and what concerns me more scientists who don't ask when they are faced with fairly convincing evidence that science is being subverted for abusive purposes who don't ask what's going on and who don't refuse to participate and I ask this very sincerely because part of our work is to make recommendations as to how to prevent future abuses and I think if we don't understand the perspective and of scientists who were involved in this and how they were produced and what it was about the environment that allowed these things to happen, we'll be unable to make recommendations.

DR KOEKEMOER: Well you know the environment that I worked with we, I didn't consider my work as being something that I would use for abusive purposes in a sense of using it against a civilian population. My brief was to develop techniques and analytical methods and ways and means to combat CBW onslaught against us and that's why I said if people want to chuck something on us, we'd be able to have the ability to chuck it back and that was how I viewed things at that time, so I said I've got no moral problems with that sort of attitude, I mean all countries, western countries had their Portend Downs and their Edgewood Arsenals and so on, why shouldn't South Africa have it?

DR ORR: If I could just pursue this. You yourself have said that you were not convinced that ecstasy was an appropriate incapacitant, that in fact there had been any research into the weaponisational distribution of it, you had very serious doubts in your mind that ecstasy was going to be used in terms of your justification for this programme. How did you reconcile yourself with going ahead and producing a thousand (1 000) kilograms of that substance?

DR KOEKEMOER: Well there was a lot of pressure brought on me, to bear on me to make this compound and I actually when I started off with this work, it went very slow because I didn't want to get involved with this and pressure was brought on me by both Dr Mijburgh and Dr Basson to make this compound and eventually I submitted to these pressures and I did it.

CHAIRPERSON: You see Dr Koekemoer, I think our problem is compounded every time you give a reply that is seeking to give us an answer to the questions that we'd like to know. Let me just start with the compound that you're taking about. Did I get you correctly when you said that as far as you were concerned, as scientist, this ecstasy was not an incapacitant which you would thought would be usable in a chemical or biological warfare?

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes.

CHAIRPERSON: In other words, let?s assume that the enemy were the Angolans. It would not be the sort of thing that would be used with the Angolans in order to subdue them for purposes of conquest or defeat in an army situation. Are you nodding - if you're saying yes ... (intervention)

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes, ja and therefore it was not in terms of your own scientific belief, and agent that was going to, that could be used to further the military ends of the South African Defence Force?

DR KOEKEMOER: Well I saw it as military ends in the context that if people use CBWs against you, you could use some of it back.

CHAIRPERSON: No, we're talking about ecstasy.

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes, I didn't see ecstasy as a potential incapacitant, no but on the other hand, I had superiors who had medical knowledge and probably more pharmacological knowledge than I had who had access to other groups with maybe more pharmacological knowledge than I had so I couldn't outright say but this is not a suitable compound ... (intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: Yes, but ... (intervention)

DR KOEKEMOER: For using utilising in a chemical warfare incapacitant capacity.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes, yes I accept that's what you say but you will remain convinced, as a scientist of note, that was not the sort of thing that that substance could be used for, in fact you felt that the compound would be used for illegal purposes or had the potential of being used as, of being abused as a substance?

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes.

CHAIRPERSON: And we are talking about 1992, is that so?

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes, that's right.

CHAIRPERSON: And talking about enemies, we had settled our ... (indistinct) externally, our differences with external enemies, there wasn't a war anymore on the borders.

DR KOEKEMOER: That was one of the aspects that actually also I didn't like about making ecstasy because there was no threat anymore.

CHAIRPERSON: There was no external threat, much less was there an internal threat.

DR KOEKEMOER: Ja.

CHAIRPERSON: In fact we were into our third year of negotiations, 1991, 1992. Now what was this enemy that had to be subdued to this extent that so many kilograms of ecstasy were produced by you? Now did it occur to you that whoever is in this programme is either pretending that there is an enemy there there has to be subdues, but otherwise there's another agenda or is using the facility that was there for their own purposes, for their enrichment, for their own agendas. Did it ever occur to you?

DR KOEKEMOER: That thought did occur to me, on the other side again at that stage, Delta G was in financial trouble and I also saw it maybe as a means of utilising army funds to keep Delta G going until the whole privatisation was finalised.

CHAIRPERSON: Exactly, so that to you it obviously did occur that this was not a programme in furtherance of chemical and biological warfare?

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes it did occur to me.

CHAIRPERSON: In fact you felt that this was a programme that might very well be an illegal activity, did you not?

DR KOEKEMOER: The possibility did occur to me, yes.

CHAIRPERSON: And when the cavalier attitude that was adopted by Lothar Neethling, evidence itself, you obviously must have felt that this gives rise to more suspicion, in fact it should have - it didn't ally your suspicions at all?

DR KOEKEMOER: No, but I never doubted the integrity of these, of the people involved.

CHAIRPERSON: No, I'm not asking that.

DR KOEKEMOER: Ja.

CHAIRPERSON: I'm asking about your own state of mind. When you go to Neethling with all these questions, with all the you know indications that (a) there is no enemy on the border; (b) there is no enemy inside; © it doesn't appear that this is in pursuance of a military objective in any event, it can only be to get Delta G out of it's problems which means it was a commercialisation of those projects, but it was a commercialisation of the project in directions that suggested to you that an illegal activity was being embarked upon.?

DR KOEKEMOER: I considered the possibility of it being an illegal activity, but on the other hand it might have been a rounding off of the whole CBW effort, where this whole process of incapacitation was concerned.

CHAIRPERSON: It's a very funny way of rounding off any project when you produce large quantities of substances that might be abused.

DR KOEKEMOER: Well it all depends on what sort of dispersal system you are using here because if you want to incapacitate an enemy, you probably have to make a weaponry system that can produce quite a large quantity of this incapacitant in gaseous form at a certain concentration level to be inhaled by whoever you are chucking the stuff at, so one thousand (1 000) kilograms is not that much in those terms.

CHAIRPERSON: But you became aware, at a certain stage you became aware that capsules were being made out of this compound.

DR KOEKEMOER: I wasn't aware of it at that time.

CHAIRPERSON: When did you become aware of it?

DR KOEKEMOER: I only became aware of it on the 4th of February when I was arrested for being in possession of capsules that was made at Medchem Pharmaceuticals.

CHAIRPERSON: You must have been aware of your possession thereof before you were caught with the ... (indistinct).

DR KOEKEMOER: I thought it was normal because we got a circular and said that Medchem Pharmaceuticals from Dr Mijburgh in 1992, that Medchem Pharmaceuticals would be the selling arm of this group of companies and I assumed that this was an ordinary commercial sort of projects and that was throw away capsules that remained behind on that and that is why I didn't give any attention to it.

CHAIRPERSON: And was it you opinion that this ecstasy was produced and kept in capsule form?

DR KOEKEMOER: I was never aware of it prior to having those tablets, capsules analysed by the police that it contained ecstasy, I've never analysed those capsules.

CHAIRPERSON: What did you think the tablets were when they were kept in your place?

DR KOEKEMOER: Can you repeat that Mr Ntsebeza?

CHAIRPERSON: When the capsule were kept in your place, what did you think it was?

DR KOEKEMOER: I thought it was normal pharmaceuticals that was formulated there because that was the objective of Medchem Pharmaceuticals to make anti-malarials and stuff like that.

CHAIRPERSON: And mandrax, when it was produced in such quantities, what did it suggest to you?

DR KOEKEMOER: I didn't know about the mandrax project and I didn't know that it was produced in any quantity.

CHAIRPERSON: I see. Now CR, what effect would it have on human beings - first of all did you ever see it being ... (intervention)

DR KOEKEMOER: Tested, no.

CHAIRPERSON: Tested.

DR KOEKEMOER: No.

CHAIRPERSON: Not even on animals?

DR KOEKEMOER: No, all I know about are the, that it has or my own experience of it is that it is quite a potentially strong sensory irritant, very much worse than CS, it has a long lasting effect, it is being contaminated with difficulty and if you try and wash yourself once you have been contaminated and I have worked for over a year on this and I was contaminated with this each and every day of my life, it's not a nice substance to work with, but on the other hand, the toxicity levels of these CR is much less than of the known CS.

CHAIRPERSON: I see.

DR KOEKEMOER: Personally, since I have been contaminated by both CS and CR, I would prefer CR being contaminated with CR than CS because CS made me sick, I felt as if I had flu afterwards whereas CR doesn't have that effect on me.

CHAIRPERSON: And did it ever occur to you that these substances, whether CS or CR, were, could have been used internally to deal with crowd control?

DR KOEKEMOER: I knew that CS was the established one of the day to use in crowd control and I couldn't see any advantage of using CR for that purpose except that you would have to use less in that case and nobody ever told me that this would be used for crowd control. I was told that this was supposed to be a harassing agent which will be used in CBW context.

CHAIRPERSON: Now when you say harassing, harassing in what sort of ways?

DR KOEKEMOER: ... would make the equipment of any guy you are making war against inaccessible or it would force him to wear protective clothing, it would make life very difficult for him when his equipment was contaminated with this material because it would keep him in protective suits the whole time.

CHAIRPERSON: And if the person didn't have any protection suits, like for instance in the townships where people were, where this thing was administered to people in township situations where suddenly they wouldn't have any protective equipment. What effect would it have?

DR KOEKEMOER: It would have approximately the same effect as CS except that it would probably be, the discomfort you would feel would be a bit more than CS.

CHAIRPERSON: In what way?

DR KOEKEMOER: CS you can, once you've been contaminated with it you can go to a water source and wash yourself thoroughly and get it off you, whereas actually with CR you enhance the effect by washing yourself.

CHAIRPERSON: Now how long does the effect of CR last?

DR KOEKEMOER: It can last two to three hours.

CHAIRPERSON: And if you inhaled it, would it have any effects on your internal organs?

DR KOEKEMOER: Well according to a work, studies done by a guy called Ballantyne, I think he published it in Journal Pharmacology, these sort of effects were much less of a toxic nature that in the case of CS.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes. Now you mentioned something about thallium, I didn't quite get your evidence in respect thereto?

DR KOEKEMOER: I analysed blood and urine samples which was brought to us from 1 Military Hospital by an officer there, Commandant Ian Joubert, who said that this was a group of Koevoet people that had been poisoned by a toxic substance and we should analyse for it and then we found thallium in the blood and urine samples and then we followed this up during the course of their treatment.

CHAIRPERSON: Now do you know if any thallium was ever produced at Delta G?

DR KOEKEMOER: No.

CHAIRPERSON: When you say no, do you say you don't know if it was ever produced or it was never produced?

DR KOEKEMOER: Thallium is a metal which is difficult to come by so you must buy it from somewhere, you can't simply produce thallium from anything else, it's one of the elements.

CHAIRPERSON: And is it poisonous?

DR KOEKEMOER: Some thallium compounds are extremely poisonous, yes. Thallium acetate, thallium nitrate, it all depends on what sort of chemical composition you have in terms of these metals you get different thallium salts and some of them are less poisonous than others depending on their solubility.

CHAIRPERSON: I don't whether you are aware of the case of Sipiwe Mthimkulu, he is a young activist from the Western Cape who is thought to have been poisoned with thallium and who, and the allegation was that this substance is odourless, colourless and tasteless. Would you agree with that?

DR KOEKEMOER: I haven't studied thallium to that extent but assume that it could be, ja.

CHAIRPERSON: Now something was mentioned of the lifestyle yesterday by Mr Lourens, that obtained at Delta G and you seemed to take a different view of life at that place. Dr Lourens gave us an impression that there was opulence and a lifestyle of people going all over the show?

DR KOEKEMOER: Well that didn't exist at Delta G. I went overseas once in my life and that was to attend a computer conference in Hammersmith in England. That's the only time that I ever went overseas ... (intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: Are you saying ... (intervention)

DR KOEKEMOER: I believe that Dr Mijburgh and so on frequently flew overseas and he was probably part of that group, but not the ordinary working scientists at Delta G.

CHAIRPERSON: So there was tridation of rank within the scientists?

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes, ja. I think that we were the ordinary working class.

CHAIRPERSON: Indeed. Now lastly - I am sure there would have been many in Cosatu who would have liked to have been your brand of working class people. You know Dr Koekemoer you see I am as worried as my colleagues are about your visit to General Lothar Neethling. Did you think that a crime was being committed at that place when you went to see him?

DR KOEKEMOER: No, I went to him simply for advice on whether they considered this to be a kosher, in his view he considered this to be a kosher project in terms of the law and that's what I went out to find out. He was non-committal about this, that he created the impression by talking to me about the chemistry that apparently he knew about this project, but he didn't want to discuss it openly with and that's the impression I went away with.

CHAIRPERSON: Didn't you think of consulting a lawyer?

DR KOEKEMOER: No I didn't.

CHAIRPERSON: And there were no lawyers, I suppose Mr Polsen was not there at the time? There were no lawyers who you thought you could confide in like you know, yesterday we were told by Mr Lourens that a certain stage he began ... (intervention)

DR KOEKEMOER: We always had this cloud of having signed the official Secrets Act hanging over our heads and I wasn't sure to what extent I could open my mouth with anybody outside official capacity and not land into trouble.

CHAIRPERSON: Did you think that the Attorney General for instance would not be one such person who was covered by the official Secrets Act? There were State law advisers.

DR KOEKEMOER: No we never, I never considered that Mr Ntsebeza.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you. Mr Vally? Mr Vally?

MR VALLY: Just some minor matters please Dr Koekemoer. Did you know Mr Corrie Botha?

DR KOEKEMOER: Did I know Corrie Botha?

MR VALLY: That's right.

DR KOEKEMOER: He was production manager, yes at Delta G.

MR VALLY: Do you know Mr Johan Botha?

DR KOEKEMOER: I knew Johan Botha for a short while when he worked at Delta G, Dr Johan Botha?

MR VALLY: That's right.

DR KOEKEMOER: He went over to Sasol.

MR VALLY: What was his role there?

DR KOEKEMOER: He was originally in charge of, during the erection of Delta G and then he was Corrie Botha's superior at a stage before he left in the production department.

MR VALLY: Very finally, you did mention after your arrest that you went back and you scratched around and you found some report?

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes.

MR VALLY: Can you tell us what was in that report?

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes, it was a pyrolysis report with MX and I believe there was cannabis in it and diphenal amine.

MR VALLY: Do you have a copy of that report?

DR KOEKEMOER: I have only one copy and that is in my - Graham has got it.

MR VALLY: Your attorney?

DR KOEKEMOER: Yes and I think that we did tell the Attorney General about this.

MR VALLY: Right, we would - as you can see from you subpoena it has been requested for documents as well relating to the subject matter of you subpoena. Maybe we can arrange with your attorney for us to get a copy thereof?

DR KOEKEMOER: Of course.

MR VALLY: Thank you, I have no further questions.

CHAIRPERSON: Is that now the very very very final question Mr Vally. Well, thank you very much Dr Johan Koekemoer for having come.

DR KOEKEMOER: Thank you Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: And I'm sure the panel as well as the investigative team will have a further insight into the workings of Delta G after you've testified. On the basis that the legal representatives of people who are, who may be implicated by your evidence, indicated you are released and excused.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Polsen?

MR POLSEN: I would like to deal with Mr Vally with regard to this particular report after I've had the opportunity of identifying the document and clearing it up with the Attorney General whose interest I also represent in this particular matter. Thank you Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: Do you have any other clients whom you'll be representing.

MR POLSEN: Yes, yes.

CHAIRPERSON: Oh yes, okay. We will adjourn for lunch until two o'clock.

COMMITTEE ADJOURNS

ON RESUMPTION

CHAIRPERSON: We are about to resume ladies and gentlemen. I believe Mr Vally is on his way but perhaps we - well, I believe Mr Chaskalson is going to be Mr Hanif Vally for purposes of this afternoon. Do you want to place yourself on the record Mr Chaskalson?

MR CHASKALSON: My name is Jerome Chaskalson and I will be leading the evidence on behalf of the Commission this afternoon.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes. There are other legal personalities that I think need to place themselves on the record.

MR VISAGIE: My name is Deon Visagie. I am here on behalf Mr Brian Currin who is the attorney for Jan Lourens.

CHAIRPERSON: Can I get that name again?

MR VISAGIE: Sorry. Deon Visagie, Mallinicks Attorneys.

CHAIRPERSON: Okay.

MR ARENDSE: Chairperson, good afternoon. Norman Arendse, Cape Bar on the instructions of the State Attorney. Finkhuizen has been standing in for me. I'm representing the Department of Foreign Affairs, thank you.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you Mr Arendse and thank you Mr Visagie.

Mr Chaskalson?

MR CHASKALSON: Thank you. Our next witness will be Doctor Schalk van Rensburg.

CHAIRPERSON: Doctor Schalk van Rensburg, welcome. We are pleased that you have been able to come.

I take it Mr Polsen that you represent ...[intervention]

MR POLSEN: I once again act for Doctor van Rensburg Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very much.

Before you testify Doctor van Rensburg, I'll ask Advocate Potgieter to swear you in.

ADV POTGIETER: Doctor, just your full names for the record please. Full names for the record.

SCHALK JANSE VAN RENSBURG: My full names are Schalk Janse van Rensburg.

ADV POTGIETER: Do you have any objection to taking the oath?

SCHALK JANSE VAN RENSBURG: (sworn states)

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you Doctor van Rensburg. May I just indicate to you that you are free to express yourself in the language you are most comfortable with.

DR VAN RENSBURG: Thank you, I'm most comfortable in English.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very much Sir. But for the audience, those people who would rather listen in to the Afrikaans, it is on Channel 1. Thank you very much.

Mr Chaskalson?

EXAMINATION BY MR CHASKALSON: Good afternoon Doctor van Rensburg. Could you please indicate for us your background and qualifications prior to 1984 please?

DR VAN RENSBURG: I qualified as a Veterinarian in 1957. I worked with the Department of Agriculture for 11 years, specialising particularly in animal reproduction studies. I gained the degree of Doctor of Veterinary Science. After problems with the Department of Agriculture at the time due to my unacceptability in the political atmosphere at the time, I was worked out by the Broederbond.

I then went on to the Medical Research Council and had 15/16 wonderful years there working exclusively on the causes of diseases amongst our rural underprivileged people. Later the research funds and so on were diminishing for basic studies like we were doing and I then joined Roodeplaat.

MR CHASKALSON: Could you tell me who approached you to join Roodeplaat?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Initially there were visits by Doctor Basson to our Nutritional Diseases Institute here in Cape Town at the Medical Research Council. Doctor Basson had certain problems that he discussed with me and a lot of my research group.

These problems were, firstly as we now know there was apparently a threat of Chemical Biological or some Chemical Biological capability, acquired by some of our neighbouring states, Angola and Mozambique in particular. They had go technology via Cuba from the Russians. We knew the Russians were working on a new generation of chemical weapons based on fungal toxins, the mica toxins and the one most promising product was Yellow Rain of course which is actually a fungus toxin from the Fezerium group.

Now my research group were already experts in this field. Minute amounts of these same toxins that were used for warfare sometimes occur in food and they can cause fatal human disease, so we were researching this intensively. We'd even had laboratory accidents with exposure to these Tricotasines as we call them in this country, Tricothekenes they call them in America, extremely irritant compounds.

Now according to Doctor Basson and others, the intelligence was that the testing had been done in Afghanistan, had been done in Cambodia. Those conflicts were sort of ending and they were expecting tests to be done with these fungal toxin weapons in Angola. So that's immediately how we initially made contact.

He also had problems, and he sketched very credible incidents of which I don't doubt are true, of covert exposure to border troops and some incidents where they could not determine what the cause was. People on patrol were definitely exposed to toxic substances but they could never find out what and it did cause occasional deaths.

So really to investigate these things you need a good laboratory backup, so he approached us. We were very keen to do any contract work even at the MRC then because funds were becoming very short for basic research. So we discussed it with him and he went back and they did a security check apparently on the Medical Research Council. The message was, there are known communists on the Board of the Medical Research Council so they can't do work with us and from that it seems they decided to establish their own group.

I'd refused the first two approaches. Ultimately Doctor Daan Goosen flew down to Cape Town, sketched a very attractive plan for a Contract Research Laboratory. I knew, and he was open about it, it was a military front company initially. The plan was to ultimately privatise it. We assumed it would remain the property of the government but operate as a private company doing contract research.

I'd had immense respect for Doctor Daan Goosen. I was a great admirer of his achievements. We both had similar good reputations internationally in the Laboratory Animal Science field. Apart from that I had the research reputation. My work is still quoted standard in many medical text books overseas. It's still quoted by even Nobel prize winners in reviews. So I had the scientific credibility to help build up the contract research.

When I talk about contract research I mean private research, genuine research, particularly to the pharmaceutical industry but also various other industries. Then of course part of it would be the confidential work for Doctor Basson centred on these requirements I've outlined.

MR CHASKALSON: Doctor van Rensburg, can you put a date to when you joined RRL?

DR VAN RENSBURG: I started at RRL on the 1st of August 1984.

MR CHASKALSON: And can you explain the structure that existed at the stage that you joined?

DR VAN RENSBURG: When I arrived I was the third Director. We had a Managing Director, Doctor Daan Goosen, we had the Research and Development Director, Andr? Immelmann. There was the Administrative Director, Doctor David Sparmer, Mr David Sparmer and then myself, I was appointed as Director of Laboratory Services. It was my job to establish laboratories, to help equip them, to appoint the right staff, work out the optimal structures for our purposes and so forth.

MR CHASKALSON: You mentioned earlier that you were there to do commercial projects, was it your understanding that there would be other projects that were not of a commercial nature?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Yes, indeed I was informed it was started as a front company and we would have these contracts supposedly with the Army, rather the Surgeon General. I did have reservations in the beginning and as a family we talked about it.

It is acceptable for any model Army, in fact it is expected to have a good technology base of covert warfare. If you don't know the dirty tricks you can't counter them or you don't detect them or your outwitted.

Then again I thought, I'm a pretty known liberal, blacklisted by the Broederbond, Anglican, lifelong Anglican, I've written it on my application form, there surely can't be anything very sinister if they ask a chap like myself.

I also had experienced previous work, contract work with the Army in the late '60's soon after I joined the, what ultimately became the Medical Research Council. I was in a team that was to develop a safe cabin for mine-proof vehicles. At those times the V had not been invented, there were no mine-proof vehicles and the police were being blown up on the border in their bakkies.

So I joined the team together with the CSIR people and we developed a cabin which was safe and which we were sure that people would survive in and I did the medical assessments in various ways. To do that work we went through very strict screening, security checks and there wasn't a problem for that purpose.

To join this company there was no security check until only after I joined. The security was at such a level that there wasn't even, they weren't even very studious about: "Die eed van geheimhouding", your secrecy oath. This document I was given in 1984 to sign so I thought why should I sign a thing like this, I don't mind industrial secrecy but this sounds a little bit sinister. I didn't sign it, I think we were asked for it once and I made an excuse and I never have signed an oath of secrecy.

MR CHASKALSON: Doctor van Rensburg, just for the record, would it be possible for us to get a copy of that document at some later stage?

DR VAN RENSBURG: You may have it all, I don't require it.

MR CHASKALSON: Thank you. Doctor van Rensburg, can you indicate to us some of the other people who were working at the facility at the beginning?

DR VAN RENSBURG: At the beginning when I got there, there were the Directors that I mentioned and a couple of technicians. There was Jaap Visser and there was already a chemist, Claus Psotta but we were a small group. We started in the old house, as we heard yesterday, the old farmhouse and worked very hard. Daan Goosen was very advanced for the big permanent institute and the building started shortly after I got there.

This was not a secret institute, it was an advertised institute. We did contract research and we had brochures and we had people from all over the world there. These are the brochures, it's for commercial work, all the details, this is the tests we can do for the pharmaceutical industry and so forth. So it was not secret, the existence was not secret, that was advertised.

What was meant to be a secret was the fact that it was a covert military operation ...[indistinct] and that some of the, a front company and that we were doing covert work for the military, that of course was secret.

MR CHASKALSON: When was the new facility completed?

DR VAN RENSBURG: I should think about early in, round about mid 1985. We had in the meantime built a small laboratory which was erected very quickly, three or four rooms near the farmhouse, which became part of our large animal laboratory facility later and in that there was very active work going already. From the beginning of 1985 there was active laboratory work being conducted.

MR CHASKALSON: When you say active work, are you talking about commercial projects or are you talking about other projects?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Both. Commercial projects never really were more than 10%. The guidelines we were given as to how much commercial work to do, they would tell us at some stage only 5%, at other stages 20%. In the early stages it was maybe at that level. At the late stages, after 1990, probably 30% of the effort was expended on commercial work but we never really earned more than 10% of the budget.

MR CHASKALSON: So the commercial work was simply a public facade to the company?

DR VAN RENSBURG: It was known as: "Dekmantelwerk", cover work, that's the reason it was done.

MR CHASKALSON: How is it that if you were recruited to do commercial work you came to know of the other work?

DR VAN RENSBURG: I wasn't specifically recruited to do commercial work but the laboratories I created or helped create because it was all a team effort, and equip and the technology that I helped to establish there, this was necessary for both commercial work and for the military work. It's the same type of laboratory facilities, a lot of the techniques are the same. There was a very good overlap. So I myself did not do projects except for two small projects which I'll touch on. I just helped keeping the machine oiled once it had been established.

MR CHASKALSON: We'll return to this at a later stage. Once the facility had grown a little bit I presume that more staff were drawn into the facility and that almost certain divisions were set up, would that be correct to say?

DR VAN RENSBURG: That is correct. We had ultimately had a staff of round about 70. I do have a breakdown here of the structure, I must just put my finger on it, there were departments of Toxicology, Biochemistry, Molecular Biology and - just let me try and find where I've got them, sorry I can't put my finger on it now. There were a whole lot of groups of scientists, only about 12 scientists in all ultimately by the time I left in 1991 and about 16 technologists.

We had these various scientific disciplines, biochemistry, Organic Chemistry, Molecular Biology, Physiology, Microbiology, the Animal Unit and so forth. And then this was supported by a lot of service systems, the State Department, the Finances, the Administration, the Directorate and so forth.

MR CHASKALSON: Did you have any specific dealings with one or more of these units?

DR VAN RENSBURG: The specific dealing I had with them, I assume you mean research activities?

MR CHASKALSON: Correct.

DR VAN RENSBURG: I participated in Fertility Project. And I'd like to put the record straight here, the original assignment to do this project came from Doctor Basson. He came to see a group of us and said they had a problem with, Savimbi had a problem in UNITA. His best troops were actually the females but the trouble is they were pregnant most of the time. And then he indicated that there was a bit of a problem in the refugee camps where they are breeding too fast. These were the reasons he gave and he had already done his homework, he came with a little book written by an Indian expert on immunological control of fertility. And in there these chaps, the Indians are very imaginative sort of group, they had all sorts of theories of how to do this.

With my background, purely because of my background in reproductive research for 11 years, I actually had a project which was registered as Immunological Infertility, the State of the Art. In other words, I did literature reviews and I could give guidance to the research team.

In these reviews there was a lot of literature that we obtained from World Health Organisations. The population council of the World Health Organisation had pinpointed immunological techniques as the future effective way to control populations and particularly in third world countries where you don't have to take a pill every day and so forth for obvious reasons.

The United Nations World Health Organisation strongly urged and there were official resolutions, all member governments who were in a position to do so, to so research on developing immunological techniques to fertility for fertility control. In other words, a vaccine.

Basically of course we didn't really believe the motivation that Doctor Basson gave, maybe he was right, maybe he was wrong but I was suspicious. We didn't worry too much, I didn't worry too much. Having looked at it I thought it's a good project. We appointed Doctor Riana Borman to actually lead the project. I was an advisor, technical advisor.

There was no question at any stage whatsoever of developing a vaccine that only works in blacks or that's colour or ethnic based. Biochemically, blacks, white, Chinese, whatever, are identical. There is nothing, no academic reason or a difference that you can look on to make racially based vaccines. There is no such thing that I know of.

So we told him at an early stage, after doing the literature reviews: "Do you understand Doctor Basson, the thing is very easily detectable". It was Doctor Basson and Wynand Swanepoel who pushed this constantly. I told them: "It's very easily detectable, you cannot use it covertly". They said that didn't worry them, we were to carry on.

So having discussed it with the research team we decided we would work flat out on this project. It was a good project commercially. If the company was ever privatised we could make a killing from it even if we didn't develop the product, just from selling the technology we had performed.

MR CHASKALSON: Doctor van Rensburg, sorry, can I just take you back a little bit. The first approach by Doctor Basson, when would that have been about, time period?

DR VAN RENSBURG: 1985, later in 1985.

MR CHASKALSON: You said that you didn't believe his motivation, can you elaborate on that?

DR VAN RENSBURG: By this time I'd learnt that the Special Force people were very cavalier and they would spread lots of covert stories and that you didn't necessarily, there was no such thing as ever questioning, it was a need to know thing and you did what you were told and you just volunteered these reasons.

I could not think that an intelligent man could think we could spend a couple of million on a project like this to control pregnancy in a few of Savimbi's female soldiers, it was just silly ...[indistinct] reason.

MR CHASKALSON: Did you have any speculation in your own mind as to why you had been requested to try and develop this?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Well one speculates that they might want to use it covertly on a huge scale, which I warned them they can never do. Any junior technical in immunology can devise a test to pick up the antibodies because if you make a person immune, there's only a few antigens hormone type things that you can use. You can pick up antibodies by very simple laboratory tests and show that population has got antibodies, you know immediately something has happened.

MR CHASKALSON: Can I ask the question, why would you want it not to be detectable?

DR VAN RENSBURG: If you want to use it covertly then you would not want it to be detectable.

MR CHASKALSON: Were you requested ...[intervention]

DR VAN RENSBURG: We were not requested, we were not told. As I say, the only reasons we were given was the refugee camps and Savimbi's female soldiers. But as I say, logistically they're rather silly reasons for such a major project.

One assumed they wanted to use it on a larger scale. I can't say they wanted to use it covertly, it might be a genuine attempt to make a product available to a population that wants it. These immunisations as I say, are firstly easy to detect and secondly in most cases very reversible.

So it would be a very desirable project and there's a huge amounts, and there are a lot of groups working on this field that were working even then. There are huge amounts being spent to try and get an effective immunological approach to control fertility. It's theoretically a very good approach.

I even went to Canada to attend an international congress on specifically immunological fertility control on this subject and nothing else. I met all the people who had written initial works, especially the Indian group and I assessed exactly what the position was and that, came back and that saved us a lot of repetitive futile work in this field.

We had a team led by Doctor Borman and the other active scientist who was a Biochemist, a young lady, who was obsessive about not being involved in covert work. She would have nothing to do with it whatsoever but having discussed it we had decided we will never release a product which is not fully tested, approved by a Medical Research Council, preferably through the Medicines Control Council sorry. We knew that we had no hope of bringing such a project to finality within 10 to 20 years.

At the later stages the best aspect of this project was that it occupied at least 30% of our research capability at the institute. That was 30% less time and effort and money to spend on developing covert ways to kill people.

There was pressure to release the product. Doctor Wynand Swanepoel harassed me about I must make it available, I said it's not tested for safety, it's not tested for efficacy, effectiveness. He said it doesn't matter, I must give him some of the product. We did not give him any and if we were pressed further I would happily have given him a dilute solution of some of the hormone antigens we were using that would definitely not work and be quite harmless. There was no question that Doctor Borman or Doctor Karen Nel or my ethics would be raped in this particular way.

MR CHASKALSON: You've raised a number of issues now which I'd like to just touch on some of them. The first one is that you had said that Doctor Swanepoel had requested you to give him some of the product. Can you clarify for us who Doctor Swanepoel is?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Doctor Wynand Petrus Swanepoel was the second Managing Director or Roodeplaat. There was a stage when there was talk of privatisation. The moment the first whispers came out, the first thing they did was to put all front companies under the control of ex-Special Forces officers and it so came that he replaced Doctor Daan Goosen.

MR CHASKALSON: Was he a scientist?

DR VAN RENSBURG: He was not a scientist at all, he was in the Special Forces in the Military Battalion, the Medical Military Battalion. I understood he played primarily an administrative role there but he was very active. Even after he came to Roodeplaat in weekend operations with the police and known CCB agents.

MR CHASKALSON: There are a number of things that I want to lead off from this. The first one is, did it not strike you as surprising that somebody with no scientific background would be placed in charge of a facility such as RRL?

DR VAN RENSBURG: The only time Doctor Basson ever actually came to my home was in 1985. He turned up there and he had a proposition to put to me and that was, he outlined why he thought he should replace Doctor Goosen with Doctor Wynand Swanepoel.

I discussed this with him at length. I said I thought it was a very bad idea. I said Doctor Goosen was an excellent leader, he was brilliant at structuring and keeping the show going, he had a highly efficient small organisation then, he was a credible scientist. I said to him: "If you put an ex-Special Forces officer there, forget your cover". I said: "These people are not suitable for administering a group of scientists. Military people come with their mythical super leadership style. This style is necessary if you want to convince a lot of otherwise sensible youngsters to become cannon fodder, they have to have it but it's not suitable in a scientific milieu". Anyway they did appoint him.

MR CHASKALSON: In your opinion, did the appointment of Doctor Swanepoel as the MD of RRL hinder or help the future of that company?

DR VAN RENSBURG: It was the end of the future. The dream that Doctor Goosen had that I supported fully was a model contract research company. We all knew then that this need the Army had was going to expire very soon, thinking people knew that the days of the apartheid regime was almost over.

And it was our dream to create a top class research facility, the logistics were right. We had fantastic scientists and a very high percentage of good trained people in this country. We had the most modern animal research technology. We had the reputations, everything was going and we thought we could create a fine facility that the country really, it could be an asset to the country from an industrial point of view, it could earn a lot of foreign exchange and create a lot of jobs.

This against the background of failing funds for basic research work, remember we were research workers, we also had to create a future for ourselves. It was not only the social priorities that reduced our funds in this country, it was actually a world-wide trend, that government funds for basic research particularly my field which was the causes of cancer, these were being cut all over the world.

DR VAN RENSBURG: I just want to go back a little bit and talk about the reporting structures that there were in the organisation as well as how the company was financed. Can you give us an indication of how accounting in the company was done?

DR VAN RENSBURG: The finance was 100% through secret military funds which were channelled through the Surgeon-General except as I say for the 5 or at best 10% that we ever made from contract research.

The administrative company or rather, we had a company that were internal auditors called Infadel. Exactly how the flow of military funds, if they came direct through the Surgeon-General through Infadel, I never knew. It wasn't my job to know and I didn't ask.

Infadel were internal auditors headed by Tjaard Viljoen and there was a man, van der Berg there. Van der Berg was a good, very strict auditor. He told us that Prime Minister P W Botha had appointed his personal friend, a man by the name of Pierre Theron, to audit all the front companies. And he'd done this to keep a special eye on us so that we would not abuse funds and that he would not be subjected to a second Info scandal. So Pierre Theron of the then, the firm was at that stage known as Theron, du Toit and Company or Coopers, Theron and du Toit.

This one firm audited all the front companies and they still have all the records. They are now known as Coopers and Lybrand. The records are all there if you want the financial dealings of the front companies.

MR CHASKALSON: We will return to that point and your point about not having another financial scandal but I'd like to do that in a more chronological order. Can you tell us something about the reporting structures within the organisation?

DR VAN RENSBURG: The research reporting structures?

MR CHASKALSON: Well, either both the research reporting structures and also how reporting was done to Doctor Basson and how reporting was done to the Surgeon-General if it indeed was done.

DR VAN RENSBURG: Initially General Nieuwoudt, the first Surgeon-General, there were occasional meetings with him where both administration and technical reports were fed back. But to start at the in-feeding stage, the instructions for work to be done at the institute came from the Managing Director, Wynand Swanepoel, it came from Doctor Wouter Basson and quite often Doctor Andr? Immelmann would initiate projects as well.

These projects would, these instructions to do work, and I'm talking about the military work, the covert work, was always verbal, never ever written. The researcher would be approached about the problem outlines, it was then his job to come back with protocols which he would present to Doctor Immelmann. Doctor Immelmann would approve them or adapt them as he wanted them and then the research work would go ahead. As far as the military projects were concerned, when they were completed the reporting was to Doctor Immelmann. He would then occasionally write information pieces, these would go back to either the operatives, Doctor Basson or, I don't know whether Doctor would take them but at times Doctor Swanepoel required overviews of certain possibilities for future research work or areas of progress.

The administrative reporting was always to the Surgeon-General, of course within the company there was a hierarchy. All money expenditure had to be approved by the Surgeon General. He had budgets and individual items that cost, say more than R25 000 or whatever, he would have to approve.

MR CHASKALSON: How do you know that?

DR VAN RENSBURG: It was in the regulations of the company. We had administrative guidelines and levels of authorisation and above a certain level I can't remember, I think it varied, it was about R20 000 then R25 000 and it might gone up to R50 000. Above a certain level individual items had to be authorised by the Surgeon-General.

MR CHASKALSON: You've spoken quite a bit about Doctor Immelmann. He seems to be a very important person in regard to the covert projects.

DR VAN RENSBURG: That's right, that was his responsibility.

MR CHASKALSON: And could you give us some form of indication as what you understood to be covert projects?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Covert projects were really requirements being fulfilled or requirements set out by the Special Forces, by the police and by the CCB. These were classified officially as "H" projects initially. Later on the "H" was too obvious. "H" stood for hard work as opposed to "C" which was commercial work. We can analyse the projects or have a look at the type of projects.

Within the document I've been given there are numerous projects, individual examples and also lists of projects ...[intervention]

MR CHASKALSON: Why don't we have a look at one of the lists of the projects?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Right. Possibly we should go on a more chronological order. There are also lists of products issued. The ...[intervention]

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Chaskalson, - I'm sorry Doctor van Rensburg, can you direct us where?

MR CHASKALSON: I will in a moment, I'm just looking for an index. I believe that document TRC 30 may be a useful one to start off with Doctor van Rensburg.

DR VAN RENSBURG: TRC 30? Right. We've got a list of research projects there. I have done some analysis of these projects. I've just got to find the place, I'm sorry for the delay. Document TRC 30 provides lists of a total of 163 hard projects. There are 163 listed here. They include projects commenced in 1985, 1986 and from 1990 onwards. In other words the three years, '87 to '89 are missing. Of the 163 known projects 66% concerned potentially lethal toxins.

MR CHASKALSON: Could you identify some of those potential lethal toxins?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Yes, I will come to that in a moment. If I can just give you a breakdown of the type of projects done?

MR CHASKALSON: Carry on.

DR VAN RENSBURG: Most were toxicity studies in animals followed by studies in which toxins were actually prepared and those were also listed as projects. Some projects concerned chemical properties and administration methods. Only 6% of these toxist studies involved treatment and neutralising agents, only 6% of the 66%.

Psychotropic agents were the subject of 2% of all studies as were techniques for detecting explosives. There were two or three projects for detecting explosives. Those were not really, there was no progress made on them until they were transferred to the Roodeplaat Breeding Enterprises where they of course went on very well.

Fertility and fertility control studies comprised 18% of all projects. Microbiological agents were examined in 12% of the studies. Highly pathogenic micro organisms predominated in those 12%.

There was only one cancer study listed, that is fact was cancelled, it never took place. It was actually in the very early stages when we had spare capacity, I wanted to sneak in an academic study which didn't have covert potential but the laboratory soon became fully occupied so I didn't have a chance to do it. So no cancer work was done.

MR CHASKALSON: Were you aware of the nature of this work while you were at RRL?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Yes, I was, I had no say in formulating or deciding what sort of work was done in this field. Where I did see it was as Chairman of the Laboratory Animal Ethics Committee. They used to briefly be shown to me so that the institute could tell the world they guaranteed that every study done there had been subjected to laboratory animal ethics screening and that we did.

And very often I would reduce the number of animals and the techniques to reduce suffering drastically as borne out. You can see in many of the reports listed in here they claim there were inadequate numbers of animals used.

MR CHASKALSON: I'd like to return to the animals but maybe at a slightly later stage. Can you tell me what Monensen is?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Monensen is a, I think it's one of these ion o fours(?), it's a growth stimulant in animals but it can also be very toxic in certain species. It's safe to use in ruminant animals, animals with four stomachs but in monograstic animals like the horse or the dog it's highly toxic.

MR CHASKALSON: And what about the human?

DR VAN RENSBURG: One would assume, being a monograstic animal, it would be very toxic.

MR CHASKALSON: Yes. A substance by the name of Brodifacum?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Brodifacum is an anti-coagulant. It would normally be extracted from I should think something like Cooper's Finale, it's a rat poison. It's a rat poison which prevents blood clotting. In other words if you feed small amounts you can suddenly die of haemorrhages or strokes or whatever.

MR CHASKALSON: Doctor van Rensburg, some of these studies even to the lay person look slightly strange. If I can refer you to the first page of that list. It seems to be marked with five zeros although some of the subsequent ones are cut off, about half way down the page, 86 H 1630, we see that they're talking about the: "stabiliteit van 'n PO nikotien mengsel". It seems as if substances are being put into nicotine.

DR VAN RENSBURG: That's right. PO stands for Paraoxon. Paraoxon is the - if you take the organic phosphate poison - Professor Folb please correct me, I'm not a pharmacologist, if I'm wrong, the organic phosphate poisons ...[indistinct] colon ...(indistinct) inhibits like Parathion. They themselves are not really toxic but what happens when you get them in, the body tries to break them down and makes a product that's far more toxic and infinitely more toxic than the parent substance and that is Paraoxon.

One can see it's a favourite substance used in various ways and I think it's one of the substances possibly they used to paint on clothes to take out selected targets.

MR CHASKALSON: Possibly looking at these experiments put into tobacco or cigarettes?

DR VAN RENSBURG: That's right.

MR CHASKALSON: Can I refer you to another document which is TRC 52. And I was wondering if you might consider some of the substances listed on this document to be of a covert nature?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Is that the list of products?

MR CHASKALSON: That's correct, it's a document with a list of dates down the left-hand side, substances and then there's a gram measure and a price on the far column.

DR VAN RENSBURG: I've analysed these lists. I knew about these lists because I had heard Doctor Immelmann and Doctor Swanepoel talking about them. As far as I know usually Doctor Swanepoel would be urging Doctor Immelmann to keep them up to date or asking for copies that he could use them to motivate more money and that sort of thing.

This is the only one I've actually seen. I knew about these product lists but I'd never seen them. I will say I was horrified to see that on 48 occasion 67 items were supposedly sold over a mere eight months. That is, this list covers March '89 to October 1989, only eight months.

If you average out this rate for the approximately five year offensive period of Roodeplaat then one can deduce that round about 500 products were in fact issued. Now what were these products? 30%, 36% were small quantities of highly lethal toxins, chemicals that are capable of incapacitating or killing one or a few people, that's about the quantities issued.

Fourteen different chemicals were issued in just over these eight months. The favourite was cyanide, it was issued five time, followed by Thallium and Botulinum Toxin three times each.

A further 36% of the so-called sales also involved the administration means of these agents. For toxins chocolate was the favourite, they issued 13 doses on four occasions followed by laced beer tins or bottles, that was seven doses and whisky five doses.

Also issued were orange juice, hypodermic needles, Propane, which I think is a propellant probably for an aerosol, Methanol and two snakes.

MR CHASKALSON: I'd just like to draw your attention to a couple of the specific items. On page two of this document the first item is Vibrio Cholera and there's a volume of 16 bottles, then slightly further down, that was on the 4th of August 1989, then on the 16th of August 1989 another 16 bottles of the substance were provided and on the 9th of August 1989 a further 10 bottles were provided. In your view, could such quantities be used to have caused an outbreak?

DR VAN RENSBURG: My answer here reads: "Remarkable was the issue of the 32 bottles of Cholera germs on three occasions during July to September 1989". I was frankly shocked to see this. With that you can cause massive outbreaks of Cholera amongst various populations. It would be interesting for the medical people to see if there were outbreaks after August/September 1989.

MR CHASKALSON: I'd just like to read out a couple of these items and then pose a question to you and I'm going to be somewhat selective here but I will cover a fair amount.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Chaskalson, I thought I heard you say that 10 bottles were in August, it seems to me the record must be straightened out then. Are you referring to the item where it says: 8th of September '89?

MR CHASKALSON: My apologies, thank you.

CHAIRPERSON: Just for the record.

MR CHASKALSON: It seems that on the first page of this list we have got three beer bottles Bot., which I presume is Botulism, three beer bottles with Thallium, another beer bottle of Botulism, another two of Thallium. We've got Sugar and Salmonella, we've got some Whisky and Paraquat, we've got a baboon foetus, we've got cigarettes with B Antheral, we've got five coffee chocolates with B Antheral, there's another five coffee chocolates with Botulinum, some peppermints with Aldicarb, peppermint chocolates with Brodifacum, peppermint chocolates with Cantharidine and peppermint chocolates with cyanide, three and three were the last two quantities. ...[indistinct] whisky with Colchicine - excuse my pronunciation, and the list seems to go on. Would you consider this list to be a list which could have been used for some form of scientific research or a list which is a list or murder weapons?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Undoubtedly a list of murder weapons, no value for research whatsoever.

MR CHASKALSON: If you could indulge me for just a moment please Mr Chair.

CHAIRPERSON: Doctor van Rensburg, did I understand you to be saying you were not aware that these things were produced, you were shocked when you got this list? I'm talking about you as a person.

DR VAN RENSBURG: I was not aware of the list. I was aware that this type of thing was being issued, that I was aware of but I didn't realise the scale it was being done at.

CHAIRPERSON: Now what was it being issued for? In terms of your awareness, what was it said, what was it going to be used for?

DR VAN RENSBURG: It was being issued primarily, most issues went either to Doctor Swanepoel or Doctor Basson but most of them went from Andr? Immelmann direct to operatives. They would meet at some neutral place, they'd have false names, Doctor Immelmann was often called Willem, he often met a guy called Chris and I believe there is letters down, just after the date delivered, you'll lots of C's there. I know that stands for Chris, the others I don't know what they stand for. These were just ...[intervention]

CHAIRPERSON: JK, is it JK?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Code names, they were code names. They weren't supposed to know who was who. Doctor Immelmann had a storeroom adjacent to his office, a high security fireproof, bombproof storeroom where he kept all these products and that was, as I say you could only get there through his office.

And the people who used to visit there periodically as I've said were Swanepoel, Basson, Doctor, General Lothar Neethling made periodic visits there, characteristically always with his bulging briefcase. I never saw what was happening inside that room. I never saw any of these products. I knew he kept them there.

I was also exposed to some of these products when we stopped offensive work and there was a panic. There was a rumour there was going to be a raid by the Security Branch or somebody and there was a rapid disposal of some of these chemicals. He exposed some in the bathroom that we used and I became exposed to some Cantharadines and I can tell you it's not a happy experience.

CHAIRPERSON: Let me just ask whilst Mr Chaskalson is spotting something that he is going to ask you. You are talking about Doctor Lothar Neethling, you must be aware that at some stage the Vryeweekblad carried stories that suggested that Doctor Lothar Neethling was responsible for certain toxins that he had administered and there was a whole lawsuit and all that. Now, from the place where you now sit and against the backdrop of what you referred to as bulging briefcases in the context of these substances and these toxins, were you surprised when those sort of claims were made in the newspaper?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Not at all, I never had any doubt what the Vryeweekblad was 100% true but that is my personal opinion and that is based on the very close association that already existed between Wouter Basson and Lothar Neethling. When I arrived on the scene in August 1984, they were obviously old buddies and worked together. They were very dedicated to their task. I saw them the first time when we tested teargas on baboons. They had a teargas that I think was meant to give them tummy cramps.

The idea was that if you put down teargas everyone quickly goes to look for a toilet. It didn't work on the baboons so these two gentleman both had no qualms about walking through the clouds themselves and that's actually the only human experiment I saw. And their close association with, not only those two, but with Doctor Immelmann. Obviously they all shared common interests in chemical warfare.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Chaskalson?

MR CHASKALSON: Thank you. Doctor are you aware that two of the substances we discussed, Brodifacum and Menensim cause acute heart failure in the human and also have the dubious merit of not being traceable?

DR VAN RENSBURG: That was a very highly sought after merit Mr Chaskalson.

MR CHASKALSON: Can you elaborate as to why you say that?

DR VAN RENSBURG: The most frequent instruction we obtained from Doctor Basson and Doctor Swanepoel was to develop something with which you could kill an individual which would make his death resemble a natural death and that something was to be not detectable in a normal forensic laboratory. That was the chief aim of Roodeplaat Research Laboratories covert side.

MR CHASKALSON: That's quite a startling admission or statement.

DR VAN RENSBURG: That's the most frequent repeated need that I heard or instruction given.

MR CHASKALSON: So it would be fair to say that you were not interested in doing defensive work on a very large scale?

DR VAN RENSBURG: I was - I joined the institute on the 1st of August ...[intervention]

MR CHASKALSON: Sorry Doctor, I was referring to the organisation itself.

DR VAN RENSBURG: Yes. Within two weeks of joining them I realised this is not defensive work, this is offensive work. It was a shock to me. There was incidents of where they, apparently they claimed to have murdered a young white conscript who was an ANC supporter on the border, by simulating a snake bite. It was early in 19 or the second half of 1984 and not to be confused with later attempt in 1989. That brought very chill winds very close to home, that something like this could happen.

I had to make the decision whether to stay with this lot or walk out and the correct thing would be to walk out. I did not do so for the following reasons: The one was we'd already been told in no uncertain terms if you let the side down you're dead.

MR CHASKALSON: Who told you that?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Doctor Daan Goosen as Managing Director in a formal Directors meeting. I could see they were not his words, it was obviously an instruction from elsewhere. I know him well enough and I know he's got a gentle nature but he'd been told, it was my deduction, that we were to understand that clearly, that's the very senior staff of course.

MR CHASKALSON: And you took this threat seriously?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Absolutely. If you let the side down you're dead, right. So what do you do, you try and leave quietly and hope they don't kill you which is probably possible.

What happens then if someone else carries on and does much worse than you do? I rationalised, if I stayed there I could minimise a lot of their effort and I'm very proud of what I did. What I did ultimately got me fired, after being confronted by Wouter Basson about my liberal views, my alleged lifetime support to the DP. How he found out I don't know, it was quite right. It was pretty chilling to know you're, suddenly you're a target. That was the one aspect that got me kicked out.

The other aspect which is probably more important, was the incredible waste of money that occurred at this place and the scams that these guys were trying to work out all the time, the high living, the absolute abuse of taxpayers money. I had to continually, I was the most senior experienced civil servant there, I just felt it my duty to try to get these guys into line and to moderate the waste and also to counter what I considered were potential possible scams involving very large amounts of money.

MR CHASKALSON: Was the scams that you're talking about related only towards financial scams or would you say that there was also an academic or rather a scientific sham?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Purely financial scams. The scams were mainly engineered by the ex-military personnel and they of course were not involved in the academic side at all.

MR CHASKALSON: We have heard testimony about lavish lifestyles, were you aware of such lifestyles?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Absolutely, it was disgraceful, the waste of taxpayers money.

MR CHASKALSON: Could you give us some sort of example as to what you're talking about in terms of a waste of money and possibly if it's in your scope, as to what sort of amounts we're talking about?

DR VAN RENSBURG: There would be small things like the habits of the Directors taking each other out to the very best restaurants in Pretoria or Johannesburg and at one stage they started a habit of thinking it a good idea that us four Directors eat out regularly. I went to one and the next one I didn't turn up and I fell into severe disfavour.

From small things like that to redecorating a brand new Director's office, ripping out all the panelling and sticking on pink wallpaper, ripping out imbuia door jams and replacing it with oak because that's what the guy just prefers to have. Spending huge amounts on interior decorating, paintings by well-known artists. Totally threatening the cover of the whole company because no commercial company of our type would waste money on trivialities like that.

Other things like motor cars. The Managing Director would not set an example for the young people. It gave me a tremendous problem, to discipline the younger staff to look after their cars correctly when the Managing Director goes out of his way to wreck the motor cars, driving too fast.

There was a pool kombi, a Caravelle which he went down to the Wild Coast for some "bosberaad" with the Army people I believe, I'm not sure, then he boasts he drove all the way back and kept the rev counter in the red and the next day the engine has got to be replaced. R8 000 but why worry, the taxpayer pays. This sort of cavalier attitude. That was a waste of money on the one side.

On the other side was, maybe I was unduly suspicious but I just suspected scams for, particularly in connection with private companies. These military officers were obsessed with forming companies. I was very much against this because every time they would come up with schemes like purchasing all our requirements through their company. Who gets the cut-off, who knows?

Selling all our contracts. Marketing all our commercial work through one of these special officers companies. Of course they get a rake off. At one stage Basson, Wynand Swanepoel and a Chinaman by the name of Chu, he was a Swiss national because he'd married a Swiss girl, they had a meeting in Switzerland and they formed a company called Medchem Actein Geselschaft or something, Medchem Research Company. They came with multi million possible contracts that our company had to sign with this company. It was for predictably useless services, now who is getting that money, who is getting a cut, who owns what?

The grandest scam of all that I suspected and that worried me the most was the facts, and this might not be a scam, I must emphasise it was my interpretation, the moment there were whisperings about privatisation of the front companies, the first thing they did was they went around and kicked out all the civilian Managing Directors in a vicious inhuman manner particularly in the case of Doctor Daan Goosen who is doing very well.

They stuck ex-military officers, all from the special forces, all big buddies, took over all the front companies, in so doing handicapping the company immensely. The threat I saw was that these people had no intention whatever of developing a viable permanent company. They wanted to get in, grab the whole lot, liquidate it, grab their millions and push off. And that's exactly what they did. I predicted that years and years before it happened.

MR CHASKALSON: I'd like to stop you there and just tack a couple of questions on there. I presume by "military buddies", in this particular case you are talking about Doctor Swanepoel taking over as the Managing Director of the company.

DR VAN RENSBURG: Yes, and Doctor Mijburgh, can we, of Delta G, that it happened about the same time.

MR CHASKALSON: I'd like to just stay wit RRL as you were working there at the time.

DR VAN RENSBURG: Right.

MR CHASKALSON: From the time that Doctor Swanepoel took over the company, I'd like to ask three questions. First question, would you say that the quality of the science increased, got better or decreased from the time that he joined?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Doctor Swanepoel spent as much money as he could expanding the institute, the facilities. What happened was, there was an enormous growth in the service units and not much growth, not anywhere near proportional growth in the research units.

We had a huge administration, an enormous staff office, enormous security section, big finance section, hopelessly too big for any commercial viability in the long term and this is where we differed a lot.

Your question on the quality of the science, I don't think that there was any difference. We that were responsible for doing this science maintained our standards, with time we improved them. I visited many contract research companies overseas. We had potentially a lot of sub-contracting work coming our way when sanctions were eventually lifted. I negotiated all this. And we learnt, and I went to courses, quality assurance and so on, so our science did improve but it certainly didn't have anything to do with Doctor Wynand Swanepoel.

MR CHASKALSON: Maybe I should ask the question in a slightly different way. While Doctor Goosen was a Managing Director, was he involved in scientific discussions and did he contribute in the scientific process?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Very much so, he was intimately involved and knew exactly what was going on. He made good suggestions. He worked out a lot of the logistics of the laboratories on his own computers. He was very involved in the laboratory programmes and administration.

MR CHASKALSON: Did Doctor Swanepoel make a similar contribution?

DR VAN RENSBURG: No. Doctor Swanepoel I don't think had a very good perception of what was going on in the laboratories. Our Marketing Manager often wished that he could take Doctor Swanepoel on a tour of the Institute like he took our clients, so that he could get to know what was going on. He had expressed this wish to me twice.

MR CHASKALSON: It's a bit unfortunate that this all took place with the use of tax payers money. Second question, you talked about a desire to find one or more substances which would not be traceable and which could be used to murder humans. Would you say that this desire took place during the time of Doctor Goosen's management or during the time of Doctor Swanepoel's management and if during both, during which period was it greater?

DR VAN RENSBURG: The urgency was greater later on. I can't say that that had anything to do with the Managing Directors, it was that later on we were bigger and stronger and more experienced and getting better at it. When you say it's a desire, I must emphasise it was a requirement issued by what we used to euphemistically call the shareholders, that is the owners of the company which is the Surgeon-General's battalion. It was their requirement that they issued.

By and large there was certainly nobody, none of the research workers at the institute who wanted to do this work or who enjoyed doing it. There was a lot conscience problems and some of the workers even needed counselling.

MR CHASKALSON: I'd like to return to this point but I would like to do it in a broader forum. The financial abuse that you are talking about, that you have talked about, can you date that financial abuse? Again I'm using the times and if I'm being unfair to use these times, please feel free to use your own time periods, during the time that Daan Goosen was managing the facility or during the time that Doctor Swanepoel took over.

DR VAN RENSBURG: Infadel was very active checking on us when Doctor Daan Goosen was there. The figures and the budget, the auditors have it all, you'll see the budget was minute compared to latter years. It was probably the most efficient financial control I've ever experienced while Doctor Goosen was there.

Somehow after Doctor Goosen was replaced they seemed to close down Infadel, Infadel disappeared. I don't know what happened to it and we were never told, you don't ask. And the control in my of thinking was not as good after that. There was a lot of, as I've said before, expenditure on trivialities.

It went so far that Doctor Wynand Swanepoel walked into my office in August 1991 and asked me if I would approve a full time salary for him with all his motor car benefits and housing benefits and everything else in exchange for a few hours work a week because he said he was very busy with other companies and other things. So I pointed out to him that was tantamount to theft, it was against company regulations and I certainly would not approve a full time salary and benefits for him.

At that time on with decisions like this we were expected to reach consensus as a directorate, so he had to win me over. That was the incident that was the final straw as far as he was concerned, where he decided to get rid of me judging from his actions following that incident.

MR CHASKALSON: How did you come to leave the company?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Following - this incident occurred not long after Doctor Basson had confronted me about my liberal political beliefs. Shortly after this Doctor Swanepoel immediately - I can tell you the date, it was the 26th of August, that he asked me about his salary, he immediately made arrangements to train what I knew would be my successor but we had a discussion, I was called into his office, we had a discussion on quality control and I pointed out some shortcomings.

There had been a meeting or our Divisional Heads, the research heads. These people are the real engine of the company, every company has a real productive core and the technical heads of each technical department, they a meeting and they had compiled a document that was extremely derogatory about the level of management.

Now to get good laboratory practice certification as well as certification from the OECD you have to meet certain managerial standards. And we were talking in general about this and I was making some suggestions and I still do not know why but he flew into a tantrum, screamed at least 20 minutes and when I tried to leave he screamed louder and told me to sit down. He then told me to take my jacket, go home, I was on suspension.

I sat at home for a week and then I got a letter for a disciplinary hearing. For six hours I was subjected to a disciplinary hearing that only proved that I was an essential part of the company and that they shouldn't get rid of me. He didn't like that, he wanted to fire me anyway. So I suggested we talk about early retirement. He wouldn't talk about it but he got rid of me anyway. I managed to swing it to early retirement though.

That was November 1991. We had just privatised. Doctor Swanepoel then created some fraudulent documents, him and his co-Directors, they all signed these fraudulent documents. They lied to the auditors, they stole my four million cut that I would have got, three million or whatever which I certainly don't want, its dirty money but I don't feel that fraudsters should be encouraged.

They kept me for a further eight months in the proverbial broom cupboard after being demoted, why I still don't know but I had to finish certain vital scientific tasks. The only real unique contribution I ever made to that company was to upgrade the level of science to an international level.

We had big clients, household names that you all know that I can't mention because of the Confidentiality Clause. These people needed research reports at a certain level. I was the only one who could get them to that level and that was the only really unique contribution I made to that company. Once they got rid of me I knew they wouldn't last anyway. They didn't last for long.

MR CHASKALSON: I just want come back a little bit. You had said at some point that you were in charge of the Animal Essex Committee.

DR VAN RENSBURG: That's right.

MR CHASKALSON: Can you explain what the involved?

DR VAN RENSBURG: It's a part of international laboratory animal science and good laboratory practice, that no researcher may decide to do a study and taken animals and carry on and do it without strict review by his piers, that is his fellow scientists or people who are specifically experienced in the field of Laboratory Animal Science.

So we had a Committee that would look firstly at the purpose of the study. If the purpose justified it we'd consider it further. It had to meet a lot of criteria like not be repetitive and so on. Then we would consider the methodology used and mostly we would try and reduce it to what we call a sub-clinical level, in other words the animal never really gets sick or dies. You evaluate your result under the microscope or in the test tube. That would be to reduce suffering in the animals.

And then of course very importantly we reduced the number of animals used to the minimum. This is always - in other words any researchers project is vetted by experts to see that he is not abusing animals.

MR CHASKALSON: Did you have occasion to attend any of the experimentation to make certain that the correct procedures were followed?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Yes, indeed, we did monitor every project that was done. It was a part of quality assurance but not the very toxic work. This was done in the basement. It was originally built as a quarantine section. It was a high security section and the toxicologists and Doctor Immelmann had access.

I tried very hard to get access, eventually they agreed to give me access because I said I can't go on in this job if I can't monitor the studies. It was such a hassle every time to get access that I was only there two or three times but with their knowledge beforehand and which is not really a valid procedure. These were for the, studies of lethal toxins were done in this laboratory.

MR CHASKALSON: Would this laboratory have utilised the restraint chair and the gas chamber that we heard about yesterday?

DR VAN RENSBURG: The restraint chair was normally in that laboratory, once of twice it was used elsewhere. It's a fairly common procedure overseas, it's not one I've personally ever used or like using but for certain physiological experiments one needs to use it.

The so-called gas chamber is really just a device where the animals in there, it's a normal cage and then you have an enclosure, it's very important for industrial applications. We used to do it the - the Medical Research Council used similar devices, for instance the lining of air-conditioning ducts, if a fire gets in there, are the fumes toxic or not.

the animal to fumes and dusts and so forth.

MR CHASKALSON: Except in this case Doctor we seem to be talking about murder weapons.

DR VAN RENSBURG: That's right you can use the same device to check on say aerosols which have botulinum toxin or organic phosphate toxins whatever, you can use exactly the same techniques for those studies.

MR CHASKALSON: Were a large number of animals killed during this period?

DR VAN RENSBURG: A - moderate numbers were killed. I would not say large. We had a fairly strict code on handling these deaths. Colonel Gaddafi's laboratory was discovered by the Americans because on their satellites they could see the wheelbarrows of dead dogs going to the incinerator. So when ours went to the incinerator they were always in black plastic bags. But animals were killed, many died, many were put out, but they were not large numbers, no.

MR CHASKALSON: Doctor this all sounds, in many ways, quite a harrowing work environment, was there any form of counselling that was offered within the organisation?

DR VAN RENSBURG: There were people who were troubled. The administrative director Mr Sparmer arranged with a dominie who I think probably had security clearance to do counselling and some individuals did make use of that.

CHAIRPERSON: Is that the sum total of counselling, dominie?

DR VAN RENSBURG: As far as I know that's as far as it went. I don't think anybody ever needed to see a psychologist or psychiatrist.

CHAIRPERSON: I see. Mr Chaskalson.

MR CHASKALSON: Can we discuss the Surgeon-General's role in this. Did you at - you talked about earlier on that in a sense you felt trapped, in a sense you had a moral dilemma, did you in any way try and bring some of your concerns, the abuse of funds, possibly some of the practices that were going on to the attention of other people?

DR VAN RENSBURG: In the course of time we went to see the auditors. I saw the Surgeon-General, I went to the Auditor-General. Much later I had written to the Minister of Justice. I've written to General George Meiring. He wasn't interested. I've been to OSEO. I've been to the Attorney General. I don't now what else to do.

The initial manoeuvre was to go and see our own auditors.

MR CHASKALSON: When would that have been?

DR VAN RENSBURG: That was early in 1991.

MR CHASKALSON: And what happened?

DR VAN RENSBURG: I went together with my two co-directors, Immelman and Sparmer. Following a meeting with Swanepoel, Swanepoel announced to the directors that he had bought the company with his own money and his own guarantees he had furnished, and he had done this through the profitability of the many companies he'd owned and so on and so on. So after the meeting we looked at each other in great disbelief. We agreed this wasn't possible. We told him so. He invited us to see the auditors, which we did. I went to Piet Theron's office in Johannesburg at Coopers and Lybrandt. We told him the story. He said that Wynand Swanepoel had lied to us. He had not put down one cent and he would not put down one cent, but he had acquired the company, yes. The so-called nominal amounts that they had to pay it was written off always against the staff loan account, they never really paid that. So we said well how come, you can't give away taxpayers money. No he says it's been approved at a very, very high level.

MR CHASKALSON: Did he indicate what level that was?

DR VAN RENSBURG: He didn't particularly say. Later on the Auditor-General told me it was the Ministerial level. It was Minister Magnus Malan, and it was confirmed by a rather ill du Plessis at that time, Minister of Finance.

At the same meeting with this auditor I reported a cheque of, it was either 15 or R25 000, I can't remember, a personal cheque made out to Dr Wynand Swanepoel from the company Protechnic. Now our Security Officer, a Colonel Jackson ...(intervention)

MR CHASKALSON: Sorry, was that abnormal?

DR VAN RENSBURG: I personally didn't see the cheque - yes it would be abnormal. Colonel Jackson said, Protechnic is a hundred percent front company, so is this, he is worried why Swanepoel should have such a cheque in his possession. So I said well as director we have the statutes, it's our job to watch each other so I reported this to the auditor. He said it's impossible, he knows Protechnic, he should not have such a cheque, but anyway he would look into it. That's the last I heard of it. It wasn't long after that the Security man was fired.

Nevertheless the auditor Piet Theron said to me that he is exceedingly nervous about us rocking the boat. That's all it had amounted to. He was exceedingly nervous that there'd be exposure and his company would suffer severely if an ANC government knew that they were auditing these companies and he instructed me to ignore my statutory duties, in fact to contravene the Companies Act, and not to question anything that Wynand Swanepoel or anyone else, and to blindly follow in support everything they did in the financial field. That was the meeting with the auditor.

Later some of these things were pointed out at a meeting with the Auditor-General in General Knobel's office. The way this meeting was set up was rather strange. I had to write great letters of apology to Dr Wynand Swanepoel that he'd never abused any money and his behaviour was unquestionable and so on and so on and so on, and he said or he would report me to the Surgeon-General. So I said well I think just maybe you report me to the Surgeon General.

MR CHASKALSON: Sorry you are saying you were requested to sign a letter or write a letter which said that Dr Swanepoel had not stolen money?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Right.

MR CHASKALSON: Had you - okay carry on.

DR VAN RENSBURG: Or abused funds or done anything wrong. So I said no I would see the Surgeon-General and the - they sent along - we talked about it too, I said I don't accept what our own auditor does, what does the Auditor-General think? So they sent along the Auditor-General as well. A man van Heerden, who was the 2 I/C of Ronsley at the time. We told him what happened and he confirmed there was Ministerial approval. This is all the way these companies were given away, has all been set out in a document written by General Knobel that I have here.

The Auditor-General's office said they would take the matter further if I could get proof of abuses and make affidavits and so on. They themselves were not prepared to investigate any of the alleged irregularities, which of course was an unreasonable request.

MR CHASKALSON: Now as I understand the line function of this project from your company Dr Basson was the project officer and presumably you could not take your concerns there, did you ever raise any of your concerns with Dr Basson?

DR VAN RENSBURG: I spoke to him once. I said "what do you think is going to happen", you know, I said "the newspapers are already on to you, there's going to be a problem". He was flippant and flamboyant about it and the newspapers had made a slight confusion and called him Willy Basson instead of Wouter Basson and he said no he'll keep them confused and he wasn't concerned about the newspapers. That's the only conversation we had.

MR CHASKALSON: What about the Surgeon-General who presumably would have had ultimate responsibility for the programme, did you discuss any of your concerns with him?

DR VAN RENSBURG: At the time, the first time I met General Knobel was when I was on the way out anyway. The actual work done at the place I did not discuss with him, it was mainly the financial abuses and our staff problems that we discussed at that meeting. He was not a person that had credibility in my own personal assessment. I had the meeting with him on condition there was nobody there connected with the CCB. So when we sat down he looked at me in the face and said "there's nobody here who has connections with the CCB". Sitting opposite was Dr Wouter Basson and also Dr Swanepoel.

MR CHASKALSON: Can you say why you believe that those two individuals have any connections with the CCB?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Well Wouter Basson already was in the newspapers, he was co-ordinator of the CCB and we all know that he really fed General Verster's unit with a lot of materials.

Wynand Swanepoel to ...(intervention)

MR CHASKALSON: Doctor maybe if we can just carry on with this point I just want to clarify something here. There is another Wouter Basson who is a member of the CCB. It may be possible that your press reports that you are referring to are referring to that one, can you comment on that? Was there any interaction with people that you believed to be CCB agents at RRL or in your presence?

DR VAN RENSBURG: No. There were no CCB agents at RRL. Dr Andre Immelman used to meet with their agents, regularly, and provide them with materials.

MR CHASKALSON: And how do you know that?

DR VAN RENSBURG: He told me so.

MR CHASKALSON: And did he say that ...(intervention)

DR VAN RENSBURG: He told me about one incident. I actually tricked him a little bit, when I read about the poisoning about Frank Chikane in the newspapers I said to him, I said "Andre what the hell are you doing to Frank Chikane?". So he told me, "hell it's a real mess". And he told me exactly what had happened, the mistakes they'd made, and he told me that General Verster was furious that the attempt to kill Frank Chikane had failed, and that he wouldn't - he'd ensure that it wouldn't fail next time.

Dr Immelman was meant to train the operatives on how to use the substances. This practice was started after failures like the attempt on Frank Chikane's life. They made a lot of mistakes there. They did simple silly things like instead of spreading the toxin which should be absorbed through the skin over a fairly large area to promote absorption the operative put it on a tiny little spot, then he laced five pairs of underpants instead of only one so Frank Chikane got sick repeatedly, it immediately showed it was poisoning. The intelligence said he was going to Namibia and he went to America. They were counting on very little forensic capability in Namibia. These are the things he told me, so I know that he has contact with them.

But to get back to your other question, yes, if they talked about a Wouter Basson and there's another one in the CCB that could be him.

MR CHASKALSON: I would like to return to the Surgeon-General. You said that you only had contact with him and by this I am referring to Lt Gen Knobel when you were on your way out and you did not believe he was credible, what did you mean by that statement?

DR VAN RENSBURG: He's a real gentleman. He receives you very well, but he never implements, this is my personal opinion, he doesn't implement necessary management procedures to solve the problem at hand. He did nothing to solve my problem. He did nothing to solve Goosen's problem. Koekemoer is in trouble with the police, he's got huge costs now because of his involvement, he's not prepared to help him. This happens repeatedly.

Then he disclaims full responsibility for what private companies are doing. The people in the front companies consider themselves full-time military personnel. You are paid by them, you get your instructions from them, you are responsible to them, you report to them, they are your employer. He would turn around if there's any problem and tend to say "oh that company we did a bit of business with them once, I've got nothing to do with the staff and I am not prepared to solve the problem further".

Jan Lourens' problem he could have solved with a very simple bit of clever thinking. There were several solutions to that problem he could have implemented which would have deprived us of the session yesterday.

MR CHASKALSON: Let me just butt in here. This is a person that we heard yesterday had ultimate responsibility for this programme. Is that your understanding?

DR VAN RENSBURG: No I didn't think that - he was the chief administrator and supervisor of the programme. Ultimate responsibility, no, there's no doubt about it that's at a higher level.

MR CHASKALSON: Okay.

DR VAN RENSBURG: There's no doubt that, in my mind the Prime Minister P W Botha, rather President, knew about the project, and that the generals all the way down from the officer commanding were aware of it.

MR CHASKALSON: Can you tell me what General Knobel's response after the meeting about financial irregularities was?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Nothing, there was no response.

MR CHASKALSON: Was he aware of the work which was being conducted at RRL, to your mind?

DR VAN RENSBURG: He must have administered - RRL costs ultimately the taxpayer somewhere between 70 and R100 million altogether. He administered those funds. There is no way you can allocate and approve such money for expenditure if you don't know what's going on. It would be grossly neglectful of your duty.

Lists of products that were supplied as far as I know were given to him to justify the existence of Roodeplaat. There are lists of these products here, they are mostly lethal weapons, lethal toxins as we know, lethal micro-organisms. He's a doctor, he knew exactly, there is no doubt about that.

MR CHASKALSON: Was he aware of the experimentation that was done at RRL?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Absolutely. He would approve the appointment of all senior scientists himself and he'd have to have the motivation of why they were there and what they were for.

MR CHASKALSON: Do you have any idea if he would have known, this is Gen Knobel, about the fact that essentially murder weapons were being produced on the facility?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Sorry, are you asking me if he knew about it? Yes absolutely, that's what the facility was all about. It was the main function.

MR CHASKALSON: Sorry Mr Chair if I could just have one moment again please.

CHAIRPERSON: Do you have an idea Mr Chaskalson how long you are going to be with this witness?

MR CHASKALSON: I think that I am actually finished and I just wanted to confer and see if there were any other questions that any of my colleagues over here would like me to address.

Sorry Doctor, are you aware of any of the substances that we have discussed being used on specific targets aside from Reverend Chikane which you outlined earlier?

DR VAN RENSBURG: There was another incident of a black dissident, and I don't know whether he was in the defence force or in the police, whose shirt was laced, probably with paraoxon or one of the nerve poisons. This was their standard way to get rid of these fellows. He lent his shirt to his friend and his friend died. This was talked about quite a lot. That is the one case.

There is another case where I overheard talk about anthrax spores were put into the food of three Russian advisors in Lusaka, advisors to the ANC that is, and one of them died.

There was another case that I overheard, or rather that in a conversation with Andre Immelman shortly after Nelson Mandela's release, he was very confident that Nelson Mandela's brain function would be impaired, progressively, for some time. This seems to link up with this newspaper report, I think I have it here, rather a remarkable one by reporter Chris Steyn on - titled "Basson's human guinea pigs horror". This was published February 7 1997. In this he talks, this reporter apparently had access to Doctors that worked with Basson and they list a lot of remarkable things he was meant to do, but here it's also mentioned there were also plans to contaminate medication used by President Nelson Mandela at Pollsmoor with an untraceable heavy metal poison thallium. That's of course not true, you can trace it. Claimed the source, as only one capsule of thallium in a pot of food, for instance, is needed to kill between twenty to thirty people.

Dr Basson mentioned, after he had told us a lot about the effects of thallium, if you give just the right dose, you mustn't give too much, but just the right amount, then you can cause what appears to be an outbreak meningitis or encephalitis. You get similar symptoms. And in so doing he mentioned in passing that he had given some thallium, or he said "we" had given some thallium to Steve Biko.

Now it might be disinformation, and idle boast, I don't think so, there was no reason to, it was only a few of us technical people involved. To me at the time it would account, if it were true, possibly for Steve Biko's very irrational unexpected behaviour under questioning. He was a highly intelligent man. He was a fourth year medical student. I know people who know him and it's not the sort of way he would have behaved so that to give normal policemen excuses to bash his head against the wall or whatever they did. So I assumed at the time, I believed what he said, I wasn't the only one there. I almost think Dr Immelman, Dr Swanepoel and possibly Dr Goosen was there as well, I am not sure, when he mentioned this.

For the moment it's only those few incidents that I actually know of.

MR CHASKALSON: Was any work done on the Aids virus at RRL?

DR VAN RENSBURG: We had one small contract with the army where they brought us a lot of serum samples. This was in the early days of Aids, and these were tested. We bought the testing kits and tested a lot. I think they had some story about screening chaps on the border. But we did routine tests for Aids on some serum samples, a few hundred, and that's all the work we ever did.

MR CHASKALSON: Do you have any knowledge of whether the Aids virus was used in any manner other than legitimate research?

DR VAN RENSBURG: No I have none at all. It did worry me at the time. Our samples were serum samples and you really need to infect another human being, my understanding is you need to transfer whole white cells, so if your serum is well prepared there shouldn't be many white cells in it. It should not be infective. If they kept back reference samples of whole blood I don't know.

MR CHASKALSON: Did you ever hear of talk of the introduction of substances such as cholera, anthrax or other such substances into communities?

DR VAN RENSBURG: One small remark by Dr Basson was that - at the time there was a lot of political problems in the Eastern Cape and he remarked that possibly they should sort out that crowd with cholera or something.

MR CHASKALSON: My final question Dr van Rensburg. When you started off earlier on today you mentioned that in order to do chemical and biological research you needed to know what could be done so you could protect against it. In your opinion is the nature of the work that was done at the facility work of a protective nature or work of rather looking for weapons as opposing to protection from them?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Less than five percent of the work done was of a protective nature if one analyses these projects. That protective nature was more really, as far as I could see, to handle situations such as an exposure of Dr Jan Lourens. If you accidentally get some of this, these very toxic substances on your finger you want a neutralising agent. No, I'd say 95% was offensive, covert work.

MR CHASKALSON: Sorry, in true tradition I have one more final question for you. Did you ever have any contact with a Professor Hofmeyr?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Professor Hofmeyr was an advisor to the Surgeon-General. I did have some contact with him, casually, in relation to setting up the Roodeplaat breeding enterprises, in the dog project. The Roodeplaat breeding enterprises was established on the same farm where the parent company was. It was a subsidiary. It was a good concept insofar as it would consolidate a lot of fragmented efforts to breed security dogs - all paid for by the taxpayer. Eskom had huge units, the military had several units, the police had several units and none of them had a gene pool big enough to really produce top class security dogs. So yes, Professor Hofmeyr was involved from the military side as far as the dogs were to a small extent, not a large extent.

MR CHASKALSON: Thank you I have no further questions.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you Mr Chaskalson. Mr Arendse do you have any questions?

MR ARENDSE: I have got no questions.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you. There was Dion Visagie there.

MS POTGIETER: Marlene Potgieter for Brian Currin, standing in for Brian Currin. I have no questions.

CHAIRPERSON: I know we are talking science here but the metamorphosis from Dion Visagie to Marlene was remarkable, thank you.

Mr van Zyl.

MR VAN ZYL: Thank you Mr Chairman. My position is the same as for the previous witness, just a bit different. I can anticipate that we will cross-examine in this case. I will make my best attempt that in view of the fact that the witness is here that if there should be cross-examination that it would be done tomorrow. So I will ask you to let me stand down until tomorrow and I will let you know what my position is.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Polsen.

MR POLSEN: After cross-examination - I am sorry, sorry Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: No just on the question of tomorrow of the availability of Dr van Rensburg.

MR POLSEN: I have no problem with that, that's fine.

DR VAN RENSBURG: Yes I am due to be back in the Free State tonight. Do you specifically want me to stay over?

MR POLSEN: Well I think the only thing in the interests of the witness that I should point out is that it was well known that this witness would give evidence today and I am sure Mr van Zyl's client was aware of that so he could have attended to judge whether it would be necessary to cross-examine this witness. The problem however is it is four o'clock already and the cross-examination will, in any event, have stood over, I presume or carried on until six o'clock or seven o'clock tonight. For those reasons I have no problems if the matter stands down until tomorrow. It's very inconvenient to the witness but it is, I suppose, it cannot be helped.

Thank you Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: Do you have a sense of how long you would be taking on cross-examination Mr van Zyl?

MR VAN ZYL: There are - quite a few allegations have been made. The question is just, or my instructions are, how many of these allegations must be argued. As far as I am concerned Dr Basson with a pending criminal case we will see about, as opposed to the case with Dr Neethling, Swanepoel and Mijburgh.

Mr Chairman I think that it should not take more than one or two hours if there were to be any cross-examination.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Chaskalson how are you standing, if we are going to be standing the witnesses over till tomorrow, that is assuming we are able to accommodate Mr van Zyl?

MR CHASKALSON: I think we would prefer that cross-examination took place now if your ruling is that it should be held over until the morning. We can endeavour to make the appropriate arrangements for Dr van Rensburg and we do have another witness on standby who we could proceed with now. It will however mean that tomorrow's schedule is going to be somewhat congested.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr du Plessis would your position have been the same? I am inclined to want to ask for us to adjourn for just a couple of minutes so that the panel can also put their heads together on this issue.

MR DU PLESSIS: My position as regards my client is the same as that of Mr van Zyl.

CHAIRPERSON: Can we adjourn for ten minutes whilst we consider what we should do. We resume at quarter past four.

HEARING ADJOURNS

ON RESUMPTION

SCHALK VAN RENSBURG: (s.u.o.)

CHAIRPERSON: Where is Mr Polsen? Mr Polsen is your client able to be persuaded to remain for cross-examination tomorrow.

MR POLSEN: I think, sorry Mr Chairman, I think he will have to remain. It seems inevitable.

CHAIRPERSON: Well Dr van Rensburg you are ably represented by Mr Polsen. May I just indicate the attitude of the panel. The attitude of the panel, and this will be to you Mr van Zyl and Mr du Plessis, is that whilst we want to be extremely accommodating to all the parties, to the extent that we believe that your clients are in Cape Town, or some of them are, you should endeavour to, if they can't be here then to get instructions from them in a fairly full fashion because we would like to be able to begin and complete a witness as and when they testify. In fact it is only because Mr Vally indicates that he needs to take the next witness, who I believe will be Dr Odendal, that we as a panel, at his instance have decided we shouldn't insist on a cross-examination of Dr van Rensburg. We therefore request you to endeavour, from tomorrow onwards, to take instructions so that you are in a position to cross-examine.

MR VAN ZYL: Thank you Mr Chairman. I would just like to place on record at this stage, and I referred to this yesterday as well, is that the unfortunate position in which we find ourselves, and I understand the circumstances as Mr Vally explained it to me yesterday, that no statements were obtained from these witnesses prior to this, so he cannot decide whether there will be any incriminating evidence or not. And on that basis I made the request yesterday that if it seems as if there are to be questions that we will be given the opportunity by instructions given to my colleague and I, I am not referring to Mr Cilliers, to stand by our clients in Section 29 to give evidence. Unfortunately there have been no allegations according to which we can do cross-examination, therefore we have not consulted over those specific aspects and we could not because we did not have the information at our disposal. That is the basis on which we ask for opportunity to consult and to say that they should have been entitled to be given notice in terms of the provisions of the Act and that a prayer ruling, as I've indicated however, three of my clients excluding Colonel Neethling are at present all three in Cape Town. I will consult with them this evening and as I have indicated I will attempt to do the cross-examination of Dr van Rensburg tomorrow.

CHAIRPERSON: Will you align yourself with those remarks Mr du Plessis?

MR DU PLESSIS: Yes Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: Do you want to place anything on record or would you let it by, Mr Vally?

MR VALLY: Just to say that Dr Basson has been subpoenaed for this whole week. We have by agreement with the legal representatives of Dr Basson agreed that he doesn't have to personally attend except for the days when he will be required to give evidence. The point I am making is he could have been here and heard the allegations himself. There is no reason why he couldn't have been here.

Finally again, there may be a few additional allegations relating to Dr Basson being given by witnesses but, in terms of the documents that we are using, and for example the shopping list or the "verkope lys" which we asked this last witness about, is in the bundle of documents that Dr Basson has. I am only concerned about one issue, that we are being left hanging. It's not clear with regard to this witness, they said there will be some issues they want to cross-examine him on. With regard to other witness there is no clarity. We are told, I will consult and thereafter I will decide, and if Dr Basson is in town the consultation can take place simultaneously as the hearing. Thank you Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: I hear all of you and I don't want us to be entering into a debate that goes backwards and forwards. I think the panel is sufficiently au fait of the position. I just wanted to say maybe ex abundanti cautela you should have your clients in readiness either here or wherever they are, so that if we need to give you an hours time to consult, whatever the time is, then they should be able - I would rather we lose an hour than lose a whole day.

Do you have a next witness Mr Vally?

DR ORR: When are we going to ask questions of Dr van Rensburg?

CHAIRPERSON: Oh by the way there are questions that the panel would like to put to Dr van Rensburg. Dr Wendy Orr.

DR ORR: Dr van Rensburg can I refer you to document TRC48 which I believe is also a list of projects which were conducted at RRL with costing associated with them, is that correct?

DR VAN RENSBURG: TRC48 are simply time sheets. They illustrate the structure of the company. Each little research group like the first one is Department of Physiology, is Dr Riana Borman as the head, Maree Wimers, Marie van Vuuren and Paula van Zyl, technologists and so on. And it's really just a breakdown of time. It was a controversial system, but these researchers had to try and allocate all their time to specific projects.

DR ORR: Can I ask you then what the "begroting" column, round about the middle of that table refers to?

DR VAN RENSBURG: I have looked at this and I can't quite understand what goes on here except that "begroting" is a budget. It's rands and cents, this is only really rands given here I think.

DR ORR: Well that's not crucial to my question. My question is that on three of the pages and in four different incidents, and it's page 1360, page 1361 and 1362 there is reference to "sampioen" which are mushrooms, and there seems to have been a fairly large amount of money allocated to research into mushrooms, over a million rand, and I wondered if you had any idea what this research constituted?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Could you give me that page again, I don't seem to....

DR ORR: 1361, 61 and 62.

DR VAN RENSBURG: I think your document is numbered differently to mine.

CHAIRPERSON: It's still TRC48.

DR ORR: It's the last three pages of the document.

DR VAN RENSBURG: Ah yes.

CHAIRPERSON: They are numbered at the top, 001355, 001361 ...(intervention)

DR VAN RENSBURG: No this will be rand, cents, so it will be R5 600. "Sampioen" whether that is a code name, or whether they actually worked on mushrooms I don't know.

CHAIRPERSON: No, no, that's R560 000. That seems to me to be R560 000 because how do you explain that 18, is it R18 000 or R180? It seems to me that looks like R560 000.

DR VAN RENSBURG: No this is - no such money was spent on a project like that. It must be R5 600.

DR ORR: I don't want to get into an argument about the money, do you have any idea what this research was about?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Sampioen?

DR ORR: Yes.

DR VAN RENSBURG: No. I don't know that one at all. This is biotechnology. It sounds like a code name to me.

DR ORR: Thank you. I have no further questions.

CHAIRPERSON: Any other questions from the panel? Advocate Potgieter.

ADV POTGIETER: Thank you Chairperson. Dr van Rensburg just on that last point that you made, this has to be rands because I see there's one that's 700 on 1361, which means it's R7,00 -just by the way. I don't really think ...(intervention)

DR VAN RENSBURG: Well what is the time.

ADV POTGIETER: ....debate about that.

DR VAN RENSBURG: Ja but there's one hour, it looks like R700, yes.

ADV POTGIETER: Ja, so we are talking about rands there, not about cents, it seems.

DR VAN RENSBURG: The average running funds towards the end of the Institute it's just annual budget without capital purchases, nothing, it was round about R10 million a year.

ADV POTGIETER: No no I was just, I was just adding to the point that Dr Orr was making, but what I really want to come to is the question of fertility, the fertility project.

DR VAN RENSBERG: Yes.

ADV POTGIETER: And I think you had said to us that that is the only project, or the only real project that you were involved in.

DR VAN RENSBERG: That's right.

ADV POTGIETER: ..in this...(intervention)

DR VAN RENSBERG: In a purely advisory capacity.

ADV POTGIETER: ...lab.

DR VAN RENSBERG: It was not done for directors to stand at the bench.

ADV POTGIETER: That instruction emanated from Dr Basson, you said.

DR VAN RENSBERG: Yes. Originally...

ADV POTGIETER: Yes.

DR VAN RENSBERG: ...and with considerable encouragement from Dr Swanepoel.

ADV POTGIETER: And if I understood you correctly you had said that all of the CBW instructions emanated, amongst others, from Basson?

DR VAN RENSBERG: I can't say they all came from there, I really only overheard a few instructions in groups, I was never personally given an instruction apart from the fertility project. They would come, undoubtedly some would come via Dr Swanepoel, the managing director, who had regular connections also with the CCB people. Some might have come shall we say a request than instructions for products might have come direct from agents from via the CCB to Dr Immelman.

ADV POTGIETER: Yes.

DR VAN RENSBERG: I can't say that Dr Basson was involved in all of them, most certainly not.

ADV POTGIETER: Yes, no no I do understand you. But this particular project, this fertility project, was that a H, was it a CBW...(intervention)

DR VAN RENSBERG: At that time they were being classified, we went on to a different system, it was "R".

ADV POTGIETER: Alright.

DR VAN RENSBERG: No it was not considered really an H project although it was a confidential one. As I say from an academic and commercial point of view it was a good project.

ADV POTGIETER: Yes it had commercial potential but it was really, in terms of the instruction, it was part of the ...(intervention)

DR VAN RENSBERG: In terms of the instructions it would be an H project.

ADV POTGIETER: H project, right?

DR VAN RENSBERG: Well it came from that sector, yes. In fact they wanted the product even though it had not been tested for safety or efficiency would indicate that.

ADV POTGIETER: So one has to assume that it was intended for use within the CBW programme?

DR VAN RENSBERG: Yes. To some extent anyway.

ADV POTGIETER: Yes now you had said, in fact you had made an unelicited explanation and you said this had nothing to do with black fertility or something to that effect, now, now what was that really, what was that story?

DR VAN RENSBERG: Nothing to do with what fertility?

ADV POTGIETER: Black. Ethnic black.

DR VAN RENSBERG: Black - yes there had been a lot of newspaper reports which are really science fiction that we were making compounds that would cause infertility just in blacks. My point is that physiologically, biochemically, endocrinologically blacks are identical to whites or to Chinese or to anybody else. There are no differences in the biochemistry or the immune system that you can use to make a product which will work on one ethnic group and not the other one. So that was never even considered.

ADV POTGIETER: Yes. So the product itself, it can never be ethnic specific but you can apply it - to target a particular group of people.

DR VAN RENSBERG: You can apply it to whoever group you target, right.

ADV POTGIETER: Now were you suspecting that that was one of the underlying intentions?

DR VAN RENSBERG: Absolutely. One would expect anything from previous experience and what these people do.

ADV POTGIETER: And the idea was to, was it a vaccine that would diminish ...(intervention)

DR VAN RENSBERG: That would be a vaccine. There are various

approaches, you can either make the male sterile, which is actually easier, you get sperm specific antigens and in fact these things happen spontaneously in certain individuals and they go very sterile, now that is if sperm leaked into the tissue and there was an immunological reaction for instance because there are certain proteins and immunogens which are specific, you only get them in sperm.

Dr Borman was more keen on this approach, I was a little bit more keen, although we worked on both approaches, to get a female vaccine and you target a protein compound, or a hormone-like compound, it's only produced by the embryo and usually in the placenta. There's unique proteins there and if you have antibodies against that the little developing embryo cannot implant and it's expelled when it's still too small to see.

ADV POTGIETER: Yes I, I'm cautious, I don't want to have the proliferation debate to be...(intervention)

DR VAN RENSBERG: There are many commercial groups which were way ahead of us already,...(intervention)

ADV POTGIETER: What I wanted to hear was, was it supposed to be a covert kind of thing, not a vaccine that you sort of apply to people quite openly?

DR VAN RENSBERG: It was generally considered very much covert and it would be for instance too politically sensitive at that time for the government to go to the Medical Research Council and say here's R5 million a year, we want you to do this project, at that time it would have been far too politically sensitive for the Medical Research Council to be involved in something like that.

ADV POTGIETER: But was the idea that it must be something that you can apply clandestinely or covertly or was the intention that it must be something that you can apply to people quite openly?

DR VAN RENSBERG: The intentions stated by the people who requested it were, as I have said, to use it again on Savimbi's lady soldiers and in the refugee camps. That is what they said. What they intended is speculation, but we had our fears.

ADV POTGIETER: And the idea was to decrease or to stop fertility completely.

DR VAN RENSBERG: To decrease the birth rate. Preferably you got a 90% plus effectiveness, so the type of vaccine that it would have been would be sort-of one to five years effectiveness, it will wear off. In fact you can give antibodies, you can neutralise those of them that are there, it could be reversible. You're not doing permanent damage to these people, but you can delay birth for a few years at the best, that's the best it would have worked.

ADV POTGIETER: Can I just find out, I just want to understand, I just want to know if I heard you properly. Was the idea that it was something that could have been applied to people covertly without them knowing ...(intervention)

DR VAN RENSBERG: That's right, you can tell them you're giving them a vaccine for yellow fever or whatever and it's the same procedure. A little injection and that's it.

ADV POTGIETER: Thank you.

CHAIRPERSON: Dr Randera.

DR RANDERA: Doctor just to follow up on that, can you, was this purely experimental, the work that you did on fertility and infertility, or did you go beyond and test it on human beings as well?

DR VAN RENSBERG: No it was never tested on human beings, most certainly not. It was experimental in the sense it was developmental. There were many theoretical lines, we had very crack teams, they produced products which theoretically should work, it doesn't mean to say they will work. The initial studies progressed so far as to try the product in a few baboons, they were injected with this product. As we expected there was no effect, it seemed to be safe. But you will never ever develop a thing like this and just go and give it in the population. What happens if you damage a young foetus and it's not expelled completely?

The Canadian group had actually started with safety studies in Australia, this I learned in Vancouver in Canada at the congress I went on this thing, and they were doing the initial safety studies on women who were sterile, who could not have babies, for instance.

From there on you would first see, is it effective, does it create antibodies, that sort of thing ...(intervention)

DR RANDERA: Sorry Doctor I just want to stop you there because I understand the process that could have taken place, but that's in your own mind, in international norms, I mean we've heard so many stories already over the last two days, where substances were put into beer bottles, were put into chocolates, into tablets, what I want to know is, is there a possibility that with the product that you and Dr Borman were working on, could there have been a possibility that could have been used without your knowledge?

DR VAN RENSBERG: It's a possibility I have considered. The three vital people involved in it was myself, Dr Borman and a biochemist. The biochemist is the one person who actually makes the product, she was a brilliant biochemist, she was very good at it, she was the one person in that company who wouldn't touch anything that smelt of a hard project. On a matter of principle she would not be involved in any hard project. She said we can fire her if we want to, she will not touch it. So that was my comfort, apart from the fact that I knew Dr Borman very well, I considered her highly ethical, and not aware of a single instance where she did anything unethical. She had a passionate interest in fertility and fertility research, she was very good at it, she was a good clinician and still is in fertility clinics, specialising more on the male than the female and I had no reason to believe she would ever have agreed to release the product.

DR RANDERA: Dr van Rensburg, I know that you left the company in 1991 I understand, is that right?

DR VAN RENSBERG: Yes I was demoted November '91 but they kept me there against my will to finish certain vital work that they couldn't do until the end of July '92.

DR RANDERA: Earlier on you told us that almost 66% if I can recall, if I remember rightly, of the work that was being done was of a toxic nature.

DR VAN RENSBERG: That's right 66%.

DR RANDERA: Can you tell me ...(intervention)

DR VAN RENSBERG: ...as listed here.

DR RANDERA: Can you tell me what, once the company closed down, what actually happened to all these products and experiments that were taking place?

DR VAN RENSBERG: There was furious humming of the shredding machines and stoking of the incinerators and as I said some of the stuff was dumped in the bathroom, cantharadines, this is one of the destructive products they used, they would go to a meeting of the End Conscription Campaign, youngsters and dish out tissues with slogans on them, but in the meantime they had been laced with this stuff. They are highly irritant but they are also very nephrotoxic, toxic to the kidneys. I was exposed to this stuff and when it happened I confronted Andre Immelman and he said no he was getting rid of a lot of stuff down the drain and the fumes were absorbed by the toilet paper. It's a very, very irritant substance, I can vouch for that.

About the middle of 1991, Dr FW de Klerk had to give his permission for the institute to continue. The military people were adamant that there's no-ways that we could continue without the permission of the State President, so we were all on tenterhooks, everyone was worried about their jobs, what would he do with Roodeplaat? And eventually had an information session with him and his decision was that Roodeplaat may continue provided there is only defensive work done and no offensive work.

And after that there were some raids, I can't remember who, our intelligence people might tell us, where I think national intelligence or the police were raiding some other military places, they feared a raid and most of this stuff was destroyed.

DR RANDERA: My last question Dr van Rensburg. We have heard over the last two days from people who were involved in similar companies to yourself and the phrase that seemed to come up repeatedly was this one of need to know basis. Now in your case, and in Roodeplaat that culture did not seem to exist ...(intervention)

DR VAN RENSBURG: Very strong indeed ...(intervention)

DR RANDERA: Sorry let me finish, because you yourself have told us that you come from a very liberal tradition. You know you'd been singled out by the Broederbond, but yet when it comes to the work that was being done here you knew about almost everything that was happening, including what was going on on the commercial side. You overheard conversations where people talked about the use of certain substances. You knew who the CCB, some of the CCB operatives were. I am just having difficulty reconciling the two. On the one side need to know basis, on the other side, in this particular establishment it seemed like there was a culture of liberalism that prevailed. Did that come with you?

DR VAN RENSBURG: The culture of liberalism is something I worked on and it tended to be there in the top class scientists because that is the way of scientists, the share ideas, they share knowledge. I will confess, and I am remorseful for it, but I went along with the system. I had to, to a large extent bluff that I was one of them. It wasn't very convincing not for very long. But the alternative was either to be quietly blotted out or to be kicked out.

Now when they employ you at this place they take over your lifelong pension; they give you a tremendous housing subsidy; they give you a motor car, and they give you a salary that's a little bit more than, not very much more, but a little bit more than what you can get elsewhere, plus you g et perks, expense accounts and so on. So if I was kicked out I would have lost my pension, I would have lost my house, I would have lost my motor car, and you've got to really start from scratch. That is a confession I make. It was a consideration in my decision to stay, and rather in a small way try and neutralise the system from within. Without I would have been totally powerless.

DR RANDERA: Thank you.

DR VAN RENSBURG: Or ineffective.

CHAIRPERSON: Are there any questions that arise from the questions from the panel Mr Vally? No?

MR VALLY: One very brief one.

CHAIRPERSON: I shouldn't have asked. Mr Vally.

MR VALLY: Why would a chemical biological warfare facility be involved in research into birth control?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Into birth control?

DR RANDERA: Fertility...

DR VAN RENSBURG: One can only assume you want to target certain groups or populations for reducing the birth rate.

DR RANDERA: Thank you Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you Mr Vally. You've asked my question for me. Thank you.

Dr van Rensburg you will be cross-examined as arranged. You are excused for now.

DR VAN RENSBURG: Sorry did you say I will be or will not be?

CHAIRPERSON: You will be.

DR VAN RENSBURG: Will be.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes.

DR VAN RENSBURG: Good. Thank you.

WITNESS EXCUSED

CHAIRPERSON: I believe you are calling further evidence Mr Vally?

MR VALLY: That's correct Mr Chair. The next witness we are calling is Dr Mike Odendal.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Polsen, you are representing Dr Mike Odendal as well?

MR POLSEN: Yes, Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very much. Advocate Potgieter is going to swear Mr Mike Odendal in.

MIKE ODENDAL: (Duly sworn in, states):

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you, Mr Potgieter. Mr Odendal, may I just remind you that if you are comfortable in Xhosa or Afrikaans or Sotho, but certainly in Afrikaans, we will have a translating facility, you are welcome to make use of it.

Mr Vally?

EXAMINATION BY MR VALLY

MR VALLY: Thank you, Mr Chairperson. Dr Odendal, do you have any statement you wish to read into the record?

MR ODENDAL: No.

MR VALLY: What are your qualifications?

MR ODENDAL: I'm a Veterinarian. I qualified in 1974 with a BSc from the University of Pretoria. In 1983 I got my MED degree in Bacteriology and then I could register as a specialist, as a Veterinarian.

MR VALLY: Is it correct to say you are both a Microbiologist as well as a Veterinarian?

MR ODENDAL: Yes, that is correct.

MR VALLY: How did you come to be employed at the Roodeplaat Research Laboratories?

MR ODENDAL: I and Dr Daan Goosen, we were colleagues, we studied together, we qualified at the same time. We worked at the same research institute at the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Pretoria. We were together for three years before he went to RRL and he offered me a job there too.

MR VALLY: What were you employed as - sorry, before that, when was this?

MR ODENDAL: This was in 1985.

MR VALLY: And how long did you work at RRL?

MR ODENDAL: I worked there for 8? years, then I resigned, and then I went to Onderstepoort.

MR VALLY: What were you employed to do at RRL?

MR ODENDAL: Initially I had to establish microbiological capacities for the South African Defence Force. I knew it was a French organisation. I was trained as a Veterinarian and I worked with - we didn't work with viruses. I'm a trained Veterinarian working in microbiology and I concentrated on microbiology and my brief was to investigate the various organisms which could be used against our country, how to identify them, diagnose them, and also develop a limited offensive capability which could be used if it became necessary, because at that stage there was a war waging against the Angolans.

MR VALLY: You were aware that RRL was a front company?

MR ODENDAL: Yes.

MR VALLY: Were you aware that it was controlled by the military?

MR ODENDAL: Yes.

MR VALLY: Who was in charge of RRL?

MR ODENDAL: When I joined them Dr Danie Goosen was the Managing Director.

MR VALLY: What I want to know, is specifically what research you did at RRL?

MR ODENDAL: We had three types of projects, those were hard projects in which the Defence Force was interested. There were soft projects, that was for a commercial view, and there was also in-house projects.

One of my briefs was to develop technology, that meant that any technology had to be developed which could be used to develop a defensive capability, as I've already said, a limited defensive capability. All the capability was my responsibility regarding microbiology.

MR VALLY: You mentioned hard projects, can you advise us what is meant by the term hard projects?

MR ODENDAL: Hard projects, one of those hard projects in which the Defence Force was interested was the development of a system which would entail all the organisms to be used in chemical warfare.

MR VALLY: So you developed various cultures?

MR ODENDAL: Yes.

MR VALLY: Let's look at TRC 48, I believe you have that document. Do you have it in front of you?

MR ODENDAL: Yes, I have.

MR VALLY: Now, this seems to be a list of all the projects that - or some of the projects, rather, that RRL was involved in. Do you recognise this list at all?

MR ODENDAL: Mr Chairman, I just want to make sure that we're on the right place, are you speaking of page 1355?

MR VALLY: That's correct.

MR ODENDAL: You see, at Roodeplaat, we had different departments and the one department was physiology and that is this department, and I was only involved in microbiology, so the projects listed here one this page, I recognise some of them, but that's all.

MR VALLY: Were you involved in any of these projects on this page?

MR ODENDAL: No, not at all.

MR VALLY: What do you recognise there?

MR ODENDAL: Well, the Bovine Embryos, some aspects of quality assurance ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: Yes, just let's just stop there, you're talking about, did you say baboon embryo's?

MR ODENDAL: No, Bovine.

MR VALLY: Bovine, I beg your pardon.

MR ODENDAL: Yes, that's the first one, 10034.

MR VALLY: Alright.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Vally, where are we?

MR VALLY: We're looking at TRC 48, the first page.

CHAIRPERSON: Oh, very well.

MR VALLY: What do you know about that research?

MR ODENDAL: No, nothing.

MR VALLY: But you know such research was done.

MR ODENDAL: Yes.

MR VALLY: Go on.

MR ODENDAL: To the next page ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: No, I want to know which other projects you are aware of on page 1355.

MR ODENDAL: Well, to be quite honest, I don't know anything of anything of those projects.

CHAIRPERSON: I thought the witness was saying that he had nothing to do with physiology?

MR VALLY: He did, Mr Chairperson, but he said he recognised some of the projects there.

CHAIRPERSON: Oh, you are just asking for him to recognise any, if there are any.

MR VALLY: That's correct. Let's move on to the next page, page 1356 which refers to biochemistry, what projects are you aware of there?

MR ODENDAL: There is only one project, the R1039, it's halfway down the list.

MR VALLY: I'm sorry, I missed that.

MR ODENDAL: The purification, R0139, the purification of the toxins.

MR VALLY: Will you please tell us about that?

MR ODENDAL: This project was a biochemistry project, but this regarding the purification of toxins. These toxins involved with the enzymes here whereof the specific group, this is one of the groups of organisms causing fatal diseases, because these clostridian profusions have five types, and you must just stop me if it becomes too technical ...(intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: Can I just establish if the Ministry of Foreign Affairs does have these documents, given their role? Mr Arendse?

MR ARENDSE: Chairperson, I've got the document available in front of me, and apparently, or I'm told that we don't object if it's relevant ...(intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: Alright I just wanted to ...(intervention)

MR ARENDSE: If the Committee feels it's important or Mr Vally feels it's important for this to come out, then we don't have any objections.

CHAIRPERSON: No, I just wanted to look after your interests.

MR ARENDSE: Very pleased to hear that.

MR VALLY: Dr Odendal, without going into the technical detail, this involved the purification of certain toxins.

MR ODENDAL: Yes.

MR VALLY: Just give us some examples of the toxins.

MR ODENDAL: A produces an alpha toxin, now this is the cause of gas gangrene in people and also a condition such as red derm ...(indistinct), this has veterinary and medical implications. The other toxin is a better toxin (b), the other one, is gibsolon toxin of a type

© which is responsible for a condition in sheep which we called poult kidney in sheep. So the reason for the purification of these toxins was to establish diagnostic tools to make a diagnoses, because we were not sure whether these toxins could be used for biological warfare or not. It is listed in the International Biohazardous Key, but we just did it in any case.

MR VALLY: Let's go on to the third page of this document.

CHAIRPERSON: Would that be 001357?

MR VALLY: That's correct, Mr Chairperson.

MR VALLY: Well sorry, I should turn over - there isn't much there - we go on to 13 - I assume it's 1358, the 8 is missing. This is where your name appears, Dr Odendal. Is that your name up there?

MR ODENDAL: That's correct, yes.

MR VALLY: Well, let's talk about some of the items referred to herein.

MR ODENDAL: If we start at the first one, NO34, Warmaconers(?) stands for the organism or the name of Hormonous Resina. It is a fungus type of organism which grows in aeroplane fuel and it causes a great deal of problems in the spraying aeroplanes of the Air Force, because polluted fuel can cause the aeroplane to crash, and we looked at methods of decreasing these organisms. The following one, or the next one is a project Septic Shock. In conjunction with an overseas researcher who came to do research at RRL quite often, I think he still comes on an annual basis to sister companies or another company, he developed a shock lung model in baboons which he used to develop certain therapeutic to test these measures, that is why he came to our country so often to do testing on baboons, and he developed this model. All that we did is that we took E-coli organisms and we grew this and gave it to him which he injected into the baboons, and they then developed this shock model ...(intervention)

DR ORR: Sorry, may I interrupt before we carry on. We had some confusion when we were speaking to Dr van Rensburg about the "begrooting" column, whether it was rands and cents, or rands. Could you perhaps clarify that for us?

MR ODENDAL: Yes, I think that would be R22 500,00.

DR ORR: Thank you very much.

CHAIRPERSON: And at the end there it would been "totale inkomste vir RNL" that would be R10 million.

MR ODENDAL: I think that would be for RNL as a company.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes, but then is would be R10 million. Mr Vally?

MR ODENDAL: Shall I go on to the following project?

MR VALLY: Just before you go on to the next one, a septic shock lung I think you called it, these experiments were done on the premises?

MR ODENDAL: Yes.

MR VALLY: With baboons?

MR ODENDAL: Yes.

MR VALLY: And they would be injected with the live culture?

MR ODENDAL: Yes.

MR VALLY: And the results would be examined?

MR ODENDAL: Yes.

MR VALLY: For what purposes?

MR ODENDAL: Well, this very prominent overseas research worker or scientist was developing a model for specifically for application in humans for the treatment of lung shock, because after an accident normal, let's say a car accident, the first thing that happens is the patient goes into shock situation and this model was used to simulate the condition in humans.

MR VALLY: Let's go on to the next one.

MR DU PLESSIS: SKB Tande, that was just the company, Roodeplaat Breeding Enterprises, they had over a thousand Alsatian dogs and during one of their vaccination trials, the dogs developed an enamel hypoplasia and to prove this we had to repeat the trial to demonstrate to the commercial company which supplied the vaccine that enamel hypoplasia took place, and this was the project.

MR VALLY: Let's go on, while I'm there, you know, you have project numbers there, some with "N's" before them, some with "R's" before them, some with "L's" before them, do those have any significance?

MR ODENDAL: Yes, the "N" project would be the projects, the commercial projects. The "R" project would be the hard project.

MR VALLY: I see, and the "R"? The "N" is commercial, the "R" is hard, ...(intervention)

MR ODENDAL: And the "L" would be an in-house development project.

MR VALLY: I see, sorry, please go on.

MR ODENDAL: Okay, the translocation 181, that was a similar project to the septic shock, the one was the production of the E-coli Endotoxin. With translocation the scientist tried to re-isolate the organisms from the different organs to sort of, to check the distribution of the gram negative organism, so we gave it another number, and we did it apart from the other one. Translocation means the movement from the organism from the bloodstream into the different organs. So after the experiment, this animal was euthenased and we did the isolations.

MR VALLY: Let's go on.

MR ODENDAL: R0012 was our culture collection in which the Defence Force had an interest. They requested us to develop and to establish a well rung culture collection.

MR VALLY: Let's just go back to the one before ...(intervention)

MR ODENDAL: Oh yes, 186, sorry, Pasteurella.

MR VALLY: Yes.

MR ODENDAL: This was Pasteurella Humalitica is an organism that causes pneumonia in cattle. It's one of the most devastating diseases, especially in fetlock cattle, and we developed a vaccine which was completely new to this country, the first type of vaccine of that nature in this country were developed, and it was done for a private veterinarian which contracted us to do this research work for him, and at this stage it is a registered vaccine in South Africa.

MR VALLY: Fine, we will come back to R0012 in more detail, that's a "versameling", a collection of various cultures as you put it. Let's go on to R0091.

MR ODENDAL: Okay, that's Bacillus Anthraces, which is Anthrax. Anthrax is one of the most common organisms used in biological warfare. I think the Americans, the British, Sadam Hussein, all the people have Anthrax in their collection, and the purpose of this project was to establish whether one could produce a strain of Anthrax that would be resistant to penicillin.

MR VALLY: We're going to come back to that as well in a short while. The next one, that's "L" with question marks.

MR ODENDAL: Okay, that aims - that stands for the aims test. The aims test is a test to test certain substances for carcinogenicity. This project didn't really get off the ground and we didn't give it any attention, but it was in our plan.

MR VALLY: Let's go on.

MR ODENDAL: L183, Gamoglobulin P and SKP is for horses, perde, en skape. We also had a project to isolate and purify the gamoglobulins from hyper immunised horse and sheep serum. This we did for a specific disease referring back to one of the sheep diseases or the Epsilon toxin in sheep, because we wanted to test one of our new theories, and that is of passive immunisation in sheep as a means of protection. This is one of our commercial projects which, it worked quite well, and we produced quite a lot of this gamoglobulin in sheep.

MR VALLY: Let's go on. You have a N204.

MR ODENDAL: RTO, Roodeplaat Teel Ondernemings, that's the synonym for Roodeplaat Breeding Enterprises. Rooiderm in English we would say red gut in dogs, because they had 1000 dogs in one place, there was - they had a very unique syndrome called Haemorrhagic Necrotic Enteritis in the dogs, and my being a veterinary bacteriologist it stimulated my interest because my - the Clostridia group of organisms was my field of interest because I did my masters thesis on Clostridium profingens, and we tackled this problem of looking into the causes this disease in these dogs. Quite a number of these dogs died as a result of this disease.

MR VALLY: Let's go on, R47.

MR ODENDAL: Okay, this is the freeze-dry process of certain pathogens. Certain of these, I think it's fair to say that not all the organisms in the culture collection was pathogenic. Some were more pathogenic than others, and we got the order from the Defence Force to select certain pathogens and freeze-dry them in larger quantities that what we normally would have done.

MR VALLY: And which would these be?

MR ODENDAL: These would be Salmonella, it would be Anthrax, it would be Cholera, and also ...(indistinct)

MR VALLY: Tell me, when you say you got the order from the Defence Force, who specifically gave you the order?

MR ODENDAL: Our structures - all my orders I received from Dr Andre Immelman. Although Dr Schalk van Rensburg was my direct Department Head all the Defence Force projects came through Dr Andre Immelman and Dr Schalk van Rensburg didn't really have inside knowledge of these projects.

MR VALLY: Let's go on, L95.

MR ODENDAL: Bacillus Anthraces in muis. We did a lot of LD 50 tests, that means that we used a lot of mice to determine the pathogenicity of - we have about 45 different strains of Anthrax in our collection, and because the Kruger National Park is a basic endemic area for Anthrax, we met closely with them and to look at some of the problems that is associated with Anthrax in wild animals, so we obtained a number of isolates and we tested their pathogenicity in mice, and this project was all about that. These results, I can just mention, I wrote it up and I published it in a scientific journal, The Onderstepoort Journal of Veterinary Science, 1992.

MR VALLY: Alright, thanks, the last two, 170 and 168, were these also both in-house projects?

MR ODENDAL: Yes. 170 was also Bacillus Anthraces. The biochemical characterisation of all these different isolates which we obtained from the Kruger Park. We did biochemical profiles on each of them, and these results I also published in The Onderstepoort Journal of Veterinary Science.

MR VALLY: And the last one?

MR ODENDAL: That's Campilabacta Dejornai, in bitches, tewe. In these ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: That's fine, you don't have to give us the details of that.

DR RANDERA: Dr Odendal, can I just ask, in terms of your categorisation of "N", "R" and "L", this is for 1990/1991.

MR ODENDAL: Yes.

DR RANDERA: Is there a possibility that whereas in one year, let's just take your L0170, it's the one that you were talking in terms Anthrax in the Kruger National Park, could that be converted to an "R" in the next year, because - or for example the septic shock one, whereas you say the idea was to develop treatment modalities on a model that would cause toxic shock. Given that you were involved in biological warfare, and biological warfare to me means in it's simplest terms means killing human beings. Could that experimentation not be converted towards what you were primarily involved in, which was biological warfare work?

MR ODENDAL: You see, we did not have any background on Anthrax. We didn't have any working experience with the organism. So what we had to do is we had to work with the organisms. We had the proper facilities for that, you know, we created a P3 facility, and if the Committee wants me to expand on that, I will do so gladly, but you need specific laboratories to work with pathogenic organisms, which we had. So, the experience you get with working with an organism obviously gives you experience, it gives you on-hands expertise. So that experience you can use for whichever purpose is possible.

DR RANDERA: Thank you.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Vally?

MR VALLY: Thank you, Mr Chair. You mentioned that the Defence Force asked you to, or asked RRL to create facilities for the large-scale freeze-drying of I think you mentioned Salmonella, Anthrax, Cholera and a fourth item, I forget what is was, what is the fourth one?

MR ODENDAL: Yersinia.

MR VALLY: Yersinia. Very briefly, what quantities are we talking about here?

MR ODENDAL: Well the quantities that was mentioned in one of these documents which seemed to corroborate the volumes which we produced, which was not very large. It was normally in 10ml volumes in a 30ml McCarthy glass vile.

MR VALLY: Would it be very easy to produce much, much more from the vials that you had once you had the cultures?

MR ODENDAL: With the facilities we had, no. You can, but over a very lengthy period of time.

DR ORR: Sorry, can I just ask, how many organisms, for instance if you have 10ml of Cholera in a bottle, how many Cholera organisms would be in that bottle?

MR ODENDAL: Well, normally we would make a count afterwards, and we would be satisfied with 10 to the power of 8 per millilitre.

DR ORR: And that is 100 million, if I'm counting my 0's correctly?

MR ODENDAL: Yes, it's quite a lot of 0's.

DR RANDERA: And the potential of harm from that?

MR ODENDAL: Well, it's difficult to say, you know, it's easy to play with numbers, but I very soon realised that it's not so easy to judge from what you have what it will be, because in the pathogenic status I have been involved with animals in my - as part of my veterinary training, it's not always easy to cause a specific disease they way you wanted to. I think Dr Schalk van Rensburg mentioned the 3 Russians were infected and only one died. You know, I was quite surprised one died because I don't think - you know, to my mind they shouldn't die because it doesn't normally work that way.

DR RANDERA: But you would still have a certain figure in mind. I mean you've given all these confounders.

MR ODENDAL: Well, some of these diseases would rather cause disease or incapacitation rather than mortality, and I think the organisms were involved in, apart from Anthrax, perhaps, all the other organisms will just cause slight - I won't say slight, but, incapacitation.

DR RANDERA: Sorry to push you on this one, but, given that you had a vile of Clostridium, let's take that as an example, whether we've talking about morbidity or mortality, you must have done certain calculations to say 1ml of the substance of the culture can affect so many thousands or so many hundreds of people, that's what I'm asking you.

MR ODENDAL: You see, we didn't really do those calculations because 10 to the power of 8 is the maximum number of organisms we can grow in a culture. We can't grow any more, so we opted for the optimum number of organisms per millilitre. So we didn't have any figures because that's not really available, how many organisms can incapacitate you, if I've answered your question.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Vally?

MR VALLY: If we could go on. If you were just having these cultures for testing purpose or for laboratory purposes, why would you be asked to keep larger quantities of these particular items, Salmonella, the Anthrax, the Cholera and the Yersinia.

MR ODENDAL: Well, I was, I didn't keep them in my collection. Those that were prepared in larger quantities I handed over to Dr Andre Immelman.

MR VALLY: Why do you hypothesise that the Defence Force asked you to produce these in larger quantities?

MR ODENDAL: Mr Chairman, I'm not sure if I understand you?

MR VALLY: If you only required these items to prepare defences against them, Salmonella, Anthrax, Cholera, Yersinia, you advised us that these were the items that you were asked to freeze-dry in large quantities. What do you think was the reason why these particular items had to be freeze-dried in large quantities?

MR ODENDAL: Well, one of the reasons that was given to me, was that Dr Jan Lourens from Protechnic wanted to test them for filter purposes because he was testing new protective - new types of protective clothing, and that was one of the reasons.

MR VALLY: That's one of the reasons that you were given?

MR ODENDAL: Yes.

MR VALLY: But I thought all the testing was done at RRL?

MR ODENDAL: No, Mr Chairman, I'm not sure if I understand you correctly, but we didn't do any testing. We just took the organisms, put them in bottles, and that's it. We didn't do any testing on them.

MR VALLY: I see. Well, maybe you can tell me about TRC 52?

This is the so-called "verkopelys". Now, do you see the document, do you have it with you?

MR ODENDAL: Yes, I have it in front of me.

MR VALLY: Now, you'll see there are a number of items on this list. Let me refer you to some of them, we seem to involve some of the items in your field, "The botulism in the bierblik - 21st of June 1989", do you see it, about three quarter of the way down?

MR ODENDAL: Yes, I see it.

MR VALLY: Were you responsible for producing the botulism?

MR ODENDAL: Yes, we did produce that.

MR VALLY: Did you put it in the beer tin?

MR ODENDAL: No.

MR VALLY: Do you know how it got there?

MR ODENDAL: I got - it was also one of the, I would say, requests I had from the Defence Force to produce Botsilium type A toxin, which I produced in a 5ml glass freeze-dried vile and this I prepared a number of these glass vials and I handed it over to Dr Andre Immelman. What happened after that to the toxin I wasn't informed. The know ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: Need to know.

MR ODENDAL: The must know system also applied to me.

MR VALLY: Did Dr Immelman never discuss these issues with you that he was using it to put into a tin of beer?

MR ODENDAL: Well, this was one of the things that came to light, and I also did some tests on liquor, beer, whisky, milk, water.

MR VALLY: Well, let's go out firstly with botulism. What effect does it have on a human person.

MR ODENDAL: Well, it causes paralysis because it inhibits the transmittance of your nerve impulse in your muscles, so eventually you would die of asphyxia.

MR VALLY: And how long does it take to work?

MR ODENDAL: That's difficult to say. In humans we don't know, I don't think those figures are available at all. On the - the only figures we have is figures which - studies we've done on mice, because mice is the most popular experimental laboratory animal which is commonly used not only to type these Botsilium toxins into the different types because there are basically eight, let's say seven different types of Botsilium.

MR VALLY: Potentially it could kill?

MR ODENDAL: Yes.

MR VALLY: And you tested these on primates such as baboons?

MR ODENDAL: No, we didn't test it in primates, we only used mice as an experimental ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: Only mice?

MR ODENDAL: Yes.

MR VALLY: Did you test - you said you tested it's ability to be mixed with alcohol and it's effectiveness thereafter?

MR ODENDAL: Yes.

MR VALLY: Why do you think you were doing that?

MR ODENDAL: Well, the reason once again that was offered to me was, it could land in one of our own people's drinks and that's to test the quality of the drink, of the drink, or of the liquid.

MR VALLY: Did you seriously believe that?

MR ODENDAL: Not really, because I know it's one of their most common or popular biological weapons as well, it could also be used offensively.

MR VALLY: Tell me about Salmonella. Did you do tests on mixing sugar and Salmonella together?

MR ODENDAL: No we didn't do any tests. We just provided the Salmonella and if you mix it with anything, tea or sugar, you know, you hope it will work, if it would work.

MR VALLY: You did tests on mixing this item with various ...(intervention)

MR ODENDAL: No, we did no tests on Salmonella.

MR VALLY: Which - and botulism, did you do such tests on botulism?

MR ODENDAL: Yes, we did.

MR VALLY: What did you mix it with?

MR ODENDAL: Well, we mixed it with milk, with water, with whisky, with beer, all types of liquid that could possibly aid the ingestion of the toxin.

MR VALLY: I want to talk about the Cholera. Do you see on the 4th of August 1989, the first item on the second page of TRC 52? Do you see that item?

MR ODENDAL: Yes, I see it.

MR VALLY: Can you describe the effect of Cholera on the human being?

MR ODENDAL: Well, it causes quite a severe diarrhoea, quite a severe dehydration and that's basically the most important effect.

MR VALLY: And who are the most vulnerable people regarding Cholera?

MR ODENDAL: Well, humans.

MR VALLY: And will - amongst humans, are children not the most vulnerable, and older people?

MR ODENDAL: Yes, they are.

MR VALLY: So Cholera would be most effective in killing children and older people?

MR ODENDAL: I assume so, yes, because that's what the literature says.

MR VALLY: And you're talking about sixteen bottles, how much cholera are we talking?

MR ODENDAL: Once again, if I remember correctly, they were small bottles, 30ml McCarthy vials and you put in at least 10ml, so that would mean, it would be quite a lot.

MR VALLY: What would you ...(indistinct) if you had to use it for offensive purposes? You see on that same page, about three quarter way down, there's 10 bottles and the top of the page was 16 bottles, so that's 26 bottles altogether. Firstly, were you the person who put this cholera together, who isolated it, or cultured it?

MR ODENDAL: I prepared the cultures, yes.

MR VALLY: You prepared them? You produced 26 bottles of cholera of 30ml a bottle, I believe you said.

MR ODENDAL: No, 10ml.

MR VALLY: I beg your pardon, 10ml a bottle, which gives you 260ml of cholera. What damage - I'm sorry, I'm told there's another 6ml also involved. I assume that you produced that as well?

MR ODENDAL: Yes.

MR VALLY: So we've got 26 plus 6, is 32 bottles which gives you 220ml of cholera. Can you give us an indication of whether this could cause a serious epidemic?

MR ODENDAL: Well, I assume that it could cause an epidemic, yes.

MR VALLY: I used the words "serious epidemic".

MR ODENDAL: Yes.

MR VALLY: Were you aware that you were producing a substance which could potentially cause a serious epidemic?

MR ODENDAL: I wouldn't - when I got the request to produce these organisms, you must remember that the idea stuck in my mind, that in the first case it was to be used for testing purposes, and in the second one, you know, there were hints that this could be used in the war situation in Angola, and it never crossed my mind for one moment that it could be used internally in our own country, because to use organisms or to spread organisms in your own country is a very risky thing, and it's not the - it doesn't go along with the convention of biological warfare that you do not produce these things to use on your own territory.

MR VALLY: You felt it was acceptable to use cholera as a weapon in Angola?

MR ODENDAL: Well, to my - with the information that was available to me, that these guys were using it on us, so why don't we use it on them.

MR VALLY: And who told you this?

MR ODENDAL: This was information that was probably passed to me by Dr Immelman.

MR VALLY: So Dr Immelman indicated to you that it was acceptable to visit a cholera epidemic on possibly Angolans?

MR ODENDAL: Yes.

MR VALLY: Who else was involved in this project? I'm talking specifically about production of cholera and for the purposes you produced it?

MR ODENDAL: Well, there was a specific technician, I only had one technician that was allocated to these projects which produced all these organisms in large quantities.

MR VALLY: Was there any advisor or consultant to this project?

MR ODENDAL: No.

MR VALLY: Anthrax, what effect does Anthrax have on a person?

MR ODENDAL: Anthrax cause three different clinical symptoms in humans. The one is, when you inhale it, it is extremely dangerous. That is the most dangerous form of Anthrax.

MR VALLY: What happens to the person?

MR ODENDAL: Well, you go into shock, into septic shock and you can die within a very short period. The other one is when you ingest it orally. In most cases nothing will happen, but if you happen to have an ulcer of some sorts, and the organism is absorbed into the bloodstream, that person will probably also die because their death is very acute. And then the third form is aquataneous form which was referred to in the earlier days as Wilsorter's disease, and that causes an abscess, which can heal by itself, or if you instigate treatment, you can recover.

MR VALLY: If you go back to TRC 52, the second page, third item, it talks about five "sigarette - B - Anthrax", do you see it?

MR ODENDAL: Yes.

MR VALLY: Are you aware of these cigarettes prepared with Anthrax?

MR ODENDAL: Yes, I was asked to do that.

MR VALLY: So you personally put drops of Anthrax onto these cigarettes?

MR ODENDAL: Yes, I was given a packet of Camel cigarettes, and I was requested to drop some of the drops onto the filter of the cigarettes.

MR VALLY: And what would it have - what would have happened to the person who smoked these cigarettes?

MR ODENDAL: Well, it's difficult to speculate, but I can imagine that it might have fatal results.

MR VALLY: Were you aware of that at the time you did it?

MR ODENDAL: Yes.

MR VALLY: Were you aware of who it was intended for?

MR ODENDAL: Well, once again this was put to me that it was going to be used to test some of the filters that Dr Lourens was developing at Protechnic.

MR VALLY: Surely you didn't believe that, I mean you don't test the filter by putting Anthrax on the cigarette?

MR ODENDAL: Perhaps I did not believe it, but I had my own thoughts about the situation.

MR VALLY: Well, let's go on. Did you do experiments with the mixing of chocolate with Anthrax?

MR ODENDAL: No.

MR VALLY: Did you, directly under the items with cigarettes and Anthrax, it says "koffie, sjokolade" and Anthrax. Did you do that mixture as well?

MR ODENDAL: No, I only provided the toxin to Dr Immelman, and what he did with the toxin, he did not tell me, he did not inform me.

MR VALLY: Are there any other items on this "verkope" list that - firstly, I want to know if you prepared the toxins, and secondly, I want to know if you were responsible for the final product, for example the cigarettes, or the peppermint chocolate with Anthrax. But, firstly, let's see, regarding the shopping list, which toxins were you personally responsible for producing? If you start on the first page, 19th of March '89 and move downwards.

MR ODENDAL: There's one, the 9th of June '89, "Spore en brief". Those were Anthrax spores and they were supposedly put onto the glue part of the envelope.

MR VALLY: So, did you prepare the envelope?

MR ODENDAL: No, I did not prepare the envelope, but I provided the spores.

MR VALLY: Were you aware what they were going to be for?

MR ODENDAL: No.

MR VALLY: Where you aware whether it could be done or not, whether spores could be put onto the gum of an envelope?

MR ODENDAL: I suppose it could be done, but I don't think it's a very good idea to immobilise or the incapacitate someone, because I doubt whether it will be effective.

MR VALLY: We're talking kill. Will it kill someone?

MR ODENDAL: I've got my doubts, but strictly speaking, it could happen.

MR VALLY: Depending on the quantity?

MR ODENDAL: Well, and depending on many factors.

MR VALLY: Would it be detectable?

MR ODENDAL: I don't think so, no.

MR VALLY: Let's go on. What else on the first page?

MR ODENDAL: "Bierblik Botsilium", I produced the Botsilium toxin, but how it got into the beer tin, I won't know.

MR VALLY: Let's go on.

MR ODENDAL: And the same with the following one.

MR VALLY: Right.

MR ODENDAL: And then with the "suiker en Salmonella".

MR VALLY: What did you do there?

MR ODENDAL: I only supplied the Salmonella.

MR VALLY: Salmonella, let's briefly talk about. What effect does it have on a person?

MR ODENDAL: It causes a nausea, and gastro enteritis.

MR VALLY: Let's go on. The ...(indistinct)

MR ODENDAL: No.

MR VALLY: You've mentioned the cholera at the top of the second page, 16 bottles, let's go on.

MR ODENDAL: The cigarettes, yes, I did that.

MR VALLY: Right, that's cigarettes at (b) with Anthrax. You say five, volume - five, was it five cigarettes, five packets, five cartons?

MR ODENDAL: I'm not sure, I think it was, if I remember correctly, it was one cigarette per packet and it was five packets.

MR VALLY: Five different packets?

MR ODENDAL: Yes.

MR VALLY: Let's go on. The coffee, "sjokolade", were you responsible for both, or just the botulism?

MR ODENDAL: Just the botulism, and just the Anthrax, and not to inoculate the chocolate.

MR VALLY: Let's go one.

MR ODENDAL: Okay, the cholera, and the Brucella Maletenses.

MR VALLY: Well, let's talk about that. That's the third last item at the bottom.

MR ODENDAL: Yes, that's also an important ...(indistinct).

MR VALLY: Tell us what effect it has on human beings.

MR ODENDAL: That causes flu-like symptoms which I would say, it could be quite severe, and it could have long lasting effects. So, it's not lethal, it can only incapacitate from that ingested.

MR VALLY: Do you know what's relapsing fever?

MR ODENDAL: Yes.

MR VALLY: Does it cause chronic relapsing fever?

MR ODENDAL: It actually causes multi fever, because relapsing fever is Brucella Abortus.

MR VALLY: I see, is that in the list as well?

MR ODENDAL: No, Abortus is not in the list.

MR VALLY: Did you produce it?

MR ODENDAL: No.

MR VALLY: You didn't produce it.

MR ODENDAL: Maletenses is one step more pathogenic that Abortus.

MR VALLY: I see, and when you say the fever you described, does it incapacitate a person for the rest of their lives?

MR ODENDAL: Not necessarily.

MR VALLY: For how long?

MR ODENDAL: Well, let's say you get quite severe fever symptoms, muscle pains, joint pains, and then that can incapacitate you for - it's difficult to say, for a couple of days.

MR VALLY: And does it recur?

MR ODENDAL: Yes, it can recur.

MR VALLY: For how many years?

MR ODENDAL: Well, this is difficult to say, but for many years, 10 years, 5 years, 10 years.

MR VALLY: And to call it flu-like symptoms is to underplay it?

MR ODENDAL: Well, it's sever flu-like symptoms.

MR VALLY: I means doesn't it totally incapacitate you, that period, when it recurs?

MR ODENDAL: I've been fortunate enough not to contract this disease, but I ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: Surely you read about it?

MR ODENDAL: Yes, but from the people that have had it, it's not a disease that I'd like to get.

MR VALLY: So you could take a healthy person, and they would be rendered ...(intervention)

MR ODENDAL: Yes, you can make them quite ill.

MR VALLY: For a long, long time. What does the literature say one it?

MR ODENDAL: Well, you get acute and you get chronic cases.

MR VALLY: Let's talk acute.

MR ODENDAL: Acute for a couple of days,

MR VALLY: Right.

MR ODENDAL: And it can pass.

MR VALLY: And chronic?

MR ODENDAL: With treatment.

MR VALLY: Yes.

MR ODENDAL: Chronic, it'll come back, you treat it, it'll come back.

MR VALLY: For how many years?

MR ODENDAL: At least ten years.

MR VALLY: And this was the more serious type of Maletenses?

MR ODENDAL: Yes, that's correct.

MR VALLY: Which would probably induce the chronic symptoms you described?

MR ODENDAL: Yes.

MR VALLY: Now, the quantity you got there, 1 by 50, how much are we talking about?

MR ODENDAL: If I remember correctly, that must be 15ml.

MR VALLY: Per bottle?

MR ODENDAL: Yes, that was only one bottle, and that was all.

MR VALLY: So, one bottle of 50. And how would you - how would this be transmitted to people?

MR ODENDAL: Orally.

MR VALLY: Can you introduce it into the drinking water?

MR ODENDAL: Yes.

MR VALLY: Or milk?

MR ODENDAL: Yes.

MR VALLY: Or alcohol?

MR ODENDAL: We didn't do any test on that, so I can't say alcohol, but it's a possibility.

MR VALLY: And 50ml will affect how many people?

MR ODENDAL: That is difficult to say.

MR VALLY: Usually these items, you use millilitres to in fact affect people, very minute amounts.

MR ODENDAL: Well, we normally cultivated, these organisms to at least 10 to the power of 8 organisms per millilitre. So, if you had to reconstitute it and if you freeze-dried, say for instance, 50ml and you can reconstitute it with less volume, and then your concentration will be a bit higher. So you can increase your concentration slightly, but it can strictly speaking, it can make a lot of people sick.

MR VALLY: When you say a lot of people, what are you talking about? Give me numbers please.

MR ODENDAL: Well, that's difficult to say, you know. It will be pure speculation really.

MR VALLY: Speculate for me.

MR ODENDAL: Two hundred, three hundred.

MR VALLY: Is it true that it is very difficult to diagnose?

MR ODENDAL: Yes, it's very often missed by the medical practitioners, because they don't normally look for it, and a lot veterinarians suffer from this disease, because it's not diagnosed properly, so it is difficult to diagnose.

MR VALLY: Is that one of the reasons why you were keen on - your research institute was keen on producing this substance?

MR ODENDAL: Well, it is also listed in the international lists of biohazard agents for biochemical or biological warfare is this organism, because we get to this specific reason.

CHAIRPERSON: I think the question, however, is still a pointed one. Is that the quality that your research laboratory was looking for, and was that the reason that they wanted to produce that ...(indistinct)?

MR ODENDAL: No.

MR VALLY: Let's go on to the last page. Were you responsible for those two items?

MR ODENDAL: Yes, the Maletenses and the ...(indistinct), but ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: Let's start off with the Maletenses first. How much of this was produced in this particular batch?

MR ODENDAL: I'm afraid, Mr Chairman, I can't remember that, you have to ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: Was it possibly the same amount as the previous one?

MR ODENDAL: This organism wasn't very popular really, because I think it was just for us to give to the people just to have it on hand, whether it was ever used or not, I can't say, but I can only assume that it must have been the same quantity. I can't say for certain, I'm sorry.

MR VALLY: And the last item?

MR ODENDAL: Typhemorium, Salmonella Typhemorium is one of the Salmonellas which can also incapacitate you.

MR VALLY: Did you produce this?

MR ODENDAL: I produced it, yes.

MR VALLY: Does it cause typhoid?

MR ODENDAL: Para-typhoid.

MR VALLY: Para-typhoid. Can you describe the symptoms, what effect it has on people?

MR ODENDAL: It also causes gastro enteritis.

MR VALLY: Does it cause dysentery?

MR ODENDAL: No, not really.

MR VALLY: Does it cause severe internal haemorrhaging?

MR ODENDAL: No.

MR VALLY: Did you put it into the deodorant?

MR ODENDAL: No, I can't understand if someone would want to infect someone with Salmonella, why you would put it in a deodorant, it wasn't me, no.

MR VALLY: How would you transmit the Salmonella in order to affect someone?

MR ODENDAL: It's also an oral ingestion.

MR VALLY: Only ingestion, not through the skin?

MR ODENDAL: No.

MR VALLY: And not through inhalation?

MR ODENDAL: No.

MR VALLY: Do you understand why this was done?

MR ODENDAL: No, it doesn't make sense to me.

MR VALLY: Have you seen this list before?

MR ODENDAL: No.

MR VALLY: Are you aware of the fact that your products, that these items that you produced were in fact being given to people? I don't mean the recipients, I don't mean the victims, I mean the middleman who'd collect it from RRL or it would be delivered to such a person? Were you aware of that?

MR ODENDAL: Yes, because we did not see the people for whom the products were intended for.

MR VALLY: When you say "we" you're talking about yourself?

MR ODENDAL: And Dr Immelman - or, no - sorry, I'm talking about myself.

MR VALLY: I think you are.

MR ODENDAL: Yes.

MR VALLY: I need to ask you, were you given certain specifications? I need, for example, a product to introduce into a cap of the ANC, which I want to produce at in fact, for example, foodworths, were you given such specifications?

MR ODENDAL: No, I was just asked to compile a list and to produce a number of these organisms in the freeze-dried form so that it could be kept in stock in Dr Immelmann?s fridge in his walk-in safe for - and he would distribute it for his own purposes, whatever the case may be, for the filtration experiments or for utilisation by some other people.

MR VALLY: Were you told what is the most effective toxin to be used in whatever circumstances, were you ever given instructions of that sort?

MR ODENDAL: No, I had to produce a potpourri of products and they made their own choices.

MR VALLY: And the potpourri was of your own volition, or were you given directions as to what should be part of the potpourri?

MR ODENDAL: I had a list of organisms, you know, from international literature which gave me guidelines on the organisms which would be the most pathogenic. I went according to those instructions.

MR VALLY: So you took what the world community said were the most ...(intervention)

MR ODENDAL: Potent organisms that could be used in the event of biological warfare, yes.

MR VALLY: And then went and produced those.

MR ODENDAL: Yes.

MR VALLY: What in fact did any of these items have on the environment, for example? Let's talk about Anthrax.

MR ODENDAL: Well, I think Anthrax, it would be grossly irresponsible if you use Anthrax in your own country, because you will contaminate the soil and the environment for a least 70 years.

MR VALLY: So for 70 years it would be highly dangerous for any living creature to be in that area?

MR ODENDAL: Yes. Well, the experiments that I have been performed so far indicate that, you know, this is the maximum time that, but probably it can be a bit longer, but 70 years is the experimental time which has been quoted in the literature.

MR VALLY: In fact when British experiments in ...(intervention)

MR ODENDAL: Green old Ireland.

MR VALLY: They had to abandon the island for many years.

MR ODENDAL: Yes.

MR VALLY: You were aware of this?

MR ODENDAL: Yes.

CHAIRPERSON: Did you think that this was being produced for use on neighbouring territories, because you say it would have been very senseless for it to be produced for one's own country?

MR ODENDAL: I think the quantities that we produced of Anthrax spores were so small that you cannot really, you know, it was incomprehensible for me to realise that this could have been used in a warfare situation, because you need many spores, especially if you want to rely on the inhalation method of inactivating your enemy. You'd have to rely on the inhalation of the spores, and therefore you'd need tons of spores, and we only produced, I think, limited quantities.

CHAIRPERSON: Maybe whilst I still have you, Dr Odendal, just so I don't forget, you see, I see that all of this work was produced by you towards the end of ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: Sorry, Chairperson, I've just been asked if we could just stop at this point. It's moving towards aspects of - which involve serious proliferation and I think we just, we need to consult on our side.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes. Well I don't know if there has been any basis that has been laid for, certainly the question that I am going to be asking. I'm not going to be asking about - I'm going to be asking about cholera. Can I just get an indication from the principals if I'm going to be asking the questions on cholera that have been heard, whether that is going to be traversing. Mike seems to say, you know, I can go ahead.

You see, Dr Odendal, most of the substance is cultures that you talk about. You produced towards the end of 1989, during '89, on the list, at least sitting on the list, all the cholera. I've seen that one was, you know, had a date in September in 1989. Do you agree?

MR ODENDAL: I think what one should also realise is that I produced these organisms and in a freeze-dried form they can stay alive for many months, and even perhaps years,

CHAIRPERSON: Yes.

MR ODENDAL: So it could have happened that I could have produced those organisms in 1988 for instance, and they were only distributed in 1989.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes. Okay, let's talk distribution. It seems to me, if you look at these dates where those distribution dates or where those dates relevant to the day on which you released them to whoever was placing an order for them. What does the dates signify here?

MR ODENDAL: No, the dates - I did not know when these cultures were handed out by whom, to whom. I assume it must have been Dr Immelman that handed them out to someone who came and collected it, but there is no connection with the distribution date the preparation date of the organisms.

CHAIRPERSON: Well, at list, it says in one column it says "datum gelewer". What does that mean?

MR ODENDAL: That I would understand, would mean to me this was given to an operative or someone, or an agent or someone that came and collected it.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes.

MR ODENDAL: That's what it would mean to me.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes the point that I am making is that you are talking about 1989. These toxic substances are being delivered as you say, possible to agents, in 1989, and all your understanding had been that this would have been in furtherance of a war situation. Do you agree?

MR ODENDAL: I assume so, yes.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes, now in 1989 there hardly was any war that was being fought by the South African Defence Force, do you agree?

MR ODENDAL: Well, Mr Chairman, you've got a good recollection,

CHAIRPERSON: If anything, there was a peace process in Namibia where the South Africans had been involved in a war that have even taken them to Angola. Do you realise that?

MR ODENDAL: Yes, that's true.

CHAIRPERSON: 1989 we're actually talking elections in Namibia. Do you realise that?

MR ODENDAL: Yes.

CHAIRPERSON: Now talking about cholera, how would it have been administered, these cholera cultures?

MR ODENDAL: There's only one basic - there's basically only one way I would think, and that would be to contaminate drinking water.

CHAIRPERSON: Contaminate drinking water. And you, for instance, in peace time, in the election time in Namibia, these doses could have been administered in drinking water in Namibia. What effect would it have had on the election process?

MR ODENDAL: Well, I think to start off with, I think the Department of Health would basically agree with me that if you have this organism in your environment, it can have a devastating effect on the health services. It can lead to disruption because you need urgent medical attention to the people that are affected. You can disrupt a whole area. It can cause wide spread disruption.

CHAIRPERSON: You are talking about the disruption of an election process, possibly even leading to some deaths.

MR ODENDAL: Certainly.

CHAIRPERSON: And you agree that the quantities of this cholera culture that you produced was sufficient to have been able to produce an epidemic, certainly that would have affected a population of 1 million plus in Namibia at this time, had there been a plan to do so?

MR ODENDAL: That's possible, yes.

CHAIRPERSON: Did it not worry you that in peace time you were being asked to produce toxins of those proportions?

MR ODENDAL: You see, at this stage, and as I mentioned it to you, there was a stage that we produced these organisms and that could have been in 1988 even.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes, but I'm talking what you are agreeing on. Here in 1989, which is peace time, you now know that certain of these toxins were being collected, certainly were being delivered to agents as you called them, did that not worry you - or let me not talk that time. Now, with the benefit of hindsight, doesn't it raise a number of questions in you head that these things were being delivered through Dr Immelman to whoever, CCB maybe, Armed - Special Forces, you were aware that these projects where they were associated with the South African Defence Force and linked in some ways to Special Forces, were you not?

MR ODENDAL: It is disturbing, yes, but at that time it wasn't, you know, we had a lot of projects going, and when you get an order or a directive to produce something, you had to produce it.

CHAIRPERSON: At that time you were aware that your projects were associated in some ways with Special Forces ...(intervention)

MR ODENDAL: Well, not at the time when we produced it. Afterwards I realised that that could have been the possibility.

CHAIRPERSON: And when you realised it, didn't you think that some of the toxins that you were producing, they're actually destined for operations by Special Forces?

MR ODENDAL: Well, I sort of realised that, you know, but it was too late to do anything at that stage, because in those cases it would have been - the results would have been evident.

CHAIRPERSON: I see. There were things you could have done, but then, that's not my function at this stage. Mr Vally?

ADV POTGIETER: Mr Chairperson, can I just before we loose the point on the cholera thing, do I understand this correctly, the cholera example, isn't that a particularly, isn't the one that particularly exemplifies a certain degree of callousness, because on what you say cholera renders children, young children and the elderly most vulnerable to it's effects, so really, it would affect that section of the population most, not so?

MR ODENDAL: Yes, that's true.

ADV POTGIETER: The innocent really?

MR ODENDAL: Yes.

ADV POTGIETER: And that underlines the callousness, if you will, to use that - those organisms in a sort of an offensive way?

MR ODENDAL: Well, I think even more so if you were to use those organisms in your own country. I think, you know, it's completely irresponsible, it's grossly irresponsible to do that.

ADV POTGIETER: Wherever you apply it, you going to affect children and the elderly most.

MR ODENDAL: Okay, if you're in a war-like situation, then I think, you know, your target would be, let's say adult men,

ADV POTGIETER: Exactly.

MR ODENDAL: But otherwise, I think, you know, to target the other populations of - would be callous.

ADV POTGIETER: So even in the war situation, it doesn't really gel with one's sense.

MR ODENDAL: Well I think even in a war situation, you know, to go and contaminate specific villages for that purpose would be - I would agree to that, yes.

ADV POTGIETER: Thank you.

CHAIRPERSON: Dr Randera?

DR RANDERA: Just make it clear for us, you started work at Roodeplaat in 1985. You say you worked there for 8? years, that takes you to 1993, midway through 1993. When did you stop producing, what we're looking at is stuff that may have been produced in '88, '89, '90, possibly right up till 1993?

MR ODENDAL: Well, I think at the end of 1990, and I can just go through my project list to corroborate those facts, but we did stop when the political initiatives became more prominent and then more constructive.

DR RANDERA: It is possible that you may have actually been producing cultures right up till 1993.

MR ODENDAL: No, I can assure you that we didn't do it up to 1993, because for the simple reason, there were a lot of other commercial ventures in which we became involved.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Vally, I think there has been an indication by the Ministry that we may well be going into areas of proliferation. I don't want an argument, I am just indicating that it is so, and it happens to be at a stage where I thought it would have been convenient to have an adjournment.

MR VALLY: We could adjourn, but I think that was a mistake on Mr Arendse's part.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes, that's why I said I'm not going to have an argument.

MR VALLY: What we're talking about happened in 1942 already.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you, for the record gentlemen, Mr Valley can we make an arrangement that we start at well, at 08h30 tomorrow, seeing it's a long a day and there are two witnesses that are going to stand over for cross-examination? I'm in your hands, if you want ...(indistinct)

MR VALLY: I would like to finish, it all depends on the cross-examination. I'd like to finish and at the very most I'd be twenty - twenty five minutes.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Vally then we'll take it 08h30 tomorrow morning. Some of the members of the panel have got other commitments. And may I just indicate that maybe we should now endeavour to pace ourselves in the sense that we should devote and provide for so much time for each witness. We have been fairly liberal, but we have wanted to conduct the hearing over five days, and we must either choose whether we want to have all the witnesses called, or have half a hearing. I'm just wanting you see how you can accommodate each other, otherwise you'll have to have place structures with the panel that beyond a certain hour a certain witness can no longer continue to be heard. You have an experience of that sort of thing in the - last year in Gauteng, and I'm sure I am not speaking a language you are not familiar with.

MR VALLY: There's two items here, or three items here. Hopefully the complaint by Mr Arendse has fallen away, so that's gone away. The other item is the witness presently before us and I respectfully suggest that we be allowed to finish him. I think if we allow to finish him we would have more time for other witnesses. It think it's unnecessary to call him back tomorrow, and I'll promise to go fast and cut ...(intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Vally, we would have come tomorrow in any event for cross-examination.

MR VALLY: If we can get an indication if there's going to be cross-examination.

ADV POTGIETER: Mr Chairman, I can just put it at this point in time I don't have any questions to ask the witness. Mr Vally indicated there is some more evidence, but at this point in time I won't have any questions for him.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Valley, I'm seriously considering allowing you only for the next 10 minutes.

MR VALLY: I'll restrain myself, Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: 10 minutes. Mr Vally?

MR VALLY: Thank you, Mr Chairman. Dr Odendal, besides Anthrax are there any other items that were produced by you that would have an impact on the environment?

MR ODENDAL: The organisms that produce gastro enteritis will have a limited impact, although something like the organisms that we mentioned as - could have a sort of a - if it lands in the rivers and in the estuaries and in the environment, it may have a, and we're talking of months, you know, an effect of months on the environment ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: Which items are we talking about?

MR ODENDAL: Cholera for instance.

MR VALLY: Alright.

MR ODENDAL: Perhaps Salmonella.

MR VALLY: So cholera could stay in the environment for months?

MR ODENDAL: Yes.

MR VALLY: Yes, perhaps Salmonella?

MR ODENDAL: Salmonella, yes.

MR VALLY: Botulism?

MR ODENDAL: No, that's a toxin and it will disappear in 24 - 48 hours from the environment if you happened to contaminate the water supplies or the environment.

MR VALLY: Any of the other items?

MR ODENDAL: No.

MR VALLY: No. Alright, just very briefly, when you started making these items, which year?

MR ODENDAL: Well, when I arrived at Roodeplaat in 1985 it took us about two years to get ourselves organised.

MR VALLY: So shall we say from 1987 until the end of 1993?

MR ODENDAL: Yes, I don't think it lasted all that long, although we had - I was responsible for the culture collection until the company dissolved in 1993, but we did not produce larger quantities than normal in the latter of, or in the beginning of the 90's.

MR VALLY: You see, we only have one "verkope" list that we have. I assume that simply because we have this list covering the period 19th of March 1989 to 21st of October 1989, that there may be many other lists, with many other deliveries, is - the items listed here, would that be just a minority of the total amount of substances produced by you?

MR ODENDAL: You see, Dr Immelman had in his large safe in his office, he had a small bar-room fridge in which he kept all these freeze-dried cultures, so it was not really possible to - we weren't geared to produce large quantities and we were not geared to hold large quantities of these organisms, so it didn't mean that we went into a large-scale production of these organisms to ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: The point I'm making is very simple, this shopping list starts on the 19th of March 1989 and goes on to the 11th of October '89. You started in '87. There would have been many more items produced from '87 to February '98, and subsequently from mid October '89 till towards the end of 1993. Is that a factually correct statement to make?

MR ODENDAL: No, I don't think so. I think we did not continuously produce these organisms, for the simple reason, it takes quite a time to produce them, and we were also involved in many other projects, so I think, you know, in all fairness, we did not - this was not the only type of work we were involved in. This was only a very small portion of our activities.

MR VALLY: Let's go on to another issue, is the treatment for Anthrax if someone has been infected by Anthrax, is the treatment - a person being treated by antibiotics, is that how you would treat it?

MR ODENDAL: There's only one antibiotic which will have guaranteed efficiency, and that would be penicillin.

MR VALLY: Right, so when you were trying to develop an antibiotic resistant Anthrax, were you trying to ensure there was no treatment for the Anthrax?

MR ODENDAL: Well, that could have been the one. The other reason is that we wanted to see if those strains could be induced because that would be one of the first things that we would treat with, and if we don't find any obvious effect, you know, what could the possible causes be. So, if we make a diagnoses of Anthrax in the laboratory, one of the cultural characteristics of this organism is it's susceptibility to penicillin.

MR VALLY: We've passed this stage about the defensive side. Once you've started putting Anthrax on cigarettes it was a different ball game, it wasn't a test situation any longer. Where you trying to produce a culture which was not treatable?

MR ODENDAL: Well, it goes both ways, yes.

MR VALLY: You carried out various tests and if you look at your documents, I'm trying to get through them quickly, so I won't go through them all, but if you look at documents 98 - Anthrax, 99 - Brucella, 100 - Cholera, 101 - typhoid, 102 - para-typhoid, sorry can you just quickly tell us the difference between para-typhoid and typhoid?

MR ODENDAL: Well, I think the typhoid is more specific - typhoid affects humans more specifically, whereas Typhemorium is a cross species type organism. It can infect cattle, sheep, humans, chickens ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: I see, so it goes in animals.

MR ODENDAL: Yes and typhoid is more restricted to humans.

MR VALLY: And the first item you talked about, is it - can the disease be spread from animals to humans and vice versa?

MR ODENDAL: Typhemorium, yes. It's ...(indistinct)

MR VALLY: Were you also responsible for paraoxon?

MR ODENDAL: No.

MR VALLY: Alright, if you look at - let's talk about Brucella, document 99. Now, this kind of report, was this done by you?

MR ODENDAL: Yes, with each batch of organisms I produced I had to supply sort of a list of instructions and of safety precautions that had to be taken when this organism was handled.

MR VALLY: Fine, and this was done for all these items I've mentioned?

MR ODENDAL: Yes, that's correct.

MR VALLY: You had in there, if you look at 2.5 of 99, TRC 99, do you have it in front of you?

MR ODENDAL: Yes.

MR VALLY: "Any liquid which is suitable for

oral intake will be suitable for the

suspension of the organisms. 5 -

10ml will be sufficient."

Sufficient for what?

MR ODENDAL: To suspend the organisms into a suspension, to dissolve the freeze-dried clot or little pellet that you have in the container.

MR VALLY: Fine, and then you go on, "this includes water, milk, etc". You envisaged that it would be reconstituted in items other that just water?

MR ODENDAL: Yes.

MR VALLY: I submit to you that that's possibly because you wanted to put it in items other than water.

MR ODENDAL: Well, that's possible, yes.

MR VALLY: If you look at 2.11 it gives you the symptoms if you are infected with it, so you could determine which poisons were more effective and which ones were not?

MR ODENDAL: Mr Chairman, I'm not sure if I understand you correctly. We did not, you know, infect humans or animals with these organisms. I just prepared them and put them in a bottle and I put in all the literature, all the information I thought necessary to ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: Alright, sorry, I withdraw that question. Look at 2.7, sorry, I'm trying to rush, you're talking about dosage, dosage for what?

MR ODENDAL: That would mean if you had to ingest that amount of organisms you will get sick.

MR VALLY: So, sick or more serious than just sick?

MR DU PLESSIS: You see it all depends, I don't think the actual dose has been established for humans.

MR VALLY: Well, look, go one back.

MR ODENDAL: So, it will basically on my part it will be speculation if I had to tell you, now this will cause disease, hopefully it will, hopefully, you know, ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: Hopefully it will.

MR ODENDAL: Yes, depending on the type of action you

intended it for.

MR VALLY: Let's go one back, to TRC 98. Look at 1.7 there.

Look at the second paragraph, this deals with the Anthracite,

"one drop of this taken in all over is a fatal dose and

will be approximately 10 to the power 8, or contain

10 to the power 8 organism."

In a lot of these items you were in a position to determine what dosage would be deadly.

MR ODENDAL: Well, that was speculation. I can assure you ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: But this is what you say here, a fatal dose. You were just speculating?

MR ODENDAL: Because that was the concentration I had in the vile.

MR VALLY: And you do that with a lot of these items?

MR ODENDAL: Yes.

MR VALLY: Alright, now ...(intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: Excuse me, Mr Valley, I'm very sorry, but what do you mean by this? It's a speculation to say each drop of this if it is taken, is a deadly dosage, what do you mean by that?

MR ODENDAL: Strictly speaking, if you ingest one spore or one organism, that may also be deadly. If it goes into your intestinal canal and if it is absorbed, specifically through an ulcer, or a broken part of your intestinal muculical membrane, then strictly speaking, one spore will also be deadly, because it will enter the body and it will multiply and multiply and the incubation period will only be a bit longer. So, I assumed that if you ingest this 10 to the power 8 organism, I assume that it will be deadly, because it's a lot of organisms.

MR VALLY: Were you specifically asked by any person to determine what would be the fatal doses?

MR ODENDAL: Well, I was asked to include this information leaflet, or to make it as complete as possible for the simple reason is that this was part of our - of a request we had from the Defence Force that we must include all the information, including the dosages and all the information, well, I could say all the relevant information.

MR VALLY: Who specifically asked you to determine what doses of these items would be deadly?

MR ODENDAL: Dr Immelman, let me put it to you this way, he asked for all the - he requested me to put in all the information, but again, you know, I would like to re-iterate we did not test or do any tests apart form the mouse test, that was the only laboratory test we did on Anthrax.

MR VALLY: And all the baboons and dogs and the chimpanzee you had besides, I'm not talking about field farm, I'm talking about the baboons and the chimpanzee and the dogs that you had for experimentation purposes at RRL, where they never used on those animals?

MR ODENDAL: No, I did not have - well, although I had access, I could have had access to the experimental animals if I wished, but I did not use experimental animals to test the efficiency or the doses of these bugs.

MR VALLY: What was the role of Dr Wouter Basson in the work you were doing?

MR ODENDAL: Dr Wouter Basson was our main contact with the Defence Force. He visited us once a year I saw him and he would come along to us and he would discuss certain things, projects they were interested in, and we had to make - we had to submit all our projects to him and he would decide which of those projects he was interested in for funding, from the Defence Force.

MR VALLY: What did Dr Wouter Basson know about your project?

MR ODENDAL: That's difficult to say, I'm not sure.

MR VALLY: When you met with him once a year, did he indicate that he was aware that you were making these items?

MR ODENDAL: Yes, he was aware, and I think he also knew that these organisms are basis standard organisms that are used by all the countries involved in biological warfare.

MR VALLY: Yes, but specifically he had knowledge you were making these items at Roodeplaat?

MR ODENDAL: Yes.

MR VALLY: What did General Knobel know about your project?

MR ODENDAL: Mr Chairman, you'll have to excuse me, I did not know Dr Knobel, I did not meet him, I honestly, I cannot answer this question.

MR VALLY: These documents, 98, 99, etc, dealing the Anthrax, Brucella, Cholera, Typhoid, Bella-typhoid, Botulism, were all these items, these reports submitted to the Defence Force?

MR ODENDAL: Yes.

MR VALLY: And who would they have gone to?

MR ODENDAL: Well, I submitted my report to Dr Immelman, and I presume he gave them to Wouter Basson, but I never saw those reports again, and I never heard anything about those organisms either. So what happened after that, after I gave it to Dr Immelman, I really don't know.

MR VALLY: Dr Odendal, you worked together with Dr Immelman for a long time, how many hears?

MR ODENDAL: Let's say 8? years while I was a Roodeplaat.

MR VALLY: He tells you, and I assume you socialised with him also?

MR ODENDAL: Yes.

MR VALLY: He orders 16 bottles of Cholera. Surely at some point you said, what did you call him, whatever, Dr Immelman, that is a large quantity you asked me to produce, yesterday, what did you do with it by the way? Surely you must have asked him?

MR ODENDAL: I did not ask him the Cholera, but I did ask him about the Salmonella.

MR VALLY: And what did he say?

MR ODENDAL: Well, he gave me some - that was the only incident where I had some feedback, where he told me that they used it in sugar to disrupt an ANC meeting.

MR VALLY: Where was this?

MR ODENDAL: I'm not sure. I presume it was in Johannesburg, Soweto, some or other place. He didn't elaborate on that occasion.

MR VALLY: And when was this?

MR ODENDAL: It's difficult, I have to make a wild guess, but it would be '89/'88, I'm not sure.

MR VALLY: Are you aware of whether anyone suffered any illnesses as a result of this?

MR ODENDAL: Well, apparently they became very ill, but no-one died.

MR VALLY: You didn't make any informal enquiries about any of the other items you produced?

MR ODENDAL: Well, they couldn't tell me, and even, I don't think - even if he wanted to, he couldn't tell me because ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: Did you ask?

MR ODENDAL: Yes, because ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: And what did he say?

MR ODENDAL: He told me he doesn't know.

MR VALLY: Did he say what he did with it?

MR ODENDAL: Well, he told me he gave them to the Defence Force and what happened to that he didn't know and he couldn't tell me.

MR VALLY: Did you feel free to leave your job at RRL, or did you feel threatened that you'd be killed if you left?

MR ODENDAL: At the time we left, it was rather a tumultuous time because a month after I left, the whole company collapsed and I think everything collapsed, and it was liquidated a short while after that and no, I didn't - by that time another Managing Director had taken over for the previous 18 months.

MR VALLY: Did you feel in fear of your life if you felt like leaving before that?

MR ODENDAL: No.

MR VALLY: My very last question, did Dr Immelman ever indicate to you what he did with these substances, who he gave them to?

MR ODENDAL: No, he didn't. He only identified them as operatives, agents ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: And what did you understand by that?

MR ODENDAL: Well, I understood covert operations.

MR VALLY: Did you know specifically which branch?

MR ODENDAL: No.

MR VALLY: You saw them as state agents?

MR ODENDAL: Yes.

MR VALLY: And that's all you knew about it?

MR ODENDAL: Yes.

MR VALLY: Did he mention CCB?

MR ODENDAL: No.

MR VALLY: Did he mention Special Forces?

MR ODENDAL: No.

MR VALLY: Thank you, Dr Odendal.

CHAIRPERSON: Dr Wendy Orr?

DR ORR: Dr Odendal, when you were asked to contaminate five cigarettes with Anthrax and told that they were going to be used to test filters which Dr Jan Lourens was making, did you honestly believe that?

MR ODENDAL: You must remember at that stage, you know, it was sometimes difficult to believe what you were told, so - and we were also in a situation at that stage that I was brought to the understanding that they were to be used across the borders to disrupt, let's say an army camp, or whatever the case is, or to remove some people in neighbouring countries. You know, I sort of realised that could have been the possibility, or the alternative possibility.

DR ORR: I imagine if you were asked to contaminate one cigarette in a packet in five different packets, it was hardly for mass use in a camp, it sounds more to me as if was for use against particular individuals who were going to be given those cigarettes. Would you accept that?

MR ODENDAL: Yes.

CHAIRPERSON: Dr Randera?

DR RANDERA: Dr Odendal, I just want to first of all perhaps rapport when you spoke about some of the bacteria and the effects, the impression I got was that when you spoke about gastro enteritis for example, that it was just a fairly mild condition, I think we need to be aware that two million child die in our continent every year from gastro, and also as far as I'm aware still, it's the major cause of mortality, infant mortality in South Africa to this day. When we talk about gastro, it's not just some mild condition, it can responsible for severe immobility as well as mortality. I hope you agree with that.

MR ODENDAL: Yes, no, certainly.

DR RANDERA: Dr, you know, in the last two days we've been trying, I suppose part of our responsibility is to understand what the responsibility of scientists is, where does it begin, where does it stop. In your - in this particular case, I just want to ask, clearly what I'm understanding from you is that this differentiation between defensive and offensive was purely academic really. On the one side perhaps you were developing this bacteria to understand what treatment modalities can come out of it in a war situation, but on the other side, you were handing over cultures with toxins that could kill to, in this situation, to Dr Immelman, and you really don't know to this day what actually happened to those cultures? Earlier on when you were asked that question, you said that when the freeze-dry bacteria, that they can survive from a few days to several years. So am I right in assuming, given that you don't know, you know that you put it into a bar-fridge into Dr Immelmann?s safe at one stage, but beyond that you don't know what happened to these cultures?

MR ODENDAL: Well, perhaps I can latch on to what Dr Schalk van Rensburg said, I know at some stage when there was a scare that someone was going to come and inspect the place, a lot of specimens were destroyed, but I had no control over that, and I think the only person that would be able to answer you correctly on this matter would be Dr Immelman himself.

DR RANDERA: But it comes back to my original point, was is the responsibility of scientists like yourself, I mean in retrospect now, what would you recommend so that these situations don't arise again?

MR ODENDAL: I think in retrospect many things could be decided on, and I think this is something that I will certainly apply to myself and I think that hopefully such a situation will never prevail again in this country that it would be necessary for any scientist to do the same sort of work that has been done. I don't think - I think your ideas change over the time, and as you get a bit older, I think you get a bit wiser, and I think even my ideas have changed of the number of years. So I would agree with you that I think one can certainly look into that and change your ideas. But I think you must remember one thing, and this - we did not - the majority of our time we spent on more productive projects, and I think that a lot of good work came from our efforts at this laboratory. We were responsible for a Bovine vaccine, which has been registered at Onderstepoort. We've done a lot of, let's say defensive type of work as well, you know I would say in our case, I think Dr Schalk van Rensburg quoted 66% were toxic, by that was for the toxicology people. In our case it was just the complete opposite. I can show you my project lists where at least a third of the projects we did were so-called hard projects, and the other projects were soft projects and commercial, with a commercial implication. So I think to a certain extent we were not satisfied with the type of management at Roodeplaat. We did, I've got documents to state my point, that we did not like the way we were being managed, and we did make efforts to rectify the matter, but that wasn't really to any avail. But nevertheless, I think more good eventually on the whole more good came out of the whole venture that the bad things. Bad things were wrong, I will not, I will agree to that and for that I am very sorry and I think I will, if this is the reason for this Commission then I would, that's why I'm here to - because I wouldn't like to see this happen again.

DR RANDERA: Well, unfortunately it's the duty of this Commission to look into the bad things that were done, but I'm sure UNESCO would look at the other things, the good things that were done, you might even be considered for an award, but our duty is to the little that was done, even if it was 10% of the whole work that was done, it ought not to have been done. We'd have been pleased if 100% of your time had been spent on good things, because the 10% of the time that was spent on these sort of things, you know, blots entirely even the good work that was done. I'm sure you appreciate that.

CHAIRPERSON: That seems to bring us to the end of our questions today. We shall adjourn until, well Hanif has some ideas, could you meet at 08h30 and we start at 09h00.

MR VALLY: 08h30 or 09h00 is fine by us, Mr Chair. 08h30 would suite us. I just want to ask that if we could just ask the attorneys to remain behind, legal representatives rather, once we adjourn, just to arrange the rest of the programme in view of potential court challenges, so we understand when the challenges will be brought, and as well as arranging our schedule accordingly. By this I mean we can tell people to be on standby so that we don't waste any time.

CHAIRPERSON: And of course you'll remember that one of the arrangements that you should possible be looking at is how much time each witness is going to be given.

MR VALLY: Certainly.

CHAIRPERSON: 08h30 tomorrow morning.

ADV POTGIETER: Mr Chairman, may this witness be excused please?

CHAIRPERSON: I would assume so. Mr van Zyl, you ...(intervention)

MR VAN ZYL: I've got no questions, thank you, Mr Chair.

CHAIRPERSON: You are excused Dr Odendal.

HEARING ADJOURNS

ON RESUMPTION ON 10 JUNE 1998

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you. If we can arrange now to start, ladies and gentlemen. Mr Chaskalson, I take it that we are doing the cross-examination of Dr Van Rensburg.

MR CHASKALSON: That is how I understand proceedings. I am afraid that Mr Vally is slightly late this morning, but the agreement as I understand it from last night is, we would deal with this issue first and then from there, there may be - we would like ...

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Vally is here.

MR CHASKALSON: I shall change chairs.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Vally, I take it that Dr Van Rensburg is on for cross-examination at this stage?

MR VALLY: That is correct.

CHAIRPERSON: Dr Van Rensburg, I only need to remind you that you are still under oath.

SCHALK VAN RENSBURG: (still under oath)

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Van Zyl, are you going to start the ball rolling?

MR VAN ZYL: Mr Chairman, I am ready to continue. Mr Chairman, before I start with the cross-examination, I want to place certain aspects on record.

There is a great number of aspects which my clients, and I refer specifically to Dr Swanepoel which places him in dispute, but after consultation, we are of the view that many of the disputes are related to your work.

I am not going to address all aspects and just refer to certain points. I am just mentioning it so it wouldn't leave the impression that many things are not in dispute. Many aspects are placed in dispute, but they will not be addressed during cross-examination.

Dr Van Rensburg, I don't have clarity regarding exactly what your function was at RRL. Can you give us a description of exactly what your function was and to answer the question, I want to give you two clues from your evidence yesterday.

You said that you were involved in only one project, that was the fertility project and that at a certain stage, you said that what you did during your time at RRL and your words were, to higher the level of science, in other words the level of scientific research was increased. In the light of that evidence, can you tell us what your exact functions were?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Mr Chairman, my job descriptions are available, I can give that to you. My function is Director of Laboratory Services, was primarily to help design, create, equip, staff, laboratories, to introduce, help introduce technology, to appoint, select and appoint staff and to administer the running of these laboratories.

The job changed with time from being Director of Laboratory Services. Later about two thirds way through the life-span of Roodeplaat, my job was changed to Director of the Animal Centre. In other words I had nothing to do with the laboratories.

The last eight months of my work at Roodeplaat, I was demoted to Scientific Advisor and that is - my function there was particularly concerned the final reporting and quality of research work.

Does that answer your question?

MR VAN ZYL: If I understand you correctly Dr Van Rensburg, you were not involved in the research or the scientific work regarding the hard projects, you were not involved in those.

Those were the chemical or biological warfare research being done, you were not involved in that.

DR VAN RENSBURG: I had to provide the facilities, the staff, certain technology, maintain the laboratories. These laboratories were used almost in an identical manner for both commercial research and for hard work, shall we call it that. In that way, most certainly I did indirectly contribute to hard work and that is the basis for my amnesty application.

MR VAN ZYL: Did you apply for amnesty? Do you have it available here?

DR VAN RENSBURG: I have it available, yes.

MR VAN ZYL: The essence of my question regarding what your exact work was, should you receive an instruction that a certain organism had to be evaluated and analysed for the purposes of biological warfare, you would not be involved in the physical work and research but you indirectly rendered assistance, you didn't do the exact work?

It appears to me and you were here yesterday when Dr Mike Odendal testified that he was the scientist involved in the research and doing the work.

The so-called need to know principle was applied strictly?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Especially the lower the level, the stronger it became.

MR VAN ZYL: What do you mean by that?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Directors for example, leaked a little bit more information to one another. Those were for two reasons, because you had to have for management purposes, know what was going on. And then secondly, we were a small group.

There were many meetings, almost every day and the Directors and the management got together at some or other stage.

MR VAN ZYL: Certainly the detail of research was not discussed there?

DR VAN RENSBURG: No.

MR VAN ZYL: In other words what exactly was asked to be done by the Defence Force, the detail of that would not be discussed during those meetings, it was only the daily management of the company being discussed there?

DR VAN RENSBURG: That is correct.

MR VAN ZYL: Receiving instructions, yesterday you testified that you received no instruction at any stage to do any specific research or for any specific project.

DR VAN RENSBURG: No, that is not correct, I did receive instructions for the infertility project.

MR VAN ZYL: Let's forget about the infertility project.

DR VAN RENSBURG: Further in my presence, usually in small groups, the need for a substance which could stimulate a disease is not traceable easily, but it was not directly given to me, it was discussed in small groups, for example to Dr Odendal.

I just happened to be there, it was not addressed to me specifically.

MR VAN ZYL: This fact that such a request was put to you and it was disturbing to you?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Right in the beginning it was disturbing, but I became used to that and I accepted the situation at that institution.

MR VAN ZYL: And that was the kind of research in which you would not become involve, it would once again be done by Dr Odendal or somebody else?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Yes, I was not directly involved.

MR VAN ZYL: Taking into consideration the strong need to know principle, I find it very strange that if such a substance was required, but your evidence seems strange that this substance which you were looking for, if a need to know principle was applied, it would be within that realm, but I think it was done informally during discussions, that that demand was made.

DR VAN RENSBURG: Mr Chairman, yesterday I outlined the procedure of projects. A verbal instruction would come to the research worker, right. That is the need to know principle.

The research worker comes back with a written proposal, protocol. That would go to Andr? Immelman, who himself would get the project into an acceptable form for him. It would then if it involved animals, serve at the Ethics, the Animal Ethics Committee. Every project using animals, had to be approved by the Animal Ethics Committee, otherwise it could not proceed.

It is there that I would on a need to know principle, see a lot of the hard projects.

MR VAN ZYL: I understand that, Dr Van Rensburg, if research had to be done on organism X and animals were involved, that had to be put to you, but the purpose for which it was demanded, was something different.

I could ask you to do research about X, Y and Z, but the reason for this research does not have to be conveyed to you. This is the problem that I have, you said there was a very strong need to know basis, now a request was made for an agent as you have described. This is mentioned informally during discussion, where you were present and it is also mentioned in your presence, although you did not have to do the research?

DR VAN RENSBURG: I had to provide facilities for that research work to be done, and in that regard, I was involved.

MR VAN ZYL: The problem that I have remains, Dr Van Rensburg, they could tell you research had to be done on X, Y and Z, it was not necessary for them to tell you what the reason for that research was, then still you were able to provide in the requirements of the scientists, but it was not necessary for them to tell you we are looking for an agent who could make somebody who dies, death appear like an accident, it wasn't necessary to do that?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Mr Chairman, yes, I agree one hundred percent, it is not necessary that I should know, it is not necessary that I will be told, it wasn't me to control the words out of Dr Basson's mouth, he volunteered it, he told me. I never asked, there is no such thing as daring to ask the purpose of anything like this.

It is entirely information volunteered by Dr Basson and he was quite chatty, too much so from a security point of view.

MR VAN ZYL: When you initially became an employee of RRL, you were certainly told or was any reason given why this need to know principle, had to be adhered to for security reasons? Was that told to you?

DR VAN RENSBURG: The specific reason was not given.

MR VAN ZYL: Was that an internal requirement of the company or was it a requirement from your clients' side or from the Defence Force?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Those were guidelines from the so-called Army or the so-called shareholders.

MR VAN ZYL: You also testified yesterday that you were initially sceptical about this project when you were approached, and that you wanted to think about it and that you had to clear it out with yourself, that a modern Defence Force had to have this kind of information which had to be researched.

Then furthermore you added, if I understood you correctly, and your words were "if you don't know the dirty tricks, you can't avoid them"?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Right.

MR VAN ZYL: Do I understand by that that it was necessary for a Defence Force to protect itself against counter-biological warfare, that research had to be done for those agents and that tests had to be executed on equipment which could be used to protect the Army.

DR VAN RENSBURG: That is largely correct Mr Chairman, I accept that all modern Armies have a covert capability. The capability I am referring to is they have knowledge of the dirty tricks.

You can quite easily procure very think manuals on this thing, emanating from Russia for instance. That will give you ninety percent of all the known dirty tricks in the world.

You must be aware of what the enemy is possibly doing if you have actual outbreaks of probable covert actions against your own troops, as we did have in Angola. You should be knowledgeable enough to go in there, see the symptoms, make a guess, get the forensic examinations of the (indistinct) if there are any, to be able to sample the environment, the food they ate, the water source. You must come back to the laboratory, you must take a guess, there guys were given Thallium or Botulism or whatever, you must have the apparatus ready, you must have reference substance ready to measure, to calibrate your instruments so that you can detect minute amounts in tissues or food or whatever.

If you know what the enemy is doing, it is always a great shock if the enemy knows that you know. If the enemy knows that you don't know, they will only proliferate these tricks.

MR VAN ZYL: Dr Van Rensburg, it is only logical just to know, doesn't help at all, the most important thing is to protect yourself. It is useless to read all the literature, do all the research but the day they attack me, I can't do anything, I have to protect myself.

DR VAN RENSBURG: I accept that retaliation against foreign enemies, in certain circumstances is certainly justified, that I do accept, foreign enemies.

But the question is did we not have enough repressive laws to control our own people, why do you have to kill them?

MR VAN ZYL: I am not referring to any specific person, I am referring to the principle. The principle regarding chemical and biological warfare, as I understand it, and you can differ from me, which sounds logical is an analysis which is done of what that capabilities of the other country is who could use it against you to go and evaluate those, and put defend mechanisms in place, should it happen again.

This is the end result which you want to achieve?

DR VAN RENSBURG: That is correct.

MR VAN ZYL: So you agree that the research by itself was not important, but also the necessary evaluation of for example protective clothing against the specific agents to see whether you can protect yourself?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Mr Chairman, over the years I repeatedly confronted Dr Wynand Swanepoel about why do we not do protective work against covert or conventional warfare.

The end, particularly when we were desperate for contracts to put the budget up, I pushed him hard on this point again and he said to me equivocally, that is not Roodeplaat's brief. All defensive work is done elsewhere.

MR VAN ZYL: What you are actually saying is that these tests were not done at RRL, it could have been done somewhere else, you did not know about it, was that possible?

DR VAN RENSBURG: That is correct. Later on I heard, we heard yesterday that it was done somewhere else.

MR VAN ZYL: The fact of the matter is according to what was told to you, that it was done, but not at Roodeplaat?

DR VAN RENSBURG: It was never told to me that it had been done or it was being done. It was only early in 1991 that Dr Swanepoel answered me clearly and put it to me that it is not our reference. This is not our work, to do defensive work.

It was round about, early, very early 1991 was the first time I knew that it was not our brief to do defensive work.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Van Zyl, I don't want to - I just want to indicate that somehow your instructions must come out in the sort of cross-examination.

You know that in the procedures that we have adopted in these hearings, that there is always a very limited time for cross-examination as such.

MR VAN ZYL: I accept that Mr Chairman. When I have gone through the aspects that I would like to deal with, I am going to put the version of my client.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes.

MR VAN ZYL: Thank you. I also want to put it to you Dr Van Rensburg, that amongst others the protective clothing which was used during the Gulf War when chemical weapons and when CBW was involved and it came from South Africa and it was found that it was of the best in the world. Do you have any comment on that?

DR VAN RENSBURG: I am proud of the achievements of Protechnic, I never knew, it is the first I've heard of that.

MR VAN ZYL: Regarding the fertility programme, did that project ever come off the ground, for example that the end result was achieved or wasn't it taken any further because of problems?

DR VAN RENSBURG: The fertility project progressed very well almost ahead of schedule, if one looks at any normal developmental project.

It of course is a far more complex project than the people who instructed us to do it, realised as is often the case. The products which theoretically should work, were made while I was still there, and shortly before I left, they were given to baboons. What happened after that, I have no knowledge of.

MR VAN ZYL: Are you saying that that project was still going on when you left Roodeplaat?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Yes, it was still going on.

MR VAN ZYL: But the point I want to make is that the end result, that which could be used physically at the end of the day, to achieve birth control, you did not achieve that result?

DR VAN RENSBURG: No, that was still far ahead in the future.

MR VAN ZYL: But then it would have been ridiculous for Dr Swanepoel to ask you continuously give me some of this agent because you still haven't received the end result? How would he be able to do that?

DR VAN RENSBURG: He did not have insight in that specific research.

MR VAN ZYL: Did you tell him Dr Swanepoel, it is going to take still years, we still haven't achieved our goal. He knew very well that that was a project which theoretically could work. He knew it had not been tested. We repeatedly told him we can't give this agent to you, it hasn't been tested.

We don't know whether it was safe.

MR VAN ZYL: You weren't able to test it because you haven't had a product?

DR VAN RENSBURG: We did produce an agent which was given to baboons.

MR VAN ZYL: But you didn't know whether it was working?

DR VAN RENSBURG: No, I didn't know. I left before that result became available. It would take about two, three years to do that type of research.

MR VAN ZYL: You said yesterday that Dr Swanepoel nagged you to make this product available, but you did not have a product to make available.

DR VAN RENSBURG: Mr Chairman, I do not agree that I used the word harassed. That is the word that you used, that is my note, Wynand Swanepoel harassed me to release it. That is the word that you used yesterday.

DR VAN RENSBURG: What happened is he came and he asked me and I told him we can't release it because it has not been tested yet.

He kept back coming and saying release it, don't worry about the safety tests. You can interpret it, I may be incorrect using the word harassed.

May I alter that to firmly requested.

MR VAN ZYL: You also said that you would give him something else, in the sense that the actual product would be diluted, so it would not have the effect that you wanted to achieve, but you couldn't do it because you didn't have the product?

DR VAN RENSBURG: It was very easy to do that. What we do is we take a hormone from the shelf, you can buy it from the shelf, for example human chorionic letrophy, that is a hormone which is produced by the conceptors. That hormone has to be attached to proteins which could achieve humanilogical response.

But it is easy to take that hormone from the shelf.

MR VAN ZYL: What I am putting to you is Dr Van Rensburg, the essence of your evidence as I understood it, tell me whether I am wrong, then I will leave it, that you did have this project and at a certain stage, you certainly realised I am going to give it to you when he keeps on asking for it, but I would dilute it.

DR VAN RENSBURG: No, I won't dilute it. The product which we were preparing, would not be made available to use on people.

It was an agreement between the researchers and you are not going to inoculate somebody with an agent who hasn't been tested for safety. Everything, he put everything, even your life in danger, and he firmly demanded that.

I thought that I could perhaps provide them with something, pretending to be the real product. That is unethical, it is also unethical to inject sterile water, but it is also unethical to inject a product which could cause a great deal of damage.

MR VAN ZYL: You have talked about instructions being received from various people, and this morning you told the Commission that you received instruction regarding the infertility project and also this agent, which was not traceable, you were present when that was said?

DR VAN RENSBURG: That is correct.

MR VAN ZYL: I understand that it was not necessarily an instruction, but we leave it there. Any other instruction for any other research? Can you tell us who gave you which instructions regarding which projects? Are you able to do that, to answer that?

DR VAN RENSBURG: This is a very vague and a very wide question.

MR VAN ZYL: What I am asking you, let's put it differently. Yesterday you said instructions were received from Wynand Swanepoel, Wouter Basson and Andr? Immelman. What I am asking you is, can you tell us which instructions were given by which of those people, regarding which projects, or isn't it possible?

DR VAN RENSBURG: No, it is not possible, I was not present there. Those were only deductions I made from the little bit I heard there, here and there.

MR VAN ZYL: Reports which were compiled after research had been completed, research results, do you know whether Dr Swanepoel received any research reports?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Dr Swanepoel was not on the Project Committee where we handled that officially. Those reports were kept by Dr Immelman. He and Dr Swanepoel co-operated, worked together, but my answer is no, I can't confirm that Dr Swanepoel had access to those reports.

MR VAN ZYL: Did you know any members of the CCB while you were working at Roodeplaat?

DR VAN RENSBURG: I obviously personally didn't know any, I did meet one. At one stage round about 1989 the Managing Director Swanepoel, organised a team building session weekend at a camp, on a farm in Heidelberg.

At this farm, it turned out to be a farm which was used extensively by the Police. They had camping facilities there, they had a shooting range and on this farm they entertained us, we had a big braai in the evening, and in the morning they put out lots of cases of ammunition and rows of weapons and we had great fun, shooting off AK47's, Uzi's, all sorts of things.

At this farm, I personally met Dr Swanepoel with Slang van Zyl and I think Staal Burger was also there.

MR VAN ZYL: Did you see any of those people at RRL?

DR VAN RENSBURG: No, never.

MR VAN ZYL: Can you confirm today that members of the CCB were seen at RRL?

DR VAN RENSBURG: No, never ever. It never happened that they came there.

MR VAN ZYL: Did you see any members of the Special Forces there at RRL?

DR VAN RENSBURG: When Philip Mijburgh was still in the Special Forces, he came there.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Van Zyl, again I don't want to be unfair to you. I again have to say that cross-examination at this sort of hearings is unfortunately a limited one, and a controlled one. It is for various reasons, I can mention them, because there are other opportunities for people who are implicated or who are affected to their detriment, by evidence that might be led.

When it comes to finding, there would be another opportunity for instance, for further representations to be made. I would suggest, because I believe there are procedures for hearings that have been circulated, I would suggest without telling Counsel how they should put their questions to witnesses, that the aim should be to put a version or to contest a version that was given by a witness.

It is on the table. I am torn you know, on the (indistinct) dilemma here because I don't want to be unfair to Counsel, but at the same time, I want to give proper meaning to limited cross-examination. So, for instance, I have to get an indication from you, how long you are going to be with the witness?

MR VAN ZYL: Mr Chairman, I am halfway through my cross-examination.

CHAIRPERSON: For instance, are you going to be longer than 15 minutes?

MR VAN ZYL: 15 to 20 minutes.

CHAIRPERSON: Let's see how far we will go.

MR VAN ZYL: Okay Mr Chairman. You said you saw Dr Philip Mijburgh there?

DR VAN RENSBURG: During those early years he came here regularly, while he was still a member of Special Forces.

MR VAN ZYL: When was that?

DR VAN RENSBURG: The second half of 1984 and the beginning of 1985.

MR VAN ZYL: When did you start working at RRL?

DR VAN RENSBURG: The 1st of August, 1984.

MR VAN ZYL: Are you aware that Dr Mijburgh was involved in the CBW project?

DR VAN RENSBURG: I was not aware of his direct involvement, but at a later stage he became involved with Delta G. I thought he was involved in conventional warfare.

MR VAN ZYL: Dr Swanepoel denies that there were any projects being done for, as you called them, Special Forces, the CCB or the Police?

DR VAN RENSBURG: I regarded Dr Basson as a member of the Special Forces.

MR VAN ZYL: Is it not correct that the client was the Defence Force? It could be that a member of the Special Forces or the Air Force could have been the contact person, but the Defence Force was the client, not Special Forces?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Yes. The exact military structure, I am not very clued up on that, but the actual involvement of the Surgeon General with Special Forces. At a stage I understood that they were part of him. I don't know whether that was his total sector.

MR VAN ZYL: I can put it to you Dr Van Rensburg, that Special Forces and the Surgeon General, didn't have anything to do with one another. The Surgeon General is not the Commanding Officer of the Special Forces.

DR VAN RENSBURG: I stand corrected Mr Chairman.

MR VAN ZYL: Regarding your evidence that Special Forces were the clients and on whose requirements certain things were prepared, that was not correct because you made a mistake in that regard?

DR VAN RENSBURG: It is correct but I want to add that Dr Basson referred to the cowardly Special Forces. They didn't want to undertake operations, because they said that was murder, can you believe it. That is how he talked about Special Forces, but I could be wrong.

MR VAN ZYL: Yesterday they referred you to a document, TRC 52, it is that sales list you have referred to. Somebody mentioned the name, yesterday you testified - when did you for the first time see this document?

DR VAN RENSBURG: In my TRC 52, in my lawyer's office about three weeks ago.

MR VAN ZYL: So before that, you didn't know about the existence of this document?

DR VAN RENSBURG: I said I knew that there were certain sales lists. Sometimes when we ...

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Van Zyl, excuse me, can I just request, people who have brought newspapers into this hearings, if they can either elect to be here and listen to the proceeding because I think that is what they have come to do, or if they want to read newspapers, to go and read them elsewhere.

Our attention is being distracted by the (indistinct) of newspapers, it is just not in keeping with the decorum that must be accorded to this proceedings. Thank you Mr Van Zyl, you will get a further minute in your cross-examination.

DR VAN RENSBURG: I mentioned yesterday that I was aware of these lists because at one particular time I can remember, Andr? had given I think Dr Swanepoel something and he said remember to put it on the list.

The other times he mentioned these lists, I got the impression and it might be a wrong deduction, that he used these lists to motivate for equipment and to justify to his bosses that Roodeplaat was doing its job. That is the deduction I made.

MR VAN ZYL: Let us focus our attention on this document, TRC 52. You have never seen this document before, until recently and you were not aware of its existence.

DR VAN RENSBURG: I want to make a correction, this document was shown to me by the Attorney General long before I saw it for the first time.

MR VAN ZYL: When was that?

DR VAN RENSBURG: And then I also saw it in this building.

MR VAN ZYL: Let's put it differently, the time when you were working at RRL, were you aware of the existence of this document?

DR VAN RENSBURG: I was aware of the existence of this document, but I never saw it.

MR VAN ZYL: This document TRC 52, can you say unequivocally that what was mentioned was this document, I am not talking about other sales lists, I am talking about the document before you, TRC 52. Can you say today under oath that you were aware of this document, you heard discussions regarding this specific document?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Mr Chairman, I can't say it was this specific one, but I knew it was the practise to keep lists of sales of products issued.

MR VAN ZYL: Mr Odendal or Dr Odendal testified yesterday that research being undertaken by him, was provided to Dr Andr? Immelman, his results from the research on these organisms, were provided to Dr Andr? Immelman and he had a small fridge in his office or next to his office and then he traded these organisms or gave it to somebody else or whatever?

DR VAN RENSBURG: I did not know about this little fridge, but I was never in that storage place where he kept those things.

MR VAN ZYL: The way of distributing these agents, you were not involved in the distribution of that?

DR VAN RENSBURG: No, I was not.

MR VAN ZYL: Dr Swanepoel will also testify that Gen Lothar Neethling as far as he can remember, during the time he was there, at RRL, only at one instance, came to RRL. His evidence that he came there regularly with a bulging briefcase is untrue, it is lies?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Lothar Neethling was there while gasses were being tested. He even came through these various gasses or the clouds. He even came there before the building was being erected.

My office was next to Dr Immelmann?s, and I saw Dr Neethling entering that building.

MR VAN ZYL: You mentioned two instances now?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Two I can definitely remember. I can't say whether it was one, or two or four, but as far as I can remember, I saw him there often.

I will agree that I can confirm that he came to visit the institute twice.

MR VAN ZYL: The rest is speculation?

DR VAN RENSBURG: The rest I can't testify about specifically.

MR VAN ZYL: Is it correct that Dr Swanepoel already in 1986 started his work at Roodeplaat?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Yes, I think it was 1986.

MR VAN ZYL: The privatisation idea, the project was executed initially like you have testified, that some of these front companies were privatised and they attempted to make them financially viable, so that they could continue. Do you know when that idea came about, that idea about privatisation?

DR VAN RENSBURG: It was explained in a document by Dr Knobel to a parliamentary committee who investigated this idea.

When these laboratories were established, it was decided that they wouldn't exist for ever. The Defence Force would use them for plus minus five years, until they have achieved their goals, then they would be scaled down, it would be privatised, and it would remain active on a lower level for about 20 years. That idea had been there always.

MR VAN ZYL: In these documents you are referring to, three phases were mentioned, a development phase, implementation phase and then the privatisation phase, but no time was attached to that. No time frames were attached, 1985 was the initial phase. The project was just being started?

DR VAN RENSBURG: The company was established in 1985.

MR VAN ZYL: If we refer to laboratories being built, that was still going on at that stage?

DR VAN RENSBURG: We moved in in the (indistinct) building in 1985.

MR VAN ZYL: If we refer to 1986, that was a year when this project was still in its baby shoes, but no mention was made of privatisation?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Mention was made yes, right from the start.

MR VAN ZYL: It was viewed as a possibility in the future, but the implementation of the privatisation phase, can we accept Dr Van Rensburg, was not mentioned, at that stage?

DR VAN RENSBURG: No specific plans, no.

MR VAN ZYL: You see you made the allegation during your evidence that Drs Mijburgh and Swanepoel were Managing Directors of front companies. You referred to Dr Basson's buddies because the privatisation was imminent, but it was far from that stage?

DR VAN RENSBURG: No, I don't agree. Mr Chairman, by 1986 it was clear to thinking people, that the life of the Apartheid regime was very limited, that they would have to do something.

MR VAN ZYL: I don't know what you answered now.

DR VAN RENSBURG: I answered that it was clear that the present arrangement would not be able to continue very long in 1986.

We could foresee that we would be getting a democratic government within the next three to ten years. As Dr Randera pointed out under evidence yesterday, from 1986 to 1988 or 1989, a state of emergency was declared twice. The war in Angola was at its worse or at its height.

So where these people who had that idea, got it, just they will know. There are people who knew the history.

MR VAN ZYL: Yesterday you also said that Dr Swanepoel created fraudulent documents and they stole my cut of R3 million that I should have got.

DR VAN RENSBURG: It would ultimately have been R3 million.

MR VAN ZYL: You also mentioned afterwards that you wanted it. Is that correct?

DR VAN RENSBURG: I said I do not want their dirty money, but I do not want fraudsters to be encouraged.

MR VAN ZYL: What you are saying is that the money that you were actually entitled to, that you knew from the beginning that this was dirty money, and you were not interested in this?

DR VAN RENSBURG: No, not at all. I made concerted efforts to recover those funds.

MR VAN ZYL: Amongst others, you initiated a court case?

DR VAN RENSBURG: They precipitated the court case, not I.

MR VAN ZYL: Was it not a matter of the fact that you were a claimant and that you were entitled to a certain amount of money?

DR VAN RENSBURG: These people were entitled to just grab their millions and then to dismiss the staff, and I was angry because of this because I had appointed these people.

More attempts had to be made to establish a permanent industry there. Mr Chairman, when they liquidated the company, I lodged an objection to the liquidation account, pointing out to the Master of the High Court that certain shares were not the property of the people who got the benefit of them.

May I finish the answer, it is important.

MR VAN ZYL: I do not know what question you want to answer, but continue.

DR VAN RENSBURG: You asked about the court case.

MR VAN ZYL: I asked whether you initiated the court case?

DR VAN RENSBURG: No, I did not.

MR VAN ZYL: And I asked you thereafter were you not a claimant in the liquidation of the company?

DR VAN RENSBURG: I am answering the first question, who started the court case.

MR VAN ZYL: You replied to that.

DR VAN RENSBURG: No, I am busy replying to that.

MR VAN ZYL: After that I asked you were you a claimant in the liquidation of the company. That was the next question.

DR VAN RENSBURG: Mr Chairman, may this gentleman give me a chance to finish the question, it is important, it is evidence that he doesn't want revealed.

MR VAN ZYL: Mr Chairman, with respect ...

CHAIRPERSON: Yes, please allow the witness to answer.

DR VAN RENSBURG: I lodged an objection to the Master of the Supreme Court against the liquidation distribution account, pointing out that certain shares were going to people who were not the owners.

There is a certain Mr H.O. Zestro and a Stephan Rossouw of the firm Coopers & Lybrandt who produced forged, falsified and irrelevant cessionary documents, cessionary type documents.

These they presented to the Master. They thoroughly confused him, they made a mockery of the Master of the Supreme Court and so doing, forced the Master to refer the objection to the High Court, which was entirely the initiative, the fraudulent document submitted by the liquidator to the Master had precipitated that court case.

Now, I do not know who compiled those fraudulent documents. I do know that the minutes of the Directors' meeting at Roodeplaat, of the 19th of November 1991 state that they took measures to confiscate my shares.

Also the minutes of the 4th of December, deciding to deprive me of my shares, were fraudulent, falsified, I have a tape recording of that whole meeting to prove it and a transcript if you want it.

MR VAN ZYL: The matter was settled ultimately, is that correct?

DR VAN RENSBURG: The instructions of Swanepoel and his crowd to the Attorney were to play the man, not the game.

MR VAN ZYL: The case was ultimately settled, is that correct?

DR VAN RENSBURG: That was so, it was done in a forced manner because I did not have another R100 000-00 to spend on that, I was nearly bankrupt.

MR VAN ZYL: Am I correct that this was a settlement agreement in which you acknowledged that you were not entitled to the money?

DR VAN RENSBURG: I acknowledged that I would not put in a following claim.

MR VAN ZYL: Dr Swanepoel denies much strongly that at any stage, he compiled any false documents.

DR VAN RENSBURG: I did not say that it was he.

MR VAN ZYL: You said that yesterday. He also denies ...

DR VAN RENSBURG: He signed it.

MR VAN ZYL: He denies that in any way, that he was involved in any illegal action be it in the form of supply of substances to kill people or connections with the CCB or anything of that nature which you testified to. He denies that he was involved in any of these things.

Slang van Zyl, myself and him, we were in a big fancy BMW and it was clear that they were very good friends.

CHAIRPERSON: Two minutes Mr Van Zyl.

MR VAN ZYL: Thank you Mr Chairman, I have no further questions.

NO FURTHER QUESTIONS BY MR VAN ZYL.

CHAIRPERSON: Any further cross-examination? Re-examination?

MR VAN ZYL: Mr Chairman, I know that my learned friend, Mr Du Plessis, indicated that he might have some questions.

CHAIRPERSON: Oh yes.

CROSS-EXAMINATION BY MR DU PLESSIS: Mr Chairman, thank you for the opportunity. First I want to say that the position with regard to Gen Knobel is the same as that of Mr Van Zyl's clients, I am therefore going to limit my cross-examination to a few aspects of the testimony given by Dr Van Rensburg.

CHAIRPERSON: May I just suggest that in the interest of - maybe you want to put your version to the client and then, well I can't suggest ...

MR DU PLESSIS: Dr Van Rensburg, when did you start working at RRL?

DR VAN RENSBURG: 1st of August 1984.

MR DU PLESSIS: Yesterday you testified that the first time that you met Gen Knobel was when you were on the way out, is that correct?

DR VAN RENSBURG: That is the first time that I had a meeting with him in his office.

MR DU PLESSIS: Did you have any other meetings with him at any other places?

DR VAN RENSBURG: He was previously Professor of Anatomy at the University. I had seen the man somewhere. I cannot remember that I communicated with him personally.

MR DU PLESSIS: So we have the position Dr Van Rensburg that you met him once and that was on your way out, that is in work connection?

DR VAN RENSBURG: That is correct.

MR DU PLESSIS: Yesterday you testified Dr Van Rensburg that at that meeting, the real work was never discussed?

DR VAN RENSBURG: That is correct.

MR DU PLESSIS: As you put it, it was only the financial abuse that was discussed?

DR VAN RENSBURG: That is correct.

MR DU PLESSIS: Then I accept that you also never personally knew much about the work or discussed the work that was done at RRL and the problems you had with your conscience?

DR VAN RENSBURG: No, I did not.

MR DU PLESSIS: Then, you were also, I accept never present when anyone else discussed the problems that might have arisen with Gen Knobel?

DR VAN RENSBURG: No, I was not.

MR DU PLESSIS: Now, how could you then yesterday have testified as a fact that Gen Knobel was aware of what was going on?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Feedback was given on a monthly basis regarding Gen Knobel's approvals, of his report backs, etc. This was done as a matter of routine.

MR DU PLESSIS: But you do not know what he said?

DR VAN RENSBURG: No, I do not know what was said to him. I just know that he sent millions of rands to our side.

MR DU PLESSIS: I am asking you whether you were aware of what was said to Gen Knobel?

DR VAN RENSBURG: That is correct.

MR DU PLESSIS: So any evidence from you in this regard, is either hearsay or deductions that you are making?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Deductions, yes.

MR DU PLESSIS: Then I am asking you now, why are you trying to mislead the Commission? Why did you not tell them yesterday that this evidence is deductions which you have made, because you do not have first hand knowledge?

CHAIRPERSON: ... almost virtually (indistinct) you know some of these things were rumours, you would hear them in conversations and I think that, I don't know in relation to this part, I don't have the record ...

MR DU PLESSIS: I am referring specifically to this part, because my notes say that he said that Gen Knobel was aware of this and he went further and said that if one spends his millions, then he could not see how one could not be aware of them.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Vally, what is your recollection of the evidence?

MR VALLY: That particular phrase that my learned friend is quoting, is precisely what the Doctor had said. He made a deduction based on the fact that there was a line of authority and a line of financing of military front companies.

Clearly it was a deduction. Secondly I refer to point 5 for the procedures for hearings, 1.5, that hearsay evidence ...

CHAIRPERSON: I don't think that is what Mr Du Plessis is contesting.

MR VALLY: Yes, right.

CHAIRPERSON: From what I understand his question to be saying is that this witness made a statement of fact, and thereby misleading the Commission or this Panel when in fact, he should have implicated as he gave a specific answer to the specific question that he has alluded to, that it was his own deduction.

Now, what I do not, and I confess to this, I do not know whether in fact it was the evidence that he gave yesterday, because I was saying to Mr Du Plessis my impression of his evidence, was a very cautious one. He was always indicating that you know, some of these were rumours and some of these were things that they had over a table, but I thought that you might be helpful specifically on the point that Mr Du Plessis is ...

MR DU PLESSIS: Mr Chairman, I can just point out to you that Mr Van Zyl has drawn my attention to his notes, and these were taken separately from mine, and he says that he was aware of the experimentation of what was going on.

Not that I deduced that he was aware of that, he gave it as a fact, that is why I am saying what I am saying.

CHAIRPERSON: But I will allow the question.

MR DU PLESSIS: As it pleases the Chairman, thank you Mr Chairman. So these were deductions that you made. Why did you then not say to the Commission, Mr Chairman, I do not have personal knowledge of this, these are deductions that I am making?

DR VAN RENSBURG: The reason is that I cannot believe that somebody could have been so incompetent to just move R7 million in a direction that he did not know what it was going to be used for. Many requests were made from senior Generals at Roodeplaat, or many visits from these Generals, why did they then visit this facility which is managed by Gen Knobel without him knowing what it was about, that they do not communicate with one another.

I believe that I am making a realistic and reasonable deduction.

MR DU PLESSIS: The question is not whether you are making a reasonable and realistic deduction, the question is why did you not tell the Commission that this was a deduction, that you did not have any personal knowledge of this?

DR VAN RENSBURG: I believed that I made it clear that it was a deduction. If I did not do this, then I now confirm that it was a deduction.

MR DU PLESSIS: Just to speak about your remarks about Gen Knobel, how many people worked at the RRL?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Approximately 70.

MR DU PLESSIS: Did you know every day what each person did at that laboratory, ever minute of the day?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Of course not.

MR DU PLESSIS: Now do you expect that Gen Knobel who was not even involved, would have known?

DR VAN RENSBURG: No, your question is irrelevant.

MR DU PLESSIS: That is not a decision for you to make. Yesterday you testified Dr Van Rensburg, that Gen Knobel made no attempts whatsoever to assist Dr Goosen with his problem, is that correct?

DR VAN RENSBURG: I am not aware of any problems, all I know about his attitude, Roodeplaat was a private company with which he had contracts.

MR DU PLESSIS: Yesterday you testified he didn't do anything to solve my problem or Goosen's problem, is that correct?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Yes, it goes without saying, nothing that I could be aware of.

MR DU PLESSIS: But you did not qualify it as that, that is the problem. You also testified it as being a fact that Gen Knobel did nothing to solve Daan Goosen's problem.

DR VAN RENSBURG: Did he do anything?

MR DU PLESSIS: I am asking you, please answer my question first?

DR VAN RENSBURG: The last information I had was that he was not sympathetic with regard to this matter.

MR DU PLESSIS: Are you aware of the fact that Gen Knobel referred Dr Goosen to the Head Office of finance for his problem?

DR VAN RENSBURG: No, I am not aware of that.

MR DU PLESSIS: Are you aware of the fact that in conjunction with Gen Knobel and HSF, that Dr Daan Goosen was referred to the State Attorney?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Are you aware of how long Daan Goosen has been in this predicament and nothing positive has yet happened?

MR DU PLESSIS: Dr Van Rensburg, I am asking the questions and you please answer them. Are you aware of the fact that Dr Daan Goosen in conjunction with HSF and Gen Knobel, was referred to the State Attorney for assistance?

DR VAN RENSBURG: No.

MR DU PLESSIS: Are you aware of the fact that in conjunction with Gen Knobel and the State Attorney, Dr Daan Goosen was referred to the Ombudsman with regard to his problem?

DR VAN RENSBURG: No.

MR DU PLESSIS: Why did you testify that as a fact?

DR VAN RENSBURG: I did hear that he went to the Ombudsman.

MR DU PLESSIS: Why did you then testify it as a fact that Gen Knobel was unsympathetic and made no attempts to assist Dr Goosen with his problem? Because then surely that is a blatant lie?

DR VAN RENSBURG: I do not agree with you. The information that I have at my disposal, was that Gen Knobel was unsympathetic, that he did not accept that we were part of his personnel.

We were a private company with which he had contracts.

MR DU PLESSIS: Who said this to you?

DR VAN RENSBURG: I believe that I heard this from Dr Goosen. I do not know whether I heard this from anyone else. I also heard from my own Attorney that this was his attitude towards Prof Koekemoer.

MR DU PLESSIS: But you made no attempts yourself, to really establish what the position was?

DR VAN RENSBURG: I heard the same from two independent sources.

MR DU PLESSIS: Dr Van Rensburg, yesterday you also testified that Gen Knobel was in possession of these product lists of lethal toxins as you put it, is that correct?

DR VAN RENSBURG: No, I said that I was under the impression that it was being used to motivate to the General for budgetary purposes.

MR DU PLESSIS: No, you said that those lists were given to Gen Knobel. You went further and said that he is a Doctor and that he knows what was going on, do you deny every having said that?

DR VAN RENSBURG: As far as I can remember, I made it clear that it was my impression that the lists were used for motivational purposes for the budget.

MR DU PLESSIS: At one stage you did say that it was your impression that it was used for the budget, but you specifically testified that these product lists were given to Gen Knobel, do you deny having said that?

DR VAN RENSBURG: If I said something like that, I will withdraw it.

MR DU PLESSIS: Good.

DR VAN RENSBURG: I cannot recall having said something like that. That is not so.

MR DU PLESSIS: Yesterday you testified, or let me rather ask you in this way, have you ever had an interview or meeting with Gen Knobel before you were appointed as a scientist at RRL?

DR VAN RENSBURG: No, how would I, he was not even involved.

MR DU PLESSIS: Do you know of any other scientist who had an interview with him before being appointed to RRL?

DR VAN RENSBURG: No.

MR DU PLESSIS: Now, I want to know from you, how can you then testify that he was responsible for the appointment of all scientists?

DR VAN RENSBURG: All senior scientists, all senior appointments had to be authorised by the Surgeon General, whoever he was. It was an administrative routine procedure. It formed part of the company's rules and regulations.

MR DU PLESSIS: Where are those rules and regulations?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Dr Swanepoel knows them.

MR DU PLESSIS: Do you have them? Or is that again an assumption that you are making?

DR VAN RENSBURG: I believe that I could perhaps be able to get parts of that. All senior applications, including mine, was handed in and I had to wait for quite a while before my appointment was approved by the Surgeon General.

MR DU PLESSIS: Was this told to you?

DR VAN RENSBURG: This is what I was told.

MR DU PLESSIS: That was Gen Nieuwoudt?

DR VAN RENSBURG: That was the procedure.

MR DU PLESSIS: That was Gen Nieuwoudt? Do you have any knowledge that Gen Knobel had to approve all appointments, or was it also a deduction that you are making?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Not all appointments, I said senior appointments. I can recall specific instances.

If for example we wanted to appoint a Pharmacist, something like that would have been approved by the Surgeon General before appointing such a person.

MR DU PLESSIS: Do you have any knowledge that any of those people's appointments were approved or any documentation about those approvals made by the Surgeon General?

DR VAN RENSBURG: I did see such approvals, let me say that the feedback given by Dr Swanepoel that the appointments of those people, this was normal administration and it was approved.

MR DU PLESSIS: That is not what I am asking you, about the apparatus and normal administration. I am asking you whether you had any proof that Gen Knobel authorised the appointment of any scientist?

DR VAN RENSBURG: I do not know personally, but the regulation say that he must.

MR DU PLESSIS: So that is a deduction that you are making, not so?

DR VAN RENSBURG: It is a very reasonable deduction, not so?

MR DU PLESSIS: I am asking you is it a deduction?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Yes.

MR DU PLESSIS: A last aspect Doctor, do you have any knowledge whatsoever of how this project was dealt with at a high level?

DR VAN RENSBURG: No, I was totally unaware of the existence of Project Coast, I only learnt about it six months after I left. That was the first time that I had seen Project Coast.

MR DU PLESSIS: Did you hear about the existence of a Co-ordinating Control Committee?

DR VAN RENSBURG: No.

MR DU PLESSIS: Do you know how this Committee functioned?

DR VAN RENSBURG: No.

MR DU PLESSIS: Did you know that there was a Financial Committee?

DR VAN RENSBURG: No.

MR DU PLESSIS: Did you know that there was a Security Committee?

DR VAN RENSBURG: There was a large security organisation, I do not know which committee you are referring to.

MR DU PLESSIS: So actually you have no knowledge of what happened at top level management and how this project was dealt with?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Very little, I agree.

MR DU PLESSIS: So once again Doctor, your testimony that all expenses had to be personally approved by Gen Knobel, was not correct, it was a deduction?

DR VAN RENSBURG: I said large expenses which is not a deduction, these were specifically according to the rules and regulations of the company, that he had to approve the budget, as well as individual items such as vehicles, senior appointments, apparatus of more than R50 000-00, this had to be approved by either him or his office. If he delegated this task, that could be possible that that happened.

MR DU PLESSIS: I have no further questions.

Mr Chairman, if at this stage I could just make a request. I did indicate that I am finished with my cross-examination of my witness. I am finished, however, there is an aspect which I neglected to mention.

He mentioned that he handed in an application for amnesty. My submission is that we are entitled to see the contents of that and in that regard, I would just like to request that the witness make a copy available to us and that if there are any aspects in that regard which will need further re-examination, then I make such a request to you.

CHAIRPERSON: Was his amnesty application referred to or was it relied upon by Mr Vally or by Mr Chaskalson?

MR DU PLESSIS: Mr Chairman, the witness in his testimony referred to the contents of his amnesty application. I cannot remember what the specific phrase said, but he said- "as I have said in my amnesty application".

I feel that we are entitled to know what is going on in it and that we can cross-examine him in that regard, regarding aspects which are related to this matter.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Vally, what is your reaction to that?

MR VALLY: Mr Chairman, we expressly did not rely on the amnesty application of the Doctor. Secondly the Doctor said that he had made an application, he mentioned an item therein, however, our Act is clear and I refer to Section 19(8)(a) and (b), subjects of the provisions of Section 33, the applications, documentation in connection herewith, further information, evidence obtained before, during an investigation by the Commission, and it goes on, shall be confidential.

The confidentiality referred to in paragraph (a) shall lapse when the Commission decides to release such information or when the hearing commences. The hearing being referred to there, is the amnesty application.

I refer to the ruling of Judge Nugent in the inquest into the Khotso House killings, where he stated that there was no obligation on persons number one, to even disclose whether they made an application for amnesty, but number two, not to disclose the applications as such. This is a ruling in that matter.

He went much further to speculate whether we were ourselves, entitled to even release this applications. The ruling of Judge Nugent in the Khotso House inquest is very clear and at the very least, at the very least, Mr Van Rensburg has that option.

If the Commission had decided to release it, if we used it, then my learned friend would be entitled to it. If we relied on the allegations therein, against his client, then he may be entitled to use it, but in the present circumstances, the option is with Dr Van Rensburg. Thank you Mr Chair.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Polsen?

MR POLSEN: I agree with what Mr Vally has just said Mr Chairman, I will have to discuss this matter. I haven't seen the amnesty application, I don't know what the contents are and how it may be relevant, but I will have to take instructions.

As things stand at the moment, my advice to my client would be not to make disclosures about the contents of this.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Van Zyl?

DR VAN RENSBURG: I accept that advice.

MR DU PLESSIS: Thank you Mr Chairman. I agree with Mr Vally that the choice lies with Dr Van Rensburg. He can exempt this if he so wishes.

If the advice is that he didn't want to give it to us, then I would just like to ask him one or two questions in that regard. Not about the contents, but about the reasons more specifically.

I do not know whether Mr Polsen wants to discuss it with his client first, he has indicated what his advice is going to be, I do not know whether they want to discuss it.

CHAIRPERSON: Anyway, I was not going to make a ruling on this matter at this present moment, and if I have to make a ruling, it would be later on. I wouldn't like to hold this proceedings just on this basis. I think we could stand down the witness and go on to something else.

MR VALLY: Mr Chairman, maybe if, and with Mr Polsen's consent and maybe he needs to consult, in order not to keep the witness here unnecessarily, we have already kept him overnight, if the questions could be indicated, if you agree on the time aspect of course.

CHAIRPERSON: I am not so sure that the Panel will be inclined in that direction, I may just indicate that from just the members on this floor, I mean on this level, there is a disinclination to allow the amnesty, but I am not making a ruling.

Can we stand the witness down and is there anything between now and tea, because after tea, if it has to be, if we have to make a ruling, we will make a ruling after tea on this specific aspect, but at this point, I would like the witness to be stood down for the purposes of us taking further evidence until half past ten.

We are pressed for time and we are going to have an early day today.

Mr Vally?

MR VALLY: Shall I call my next witness Mr Chair?

CHAIRPERSON: Yes. Mr Van Rensburg, you are stood down for the moment. Don't go away, you may have to, depending on how your negotiations with Mr - your lawyer (indistinct) Mr Van Zyl, go, and our ruling in the matter. If you could just hang on until eleven o'clock.

DR VAN RENSBURG: Certainly.

CHAIRPERSON: Immediately after eleven o'clock, we will be coming back from tea.

WITNESS EXCUSED.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Vally?

MR VALLY: Thank you Mr Chairperson. I call Dr Philip Mijburgh.

MR VAN ZYL: Mr Chairman, earlier this morning I spoke to Mr Chaskalson's assistant. Unfortunately as you know, he was a bit late this morning, and there was no opportunity to speak to him.

The tentative arrangement was made between Mr Chaskalson and I, that Mr Vally and I would first have certain discussions regarding Dr Mijburgh. Unfortunately he was not aware of the fact, due to the fact that he only arrived after the proceedings had started. I do want to recommend.

I see that they are discussing it, I think perhaps this is a suitable time to just take an adjournment for five minutes.

CHAIRPERSON: What is intended to be done?

MR VAN ZYL: There is a possibility which is still being investigated as a result of certain information which was obtained this morning, from the offices of the Attorney General, which was conveyed to Mr Chaskalson that an application will be brought on behalf of Dr Mijburgh, but there is no finality yet, and we want to discuss with Mr Vally firstly in order to clear up certain aspects before a final decision is made.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Vally?

MR VALLY: Mr Chairman, maybe we should ...

CHAIRPERSON: Where is the witness, where is the witness? I would like the witness to be where he has been called to. Are you saying sir, that he does not even have to be here to hear what you are talking about?

MR VAN ZYL: The initial arrangement was that Dr Mijburgh would only be here tomorrow, but he is available here in Cape Town, we can get him.

He is available, I mean he is apparently inside the building or just outside the building, we can get him here very quickly. He is not refusing to be present. All that I am saying is that the proceedings can be cut short due to the possibility of an application, if we just allow that we have a five minute conversation, Mr Vally and I.

CHAIRPERSON: Is he not here?

MR VAN ZYL: He is not in this hall at the moment, he is available.

CHAIRPERSON: Is he not here? Mr Vally?

MR VALLY: Mr Chairperson, I do agree, we did have an agreement with Mr ...

CHAIRPERSON: Do you need the five minutes that he is talking about?

MR VALLY: No, I would suggest that we take an early tea, but on your first issue regarding ...

CHAIRPERSON: We can't talk tea now, tea is at half past ten. Call your next witness Mr Vally, we can't afford to waste time.

Maybe you must stand down to call Mr Mijburgh and get another witness.

MR VALLY: Yes, we could do that, but before that I do agree, and we had an agreement with Mr Van Zyl yesterday that Mr Mijburgh would be called today, so there is no reason for him not to be present. I would suggest that before any further discussion, if we can stand down for five minutes but I think in that five minutes, Dr Mijburgh must be produced.

CHAIRPERSON: We stand down for five minutes for Dr Mijburgh to be produced. Ten o'clock.

HEARING ADJOURNS

ON RESUMPTION:

CHAIRPERSON: Can we just get ourselves organised so that we should start in a while, we are two minutes to eleven o'clock.

MR VAN ZYL: Mr Chairman, before we go on with Mr Swanepoel's evidence, I have indicated the circumstances regarding Mr Basson.

I have discussed it with Mr Polsen and the indication is that he advised his client not to reveal it to us and that is also going to be provided as a reason. I am not going to continue with that point any further.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you, Mr Van Zyl. Is Dr Van Rensburg anywhere around, Mr Polsen?

MR VAN ZYL: I see he is sitting at the back there, Mr Chairman.

MR POLSEN: I confirm the correctness of that statement Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Van Rensburg, I would like to call you to the stand in view of - Dr Van Rensburg. Dr Swanepoel, if you could just bear with us.

Mr Vally, did you want to put certain things before we ...

MR VALLY: Thank you Mr Chair. Mr Chair, maybe the - is this in connection with which witness?

CHAIRPERSON: Well, let me do what I was proposing to do with the witness.

You Dr Van Rensburg, you are sitting where Dr Swanepoel should be sitting, but just sit there, just sit there.

You yesterday, I think it was you who testified about things you had heard and one of the things that you had heard was how it was mooted that some of the toxins that were produced, might be used to affect the health of Dr Mandela.

Was it you, I just want to establish whether it was you?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Yes, Mr Chairman, I made a brief reference to it. My knowledge was very limited. (Indistinct) overheard.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes, yes, I know. What exactly did you overhear?

DR VAN RENSBURG: I had a conversation with Dr Andr? Immelman, Dr Mandela had just been released and he was making certain statements which weren't clear and we speculated on this, and he somehow made a comment that I needn't worry, his brain function will deteriorate with time.

CHAIRPERSON: In other words you got the impression that there were people, somewhere, who were aware that an attempt would have been made, or would be made on his life in a manner that was covert and secret?

DR VAN RENSBURG: No, I do not believe that the intention was to make an attempt on his life. We had already, there had already been talk that such a thing should not happen because whoever succeeded him, might be a worse option.

CHAIRPERSON: What was the intention, as you understood?

DR VAN RENSBURG: The intention as I understood it, was to reduce his level of intellectuality and effectiveness by inducing actual brain damage.

CHAIRPERSON: I see.

DR VAN RENSBURG: That is how I understood it, I can't say...

CHAIRPERSON: There is a document which has just been put before you. It is headed Secretariat of the State Security Council, dated March 1986.

Now, towards the end, I think that is where I - in fact on the very last page - there is on 29 and it appears these were recommendations which were made to the State Security Council by the Secretariat of the State Security Council, can you read recommendations (b) and © of 29.

DR VAN RENSBURG: (b) and ©?

CHAIRPERSON: The very, very last page.

DR VAN RENSBURG: Right, (b) Mandela has to be released outside the Southern African region, and © Mandela should be in a poor physical capability, so that he could not act as the leader any more.

CHAIRPERSON: I am not asking you at the moment to authenticate this document, but what do you understand © to be? What does it say?

DR VAN RENSBURG: © would be to cause him some health damage which would be consonant with what I overheard the intention was. In addition to what I overheard, I will draw your attention to the extract I read from the Star, a news story, I did give the exact date which alleged that Doctors were aware of a plan to expose him to small doses of Thallium.

That could cause central nervous system damage resembling meningitis, according to information supplied to me by Dr Basson years before.

CHAIRPERSON: Now, who was the person on this document on the first page who was responsible for any enquiries made in connection with this document?

DR VAN RENSBURG: It says the Gen Major J.F.J. Van Rensburg.

CHAIRPERSON: Any relative of yours?

DR VAN RENSBURG: No relative, I don't know who this possibly could be.

CHAIRPERSON: You never knew who this person was yourself?

DR VAN RENSBURG: No, I have never known him, I don't know of his existence.

CHAIRPERSON: And you have never seen this document before?

DR VAN RENSBURG: I have never seen it Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: And to the extent that there was mention in your environment of any weakening of the health of Dr Mandela, it was not - your evidence was not related to your knowledge of existence of this document purporting to come from the State Security Council?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Not at all Mr Chairman, I merely related what I had heard from Dr Immelman and the extract I had read in the newspaper. There was never any other talk of any operation at the institute against Mr Mandela, neither was there any positive action that I know of.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you Dr Van Rensburg. Are there any questions from members of the Panel?

Are there any questions from any representatives?

MR CILLIERS: Only a few questions from my side. Dr Van Rensburg, on the face value of this document, it appears this document has nothing to do with the Project Coast, Roodeplaat Laboratories, Delta G at all, do you agree?

DR VAN RENSBURG: I didn't read the document Mr Chairman, but I can't say that it has anything to do, it doesn't appear to have anything to do with those.

MR CILLIERS: Secondly, you interpret © according to you, that it should be seen to that President Mandela be in a poor physical condition before he is released, in the sense that something had to be done actively to see that he is in a poor physical condition, for example giving him some or other substance, is that your interpretation?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Mr Chairman, there is one interpretation. There are many possibilities of reducing a man's health to a status where he cannot act as a leader.

MR CILLIERS: But that is your interpretation?

DR VAN RENSBURG: I, in the milieu that I was functioning and that Dr Immelman talked to me, I thought it logical that they would use a chemical substance, which was toxic to achieve this aim, yes.

MR CILLIERS: Do you agree with me, you have already said that, only a confirmation, that is not the only interpretation of © of paragraph 29?

DR VAN RENSBURG: No, you could hit him on the head and cause brain damage that way too, theoretically, physically.

MR CILLIERS: Or you could just have detained him until such a stage that because of his age, he would be in a poorer physical condition, isn't that a possibility?

DR VAN RENSBURG: Certainly, if you did not intend to release him, you could wait until he was senile.

MR CILLIERS: All I am putting to you is, there isn't necessary a sinister deduction to be made from paragraph ©, it is a possibility but not a necessity?

DR VAN RENSBURG: No, I don't agree. This is a very clear guideline that something had to be done positively regarding the intention to release him.

MR CILLIERS: Where do you see the very clear, positive action referred to?

DR VAN RENSBURG: (b) says he has to be released outside the Southern African region.

MR CILLIERS: What does it have to do with a sinister motive?

DR VAN RENSBURG: That means you can't detain him.

MR CILLIERS: All this means is that when you release him, do not release him in South Africa, release him, but release him for example in Europe.

DR VAN RENSBURG: How can you ensure his poor physical health if you don't do something sinister?

MR CILLIERS: Doctor, if he would become so old we know that he was already aged at that stage, if he became so old and he is released in a region outside South Africa, (b) and © would be fulfilled. Is that a possibility?

DR VAN RENSBURG: No, it was not a possibility?

MR CILLIERS: Why are you saying that?

DR VAN RENSBURG: The political situation of the day dictated that he had to be released shortly. There was no question that he could be detained for another ten years.

MR CILLIERS: But after that, he was detained for another seven years. Your, within a short time, became seven years?

DR VAN RENSBURG: This document was dated 1984, you don't become senile in four years.

CHAIRPERSON: Well, it was only four years from the date of this document.

DR VAN RENSBURG: Yes, four years, not seven years.

CHAIRPERSON: I know the Bible refers to seven years. If you look at paragraph 19, you see of the same document, 19© how does that read?

DR VAN RENSBURG: 19©, do you want me to read it Mr Chairman?

CHAIRPERSON: Yes.

DR VAN RENSBURG: The possibility that his condition of health would decrease to such an extent that by later release, he would only be able to act as leader of the revolutionary onslaught for a limited period of time, is not excluded.

This reads that it is possible that his health situation might deteriorate in the interim if one delays he release, which would mean that he could only possibly act as leader for a short time.

MR CILLIERS: If I could just ask something Dr Van Rensburg, in that context of the paragraph as a whole which the Honourable Chairman has read to you, it is clear that the deterioration of his health was not linked to active action by anybody, it was merely linked to the continued detention with the later release?

DR VAN RENSBURG: It is certainly that his health would deteriorate as he got older, if he was detained later, yes.

MR CILLIERS: The purpose as explained here is clear, if you see this in context, that it was the longer detention and not active conduct by giving him substances or hitting him over the head with a walking stick as you said.

DR VAN RENSBURG: As stated in 19 © it does look like that, yes.

MR CILLIERS: So your whole conclusion at 29 is once again an illustration of the deductions that you make without any factual basis?

CHAIRPERSON: Except that he is basing it on a conversation which he says, was made.

MR CILLIERS: With all respect, he concedes that that discussion that he had with Dr Immelman from the document itself, it is clear that these documents had nothing to do with Roodeplaat where Immelman worked.

CHAIRPERSON: Except that you see the sort of inference that can be drawn. Here is a person who is relating something about the health of Mandela having to be, it says no well, he is not going to live long, because you know something has been done to his health.

MR CILLIERS: As a result of his age.

CHAIRPERSON: No, no, no, the conversation that he held, the conversation between him and Immelman, what was the nature of the conversation?

MR CILLIERS: It had nothing to do with his life expectancy, it had something to do with his intellectual abilities and was not linked at all to his life expectancy. That is how I understood the witness.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes, now when you take that remark that has been made in that sort of context, you believe it or you don't believe it, but then there is also at this level recommendations and in the nature of those sort of recommendations, recommendations that are made in language that is ambiguous, which says for instance that recommendation on 29©, he must be you know, in such a relative weak physical condition so that he should not live long.

I understand and I take the point where you say it did not necessarily mean he should, something active must be done to promote that relative weak condition, but does it not say - does it say it also could not have meant that something active must be done?

MR CILLIERS: If one reads this in isolation, it could have meant that. We do not have the document, we did not have it before this, but if one looks at the contents, specifically at the paragraph that you referred to yourself, paragraph 19, then it excludes the possibility of active action because paragraph 19 says that one of the options are detain him longer, this will result in the fact that his health deteriorates as a result of age.

By the recommendation one must see that recommendation as the choice of option five, the continued detention to release him at a later age. So as Dr Van Rensburg said, it then seems as if it refers to age and not active behaviour or conduct, and that is the only point that I am making.

I must however concede that to some extent with his evidence, that this document has nothing to do with the whole project which he was involved, or the greater Coast project, that this is actually outside the context of the relevant investigation. But it was my feeling that the situation had to be rectified, that one could not just make such light-hearted recommendations without having studied the document.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you.

MR CILLIERS: I have no further questions.

ADV POTGIETER: Dr Van Rensburg, you indicated that at about this time, there was a ground swell, there was considerable pressure for the release of President Mandela?

DR VAN RENSBURG: That is right.

ADV POTGIETER: Now, my recollection is not very clear on this one, but wasn't it so that prior to his release, not too long prior to the release, he had allegedly contracted some or other disease, I think it was diagnosed at tuberculosis or something like that, do you have any recollection along those lines?

DR VAN RENSBURG: No, I do not have specific recollections at all, Advocate.

ADV POTGIETER: All right, we might want to pursue that, but I thought you might have some recollection.

DR VAN RENSBURG: No, I do not.

ADV POTGIETER: Well, thank you.

CHAIRPERSON: Well Dr Van Rensburg, at last - oh, Mr Vally?

MR VALLY: Just one thing before the witness is excused, not a question to the witness Mr Chairperson, but to record that the allegations relating to President Mandela and his treatment or assaults upon his person in which ever form, is from a State Security Council minute, dated March 1986, for the record, that it is from the State Security Council minutes.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes.

MR VALLY: Thank you Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: I thought that I had made that fairly clear. Thank you Mr Vally.

Mr Van Rensburg, you are excused.

DR VAN RENSBURG: Thank you.

MR POLSEN: Mr Chairman, sorry, just before you excuse the witness, I would like to let the record show that the witness was given a document that he had not had the opportunity of reading the document, and that there was then a debate which followed on his interpretation of this document, without his having had sufficient time to really study the full import of the entire section.

Just for his protection, before you excuse him, thank you Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes, that is well accepted Mr Polsen. If we could then now finally release you Dr Van Rensburg.

WITNESS EXCUSED.

CHAIRPERSON: I believe you are calling Dr Wynand Swanepoel.

MR VALLY: That is correct.

CHAIRPERSON: Before anything happens maybe we need to swear Dr Mijburgh in. Advocate Potgieter.

ADV POTGIETER: Dr Mijburgh will you stand please. Please switch on the microphone. Your full names please?

PHILIP MIJBURGH: (sworn states)

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very much Dr Mijburgh. May I formally welcome you to these proceedings.

May I just again state some ground rules for those who were not here.

One of them is the newspaper. People who are wanting to read newspapers are entitled to do so but outside this room.

The cellphones please, starting with the Commissioners if you can switch your cellphones unless you have got a noiseless cellphone but the idea is that you should not have cellphones switched on. Mr Vally what is the position?

MR VALLY: Mr Chairperson the position is as follows; I have indicated to my learned friend we were waiting because there was a case that I referred my learned friend to. I have mentioned this in the past to him and I just gave him a copy of it; FERRIERA v LEVINE.

The position is this that as regards Dr Mijburgh, we telephoned Advocate Torry Pretorius from the Attorney General's office to determine whether he is going to be charged. We had a rather vague response in that we were told at some future date he may be charged. But strictly for the purposes of facilitating these matters and strictly for the purposes of speeding up this hearing I have suggested to my learned friend that he argue the issue of whether Dr Mijburgh and Dr Wouter Basson should be compelled to give evidence before this hearing jointly. Thereafter if there is agreement by the Chairperson we will take another witness so that I can research the points raised by my learned colleague and after that witness has given his evidence give our response thereto. That is my suggestion to the panel.

CHAIRPERSON: If you could bear with us? Mr Cilliers what is your attitude to the proposal by Mr Vally?

MR CILLIERS: My suggestion Mr Chairman is that we either do it in a global sense otherwise you will have a disjointed argument in the end. It will partly an argument from my side and then Mr Vally can come back after he has done the research and then I am going to advise you regarding the legal position after his argument. This is going to make it very difficult for you as a panel. I have suggested to Mr Vally that the next witness, I do not know whether there was a big problem for the presentation to distinguish between Dr Swanepoel and Mijburgh and my suggestion is that Dr Swanepoel should be called. He is going to give evidence as he has been subpoenaed for. And I am prepared to provide my argument and even my notes to Mr Vally on which my argument is based. So that he knows what he can expect, what my argument will be. I do not want to take him unawares. Last week I informed him regarding this type of application. I have also referred the authority I am basing this on. I have already given that to Mr Vally. The evidence of this Dr Swanepoel should be handled in that way and then Mr Vally will be in a position to argue in the correct order and one after the other. So that you will be in the right position to evaluate.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Vally may I just get a sense from you how long do you think you are going to need to research what you need to research? He says he is going to give you everything ready in written form that he is going to be relying upon for bringing the application. I was just thinking that I do not know how long you are going to take. Whether you could not be excused whilst you go and do the research and Mr Chaskalson continues to do what can be done in the meantime. I would also like the situation, my preference would be the applicant makes his application you answer and then there is a reply and then we are given an opportunity to reflect on the application and we give a ruling.

MR VALLY: If that is the preference of the panel and especially if my learned friend gives me his written heads for want of another phrase then that would be fine. It should not take me longer than the time it will take to lead the next witness or question the next witness.

CHAIRPERSON: Are you therefore saying we should stand this witness down, call the next evidence?

MR VALLY: Sure if I am assured that there is not anything new that is going to be raised when I come back which will necessitate another postponement. If my learned friend is giving me the heads right now which covers all the aspects he wishes to raise I have no problems then.

CHAIRPERSON: Was that your proposal Mr Cilliers?

MR CILLIERS: Yes I do not have written heads. The situation just occurred this morning. I have made certain notes regarding the main points of my argument giving reference to various authorities I am going to base my argument on. I am willing to give it to Mr Vally. I do not intend Mr Chairman to argue anything which will catch him unawares because the result will be is that this matter stand over for half hour so we can research that. Because I do not want to place him in an awkward position. I will give him everything before hand.

CHAIRPERSON: If I understand you well you are not necessarily indicating to Mr Vally the basis on which your application is going to be brought. You will indicate to him the authorities you are going to rely on.

MR CILLIERS: The total bases together with the authority.

ADV POTGIETER: Mr Cilliers what are you going to ask us? What do you want us - which application are you bringing in regarding this witness?

MR CILLIERS: The basis?

ADV POTGIETER: No I do not want to know what the basis is. What are you asking for?

MR CILLIERS: The application is that the proceedings should be suspended until the criminal proceedings have been taken into consideration. The legal position is there is a distinction between the South African law and the Canadian law. And the Canadian and European law where total procedures could be suspended and the choice which a person then has to testify is not a proper choice. Because of the prejudice during a criminal court case. The South African law follows a stricter approach because the choice to give evidence even if it is a difficult choice is still a choice. Here is now a case of statutory force and the proceeding regarding the interrogation of the witness taking into consideration his right to keep silent would not be impeded.

ADV POTGIETER: This is what you are going to submit to us? What you are saying is the decision regarding this witness and Dr Basson is the same. You are going to address us in the same respect.

MR CILLIERS: There is a difference. Mr Vally has agreed in a certain respect and the application seemed to be the same. The legal assistance I am going to ask for will be the same. The basis for the argument will be different. But what I am going to ask you will be different.

ADV POTGIETER: And you are ready to argue?

MR CILLIERS: I have received a decision from Mr Vally the library has provided various documents to me. I would like 10 minutes to peruse those. This will be a sensible. The proposal from the Chairman that we continue with Dr Swanepoel's evidence then I will be in a better position to present my case.

ADV POTGIETER: I am convinced thank you.

CHAIRPERSON: Now is it possible when you bring the application also on behalf this Dr Basson for him to be present? I believe he is in Cape Town.

MR CILLIERS: Unfortunately it would not be possible to have him here within the very short time. He is in Cape Town and we can have him here but it might take an hour or so to have him in fact here.

CHAIRPERSON: No what I was thinking is that if you are inclined to follow your process as suggested by both you and Mr Vally we have tea for instance now and we should be coming back at eleven. And at eleven we would then take Dr Swanepoel and that should provide sufficient time getting through the evidence of Dr Swanepoel for all those arrangements to be made for Dr Basson to be here. Will that be?

MR CILLIERS: I think all the arrangements will be made within that time then available yes.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Vally how does that strike you?

MR VALLY: That seems to an eminently suitable arrangement Mr Chair.

CHAIRPERSON: Shall we then adjourn for tea until eleven and at eleven we will take the evidence of Mr Swanepoel.

COMMITTEE ADJOURNS

ON RESUMPTION:

CHAIRPERSON: Doctor Swanepoel, welcome to these proceedings. Before you take the stand and testify I will ask Advocate Potgieter to swear you.

ADV POTGIETER: Full names please.

WYNAND PIETER SWANEPOEL: (sworn states)

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Vally, or is it Mr Chaskalson?

MR VALLY: I'll be commencing and Mr Chaskalson will be taking over Mr Chair. The reason I'm beginning is, we need to invoke the provisions of Section 31 of our Act in respect of this witness. I had a brief discussion with my learned friend. If you look at Section 31(2) we may compel this witness to respond to questions which may be self incriminating. In order for us to do that we have satisfy the requirements set out in Section 31(2).

I can for the record, Mr Chairperson, confirm that:-

(a) We have consulted with the Attorney-General who has jurisdiction for that requirement, Section 31(2).

(b) We have to satisfy the panel that the information that we require from such a person is reasonable, necessary and justifiable in an open democratic society based on freedom and equality. And I will briefly address these aspects.

Firstly, that the purpose of our Commission is an important both government concern and social concern in that we are trying to determine the gross violation of human rights in our mandate period and the value reflected therein in terms trying to expose gross violations of human rights would, I submit, reflect the values inherent in our Bill of Rights.

Secondly, the restriction or the interference with the witness' constitutional rights is impaired no more than is absolutely necessary and in this regard I would refer to Section 31(3) of our Act which states:

"Any incriminating answer or information obtained or incriminating evidence directly or indirectly derived from a questioning in sub-Section (1) shall not be admissible as evidence against the person concerned in criminal proceedings in a Court of Law or before anybody or institution established by or under any law, provided that incriminating evidence arising from such questioning shall be admissible in criminal proceedings where the person is arraigned with a charge of perjury or a charge contemplated in terms of Section 39 of this Act or Section 319(3) of the Criminal Procedure Act"

Thirdly the benefits to be gained are not out of proportion to the restriction of the witness' constitutional rights and this regard I respectfully refer the Commission to the objectives as set out in our Act.

And finally I would submit that the evidence given by this witness to the Commission, in view of our obligation to make a report to Parliament, to make recommendations as regards any potential future violation of human rights and what steps should be taken to prevent these are of significant social benefit to the society and therefore should be allowed to be led.

And I would respectfully submit that this meets the requirement as set out in Section 31(2) (b), that the information we require is reasonable, necessary and justifiable in an open and democratic society based on freedom and equality.

As regards the third issue, Section 31 Sub-(2), Sub-© we need to satisfy ourselves that the person has refused or is likely to refuse to answer a question or produce an article on the grounds that such an answer or article might incriminate him or her.

My learned friend will confirm that in discussions before my submission that there is a possibility that he, a likelihood as the Act states that Doctor Swanepoel would have declined to answer questions on the basis that they may incriminate him and on that basis I have made my submission. Thank you Mr Chair.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Cilliers?

MR CILLIERS: Mr Chairman, I agree with the submission of my learned friend. I did give an indication that there might be some difficulties regarding incriminating questions and I agree with his suggestion that we in advance, bring into operation the specific provisions in order to protect the witness against the result of giving incriminating answers already at this stage, then we don't have any difficulties further, then he can without difficulty answer any questions put to him at any stage of the proceedings and we don't need argument in-between, whether this might an incriminating question or not.

It's always a very difficult situation to handle, so I agree with the submission by my learned friend, that at this stage already the provisions of the specific Section are being brought in operation by yourselves and that the specific indemnity is given to Doctor Swanepoel.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very much Mr Cilliers. I'm sure I'm reflecting the views of the panel that to the extent of Doctor Wynand Swanepoel's testimony which is being given during the course of this hearing, to that extent the provisions of Section 31 will apply and he will be compelled to answer all questions on the basis that any evidence that he leads in this inquiry shall not be used for purposes of prosecuting him at a later stage.

Mr Chaskalson?

MR CHASKALSON: Thank you Chairperson.

MR ARENDSE: Sorry Chairperson, just before we proceed, there was a matter which I raised with you during the break and you said you would address it and issue a directive which is appropriate.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you. We, over the last two, three days and consequently upon an application by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, there a ruling that any new documents that might be brought, and especially documents that might emanate from witnesses, must be discovered so that the Ministry should not be placed in a position where such document have not been debated upon as to the susceptibility to proliferation beforehand.

And I would like to emphasise and direct that if any witnesses are going to be producing such documents as may have the potentiality to affect that agreement, those documents must be discovered ahead of time so that counsel for the Ministry and all relevant counsel should have the necessary agreement as to whether or not they are in line with the agreement.

So I just want to remind those who represent witnesses who might testify, that if there are any new documents which do not form part of the bundle of documents that have been situated to counsel and to witnesses, those documents need to be discovered first to counsel for the Ministry so that their agreement should capable of being enforced.

Mr Chaskalson?

MR CHASKALSON: Doctor Swanepoel, could you tell us what your qualifications are?

MR SWANEPOEL: I'm a dentist by professional qualification.

MR CHASKALSON: Just for the record insofar as it is necessary, we identified Mr Swanepoel as a Doctor at the outset and the correction insofar as it stands should just be noted.

Mr Swanepoel, could you tell me when you joined the Special Operations team in Special Forces?

MR SWANEPOEL: In 1983. April of 1983 I joined the Medical Special Operations. I was never a member of Special Forces.

MR CHASKALSON: Can you tell me what your functions were during that time?

MR SWANEPOEL: I was mainly in charge of personnel, administration and logistic support and co-ordinated these functions.

MR CHASKALSON: Who else was involved in your unit?

MR SWANEPOEL: Doctor Wouter Basson was the head of the unit, Doctor Philip Mijburgh and then there were other doctors and a great deal of conscripts.

MR CHASKALSON: Was Doctor Johnny Koertzen by any chance a member of that unit?

MR SWANEPOEL: He was a conscript but joined the permanent force a while later.

MR CHASKALSON: During this period of time, did you participate in any operations?

MR SWANEPOEL: No.

MR CHASKALSON: Did you at any stage, later after you had left this unit, participate in any Special Force operations?

MR SWANEPOEL: No.

MR CHASKALSON: When did you join RRL?

MR SWANEPOEL: I am not sure but it was approximately 1 April or 1 June '86.

MR CHASKALSON: Can you tell us who recruited you?

MR SWANEPOEL: Doctor Basson.

MR CHASKALSON: And under what circumstances, how was your new job explained to you?

MR SWANEPOEL: Doctor Basson explained that they had a front company where the management aspects and the co-ordinating aspects in terms of personnel and finance had become a bit or a problem, got out of hand, and they had problems with the control thereof.

He asked me whether I would be prepared to take up this role as I had already had managerial experience from my stint in the Defence Force. He asked me whether I would do this and after two or three months I said yes.

MR CHASKALSON: So if I understand you correctly, you are saying that there was a management problem at the company and they wanted you to go in and try and sort that out

MR SWANEPOEL: There was a management crisis as I later realised, yes.

MR CHASKALSON: And you said that you had had experience during your time in the Army with these sort of management issues?

MR SWANEPOEL: That's correct, yes.

MR CHASKALSON: Do you have any scientific background?

MR SWANEPOEL: No.

MR CHASKALSON: Were you told what the nature of the work that was to be done at RRL was?

MR SWANEPOEL: I was informed that RRL dealt with the evaluation and the development of biological and chemical agents for the purpose of being able to diagnose them and to trace them and to be able to diagnose the working thereof and in whichever form it could be expected in terms of diagnosis. And then I was also informed that the ultimate purpose was to give treatments, neutralisation methods and contamination which had to be developed.

MR CHASKALSON: So this sounds a strictly defensive programme. Your aim is to identify possible substances that could be used in chemical and biological warfare and then undertake work to neutralise such agents, decontaminants?

MR SWANEPOEL: That's correct, yes.

MR CHASKALSON: Thank you. What was your title when you joined RRL?

MR SWANEPOEL: In which regard are you referring to now?

MR CHASKALSON: Well, were you the Managing Director of the Company?

MR SWANEPOEL: No, initially I was the Director of Management Services.

MR CHASKALSON: Could you explain how the structure worked when you joined?

MR SWANEPOEL: The structure at Roodeplaat?

MR CHASKALSON: Yes.

MR SWANEPOEL: Roodeplaat was divided - and I cannot recall very well but I'm going to try my best, into a Research and Development Section and then the Experimental Animal Centre and a Personnel Section.

MR CHASKALSON: Maybe let me phrase the question in a slightly different manner. Could you tell us who were Directors at the time you joined the company and what each of the Director's functions were?

MR SWANEPOEL: Doctor Daan Goosen was the Managing Director. Doctor Schalk van Rensburg was in Laboratory Services and Doctor Andr? Immelman was there for Research and Development and Mr D W Sparmer was the Head of Personnel and Administration. They were also the Directors.

MR CHASKALSON: And was Doctor Goosen a Director as the same time as you were a Director or did you replace him?

MR SWANEPOEL: He remained as a Director for a short while afterwards, approximately four to five months and then he was made the Managing Director of another company in the group.

MR CHASKALSON: At that stage was anybody appointed as the Managing Director of the company?

MR SWANEPOEL: I was appointed, yes.

MR CHASKALSON: What are your understandings of the function of a Managing Director of a company?

MR SWANEPOEL: To control the effectiveness of the Company in terms of personnel co-ordination to do a task and motivation as well as to achieve results. And my view of this was to achieve production effectivity or effectiveness and to take control of financial management and to make it streamlined.

MR CHASKALSON: Do you see yourself as having any involvement in the actual subject matter of the company?

MR SWANEPOEL: No.

MR CHASKALSON: Isn't that a little strange?

MR SWANEPOEL: No.

MR CHASKALSON: So you are a Director of a Biological Company and your functions in regard to that company are personnel related, financially related and production related?

MR SWANEPOEL: Not personal, personnel.

MR CHASKALSON: Thank you.

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes.

MR CHASKALSON: You had absolutely no function whatsoever at your company?

MR SWANEPOEL: No.

MR CHASKALSON: Who had that responsibility?

MR SWANEPOEL: Doctor Andr? Immelman was the Head of Research and Development, Doctor van Rensburg was appointed to do the ethical aspects of research and to approve these first of

all.

MR CHASKALSON: You said at the outset that the company was a front company, who did you report to in the SADF structure?

MR SWANEPOEL: We had various structures.

MR CHASKALSON: Could you elaborate on those please?

MR SWANEPOEL: It was the KBK which was referred to earlier, the Financial Committee and a Security Committee and the CCC.

MR CHASKALSON: What would be reported to each of those structures?

MR SWANEPOEL: To the CCC reporting was mainly done regarding the financial and personnel aspects and the future of the company and the course of the company. The Financial Committee which ran parallel to this, dealt with the financial matters which were reported on monthly and the Security Committee, we reported to them on - well, this was highly confidential by nature of the case, and we had to have quite a great deal of communication about this, about various information from their side and from ours.

MR CHASKALSON: Would reporting of experimentation that was taking place at the company be to the Security side of things?

MR SWANEPOEL: No.

MR CHASKALSON: Who would that reporting be made to?

MR SWANEPOEL: The reporting of research results, we dealt with them as any other contract in the company and that was to the person who gave the instruction, Doctor Basson.

MR CHASKALSON: You mentioned that when you joined the company there was an administrative crisis?

MR SWANEPOEL: That's correct.

MR CHASKALSON: Could you elaborate on that?

MR SWANEPOEL: It was not an administrative crisis alone, it was a management crisis in general. All three the other Directors, Messrs Sparmer, Doctor van Rensburg and Doctor Immelman made the statement that they could no longer work together with and under Doctor Goosen, that he kept the financial aspects a secret.

He never involved them in the formulation of budgets etc., personnel matters were not supported by him and they did not see their way clear to work under him and I hear that, I think that this is where the crisis existed.

MR CHASKALSON: Can you give any explanation why none of this was mentioned by Doctor van Rensburg when he gave his evidence?

MR SWANEPOEL: I have no idea, I cannot speculate about that.

MR CHASKALSON: And if he said that he thought that Doctor Goosen was doing a good job, you would say that he was lying?

MR SWANEPOEL: That is his interpretation.

MR CHASKALSON: You have just said now that he had said to you that he was unhappy with Doctor Goosen's performance at the time.

MR SWANEPOEL: That was the reason why I came to the company.

MR CHASKALSON: Was that a reason that was given to you by Doctor van Rensburg or was that a reason that was given to you by some other party?

MR SWANEPOEL: It was given by both, at least by all the Directors as well as all the outside parties.

MR CHASKALSON: So if Doctor van Rensburg has told us that he no problem with the management style of Doctor Goosen nor of his performance in the company, which incidentally involved both input into the scientific and other general management procedures, you would say that he was lying either to us now or to you at the time?

MR SWANEPOEL: I put it so unequivocally, yes.

ADV POTGIETER: Mr Swanepoel, he told us that your appointment was the end of the future. Do you have any comment on that?

MR SWANEPOEL: I cannot comment on his opinion, no.

MR CHASKALSON: Did you change any of the structures that existed at RRL prior to your joining the company?

MR SWANEPOEL: Perhaps you have now said two things in one. I did not change the structures before coming to the company but the existing structures when I arrived there, I could change and that is what I did, yes.

MR CHASKALSON: Can you tell us what sort of changes you made?

MR SWANEPOEL: The Laboratory Services and the Research and Development I brought together as a unit and the Personnel and Administration as well and I kept Finance separate.

MR CHASKALSON: You earlier gave us your understanding of the role of the company in the Chemical and Biological Warfare programme at the time you were recruited, did this understanding change over time?

MR SWANEPOEL: No.

MR CHASKALSON: Did you know any of the scientists or researches at RRL prior to joining the company?

MR SWANEPOEL: No.

MR CHASKALSON: Had you met any of the researchers of scientists at RRL prior to joining the company?

MR SWANEPOEL: Only with my introduction. There was an occasion where I was introduced to them a few weeks before I arrived, yes.

MR CHASKALSON: And prior to that occasion which was just shortly before you took over, you had never met them?

MR SWANEPOEL: No.

MR CHASKALSON: Was Doctor Basson actively involved in the projects that were undertaken an RRL?

MR SWANEPOEL: I think so, yes, because the reporting of all the results and the instructions came from his side as being the one to deal with the Defence Force contracts at RRL.

MR CHASKALSON: Are you telling us, and please correct me if I'm wrong, that a project that would have come from the SADF who were for all intents and purposes the owner of this company, to RRL would be directed from Doctor Basson - or maybe you should just tell us, how was that directed into the project? Would it go from Doctor Basson to you or would it go from Doctor Basson to Doctor Immelman or from Doctor Basson to some other member of the company?

MR SWANEPOEL: To reply to your question directly, it would have come directly from Doctor Basson after discussion with Doctor Immelman.

MR CHASKALSON: So you would have no knowledge whatsoever of what contracts were being given to the company by the SADF?

MR SWANEPOEL: No.

MR CHASKALSON: Didn't this make planning very difficult?

MR SWANEPOEL: No, because the budgets and the planning came from the various departments to me and we only did the planning on their predictions and their budgets.

I must also draw the parallel between the commercial contracts that we dealt with. I never saw any of them or dealt with any of them either. It came into the company, a product was delivered and it left the company.

I'm sure that at the highest level of government, the President does not have such a good financial knowledge but he has his supporters or supporting team that advises him. I think that in the level of each company at that level, that it works in exactly the same way.

MR CHASKALSON: So your understanding of your role in this programme from commencement and essentially throughout your duration is that you were there to make certain that the people worked and that the systems worked. What actually happened would have nothing to do with you and you were not aware of it?

MR SWANEPOEL: That is correct, yes.

MR CHASKALSON: Were you ever informed of any research and/or synthesis projects which took place at the company?

MR SWANEPOEL: No.

MR CHASKALSON: Not on one single occasion?

MR SWANEPOEL: No, not on a reporting basis, no. I can just qualify that in management meetings where there were problems with payments and clients I did hear the nature of the projects ...[intervention]

MR CHASKALSON: But that would have been in relation to what has been referred to as the: "soft projects", those projects which were of a truly commercial nature.

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes, the commercial projects.

MR CHASKALSON: So in terms of the SADF projects no knowledge whatsoever?

MR SWANEPOEL: That's correct.

MR CHASKALSON: So how can you make a statement that this is a defensive facility?

MR SWANEPOEL: I did not make the statement, I explained to you that that is what I learnt about the thing before I went. You asked specifically what did I know about that and what was told to me and what was the objective.

MR CHASKALSON: Well let me ask you your opinion, what is your opinion of the facility?

MR SWANEPOEL: Precisely that.

MR CHASKALSON: What role did the Surgeon-General play in the company?

MR SWANEPOEL: None.

MR CHASKALSON: Was any reporting made to the Surgeon-General?

MR SWANEPOEL: The Surgeon-General was a member of the CCC's and the Financial Committee etc.

MR CHASKALSON: Was any reporting on the nature of projects undertaken at the facility ever made to the Surgeon-General?

MR SWANEPOEL: Not that I have any knowledge of, no. I cannot say yes or no, I do not know.

MR CHASKALSON: We've talked about commercial and SADF projects, was there some form of distinction made between these two projects in the company?

MR SWANEPOEL: Which two projects are you referring to?

MR CHASKALSON: Projects of a commercial nature, projects which have come from, on a SADF request from Doctor Basson?

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes, there was a clear distinction. There weren't only the two types of projects, there were three types and they were registered separately. There were the military projects which we know about already, there were the commercial projects which we also know of and then there were projects which we called in-house projects. In other words, where we had the scientists in a closed community, who could not speak out in terms of their research. We gave them the opportunity to do research further and to be able to speak on that at congresses and so forth.

MR CHASKALSON: Could you explain how each of those three separate projects would be handled?

MR SWANEPOEL: All treated in the same way.

MR CHASKALSON: And how would that have been?

MR SWANEPOEL: That there was a Project Application, Project Approval, Project Management and the course of the project and Project Results and post components and time components were placed on this.

MR CHASKALSON: Could you take us through those components again slowly and tell us who would be responsible for each component. I presume the request would come from an individual or maybe - I'd rather you told us how it worked properly.

MR SWANEPOEL: There were various ways in which such a project could be initiated. Firstly, if it was an in-house project it came from the researchers themselves who requested to do research into a specific direction. It was commercial then it would come from or arise from a need or a request from a client who would ask whether we could do specific research for him. These things were dealt with by Doctor Andr? Immelman. ...[intervention]

MR CHASKALSON: Can I just stop you there for a moment please. Doctor Immelman would be approached from an outside company for a commercial project?

MR SWANEPOEL: That is correct. Many years later we appointed a marketer to deal with this.

MR CHASKALSON: Would you be informed of a commercial contract?

MR SWANEPOEL: I was not informed about this. The work was done and completed, the funds were obtained and I was informed about the financial aspect, costs and income.

MR CHASKALSON: Let's continue.

MR SWANEPOEL: With regard to the military projects, those projects were also directly referred to Doctor Andr? Immelman who dealt with that.

MR CHASKALSON: To your knowledge are all of those projects from Doctor Basson to Doctor Immelman?

MR SWANEPOEL: I do not believe that all came from Doctor Basson, we also had projects from Armscor of a para-military nature but yes, the chemical biological aspects from Doctor Basson, yes.

MR CHASKALSON: And when we say Doctor Basson, would it be possible for Doctor Basson possibly to send a delegate of his own to Doctor Immelman and ask Doctor Immelman to do something?

MR SWANEPOEL: I cannot speculate about that, I doubt it.

MR CHASKALSON: So in terms of control of what was going on at your company in terms of the actual physical work that was being done there you had zero knowledge, zero control, zero interest?

MR SWANEPOEL: I had my specialists there to do that job, yes.

MR CHASKALSON: Did you specialists ever report to you?

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes, in terms of, as I said the financial implications and the time implications.

MR CHASKALSON: Did your specialists ever report to you about the research that they conducted?

MR SWANEPOEL: Not for me, no.

MR CHASKALSON: So in terms of all of the instructions that were given from the SADF, presumably from Doctor Basson to your company, the nature of the work that was given to your company you had zero knowledge, you heard nothing about it and you had no interest in it?

MR SWANEPOEL: That's correct.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Swanepoel, I'm not interfering with your rights, I just want to indicate that your replies, notwithstanding the provision of Section 31, are of a nature that you are committing yourself to a version ...[intervention]

MR SWANEPOEL: I can't hear you Mr Chairman. Must I put one of these on?

CHAIRPERSON: You are committing yourself to a version. I assume that that speaks for itself but I have a duty to indicate to you that the answers that you are giving are such that you are giving a version which given under oath is a version that you reconciled yourself is a version that you want to put.

I'm not prejudging the nature of your replies, I'm simply saying we will come to these questions. We may put the same question for our own quantification and if you are reconciled that it is the sort of version that you put across then it is so.

MR SWANEPOEL: Mr Chairman, but then I must ask you what you want me to say?

CHAIRPERSON: I'm not wanting you to say anything, I'm wanting you to speak the truth. I want you to ...[intervention]

MR SWANEPOEL: Mr Chairman, that is what I am doing.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you.

MR SWANEPOEL: Thank you.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Chaskalson?

MR CHASKALSON: Thank you.

Mr Swanepoel, it's been drawn to my attention that my previous question, when I asked about any reporting, you had said: "not formally". Did you have any knowledge whatsoever be it formal or informal?

MR SWANEPOEL: Of the Chemical Biological, the operational aspects? ...[intervention]

MR CHASKALSON: Of the nature of the research being done.

MR SWANEPOEL: Right Mr Chairman, I understand what you're meaning. Yes, in terms of the research, the biological and chemical agents, yes, I had heard of what was used, I heard common names being mentioned which meant nothing to me.

MR CHASKALSON: Can you tell me who you heard things from?

MR SWANEPOEL: Doctor Andr? Immelman mostly.

MR CHASKALSON: Can you tell me what sort of things you heard?

MR SWANEPOEL: It was about the type of agents they're researching. I've heard names that I have seen in these documents but I couldn't place them in any relevance in any research.

MR CHASKALSON: Can you tell us in what context these discussions took place?

MR SWANEPOEL: It wasn't discussions on the technical aspects of the research whatsoever, it was in terms of mentioning a name and then the talking about the financial aspects, the progress in terms of time and money.

MR CHASKALSON: So we might have a project which deals with Botulism for instance and so the name Botulism would be mentioned and then he would say: "Please give me a great deal of money"?

MR SWANEPOEL: No, he would do a budget on that project which would go through the Research Committees.

MR CHASKALSON: Can you clarify for me, during what discussions with Doctor Immelman you would have heard about names of products, I'm not understanding you fully.

MR SWANEPOEL: I understand that we had various management levels of meetings. We had a Management Meeting as well as a Board Meeting. At the Management Meetings we spoke about the day to day management of the company. These were names that were mentioned of which no specific reports were given but about the progress in general.

In the discussions amongst the researchers I heard names and the research which was done about the things but specifically about the course of it, which context it was discussed I cannot say.

MR CHASKALSON: Can you tell me why when you joined the company you put Lab Services and Research and Development which were previously being run by Doctor Immelman and Doctor van Rensburg into one single section?

MR SWANEPOEL: It happened a very long time ago, I cannot specifically remember the motivation for this restructuring but we wanted to make the organisation more streamlined and these were the main reasons, more streamlined and more functional. These were the reason why we made these structural changes.

MR CHASKALSON: More functional or an attempt to get a person who you were not certain you could control, out of the lib?

MR SWANEPOEL: I have no idea what you mean.

MR CHASKALSON: I'll return to this point in a moment. Mr Chair, if you could just bear with me one moment, I've got an indication that a colleague would like to say something to me.

CHAIRPERSON: Very well Mr Chaskalson. Doctor Randera?

DR RANDERA: Doctor Swanepoel, may I then just ask a question. This position that you took as the MD of the company and the answers that you've given to Mr Chaskalson that you didn't involve yourself in the actual questioning of what the research was all about, was this on this need to know basis that your organisations seemed to work on because earlier on you told us that you were a dentist?

MR SWANEPOEL: That's correct.

DR RANDERA: Now as a dentist you see a research document that says: "We are making cultures on Salmonella tifi(?)" now that's part of your training so you would know what Salmonella tifi is and what it's being produced for. And if we just ask in terms of the product itself because Doctor Odendal said to us yesterday that cultures were produced, that was the end product of what he was involved in.

Now did you not ask what that was for and where it was going to because I understand that once the culture was made there were no tests being done at your laboratories, that was done somewhere else. Did you ever ask yourself what is going on with these cultures that have potential danger to society?

MR SWANEPOEL: We can bring this in context with what I believe about the company and its proceedings or activities and this was in the context of the evaluation of biological and chemical agents in order to be able to diagnose and trace and work out methods of treatment, yes.

DR RANDERA: I'm still not clear. We have a product, the product let us say is a culture, if we just Doctor Odendal's explanation yesterday that 30mls say of - just for the sake of discussion, some analatifi(?) culture was produced, as the MD of the company, as the person who overseas everything, because that's the impression you're giving us, that was your role there.

MR SWANEPOEL: Correct.

DR RANDERA: What was the next stage? I understand this culture went into Doctor Immelmann?s fridge - and let me tell you I find that astonishing, that a company that spent millions of rands, once a product was produced went into a bar fridge as was told to us yesterday, in the safe of Doctor Immelman. What actually happened to the product beyond that or was that not your role, was it not a question what happened to that? Was it sold to somebody, was it ...

MR SWANEPOEL: It was not my responsibility to analyse the instruction and to trace it and to send the results to the client. The work was done at the request of the client as well as done with commercial projects, the results were obtained and the client was informed and he dealt with it in the way he felt he wanted to. I cannot speculate as to what the client did with it.

DR RANDERA: The client in this case was the Army?

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Chaskalson?

MR CHASKALSON: So Doctor Swanepoel, what you seem to be saying is, despite a dental background the names of these toxins and/or other drugs were not known to you?

MR SWANEPOEL: That's not what I'm saying.

MR CHASKALSON: Well let me ask you that question and ask you to answer it then.

MR SWANEPOEL: The names of the organisms and they work is known to me or I could have read about it if they seemed vague to me but the point is that my perception in terms of the things that were being done there, be used for the purpose which I spelt out very clearly a while ago, and I was satisfied with that.

MR CHASKALSON: And you never questioned that perception?

MR SWANEPOEL: No.

MR CHASKALSON: What percentage of the projects undertaken at the company were commercial and what percentage were from the Defence Force?

MR SWANEPOEL: Initially the capacity of the company was utilised fully with Defence Force projects. By 1989/1990 we got it down to a 60/40 ratio, 60 military, 40 commercial.

MR CHASKALSON: So originally it was entirely SADF and then over time, and I think you said by 1989 ...[intervention]

MR SWANEPOEL: 1990.

MR CHASKALSON: '89/'90 it was 60/40?

MR SWANEPOEL: That's right.

MR CHASKALSON: And presumably this had something to do with an attempt to privatise the company?

MR SWANEPOEL: Obviously so, ja.

MR CHASKALSON: How was a company which was set up to be a front company supposed to fill this illusion if it had no clients?

MR SWANEPOEL: I cannot answer that question because I was not involved in the initial planning. My involvement later dealt with the changes which had to be brought about and I think that was one of the big problems to bring about managerial changes, that's part of the reason.

MR CHASKALSON: Were the two types, and here I'm leaving out the in-house but possibly the three types of projects, were they distinguished in different manners in the financial reports?

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes.

MR CHASKALSON: How would that be done?

MR SWANEPOEL: We received report-backs on a monthly basis from the clients regarding their time and their financing and they were dealt with in these compartments so that we could get to the percentage in terms of what the different liabilities were in the ...[End of tape, no follow-on sound] of that company.

MR CHASKALSON: Do you have any knowledge as to whether directions from the SADF were received as to what they wanted or would you initiate your own projects or would there be a combination of both?

MR SWANEPOEL: I believe that we received direct instructions from the client, the Army in this case or the Defence Force. We were also asked general questions for example: "look at the following aspects" which included no specific aspects of which the company would have to take the research initiative.

MR CHASKALSON: And that broad instruction was always: identify substances and try and find antidotes to those substances?

MR SWANEPOEL: Within the context that I explained.

MR CHASKALSON: You wouldn't be able to tell us what sort of projects you actually did for the SADF would you?

MR SWANEPOEL: No.

MR CHASKALSON: Was there a salary scale at the company, for instance, was the Managing Director, yourself, paid more than Doctor Immelman?

MR SWANEPOEL: I cannot recall it at the moment but yes, I think there would have been different levels. Yes, there were post level structures in terms of personnel and the company.

MR CHASKALSON: And you would have been paid more money than a Director of a particular, say Doctor Immelman if we're taking an example of a person, or Doctor van Rensburg?

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes.

MR CHASKALSON: How much more money?

MR SWANEPOEL: I cannot speculate now, I do not know and I cannot remember.

MR CHASKALSON: You were involved with all of the financial sides of the project?

MR SWANEPOEL: That's correct.

MR CHASKALSON: Would you be able to estimate as to what a basic salary or what the salary of somebody in the position of a Doctor Immelman or a Doctor van Rensburg would have been?

MR SWANEPOEL: I have not been prepared, I cannot speculate at this stage about this. I would like to prepare.

MR CHASKALSON: It seems a strange question, that you shouldn't be able to answer. I can understand that this was a long time ago and I don't mind if you don't give me exact figures but maybe you could just give us some sort of round indication. For instance, Doctor Immelman and Doctor van Rensburg, if they were getting R4 000, I would have got R5 000 or if they were getting R4 000, I would have got R8 000. Could you give us any sort of indication?

MR CILLIERS: Mr Chairman, at this stage I will just advise my client not to take a guess. He says that if he gets the opportunity, it was not specified in his summons, where any indications were given of what he had to prepare in the extremely limited time that was given, that he had to prepare this aspect.

No documentation was provided in this regard and if it is of such importance Mr Chaskalson, I would recommend that my client be given the opportunity to look at relevant documentation. Mr Chaskalson most probably has it in his possession or Mr Vally, and that this be made available so that he could give you exact answers and that he is not expected to guess and speculate.

CHAIRPERSON: Does your case rest and fall on this aspect Mr Chaskalson?

MR CHASKALSON: My case doesn't necessarily rest or fall on this aspect. I would just like to point out that one of the items requested in the notice is set out as: "Activities of Roodeplaat Research Laboratories (Pty) Ltd, previously Inter Laboratories insofar as they relate to the programme or any other activities. We've now been told by the Managing Director that he practically doesn't know anything except for the financial side of the programme and I was just wondering if he could maybe help us in that manner.

CHAIRPERSON: Well he has given a reply that he would need to go and do research or try and see and then ...[intervention]

MR CHASKALSON: I would appreciate it if that information does come to hand, if we can get it in due course.

CHAIRPERSON: There has been an undertaking Mr Swanepoel.

MR CHASKALSON: Thank you.

CHAIRPERSON: Do you have a sense Mr Chaskalson in how long you are still going to be with the witness?

MR CHASKALSON: I think I am still going to be a fair amount of time but I think that at lunch-time we will be in a better position to assess how the questioning is going. I don't anticipate in being much more than say an hour after lunch at the maximum.

CHAIRPERSON: No, no, we can't afford that. I must indicate very, very clearly.

MR CHASKALSON: I will endeavour to finish by 1 o'clock.

CHAIRPERSON: Very well.

MR CHASKALSON: Doctor Swanepoel, I would like to draw your attention to a document which is numbered as TRC 26. It has a heading:

"Payments of Coast Projects"

If you could just indicate when you've located the document.

MR SWANEPOEL: I have the document.

MR CHASKALSON: Have you seen this document previously?

MR SWANEPOEL: No.

MR CHASKALSON: Do you have any idea of what this document is?

MR SWANEPOEL: No.

MR CHASKALSON: On the second page of the document there are a number of project system codes, could you read those out for us please?

MR SWANEPOEL: Which page is this specifically?

MR CHASKALSON: This is, it's got a number on it on the top of 4733 and it is the second page of TRC 26.

MR SWANEPOEL:

"Project Coast - Objective Codes"

1 - Establishment of Facilities for CCC Research

2 - Establishment of Security Coverage and Systems for Research

3 - Establishment of Security Systems for CCC Research

4 - Management of CCC Research

5 - Establishment of an Industrial Ability in regard of CCC

6 - Management of the CCC Technical Information System

7 - [no English translation]

8 - CCC Operational Support to the Security Forces"

MR CHASKALSON: And I'm just going to confirm that you haven't seen this document before?

MR SWANEPOEL: No, I haven't.

MR CHASKALSON: You described item 7 is actually marked as "Voer van CBO - Ops", you had read it into the record as operations, obviously this is a new document to you, could it also be operatives?

MR SWANEPOEL: It could be.

MR CHASKALSON: Could I ask you to turn another two pages on to page 4735 is the number where ...[intervention]

MR SWANEPOEL: Can I just comment on the last statement please?

MR CHASKALSON: Sure.

MR SWANEPOEL: The feeding of CBW ops would mean that you have to feed them.

MR CHASKALSON: For there food?

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes.

MR CHASKALSON: And who would ...[intervention]

MR SWANEPOEL: ...[no English translation] means operations.

MR CHASKALSON: And if you wanted to pay somebody who was conducting an operation, that would go under operations as opposed to an operative?

MR SWANEPOEL: I cannot speculate specifically in that regard.

MR CHASKALSON: That's fine. Could you go back to page 4735 where 07 - Management of CBW Ops, and could you read us through that section?

MR SWANEPOEL:

"7/1 - Chancellor

7/02 - Chris

7/03 - Koos

7/04 - Mielie

7/05 - Hekkies

7/06 - Barries(?)

7/07 - Conventional

7/08 - Other"

MR CHASKALSON: Some of those seem to be a list of names, can you comment on that?

MR SWANEPOEL: I cannot comment on that.

MR CHASKALSON: If that was a list of names, have you ever met any people of those names?

MR SWANEPOEL: No.

MR CHASKALSON: You would not know where those people came from, assuming that they are people?

MR SWANEPOEL: No.

MR CHASKALSON: You would not be able to tell me for instance, Koos' real name or full name?

MR SWANEPOEL: No.

MR CHASKALSON: Would you have any indication as to who would know?

MR SWANEPOEL: I believe that Doctor Basson will know.

MR CHASKALSON: Thank you, we will raise that question with him. Before I leave this document alone, under Section 08 there is some handwriting there, there's also some handwriting on one of the earlier pages, sorry the last page 4739, do you by any chance recognise that handwriting?

MR SWANEPOEL: I am not sure about it, no.

MR CHASKALSON: For the moment that is all that I wanted to deal with on this particular document.

Mr Chair, if you would bear with me, I have an affidavit that I would like formally enter into the record. I understand that all of the relevant parties have been furnished with a copy of the affidavit. It's a copy of the affidavit of Doctor Andr? Immelman ...[indistinct]

CHAIRPERSON: You are not on the record Mr Chaskalson.

MR CHASKALSON: Sorry. It is a copy of an affidavit that has been deposed to by Doctor Andr? Immelman ...[intervention]

MR CILLIERS: Mr Chairman, I haven't been supplied with a copy of that affidavit, may I have a copy?

CHAIRPERSON: Can I just check? I was of the impression that the documents were circulated.

MR CHASKALSON: As far as I was concerned it was circulated to the legal representatives of one that team. I'm quite happy to make another copy available.

MR VAN ZYL: I did receive a copy, I can confirm that.

LEGAL REPRESENTATIVE FOR DOCTOR IMMELMAN: Mr Chairman, I also received a copy that initially the documents were given to Doctor Immelman by means of my office because I act on his behalf. I later established that there is an arrangement with Mr Vally and the Attorney-General that this witness would not be called.

I do not know exactly what that ruling is but I just want to make it clear that if the affidavit is handed in by means of evidence that the correct value be attached to it. If it is done by agreement an affidavit cannot be cross-examined and it cannot give explanations so the value which is attached to that affidavit must be more limited and less than what somebody says under oath. I just want to reserve my rights in that regard on behalf of my client.

MR CILLIERS: Mr Chairman, may I at this stage just have it placed on record the attitude that we have regarding this specific document is that we find it very strange that Doctor Immelman who, if I listened to the testimony of Doctor van Rensburg, Doctor Swanepoel, what Doctor Odendal testified, then it seems to me as if Doctor Immelman is one of the most important witnesses in this whole matter.

And I find it extremely strange that from the side of Mr Vally agreements were entered into with the office of the Attorney-General, that he does not have to testify. The reason as I understand it is because he will be witness in a criminal case against Doctor Basson and Doctor Mijburgh.

And with all respect I find it strange the way in which this was done, in which the accused in the case are being subpoenaed and they are being expected to give evidence before you in public but agreements are concluded or entered into with Mr Vally and his team with the Attorney-General who is the party in that criminal case, that Immelman is kept away so that he does not give his version in public and that he does not have to subject himself to cross-examination as the people who are the accused in this specific case, as they will have to do if their applications do not succeed.

At this stage our attitude is that we oppose the handing in of the affidavit and we feel that you should have Doctor Immelman here, who is for all intents and purposes the most important man at these proceedings and that he should be here.

CHAIRPERSON: Now as I understand the position, you are not objecting to the document being used, you are just placing on record your reservations and your surprise that Mr Immelman is not, are you objecting to the document being used?

MR CILLIERS: I probably didn't make myself very clear. I also object to the use of the affidavit. The witness is available, he's been subpoenaed and there is no basis on which the Attorney-General for reasons of their own, should conclude any agreements that this witness not be subjected to cross-examination and it is my basis that this is a mala fides situation. Immelman should give his version himself.

MR CHASKALSON: Mr Chairman, if I may just address a few remarks. I'd just like to place it on record that the decision not to call Doctor Immelman to the hearing was a decision was made after serious consideration and discussion with a number of interested parties, including canvassed quite broadly within the Commission itself.

Doctor Immelman is under subpoena. The final arrangement that we had made with both the legal representative of Doctor Immelman and the Attorney-General was that we would prefer to have Doctor Immelman at the hearing. It was argued to us that it would severely prejudice a future criminal prosecution. We did not want to take such steps but we did warn the respective parties that if compelled we would require Doctor Immelman to be at the hearing.

I'd also like to point out another factor which I think it's slightly disingenuous to argue that it is unfair to subject Doctor Immelman to cross-examination when we are about to be addressed with legal argument as to why Doctor Basson and why Doctor Mijburgh should not even appear at our hearing.

MR CILLIERS: If I could just briefly reply. My learned colleague can get the reason for this in the Constitution where accused people have a fundamental right, entrenching the Constitution in Section 35 which gives them the right not to answer.

I find it extremely strange that the level on which this investigation is dealt with by them is on the basis that my learned colleague is now saying, that a witness should be protected for purposes of the obtaining of him being guilty and he's kept away and dealt with with gloves and that he should be protected until the hearing commences but the accused person who has a right, entrenching the Constitution, is not given that privilege. And the application to give them that same right which they have in terms of, not only the Constitution but in terms of our common law is dealt with by my colleague.

So in answer to his question he can get the answer of that in Section 35 of the Constitution. But what he is saying at this moment, I really find this very strange and with all respect the bone fides of that are above me or beyond me.

ADV POTGIETER: Mr Cilliers, why do you say that we cannot receive the affidavit regardless of whether this witness is going to testify or not, why can we not receive this at this stage?

MR CILLIERS: The affidavit is being given to you, as Mr Chaskalson is saying ...[intervention]

ADV POTGIETER: Forget about that, listen to what I am saying. Forget about whether the man is testifying or not, why can we not receive the statement of the affidavit at this stage?

MR CILLIERS: You must go and look at the reason and the motivation behind. The motivation has been given in order to keep this person away to get prejudice in a criminal case which is going to follow and therefore I say that the motivation for the request to you is not bona fide.

ADV POTGIETER: Regardless of that it is an aspect which lies within our discretion. We can decide whether we are going to have the person appear here or not. It is something which we can decide about but the purposes of cross-examination or the questioning of this witness, why can that affidavit not be used?

MR CILLIERS: If it has been prepared and submitted to you as explained by my learned colleague, with no bona fide motivation then you can act on your own discretion. You should not allow that such negotiations follow to provide witnesses in criminal cases which would follow after this.

ADV POTGIETER: I cannot understand what the problem is, why we cannot use the affidavit. You are giving an explanation about the reason why Mr Chaskalson wants to place it in front of us at this stage, it might be so, it might be his reason. Why can we not accept it at this stage and decide later whether we want this specific witness here or not?

MR CILLIERS: Well surely, you should not allow that the procedure be abused which you should actually follow and if you know that there is a procedure which has to be followed which has the basis of non bona fide motivation, then you should not allow this.

CHAIRPERSON: Do I understand your position to be, are you arguing that this document is inadmissible? Are you arguing that the weight that must be given it must be one that would be given to a document whose ...[indistinct] value should be less than a document which was backed by the testimony of a person who would have to be cross-examined on the basis of his or her allegations? In other words, are you saying it is inadmissible and I haven't really heard you say that it is inadmissible or are you saying, if we are going to admit it then due weight must be given to the type of document that it is? That is the first question.

The second question, I understood Mr Chaskalson to be saying the agreement such as it is, is one that was clearly communicated to the Attorney-General to be depending on the discretion of the panel as the process goes on. If it so becomes that it is necessary for the witness to be called then the witness will have to be called.

Thirdly, isn't it about prejudice that this whole thing turns on? And if it is on the basis of potential or real prejudice, being the issue insofar as your clients are concerned, and if we are going to make a finding because I think in line with, certainly some authorities, where a finding which is detrimental to the person who is mentioned to his or her detriment is going to be made, then an opportunity must be made available to the person prejudiced by that evidence in one or two forms. Section 30 I think provides, it can be either in terms of written submissions or if it becomes necessary for the witness who made these allegations to be brought for subjection to cross-examination.

What I'm trying to get at is, is it not something that, to use a colloquialism, we should play be the ear? Let's have your objection noted only to the extent, unless of course you are going to argue very strongly and with authority that it is totally inadmissible, only to the extent that it can be admitted but no weight should be given to it.

MR CILLIERS: As it pleases you Mr Chairman, it's possible to argue that what you're proposing is perhaps in the direction Mr Potgieter is moving with his questions. Perhaps a practical approach will save time and which will eliminate all disadvantages. If can answer your questions in a certain order, whether it's admissible or not, it is not my argument that is not admissible. You will have a discretion in determining your procedures to allow such a document or not.

The argument goes further than that, it's based on that discretion. And my submission is that you already at this stage have enough evidence to say that I don't want to take in this document. Immelman is a very important witness, perhaps one of the most important, it not the most important and he must come to these proceedings. He is available, he has been subpoenaed. The submission I'm making is that in the exercise of your discretion you should not allow that negotiations take place and people be kept away who are necessary here to be able to determine the truth. These people are available and for some or other negotiation with the Attorney-General, because of that they are not being called.

The reason why he is not being called is very, very improper. In your search for truth, that is why you are here and a lot of money is spent on that, the evidence of almost the most important witness is not heard because the Attorney-General tells that this is going to impede my criminal case. But at the same time the accused in that criminal case whose rights are being protected by the Constitution, forget about their rights, we are only protecting State witnesses not the accused. That is not the impression that should be created here.

Regarding the admission here at this stage, just for a few questions, you are probably right, there is not total prejudicial circumstances which cannot be set right. You can exercise your discretion afterwards and say the witness must still come here to be cross-examined. I would request that after we've completed this evidence we should address you about this question, whether Immelman should testify or not and then you should make a relevant decision and make a ruling so that there's enough time to, before the end of the week, to fit him into the time slot.

I find it strange that these arrangements - I'm not saying Mr Chaskalson as a person was involved as a person and I'm referring to the evidence leaders, that they and the Attorney-General negotiated without Mr Immelmann?s lawyer being informed about this. I find this very strange that he was not involved.

LEGAL REPRESENTATIVE FOR DOCTOR IMMELMAN: I was aware of the fact that the overtures were being made and that there were negotiations that were going on as to whether Doctor Immelman would give evidence or not and I presumed that it was because in terms of Section 31 of this Act there is a right conferred on the Attorney-General in the sense that consultation may take place with him and I understood it was under that regime as it were, that the negotiations were taking place. So I was informed but I wasn't part of that particular agreement hence my cautionary remarks that if the affidavit is accepted as an affidavit due weight must given to it as to probative value without the viva voce evidence or the benefit of cross-examination having taken place. Thank you Mr Chairman.

MR CILLIERS: I would abide by your decision.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Chaskalson, do you have anything to say on the law with regard to the weight that we need, should we be inclined in that direction, that we should give to this?

MR CHASKALSON: I do not feel that you need to apply unnecessary weight to the affidavit, I'm quite happy with the suggestions that have been made. The affidavit deals with a document that is a TRC document in many respects and is one we are going to go through. It places certain important information on the table and we believe that it is of importance to the hearing.

CHAIRPERSON: Now, can I make a suggestion? We obviously as a panel would like to put our words together as far as this particular aspect is concerned but pending that, is it not possible for you to go to some other aspects until lunch which is about twenty minutes from now?

DR ORR: We've had a 15 minute interruption.

CHAIRPERSON: Oh yes, except that you said you'd be done but you didn't anticipate 15 minutes interruption.

MR CHASKALSON: I'll also qualify it by saying I said I would try to be done.

CHAIRPERSON: Would that be acceptable?

MR CHASKALSON: I can try and work around it. I may ask that we stop slightly before the scheduled break but I will see if I can keep going because I want to deal partly the affidavit and partly with TRC 52, however TRC 52 is referred to extensively in the affidavit. I wouldn't necessarily have to question on the basis of the affidavit and in fact I'm quite happy to steer clear from it.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Chaskalson, it is our view that in view of argument and view also of the slight concessions that have been made by counsel for the witness as far admissibility of the document is concerned, you may introduce the document at this stage already but all the, you know, reservations of law made by Mr Cilliers will have to be borne in mind.

MR CHASKALSON: I accept that. I can also, if it would be convenient, leave my line of questioning for a moment, deal with some other issues and then revert back to that potion after lunch. I don't anticipate to be more than half an hour after lunch.

CHAIRPERSON: Well you have my ruling.

MR CHASKALSON: Thank you. While we're on the subject of the affidavit I just want to note out that it does refer to an Annexure, in fact it refers to two. One is an Annexure A and the other is a document which is TRC 52. For some reason that did not come with the affidavit.

I was furnished with a concept statement which has got all of the affidavits on it and I'd like to just distribute that if I may. If requested I can draw the similarities but in the affidavit it's referred to the document number 000100001100012. This reference sorry, is done on paragraph 17 of the affidavit and that document is document TRC 52.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Chaskalson, conduct your proceedings in line with my ruling.

MR CHASKALSON: I am going to venture into the affidavit if I may.

Doctor Swanepoel, earlier on you had stated that you had never met any of the members of RRL prior to joining the company, that is correct?

MR SWANEPOEL: That's true.

MR CHASKALSON: Could you please read paragraph 25 of the affidavit out for us?

CHAIRPERSON: Paragraph?

MR CHASKALSON: 25, the paragraph beginning:

"Ek onthou dat"

MR SWANEPOEL:

"I remember that before 1989 on the request of Doctor Basson, a small bottle with on 2 to 3 millilitre peroxide delivered to Doctor Swanepoel who was a Captain in the South African Defence Force. I delivered it to Doctor Basson's office in - I delivered it personally to Doctor Swanepoel"

MR CHASKALSON: Can you confirm or deny that content of that paragraph?

MR SWANEPOEL: I deny the contents of that.

MR CHASKALSON: Doctor, I'd ask you if you could read from paragraph 15 for me and I'm specifically interested in the last sentence of that paragraph beginning with your name.

MR SWANEPOEL:

"Wynand Swanepoel requested me to maintain good relations with Doctor Basson"

MR CHASKALSON: Would you confirm that, or deny that statement?

MR SWANEPOEL: I can't remember that. What I could have done was to say that those were our military clients and that we should handle them like you would do any clients.

MR CHASKALSON: Except up until 1989 he was your only client?

MR SWANEPOEL: I don't understand.

MR CHASKALSON: Earlier you had said that the SADF accounted for 100% of the work up till about 1989/'90, at which point the work was split 60/40 with the side that you said there was some stuff done from Armscor.

MR SWANEPOEL: I have to explain to you that the change in the relationship does not change overnight, it takes years to accommodate.

MR CHASKALSON: You told us earlier that if Doctor Immelman did something for Doctor Basson you would not be consulted, is that correct?

MR SWANEPOEL: That is true.

MR CHASKALSON: Notwithstanding the fact that you were Managing Director of the company?

MR SWANEPOEL: That's true.

MR CHASKALSON: Could I draw your attention to paragraph 17 and ask you to read that paragraph into the record for us?

MR SWANEPOEL: Paragraph 17 from Doctor Immelman's affidavit:

"The sales list with numbers B000010B000011 and B000012 was shown to me. I recognise the substances on the list and my handwriting on the side, also my handwriting on list number B000011 where I wrote: brought back next to the entry Mamba Toxin on 8.9.89. The words JK which I wrote next to the dates 19.3.89 and 23.3.89 I can't remember them well. I think it was referring to Johnny Knoetzen. The C next to the other dates meant Chris. That was my entry for substances which I delivered to Chris or one of the other associates. The K next to the other dates refer to Koos. Certain entries are not in my notes. Koos was a white person whom I met in Doctor Basson's office at the ...[no English translation] office. I was also introduced to Koos. He told me that Koos was also an associate. Meetings between me and Koos was arranged by Doctor Basson's secretary"

MR SWANEPOEL: I'd ask you if you could also refer to TRC document 52 which is actually the Annexure which should have been attached to the statement. On that list you will see that there do appear certain initials, those initials being JK, C and K. Can I just ask you to have a look at that and to confirm that for me?

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes.

MR CHASKALSON: And we heard that JK possibly stood for Johnny Koertzen, C stood for Chris and K stood for Koos, that is correct, according to the affidavit?

MR SWANEPOEL: That's correct.

MR CHASKALSON: Would you also confirm that earlier on when we looked at Section 7 of TRC 26 in the: "Bedryf van CBO Ops", the names Chris and Koos appear?

MR SWANEPOEL: That is correct.

MR CHASKALSON: So it is conceivable in that other list that these are indeed names of potential operatives?

MR SWANEPOEL: It could be, I can't speculate.

MR CHASKALSON: And you have no knowledge of who C and K are?

MR SWANEPOEL: None.

MR CHASKALSON: But you have met Johnny Koertzen before previously?

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes.

MR CHASKALSON: And that was during?

MR SWANEPOEL: While he was a conscript. I would say from 1983 to 1986.

MR CHASKALSON: And that was during the period when you were all in a similar unit I understand?

MR SWANEPOEL: That is correct.

MR CHASKALSON: And that would have included Doctor Basson, Doctor Mijburgh, yourself and Johnny Koertzen?

MR SWANEPOEL: That is correct.

MR CHASKALSON: Thank you. I would like you to have a look at TRC 52. I'm not going to take you through this entire list but you see, and if you would like to draw anything to my attention please feel free to. The third item there is Audi Carb - Lemoensap, that's next to the date 4.04.1989, there's a little c next to it which is Chris and there's a volume: 6 x 200 milligrams. Do you know what Audi Carb is?

MR SWANEPOEL: No.

MR CHASKALSON: For your information Audi Carb is an insecticide which is highly toxic in animals and humans. Let's look at the next item which is done 04.04.89 under the initial C, it's 3 x, it looks like 1 x 5 - I'm not certain what that is, it's bottles and it's of Azide whiskey. Sorry that's Azide, do you know what Azide is?

MR SWANEPOEL: No.

MR CHASKALSON: For your information Azide is Sodium Azide a herby Herbicide which is also a preservative. Acute poising cause a fall in blood pressure, convulsions and severe headaches.

Let's look down the list, there is on the 9th of the sixth '89, there are no initials next to that, it is described in the affidavit but we haven't read it if my memory serves me correct, that when there is no description that was going to Doctor Basson, which is read: "Spore en brief" Yesterday we heard evidence to the fact that that was indeed Botulism spores. Doctor Odendal said that, well not necessarily this specific item but Doctor Odendal gave testimony that he had put spores on a letter.

MR CHASKALSON: Dr Odendal said that he, well, not necessarily specific item, but Dr Odendal gave testimony that he had put spores on a letter, on an envelope. Let's leave that one aside. If we go down to the 21st of the 6th 1989 we see there's a volume of 3, and it's "Bierblik Phalium", do you know what Phalium is?

MR SWANEPOEL: All I know, it's a toxin.

MR CHASKALSON: The next item which is on the 22nd of the 6th 1989 has the initial "K" next to it, it's 200 grams. It is under the description "Suiker en Salmonella", do you know what Salmonella is?

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes, it's a bacteria.

MR CHASKALSON: A poison, was it also harmful to humans?

MR SWANEPOEL: I think in the right concentrate, yes.

MR CHASKALSON: The next item is 27 June 1989, there's a little "c" next to it. It is a 1 X 75 ml volume. It is whisky and paraquat. Do you know what paraquat is?

MR SWANEPOEL: No.

MR CHASKALSON: Paraquat is a herbicide that is highly toxic to humans. Apparently death in this case is often delayed for two to three weeks and it causes widespread organ damage, especially to the kidneys and to the lungs. I ask you to turn over the page. On the 11th of the 8th 1989, there's a volume of 5 which is "sigarette - B - Anthrax", do you know what Anthrax is?

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes, I think it's a bacteria.

MR CHASKALSON: ...(inaudible) be put into cigarettes?

MR SWANEPOEL: No.

MR CHASKALSON: The next item, there are also a volume of 5 of them, this is also 2© and in fact the next five or so are all from ©, is "coffee chocolate". Do you know why Anthrax would be put into a coffee chocolate?

MR SWANEPOEL: No.

MR CHASKALSON: The next item is "koffie sjokolade" - also

volume 5, do you know Botulinum would be put in chocolate?

MR SWANEPOEL: No.

MR CHASKALSON: The next item is "peperment sjokolade - Audecarb", we did discuss Audecarb earlier, can you speculate as to why Audecarb would be in peppermint chocolate?

MR SWANEPOEL: I can't.

MR CHASKALSON: Okay, I'm not going to go through the rest of this list which is fairly extensive. This is a document that emanates from your company RRL. Can you explain how these items could fit into the defensive nature of the chemical and biological programme as you have explained it to us?

MR SWANEPOEL: As I've said, I haven't seen this document before, except when you provided me with a set of documents. I don't want to speculate, but it could possibly fit in in the explanation I have given regarding the various ways these things can be applied.

MR CHASKALSON: Is it that the purpose of RRL, as you saw it, was to identify substances and to find suitable neutralisers to those substances?

MR SWANEPOEL: Can I repeat what I have said, I said Roodeplaat had to do the evaluation and analysis of biological and chemical agents to be able to diagnose and trace them, and to establish the working of those in whichever forms it can be expected with the purpose to do neutralisation and decontamination.

MR CHASKALSON: ...(inaudible) I'm going to have to ask you to speculate a little but, but I would appreciate it if you bore with me. Would it be your contention that this list is a list of substances, together with poison, which is simply a method to identify what could be done, or in your view, is it more likely that this is a list which you were unaware of, which you had not sanctioned according to your own view, but was in actual event a list of murder weapons?

MR SWANEPOEL: I am not prepared to speculate about that.

MR CHASKALSON: Could you explain the purpose of putting poison in whisky in terms of a defensive programme?

MR SWANEPOEL: I can possibly refer back to what I previously said, to determine how it would work in whisky, whether you could identify it in whisky, or whether you could provide that information to your client. Perhaps it was his need to know whether all these agents or substances could be traced in whisky. That is my interpretation.

MR CHASKALSON: Will you not concede that this list is possibly a list of abuses?

MR SWANEPOEL: The application I can't speculate about.

MR CHASKALSON: ...(inaudible) these substances were given to people who are described as CBO Ops?

MR SWANEPOEL: I can't.

MS ORR: Mr Chaskalson, I've been promoted to the Chair, can I ask if you finished with that line of questioning, would it be an appropriate time to take a lunch break, or do you want to pursue "die verkopelys" further?

MR CHASKALSON: I think given the answers that we have given, it's not going to be taken all that much further, if necessary I can return to it in lunch, but I've made the point and the witness has provided his answer and I do not see him changing from that.

MS ORR: Thank you, we will adjourn for lunch and we will convene at 14h00.

HEARING ADJOURNS

ON RESUMPTION:

WYNAND SWANEPOEL: (s.u.o.)

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Chaskalson?

MR CHASKALSON: Thank you, Mr Chair. Dr Swanepoel, did you ever have any contact with General Lothar Neethling during the course of your work?

MR SWANEPOEL: On a personal level, yes, not in regarding to any work or contracts.

MR CHASKALSON: Sorry, you were socially friendly, but you did not discuss the nature of your work with him?

MR SWANEPOEL: Correct.

MR CHASKALSON: Did Dr Neethling ever visit RRL?

MR SWANEPOEL: On one occasion I can remember that he came to visit.

MR CHASKALSON: ...(inaudible) on that tour?

MR SWANEPOEL: I cannot remember specifically.

MR CHASKALSON: Did the Surgeon-General ever visit RRL?

MR SWANEPOEL: That I cannot recall specifically.

MR CHASKALSON: Did ...(inaudible) ever visit RRL?

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes.

MR CHASKALSON: Would you say he visited frequently?

MR SWANEPOEL: It was not often, no, probably twice a year, or three times a year.

MR CHASKALSON: Were you friendly with Dr Basson?

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes.

MR CHASKALSON: If Dr Basson were to visit RRL, you would in all likelihood be consulting with Dr Immelman on some or other instruction, or would it be a social visit?

MR SWANEPOEL: I personally?

MR SWANEPOEL: When, if Dr Basson were to visit RRL, he would probably be meeting with Dr Immelman.

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes.

MR CHASKALSON: To discuss a project?

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes.

MR CHASKALSON: You would not have had knowledge of that project because the link between the SADF projects was from Dr Basson to Dr Immelman?

MR SWANEPOEL: That was not the rule, there were occasions of which I knew, and occasions of which I did not know.

MR CHASKALSON: You clarified that for me earlier. Earlier you had said that you knew of some of the projects if they came up in the course of financial matters or other matters, but you never had any understanding of what the nature of those projects were.

MR SWANEPOEL: That's correct.

MR CHASKALSON: That would apply to the present comments that you have just made as well?

MR SWANEPOEL: That's true.

MR CHASKALSON: Were you aware of the existence of a company by the name of Delta G?

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes.

MR CHASKALSON: What did you know of Delta G?

MR SWANEPOEL: I did not know a great deal about Delta G. I knew that it was a manufacturing facility and that it was part of Project Coast family.

MR CHASKALSON: Did RRL ever do any work for Delta G?

MR SWANEPOEL: No.

MR CHASKALSON: Did Delta G ever do any work for RRL?

MR SWANEPOEL: I can recall one aspect where we did research, or a specific peace of research that we wanted to have done there for the manufacturing of a substance. All that I can remember is that it was a fiasco. We never got anything from them and the relationship ended.

MR CHASKALSON: You would have had responsibility for the control of finances at RRL?

MR SWANEPOEL: Ultimately, yes.

MR CHASKALSON: And you would account to that other committee that we were talking about earlier in terms of higher up reporting to the SADF?

MR SWANEPOEL: Correct.

MR CHASKALSON: Were you a Director of any other SADF company, front companies?

MR SWANEPOEL: Not front companies, that I can recall as being front companies, but I was a Director of other companies.

MR CHASKALSON: ...(inaudible) that you were a Director at RRL?

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes.

MR CHASKALSON: What were your functions at the other companies?

MR SWANEPOEL: As a Director on the board meetings in terms of financial and management inputs.

MR CHASKALSON: Can you tell us what those companies were?

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes, Protechnic, for a short while I Director of Lifestyle Management. I cannot recall anymore at this moment.

MR CHASKALSON: Can, aside from Delta G, were you aware of any other SADF companies that belonged to this scheme?

MR SWANEPOEL: I was not aware of any, no.

MR CHASKALSON: The two companies that you mentioned previously, are you saying that they are private companies, and not SADF front companies?

MR SWANEPOEL: That is what I suppose, yes.

MR CHASKALSON: ...(inaudible) companies?

MR SWANEPOEL: Protechnic, it was Jan Lourens, at times there was a Bernard Zimmer who was in time replaced by Charles van Remoortrere and later on when further shares were sold from Medchem Consolidated, Dr Mijburgh was a director, and I left the company as a director.

MR CHASKALSON: ...(inaudible) companies, they certainly involved the same people who in some or other form, or at one or other stage were involved in SADF front companies?

MR SWANEPOEL: Not necessarily so. I did not know that Charles van Remoortrere or Bernard Zimmer were involved.

MR CHASKALSON: Dr Jan Lourens?

MR SWANEPOEL: He was a member at Seven Medical Battalion, but I did not know of any front companies.

MR CHASKALSON: ...(inaudible)

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes.

MR CHASKALSON: Were you paid a salary for your directorships in the other companies?

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes.

MR CHASKALSON: And can you tell us what your salary was?

MR SWANEPOEL: I think for the two or three years I was involved I earned R25 000.

MR CHASKALSON: R25 000 per year?

MR SWANEPOEL: No.

MR CHASKALSON: For the entire period?

MR SWANEPOEL: For the whole period.

MR CHASKALSON: Can you remember what your salary was at RRL when you were the Managing Director?

MR SWANEPOEL: No.

MR CHASKALSON: Isn't it strange that you can remember the one salary, but not the other?

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes, because it was one.

MR CHASKALSON: Sorry, can you just clarify that for me?

MR SWANEPOEL: I can remember it because Dr Schalk van Rensburg made a lot of noise about that at a certain stage. He drew attention to that because he saw that lying around, and he made a lot of noise about that.

MR CHASKALSON: ...(inaudible)

MR SWANEPOEL: His facts regarding what?

MR CHASKALSON: ...(inaudible)

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes.

MR CHASKALSON: Did you have other business interests while you were working at RRL?

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes.

MR CHASKALSON: Did you disclose those business interests with your directors?

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes.

MR CHASKALSON: What was the nature of those business interests?

MR SWANEPOEL: I was a director and if I say business interests, it means I was a director, a director of Global Air Charter and Wisdom Travel.

MR CHASKALSON: Who were the members of those companies?

MR SWANEPOEL: They were Mrs Cecelia Grant and I can't remember - no, there were no other people involved.

MR CHASKALSON: ...(audible) there any links directly or indirectly to Dr Basson?

MR SWANEPOEL: No.

MR CHASKALSON: Did you receive remuneration for the work you did at those companies?

MR SWANEPOEL: No.

MR CHASKALSON: Would I be correct to say that your salary during this period is the amount you were paid at RRL and an amount of R25 000 in total for the other two companies?

MR SWANEPOEL: That is correct.

MR CHASKALSON: You have heard allegations about a lavish lifestyle, do you have any comment on that?

MR SWANEPOEL: I want to put it clearly that this comment is coming from grieved people and they were suspended from the company under very difficult circumstances.

MR CHASKALSON: So the lifestyle was not particularly lavish?

MR SWANEPOEL: No.

MR CHASKALSON: Have you ever gone overseas for RRL?

MR SWANEPOEL: I did yes.

MR CHASKALSON: What were the occasions?

MR SWANEPOEL: I can't remember specifically, but I can't remember - not more that four times. I visited various people and I positioned RRL for European markets on how we should structure ourselves and comply with the requirements of overseas markets, and I tried to recruit consultants.

MR CHASKALSON: ...(inaudible)

MR SWANEPOEL: No, but I've already sent assistance before the time.

MR CHASKALSON: Did you find it easy to explain to foreign people about the capacities and the abilities of your company?

MR SWANEPOEL: No, I did not find trouble in doing that.

MR CHASKALSON: So you weren't going to look to see what you could possibly do in the future.

MR SWANEPOEL: That's right yes.

MR CHASKALSON: Then how would you be able to examine properly if you didn't know what your company was doing?

MR SWANEPOEL: Because I did not require inside into the details of contracts to present information to them. I did not provide them with contracts, I tried to find consultants to help us manage various structures and to also come and address my specialist regarding the handling of contracts and standards for European market.

MR CHASKALSON: ...(inaudible)

MR SWANEPOEL: Op die oomblik?

MR CHASKALSON: Yes.

MR SWANEPOEL: At the moment, two.

MR CHASKALSON: I believe in the past you had a very nice collection of Mercedes Benz cars, is that correct?

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes, they were not in my name.

MR CHASKALSON: Whose name were they in?

MR SWANEPOEL: It's in the name of a trust.

MR CHASKALSON: Who are the beneficiaries of the trust?

MR SWANEPOEL: My family.

MR CHASKALSON: Who obtained the assets to acquire those cars?

MR SWANEPOEL: I don't understand your question. Mr Chairman, I don't want to object unnecessarily, but this question is about which vehicles the person owns now, this is now a decade after this investigation. This is not relevant then. We are under time pressure as I see this, and with respect, my submission is that this interrogation is leading nowhere.

MR CHASKALSON: ...(inaudible) and that is that he had two cars. The way I was enquiring about it, I understate that he potentially had a collection of cars which were certainly a prize collection, and I'd just like to establish what they were and at what stage he had this collection. This should take no more that a simple minute or two.

CHAIRPERSON: Put the question, Mr Chaskalson.

MR CHASKALSON: Can you tell us at what time period you started developing this collection of Mercedes Benz cars?

MR SWANEPOEL: I want to correct you, they were not Mercedes Benz motor cars, I've collected them over a period of thirteen to fifteen years. I've restored them myself. I bought them in a ...(indistinct) condition and restored them myself.

MR CHASKALSON: You have heard allegations of financial mismanagement during your period at RRL, do you have any comment on that?

MR SWANEPOEL: I reject it with utter contempt.

MR CHASKALSON: You stated that you had put a request to the directors that you wanted a full salary during a period which you were only prepared to do partial work, is that correct?

MR SWANEPOEL: Dr van Rensburg has a problem.

MR CHASKALSON: It is simple enough to answer whether the allegation is correct or incorrect.

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes. With respect, the witness has a right to motivate his answer.

MR CHASKALSON: ...(inaudible) allegation was correct.

MR SWANEPOEL: Dr van Rensburg had a problem in the company because he could not work with his colleagues. They all protested, they scolded him, nobody was such a good scientist as he himself, according to him. Dr van Rensburg at various instances did not abide by certain targets, management targets. At every instance when he was called in to handle that, he left the office hysterically, he threw papers around and he walked around with a textbook, a Harvard Business Management book under his arm and he said he said he was a very good manager, and he does not accept the management staff of the company. At various instances we discussed these problems with Dr van Rensburg, not problems with only me, but with all the other people and I had to address these problems. It all culminated in October/November 1991 when at various instances over a period of two months Dr van Rensburg had an indication that he had to prepare for certain report back planning meetings. At that stage he was the head of the quality control unit and the purpose was to bring the company in line with the international standard organisation standards. That was part of those things I found overseas, so that we could compete with overseas research institutions. At that stage Dr van Rensburg made wrong propositions to the Bureau of Standards. His people were not informed, they did not know what their duties were. He forbade them to speak to anybody in the company, so when he was on leave, nothing happened regarding quality control. We were working according to a strict time schedule to be able to penetrate the market. I want to say it was part of that attempt by Dr van Rensburg which hindered us so we could not enter the European market when it was a good opportunity to do that. Dr van Rensburg had to appear in a hearing and he self referred ...(intervention)

MR CHASKALSON: ...(inaudible) the question which I started on and which your legal representatives have not asked you to address ...(intervention)

MR SWANEPOEL: What I'm trying to tell you from the evidence of Dr van Rensburg, you might hear it, put it against the background that he is a grieved scientist, according to his theory.

MR CHASKALSON: Would you say that he or you is more qualified in this particular field?

MR SWANEPOEL: What particular field are you referring to, sir?

MR CHASKALSON: Let us - can do this in a number of ways, we could start off in a chemical and biological field, non administrative functions.

MR SWANEPOEL: He has more knowledge than I have regarding that.

MR CHASKALSON: In your view both Dr van Rensburg and Dr Goosen were people who could not interact well with other people, is that correct?

MR SWANEPOEL: That is correct. Can I expand on that?

MR CHASKALSON: We don't need an elaboration at this stage, thank you. In 1986 you replaced Dr Daan Goosen, is that correct?

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes.

MR CHASKALSON: After a short period of months you took up the position as the Managing Director and he took up a position in the Roodeplaat Breeding Enterprises, is that correct?

MR CHASKALSON: And he was removed because there was something of a crisis going at RRL, is that correct?

MR SWANEPOEL: Not something of a crisis, it was a crisis.

MR CHASKALSON: So you experience as a Managing Director of RRL was poor then?

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes.

MR CHASKALSON: Do you feel that you performed well at RRL as a Managing Director?

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes.

MR CHASKALSON: Would you care to give us a brief summary of achievements of RRL while you were Director?

MR SWANEPOEL: RRL became well-known in the commercial world. The various structures were created within the organisation, firstly to determine the needs of the anti vivisectionists or perhaps to meet them. We established various committees. There was financial control. We budgeted, there was a personnel staff code. We tried to at that stage, when we failed, we were a leader regarding to Iso '92 standards. We had to leave that by the way. Regarding finances, we were well ahead. Regarding the turnabout of the handling of contracts, military contracts or the research contracts and in that respect we were doing well. In terms of the situation in which RRL found itself regarding the private and the open market, before my time, it was a very difficult time and at that stage when I was there in 1990, for example, we had progressed a far way to make the company more competitive and it was a successful commercial company.

MR CHASKALSON: What achievements that were made at RRL during your period?

MR SWANEPOEL: No, I can't remember anything specific.

MR CHASKALSON: Or would you just not know them if there were any?

MR SWANEPOEL: I know of various attempts which have resulted in anything.

MR CHASKALSON: ...(inaudible) as being memorable enough for you to recall for us today?

MR SWANEPOEL: No.

MR CHASKALSON: Did you interact well with the scientist at RRL?

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes.

MR CHASKALSON: ...(inaudible)

MR SWANEPOEL: I hope so, yes.

MR CHASKALSON: Were you ever involved in any scientific conversations or input into scientific discussions with them?

MR SWANEPOEL: No, I did not have the ability to do that.

MR CHASKALSON: So you have not published any scientific papers or anything of that nature?

MR SWANEPOEL: No.

MR CHASKALSON: Do you think that that was a particularly good chance for the Managing Director of a commercial research front company?

MR SWANEPOEL: I have no illusion about it, but the Managing Director of a company is there to manage the company and if the necessary specialists are there to handle the specific departments and the Managing Director does not necessarily have to be a researcher.

MR CHASKALSON: ...(inaudible) expertise on their field?

MR SWANEPOEL: No, I had my specialists.

MR CHASKALSON: Was Daan Goosen at any stage ever requested to return to RRL after he had moved to the breeding enterprises?

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes.

MR CHASKALSON: Can you tell us when that took place and under what circumstances it took place?

MR SWANEPOEL: When I went to RRL, part of my guidelines was to assist Daan Goosen and not to get rid of him, and personally I devoted a lot of time in discussions with him, in interviews with him and assistance to him. All my planning I did together with him so that he could become part of the process and my point of view was that I wanted to improve his image. When I moved to RTO, one of the reasons was, he went to RTO, but he had to report back to me, so I remained involved with him. He came back from RTO, because there he was not available and he also hampered the contracts with Eskom and the Police and with the Defence Force. We had to appoint another Managing Director, and I consulted with him again. I withdrew him, or I drew him back to RRL to give Dr Goosen another opportunity to improve his image, and I made him head of the experimental animal section, but sometimes his people could not get hold of him because the one says he's there and the other says he there, nobody knew where he was. And then in the end Dr Goosen used the company for his own personal gain and he also used means from the company, and I want to make this statement, and the evidence is there, that the builders who built RRL, he asked them to make renovations to his house and then he drew a subsidy for that. This was part of the things being discussed during his retrenchment. He understood that and he knew what the reasons were. I have a letter in his own handwriting in which he says thank you for the way you handled this whole matter.

MR CHASKALSON: If my question were to say that he was approached by you after being forced out of the company and at some stage later you approached because the company was now in a crisis, to request his help, you would say that he was incorrect and/or lying.

MR SWANEPOEL: That's true, yes.

MR CHASKALSON: If I tell you that he made a simple suggestion, if you would like to turn this company around, put somebody in charge who knows the field, i.e., remove yourself, you would say that he was lying?

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes.

MR CHASKALSON: What do you believe of the quality of the science during your time?

MR SWANEPOEL: Please repeat the question.

MR CHASKALSON: Would you refer to your science at RRL during your period of management as good, bad or indifferent or incapable of categorising as I did not know science?

MR SWANEPOEL: I would say it was good.

MR CHASKALSON: How would you know it is good science if you can't say - if you can't tell us about scientific projects?

MR SWANEPOEL: Because I did not receive feedbacks regarding problems.

MR CHASKALSON: Can you outline for us why there seems to have been an interest at RRL in developing toxic chemicals that should be tasteless, colourless and odourless?

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes, for precisely the same reason as I've mentioned right in the beginning.

MR CHASKALSON: ...(inaudible) as opposed to have in any way using such a substance on possible people.

MR SWANEPOEL: As I've already said, how can we trace it, how can we observe it, how can we diagnose it?

MR CHASKALSON: ...(inaudible) outside the mandate of the company?

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes.

MR CHASKALSON: And you would explain the putting of toxins into cigarettes, chocolates, various liquids and other substance and a category of testing what could be done as opposed to a category of testing which weapons could be manufactured?

MR SWANEPOEL: I've already said specifically yes.

MR CHASKALSON: Can you discuss or pass a comment on the interest in certain toxin which could cause death, but which would not be located in a post mortem?

MR SWANEPOEL: I can't comment on that.

CHAIRPERSON: I'm just asking do you have an indication of how long you still want to be with this witness?

MR CHASKALSON: ...(inaudible)

CHAIRPERSON: Yes, Mr Chaskalson.

MR CHASKALSON: Did you receive a payment at the time of the privatisation of RRL?

MR SWANEPOEL: Which payment?

MR CHASKALSON: The payment, did you receive shares in the company?

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes.

MR CHASKALSON: Did you receive proceeds from the sale of assets of the company?

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes, everybody bought shares.

MR CHASKALSON: What - how many shares you purchased and what was the purchase price?

MR SWANEPOEL: I can't remember the number of shares, but it was a par value.

MR CHASKALSON: Can you tell us how much you received when you redeemed those shares?

MR SWANEPOEL: Can I consult with my lawyer?

MR CHASKALSON: With pleasure.

MR SWANEPOEL: I will answer that question, I can't remember the specific amounts, but in the trust which I have referred, there was R4,5 million.

MR CHASKALSON: What you paid into that company, would you be able to approximate what that would have been? Would it have been R1 million?

MR SWANEPOEL: No.

MR CHASKALSON: Would it have been R500 000?

MR SWANEPOEL: No, it was about R50 000.

MR CHASKALSON: ...(inaudible)

MR SWANEPOEL: I can't remember, but it was when the shares were bought, it was before the privatisation process.

MR CHASKALSON: In 1989?

MR SWANEPOEL: No.

MR CHASKALSON: Would you care to give us an estimate as to when that privatisation process took place?

MR SWANEPOEL: In 1991.

MR CHASKALSON: 1991, and when did you redeem your shares?

MR SWANEPOEL: I don't understand your question.

MR CHASKALSON: You received a pay-out of I think you said - you received a payment of R4 million, is that correct?

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes.

MR CHASKALSON: When did you receive that payment?

MR SWANEPOEL: You have to understand the whole process. This process of privatisation took place over various stages.

MR CHASKALSON: At the moment I'd just like to clarify the amounts.

MR SWANEPOEL: I can't remember the specific date, but I think it was roundabout 1991, 1992, so we're talking ...(intervention)

MR CHASKALSON: ...(inaudible) something like R50 000 and a final pay-out of something like R4 million in a time period of something like a year or two years.

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes.

MR CHASKALSON: Does that not seem like a exorbitant amount of money?

MR SWANEPOEL: Mr Chaskalson, if you are aware and know the privatisation process and the various stages which it entails, I can give you a direct answer.

MR CHASKALSON: So you would simply say that you would probably have thought of it as a good investment?

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes.

MR CHASKALSON: Schalk van Rensburg discussed the fertility programme with us and a request that you made to him to release certain untested products to you. Would you confirm or deny that?

MR SWANEPOEL: Deny.

MR CHASKALSON: Earlier on, and it's emerged repeatedly during this interview, you spoke about an MD and you likened yourself either to a hospital administrator or possibly even a president, and that you surrounded yourself with good people to make important decisions. Would you say that that is correct?

MR SWANEPOEL: I did not liken myself to them, I quoted as an example of how structures work.

MR CHASKALSON: Correct. Well leave the president aside and settle for a hospital administrator. How would you think that a hospital administrator could perform his job if he couldn't give an account of the patients and diseases, the equipment used the modes of treatment, the drugs available, the duties of staff, or the experiments done, and their ethics? Would you say he or she would be in a position to do that job well?

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes, Mr Chaskalson. I was a medical superintendent of Military 3 Hospital.

MR CHASKALSON: ...(inaudible) about the fact that you were the Managing Director of a company which potentially could prove devastating organisms and which you had absolutely no knowledge about.

MR SWANEPOEL: I trusted my specialists.

MR CHASKALSON: Thank you Dr Swanepoel, I have no further questions.

CHAIRPERSON: Is there any cross-examination, Mr van Zyl?

MR VAN ZYL: Just one aspect please, Mr Chairman. Dr Swanepoel, yesterday Dr van Rensburg testified that at the stage when Dr Daan Goosen was the Managing Director, he was involved in, amongst others, the research and he said the position after you took over changed as he said you did not make a similar contribution as Daan Goosen because you did not know what was going on with the research. Does it fit in with the knowledge you had about the process? You did not know about the research, that's why you did not interfere in that?

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes, the research I left for the researchers and I was involved in the management of the company.

MR VAN ZYL: Thank you, Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Polsen?

MR POLSEN: Dr, you referred to various contracts by Daan Goosen, there was a freezing of a embryo which was done for Dr Rautenbach and I have statements of his subordinates which it was said they did this job. It was not a registered project and it was not on company's list of research projects. How did Dr Goosen register that?

MR SWANEPOEL: I don't understand your question.

MR POLSEN: You said that he concluded certain contracts or he impeded certain contracts. How did he do that with the establishment of the subsidiary company?

MR SWANEPOEL: The purpose was that the military, the Police and Eskom would stop their various projects and then these dogs had to be bred at RRO. Things went wrong and the feedback was that they could not work with Dr Daan Goosen. Eskom placed a person there, he was used as the director and Dr Goosen and that person experienced big problems, so the whole management or the operation of the company came to a standstill until such time that the other person went back to Eskom and they also took the contracts or the dogs back.

MR POLSEN: He also referred to subsidies being obtained for a house which was renovated.

MR SWANEPOEL: It was his house at that time. He had certain contracting work being done, building work and he asked a subsidy for that later one.

MR POLSEN: He was not - we will ask Dr Goosen about this ourselves. I have no further questions.

MR CURRIN: No questions, Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr du Plessis?

MR DU PLESSIS: No questions, Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: Any re-examination.

MR CILLIERS: No further questions.

CHAIRPERSON: Any questions from the panel?

MR POTGIETER: Did one of your projects deal with fertility?

MR SWANEPOEL: It was one of the registered projects at Roodeplaat. Initially it was an in-house project.

MR POTGIETER: And later, was it a hard project?

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes, in time it became a hard project, or part of that.

MR POTGIETER: Were you interested in that project?

MR SWANEPOEL: No.

MR POTGIETER: And the result of the project?

MR SWANEPOEL: I cannot comment on that.

MR POTGIETER: I understand that there were no results. Did you at any stage exert pressure on the people who were involved in the project to get results?

MR SWANEPOEL: No, I was not involved in this at all.

MR POTGIETER: Dr van Rensburg told us that he was one of the persons who worked together with Dr Borman, so Dr Borman was actually the person who dealt directly with this project?

He was a kind of an advisor to Dr van Rensburg and he said that on various occasions you exerted pressure on them to come to the fore with the product of that project.

MR SWANEPOEL: That's not true.

MR POTGIETER: Can you give us any reason why you think he would try and get you into trouble?

MR SWANEPOEL: It seems that it is not of much interest or importance. I think that I made myself clear, it's a personal - an old man whose got - who is grieved about things and wants to get his own back.

MR RANDERA: Dr Swanepoel, these companies that you were part of and how they were set up, now, from other people we've heard first of all, is it Infidel or Infladel, both RRL and Delta G reported to initially.

MR SWANEPOEL: It was Infladel, yes.

MR RANDERA: ...(inaudible)

MR SWANEPOEL: No.

MR RANDERA: And then we heard about Medchem as the holding company for many of these other front companies. Were you involved in Medchem?

MR SWANEPOEL: No.

MR RANDERA: Just explain to me again in terms of structure that you gave out earlier on that there was first of all your internal structure and then there was reporting to the middletory structures, the Finance Committee, the Co-ordinating Committee and the Security Committee. Where did Infadel fall, how did they come into the structure, or was there dual reporting that was going on?

MR SWANEPOEL: As far as my knowledge goes Infladel was a structure that was created to - for specifically in connection with the image to the outside. When companies were extremely confidential and had to have an image of a commercial industry, it was there to represent shareholding and to represent the channels of communication.

MR RANDERA: In the situation that we're looking at the present time, when you started off, your company was a 100% supported by the military, so there were no shareholders as such, were there?

MR SWANEPOEL: Nominee shareholders.

MR RANDERA: So who were these nominee shareholders?

MR SWANEPOEL: Myself - well, before my time Dr Daan Goosen, Immelman, van Rensburg and Mr Spalmer.

MR RANDERA: And the same then applied to Medchem as well, they were just nominee shareholders?

MR SWANEPOEL: I don't know.

MR RANDERA: You had nothing to do with it?

MR SWANEPOEL: No.

MR RANDERA: Some of the reports we have in our files as well as the information that came out in the last few days talked about an incident that took place in Mozambique in 1992 where several soldiers died, many were incapacitated, was your company ever involved in carrying out any tests there? Are you aware of this incident?

MR SWANEPOEL: I have no knowledge of that.

MR RANDERA: Earlier on when Mr Chaskalson asked you about your company and the contributions you made to it, you talked about the - that the science was of a high standard, that management was of a good standard, but what was the profitability of the company by the time it became privatised in 1991, and certainly by - and I'd like to know also the subsequent development, what happened to it, you've mentioned the sum of R50 000 that you invested in the company. What has happened to this company since?

MR SWANEPOEL: The company was specifically in the transitional phase. The intention was the purchasing of the shares and the privatisation between the employees of RRL. Part of the structures that were created were then also holder companies and the shareholders trust within the company. Perhaps I am missing the point now, but the intention of the company was to privatise, to take over commercial projects in its full capacity to deal with commercial projects. The Defence Force indicated that they would cease their projects, they did however conclude a contract with us for a further five years in 1989, or sorry, 1990 and with this contract we decided that we would deal with it and we would continue with the process. In the privatisation process we gave them a loan account, the Defence Force, and we also had to buy the property from them. In due course the Defence Force informed us that they had to implement increased option regarding the ending of contracts because they wanted to terminate the work and take everything back. Our provision was that we would continue with the company. In a specific year, I think this was also 1990, Minister Pik Botha announced in declare that we did not have chemical biological abilities, but he had to correct himself later and say that we did have this capability and this specific convention wanted to know who was involved, who were all the elements and what is their involvement in this specific subject, and on this basis we undertook not to make this known - it was undertaken not to make this known, but we were made known world-wide in terms of our involvement in the project and we started losing our clients, our commercial clients, that around which our whole company was built. At that stage we tried to negotiate with our clients, and we said stay with us, we will carry on dealing with your things, things are changing, but they also said to us, no, let's rather leave it at that, we are no longer interested. So we started losing clients as a result of the public making of this. This led to the process that finally we had to liquidate or subsidise the company with no prediction of the results thereof.

MR RANDERA: May I ask two questions to you, Mr Swanepoel. The first one is, I suppose it would be in the last few days, the thought that I go away with at the end of the day is, here was your company, particularly involved in what you call ...(indistinct) because that's you saw at the end of the day, and I must say, I haven't from any of your directors, scientists who were involved and earlier on I asked that question as well if you, had a reasonable explanation as to what's happened to these products. Do you sleep easily yourself, knowing that your company may be perhaps, somewhere in some fridge, these deadly organisms are still surviving?

MR SWANEPOEL: I must tell you that before I received these documents and the line of questioning from Mr Chaskalson it was not a problem for me, because I believe that it had happened as I had set it out to be a discussion initially. I cannot tell you what was done with this because these things were all removed under instruction, all documentation, all products were removed and went back to the client. In the commercial line one or other pharmaceutical company, if they have come to me, I do not know what the result of his intentions would be. If it is as you say, then surely, if you want to follow the approach that you are following, then I must tell you that the director of Musgrave must also sleep, very fitfully.

MR RANDERA: Having had an insight into all these documents now, that you say you didn't know about previously, and part of the Commission's responsibility is also to look at the future, what would you recommend as far as chemical and biological warfare goes for this country, and what processes should be involved if we were to become involved in developing such instructions?

MR SWANEPOEL: It can surely not be an open subject, you know the sensitivity regarding this subject in the world arena. There are many countries who have these capabilities and you say they do not, but they do. The handling of this will certainly in future still be done in a clandestine and extremely confidential basis. Depending on the Government's policy regarding publicising and what they want to pretend to other countries and other governments, I cannot comment on this. What I think is that I believe that one should have a defensive capability. It also depends on the threat, that's a political question, but if the political scene should change overnight, these are not things which are established in a day or two, these are things which develop over a long period of time and are prepared, and one must be ready to be able to handle oneself in such a case, as is the case with any other country.

MR RANDERA: One last question, yesterday we certainly heard somebody talk about the enemy. In your particular case did you become involved in this sort of work because there was an enemy for you too, and if so, who was this enemy?

MR SWANEPOEL: No, this was not my objective, it was just a further challenge regarding management and my own involvement.

MR RANDERA: So it was purely business for you?

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes, I was in the medical services and this meant support to troops and this was that medical services do not joint in the fight, they support their own troops, so my whole approach was a support role in my time in the military and with this management challenge - it was a personal challenge for me.

MR RANDERA: Thank you Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: Dr Orr?

MS ORR: Dr Swanepoel, did RRL ever do any work for, or have any interaction with Protechnic?

MR SWANEPOEL: Yes, Protechnic - at one stage Mr Jan Lourens consulted for us as a biotechnical engineer in terms of the building of certain apparatus.

MS ORR: Are you aware that what Dr Odendal called larger quantities of bacterial cultures were prepared for testing filters at Protechnic?

MR SWANEPOEL: No.

MS ORR: You did not know that your company was producing products for testing at Protechnic?

MR SWANEPOEL: No.

MS ORR: And do you have any idea why Protechnic might have asked Dr Odendal to prepare five cigarettes contaminated with Anthrax?

MR SWANEPOEL: No.

CHAIRPERSON: You are excused Dr Swanepoel.

MR SWANEPOEL: Thank you.

WITNESS EXCUSED

MR RANDERA: Mr Chair I would request if we could stand down for five minutes, we have to send a message down to Mr Vally, but I understand the legal argument could probably take place now, and I just want to drag him back here.

CHAIRPERSON: We'll stand down for five minutes. Are we in a position to put any other witness in the event legal argument is still ...(intervention)

MR RANDERA: We are in a position to put another witness, but we would far prefer it if the question of the legal argument was resolved, just because it allows us to determine the timing for the remainder of the hearing.

MR POTGIETER: If I can assist, Mr Chairman, I went down to Mr Vally a couple of minutes ago to establish how far he was, and the impression I had that he would still need some time, so I think your suggestion of another witness is maybe time-wise the correct choice.

MR POLSEN: Mr Chair, if I may, I would like to consult with Mr Vally.

CHAIRPERSON: Please do.

MR POLSEN: I would rather prefer that we do not lead the next witness right now.

CHAIRPERSON: No, was - I'm giving you the five minute adjournment, but five minutes strictly. If he is in any way going to be 10 minutes after five minutes, then we are taking the next witness.

HEARING ADJOURNS

CHAIRPERSON: The honeymoon is over, let's get on with the job. Mr Cilliers.

MR CILLIERS: As it pleases you Mr Chairman, the witness hasn't been called formally yet but can we continue with the legal argument regarding the question if there's obligation on these witnesses to testify.

CHAIRPERSON: One of the witnesses, we have sworn Dr Mijburgh I think. Can I ask....

MR CILLIERS: The witness Mijburgh has been sworn, Basson not yet. My submission will be, for practical reasons, that we first have the argument although I have no specific prejudices I think it will be practical that you first make the decision before he is sworn in.

CHAIRPERSON: Adv Potgieter can you swear the witness in.

WOUTER BASSON: (sworn states)

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Cilliers.

MR CILLIERS: As it pleases you. As indicated Mr Chairman during last week to Mr Vally and Mr Chaskalson and more specifically this week to you, there is at this stage an application on behalf of the two witnesses before you and what we want is that their evidence be suspended according to the criminal charges pending against them.

At this stage, in view of the attitude of Mr Vally I will make no distinction between the two. I will deal with the legal position on the same basis, although there is a small difference between the two, but Dr Basson, as you possibly know, has already been arrested and is out on bail and a date has already been set for his appearance in court. He has appeared in court regularly, but from the 17th of August a final charge sheet will be provided and he will be expected to plead and from there the case will be continued.

The position is not quite the same regarding Dr Mijburgh, but I have been told by Mr Vally that we can deal with the matter and it's my submission that this is an agreement with the present law in this regard and that Dr Mijburgh has the same rights, in light of the indications, that Dr Mijburgh will be charged for these crimes or offences. It is only the finalising thereof in the near future.

As regards the legal position ...(intervention)

ADV POTGIETER: I am sorry Mr Cilliers before you do that, don't you just want to sketch the practical situation for us? You said that this evidence must be suspended or curtailed pending the criminal charges, what is the prognosis? How far has this case progressed? When is it going to be completed? Is there any idea that this case will be completed by the time that this Commission has to complete its work which is the 30th of June?

MR CILLIERS: No, this is an absolute date and that there's no possibility of an extension as has happened in the past then there can surely be no realistic estimation that it will be completed by that stage unless the government will not continue with the prosecution. But there was an initial indication that the State would be ready at the end of January this year, but as a result of problems on their side they could not continue with this or could not even give us the charge sheet at this stage and the situation was extended or delayed, postponed till August.

So it is our submission that this is a realistic possibility that has not been envisaged at all by the Attorney-General and we can therefore not make a realistic estimation that if the case continues that it will be completed by the end of June.

ADV POTGIETER: So if we should curtail this or postpone it, it would not be practical unless there is an extension of the period of taking of evidence. That's out of the question.

MR CILLIERS: I am not clued up about that. I can possibly boil down to that, yes.

ADV POTGIETER: So you want to deal with the legal position?

MR CILLIERS: Yes. As regards the legal position you must just understand the factual basis first and I think that Mr Vally and I are in agreement about the fact that the factual basis on which this questioning rests is exactly the same as the factual basis of the criminal charges against these two witnesses.

The evidence that they will give here, if they are obliged or compelled to testify, that will deal with exactly the same aspects as the complaints are against these specific witnesses. You must accept this as the basic point of departure because this is of cardinal importance.

As has already been said I will not continue with the factual situation, the distinction thereof, in view of Mr Vally's attitude that he makes no distinction between the two.

We must then start with Section 35 of the Constitution which deals with the relevant situation. You must keep in mind this so-called right not to answer, the dealing with accused people which has been entrenched in our common law. It's the deep-rooted law or right which is in all the legal systems in the world including the Canadian and the British legal systems, so it's a deep-rooted right which is accepted throughout the world as a right in the fair dealing, handling, of any person who is charged.

Section 35 of the Constitution went further and this specific right was entrenched in the Constitution. Section 35, as you possibly know, deals with three sub cases. The heading is perhaps already an indication of which three cases are dealt with, namely arrested persons; detained persons and accused persons.

Subsection 1, already this is now before the charge sheet has been given to a person, or a decision has been made, but on his arrest already the Constitution in Section 35(1)(a) gives the right without any - for such a person and such a person has the right not to answer. There is no compromise reached in that article and this is a right which he is given and which will be our respectful submission which cannot be affected by proceedings of any nature. This is how in the recent past it was dealt with in the courts in South Africa and we will in time refer you to that.

At the outset I would also like to make something clear. We must just make a clear distinction and perhaps for the people on the panel who are not jurists that is just something which you must distinguish between in your own mind, one gets the situation of self-incrimination on the one hand and the so-called right not to answer on the other hand. These are two total different rights and they must be dealt with, are dealt with differently in the Constitution and are dealt with by different sections.

This is also dealt with on a different basis in different legislation. I will try to explain briefly what the difference is.

The right against self-incrimination is purely that right that a person has not to give any testimony during any proceedings which will implicate himself. Such right is also included in Section 35 and 35(3)©. It's been entrenched in these sections, the right not to answer as opposed to this is merely the right that an accused person is not obliged or cannot be compelled to - this is a basic right that he has to say that during my case I will give my testimony. The basic difference and handling of this is of great importance and this is explained as such. And this is the right to give self-incriminating evidence can be saved by legislation and Section 31 argues this to a large extent.

The negative effect that this has for a witness is that the incriminating evidence cannot be used against that person in a later hearing.

CHAIRPERSON: ....to remove yourselves here. Thank you.

MR CILLIERS: Thank you Chairperson. So to a large extent measures have been built into legislation which can eliminate the possibility of incriminating yourself or can justify it by the section which says that it cannot be used later.

The right not to answer is, however, a different situation. If that right is ever affected or infringed then there is no way in which that infringement in a situation such as this, can be rectified. If the witness has to give his testimony in a matter such as this, which is held in public, where the Attorney-General and the police have access to etc, where there are representatives present of the Investigative Team then you can understand that the infringement of that right cannot be rectified. And not even you or an order from any Supreme Court can do this. The Act does not make provision for special treatment of this. There are Acts which make provision for special treatment, Section 35 of the Insolvency Act makes special provision and provides that such proceedings be held in camera where the right not to answer can be brought up. It determines that it will be a crime to make public that information even to the police. So it will place the obligation on you, as members, and the Investigative Team that, that information should not even be given to the police, because it makes it a simple offence to even publicise such information.

The legislation does not have such a protective provision and as a so-called creature of statute, you are not entitled to tackle something like that on your own.

The further situation is that even the Insolvency Act, where one does have those protective measures the way in which the courts deal with this is that those proceedings are curtailed, the evidence which is gathered from the specific person is curtailed pending the outcome of the criminal case. And the reason appears very clear, and the best I can do for you is to quote from a ruling from Justice Kriegler in the Constitutional Court, at that stage in the Transvaal Provincial area which he gave in the judgment of HAVENGA v RHEEDER AND ANOTHER, 25th of March 1988. It's not reported but you will find it in all the legal documents and it's been quoted. I am reading the quote by Judge Navsa in the judgment, SEAPOINT COMPUTER BUREAU v KLAGEN & DE WET 1997, the second judgment on page 66, and I am reading on page 644G, in which Judge Kriegler says -

"What is the background or the basis of this law and what it entails? The practice is very clear....."

this is regarding the right now to answer -

"...this is fairness towards a person who is approaching a criminal case in which he can be prejudiced when he has to give all the information before the criminal case starts".

This is the situation here also.

Our law then went along a different route than the Canadian and the English law which handles these aspects much stricter or has better protection of the right not to answer. In the recent past, as mentioned by Judge Navsa in this judgment I've already referred to, and also Judge Nugent in one of his judgments and DAVIS v TIPP when specifically attention is paid to the right not to answer and how it should be handled. I will discuss this later on.

The first question is whether in that case whether courts can suspend activities such as these depending on the finalisation of criminal cases. And a long list of authorities the court did find that they could do that. I am also referring you to a passage from the judgment of Judge Nugent where he said expressly that the handling and the protection of fundamental rights, this is the protection of Section 35(1)(a) is not only the duty of the courts, but it's also the duty of any instance which has to do with the rights of individuals such as you. And the courts, at the end of the day, are the instance who should decide whether this had been complied with. But in the first instance this is an organisation like you.

And the reason why I am mentioning this here is, and why I am addressing you on the aspect that courts could suspend procedures, and I want to show you, indicate that you also have those rights and it's not necessary to go to the court to ask them to ask you to suspend the proceedings because you have the right to enforce those rights.

DAVIS v TIPP ...(indistinct) (SA) 1152 and the citation that I wanted to quote to you Mr Chairman, is. I quote on page 1156C from the relevant judgment to illustrate this point.

".... admitted that this was a question which the first respondent had been precluded from enquiring into as the Constitution is the sole domain of the courts. I do not think that is correct. The Constitution's charter of rights is the touchstone for testing the validity of conduct which is subject to its terms. It must necessarily, in those circumstances, be the light which guides those who are bound to act in accordance with its terms and not one against which their eyes are to be shielded. The role of the courts is merely to ensure that there is no deviation from the path".

So our submission, with respect, is that it is clear and it is the correct approach that any organisation which is working with the infringement of rights has to keep the Constitution in mind and it must be used as the basis and the point of departure according to which certain laws are evaluated or tested. And the court is just a way of saying whether it has been interpreted correctly.

CHAIRPERSON: Can I just put a question Mr Cilliers, you need not respond to it directly, but you may do so. Section 35 seems to be referring to arrested, detained and accused persons, and everyone who is arrested for allegedly committing offences, the right to remain silent. Now talking about forums, is this the forum where you can state that right?

MR CILLIERS: Yes.

CHAIRPERSON: This particular right?

MR CILLIERS: In Judge Navsa and Justice Nugent their judgment was about procedures and it is your task, during any procedure, to enforce those rights.

CHAIRPERSON: (Microphone not on)

MR CILLIERS: The first one the SEAPOINT 1997 (2) SA 636B. It is my submission that these are judgments, I have copies of those. I have given to my learned colleagues and you can look at those. These are the recent judgments and the very latest judgments regarding this specific aspect, and it will be fruitful to consider those.

Before I mentioned this new aspect I indicated that in a long series of cases in the South African legal system and also internationally, that this right, the right to suspend proceedings I have referred to what Judge Kriegler had said and I am referring you again to a judgment in GRATIS & GRATIS (PTY) LTD v JACK LOUW, 1930 (VLD) 496. You will find extracts from this in the SEAPOINT judgment. I am quoting: -

"The respondent certainly might be prejudiced if pending the decision of the criminal proceedings he were examined under the Insolvency Act or if he were interrogated by the provisional trustee. But the applicants agree to a direction being given that pending the decision of the criminal proceedings there shall be no examination of interrogation of the insolvent and provided that safe guard is laid down I fail to see how the sequestration of the respondent's estate can cause any prejudice to the respondent in the criminal proceedings."

So what the Court decided in that instance what that he allows the sequestration but in the light of the applicants regarding the sequestration in that matter they agreed that the insolvency should not be interrogated before the criminal proceedings. But this should be made part of the order that he is not allowed to testify or be interrogated by the trustee depending on the finalisation of the criminal case.

I want to refer you to DU TOIT v VAN RENSBURG, 1967 4SA433 and it is Cape Provincial division decision. And I will quote from that. It is on page 1072 (H).

CHAIRPERSON: It cannot be. Didn't you say it is 433?

MR CILLIERS: It is.

CHAIRPERSON: It would be a long judgment to cover (...indistinct)

MR CILLIERS: It is in fact. I am coming back to that and I am quoting from a later judgment IRVIN AND JOHNSON LTD v BASSON, 1977 (3).

CHAIRPERSON: This is not this Basson (...indistinct) What is the year Mr?

MR CILLIERS: 1977 (3) 1067 Transvaal decision. And the judgment was given by Justice Trengrove and I quote: -

CHAIRPERSON: And what is the page where you will be?

MR CILLIERS: 1072 (H) and further:-

"The principle as I understand it is that if it is shown that proceedings in an insolvency and the examination of an insolvent are likely to prejudice the insolvent in his defence and related criminal proceedings the Court has a discretion to stay all proceedings against him until the criminal proceedings have been concluded."

It refers to various authorities: -

"This arises out of the general rule in civil proceedings that until criminal proceedings have been disposed of where a defendant or a respondent as the case may be, might be prejudiced in criminal proceedings if the civil proceedings were heard first. The civil proceedings would then be postponed or suspended."

CHAIRPERSON: Can I just ask was there a provision or is there a provision by law is not that? Is there a provision in the Insolvency Act for the (...indistinct) of witnesses to self incriminate themselves?

MR CILLIERS: Ja. Section 65 ja.

CHAIRPERSON: Okay. You can go on now.

MR CILLIERS: I want to make something clear mention is made here of a discretion. Reference is made to discretion in later authority and you will find it in the judgement of Justice Nugent and I will give you the passage later on. He finds that the Court and including you yourself there does not have the discretion. Should an occasion arise where there is a potential prejudice there is an obligation. And under the term of the constitution which give you the basic right not to answer it is my submission that it is even stronger now when we have the constitution and Section 35 (1) (A) which gives somebody the right not to answer who is approaching a criminal court case.

I have given you the passage from du Toit page 435 next to the letter H. Says: -

"It has been held that where civil proceedings and criminal proceedings arising out of the same circumstances are pending against the person it is the usual practice to stay the civil proceedings until the criminal proceedings have been disposed of. The principle at the root of this practice is that the accused might be prejudiced in the criminal proceedings if the civil proceedings were heard first. Because he might have to give evidence in the civil proceedings and he might be subject to cross-examination or he might be compelled to disclose information in his possession before the criminal proceedings were disposed of."

I just want to make two remarks regarding this matter. On the one hand this matter is about a civil court case where a witness had the choice whether he wanted to testify or not. There is a difference between our law and the European and other legal systems. This is irrelevant here because in this situation we do not have that choice. Here we have the situation where Justice Kriegler has already indicated and Havenga Justice this is a statutory obligation. In the Canadian legal system usual proceedings where a witness has the choice to give evidence it can be suspended depending on the criminal proceedings. The choice he has is not a proper choice but should he not testify a negative deduction could be made or (...indistinct) inference could be drawn. And such normal civil proceedings are suspended. In our legal system the view has developed that although it is not a pleasant choice it still remains a choice. And there will be not an attempt made to protect his right not to answer. When something will be done is when there is some or other form of force. Where for example there is statutory pressure to make him testify. That is the case in the South African legal system. This is why I do not want to go deeper into this distinction here is a situation where there is not a choice but statutory enforcement.

ADV POTGIETER: Just give us the reference to Justice Nugent's judgment where he says the position is that there is no discretion?

MR CILLIERS: Page 1157 next to the letter d. Shortly I want to read from that so that you can see or hear that in context. It is the judgment of DAVIS.

ADV POTGIETER: Please read it.

MR CILLIERS: He says: -

"Although the principle has been articulated in the language of a discretion."

That was after the quote from the BASSON court case.

"Although the principle has been articulated in the language of a discretion this may be misleading. I do not understand the decided cases to have been held that the court may direct the civil proceedings to continue even where it has been found where they may prejudice an accused person. On the contrary, it is clear that once the potential for prejudice has been established the courts have always intervened to avoid it occurring. In that sense then it has no discretion."

ADV POTGIETER: What was the situation in DAVIS v TIPP?

MR CILLIERS: It was in disciplinary. DAVIS v TIPP the facts are that it was an official of a municipality who allegedly took some action which led to criminal prosecution. I think corruption and fraud were involved. And together with that with the court proceeding they had a disciplinary hearing during which the applicant approached the Court and said suspended all these proceedings pending a completion of the criminal case. In the end to give you the full picture. In this case the applicant had a choice because a municipality has no right to force somebody to testify. And in the end the judgment was that they will not suspend it. They will only do that when there is statutory pressure on the applicant to testify. Then they could do it. This is where the distinction is mentioned that the distinction regarding the choice. They say that the applicant is in a difficult position but should he not testify at his disciplinary hearing he was in a poorer position than otherwise. But he says he still has the choice. It is a difficult choice but this is not found in the Canadian legal system. Then they would only interfere if what they called there would be State coercion to force him to testify.

In the light of the fact that I have already mentioned it previously referred to the judgment in the Canadian legal system where regarding this decision situation civil proceedings are suspended. WILLIAMS v DEPUTY SUPERINTENDENT OF ASSURANCE, 1993 (18) CRR (2D) page 315. I shortly want to quote from the relevant judgment. The presiding judge was a certain McAdam. And I quote: -

"Justice Hallard (in Phillips case) confirms that the right to silence may even be compromised where the person agrees to testify."

And then he quotes from the PHILLIPS decision.

"Therefore respondent's right to silence will have been compromised even if they agreed to testify which they may be forced to do as they may not want to leave unanswered allegations that are made at the public enquiry. They are in the coercive power of the State. The Crown will be able to gather evidence without the usual safe guards provided by the criminal law."

And then he goes on: -

"Similarly the applicant faced with the evidence before the advisory board may notwithstanding that he has not been subpoenaed to give evidence be forced to waive the right to silence in order to respond to the evidence in the possession of the superintendent. He will therefore be in the coercive power of the State and the Crown will be able to gather evidence without the usual safeguards provided by the criminal law."

The effect of that and I do not want to take too much time we have here a typical example of State coercion. These are statutory obligation because the accused have no choice. And the handling of that they follow the approach that when there are criminal proceedings which are pending like these, those proceedings would be stayed. Although during those proceedings there are no statutory pressure on people. But the feeling is that perhaps he wants to testify but because he does not want to prejudice himself in the criminal proceedings pending he is in a difficult position should he or should he not testify. And that "pressure" to force him to give evidence to answer questions that difficult choice called State coercion by them, that is so unacceptable that all these proceedings are suspended until the criminal proceedings have been finalised.

In the light of the fact that we have an easier situation here where there is direct statutory force from the side of the State and it leaves them no choice and you do not have to pay any attention to that.

CHAIRPERSON: Would I be understanding you correctly Mr Cilliers that the gravamen of your argument is that your client would suffer great prejudice in the criminal proceedings in relation to which they have been charged were they to be compelled in terms of Section 31 of the Promotion of National Unity and Reconciliation Act?

MR CILLIERS: That is the crux of the argument yes.

CHAIRPERSON: Now I know that you did mention this in your argument but I just want to hear you again. And are you saying that prejudice will not be prevented from occurring or in other words it will not be that Subsection 3 of Section 31 of the Act - Promotion of National Unity and Reconciliation Act, is cold comfort from the point of view of prejudice. Subsection 3: -

"Is there any incriminating answer or information obtained or incriminating evidence directly or indirectly derived from a questioning in terms of Subsection 1 shall not be admissible as evidence against the person concerned in criminal proceedings in a court of law or before anybody or institution established by or under any law. "

And then the proviso is only in relation to the law relevant to (...indistinct)

MR CILLIERS: That is the reason why with respect Mr Chairman right in the beginning I have made a distinction between the two types of law. That is in Common Law and according to the Constitution. The distinction between the right to prevention of self incrimination and the right to keep silent are two various laws handled in various aspects in the Constitution and in the law. The protection of the right to keep silent is more difficult than the right to self incrimination. This is referred to in Section 31 on a proper basis it is handled there.

To illustrate this Dr Swanepoel was advised by me and I advised him: "Answer the questions that do not fall in this category and the protection by Section 31 is enough protection."

But in this case where the right to keep silent is relevant I cannot do it better than Justice Kriegler in that first quote where he made a clear distinction. And he said the underlying principle is fairness towards a person who is approaching a criminal court case and who can be prejudiced if he has to kind of show his hand before the criminal proceedings start. It not has to do with incriminating but it is revealing all information.

ADV POTGIETER: Does it have to do with prejudicing himself? But regarding prejudice and Subsection 3 is also relevant.

MR CILLIERS: Only during incriminating questions.

ADV POTGIETER: Why?

MR CILLIERS: The disclosure of your hand that is when you give certain questions which indicate in which direction your defence is going to be made. It is not an evidence that somebody is going to stand in a court and say: "You are saying this. Last time you said that you produced this agent." It gives the State the advantage that he now knows long before the court case what is the hand, what is the essence of the defence. To illustrate it on two bases. It is the same as to listen what an accused and his legal representative are saying. The policeman would go to court and say this person is not telling the truth because he told his legal representative on the day the crime was committed he was in Cape Town. And the fact that he should not do that does not make that it could be allowed. Now they can do this because of the statutory force which is put on the person that this accused was pressurised to show his hand.

ADV POTGIETER: You have to read this whole Subsection. If you interpret that we should take into consideration the potential prejudice the client can experience when he testifies you should show us the potential prejudice. And I am asking you when we measure all this up why can't we take the provisions of Subsection 3(1)? If we find for example that in the light of the protection provided by Subsection 3(1) he cannot be prejudiced and we can find that we did not make these points.

MR CILLIERS: Should you find that compulsory evidence under statutory pressures cannot prejudice a person. I will fall off this chair with surprise.

ADV POTGIETER: We are referring to the principle now. Subsection 3 is not irrelevant whether you are talking about the right to keep silent or self incrimination it is not relevant. It is one of the considerations we can put in the whole pot. If we talk about prejudicing.

MR CILLIERS: Subsection 3 refers to one of the basic rights involved here. Subsection 3 of Section 3 refers to the fact that incriminating answers or evidence or evidence of an incriminating nature cannot be used against the person.

ADV POTGIETER: That is the point. If we look at the Afrikaans: -

"An incriminating answer or information or incriminating evidence."

So in other words anything which is mentioned within the context of our proceedings cannot be used in any later criminal proceedings. And I am asking you is your submission that we can take this into consideration only regarding the right not to incriminate yourself. It is irrelevant regarding the right to keep silent.

MR CILLIERS: I am telling you in its context that is clear that, that is an incriminating way to obtain information. If you look at Section 31 and the heading to not allow incriminating evidence. And with respect you cannot take certain passages and not read that in context. If you read that in context it is very clear with what 3 has to do.

ADV POTGIETER: Is your submission that the positions of Subsection 3 of 31 are irrelevant if we have to decide about prejudicing regarding this right to keep silent?

MR CILLIERS: It handles one of the problems because the right to keep silent and the incriminating question are inter-related. There is always a situation where you infringe on the right to keep silence goes further and is a right broader than the right to self incrimination. This is why I have read the judgment of Kriegler. It is not about evidence which can be given in court.

ADV POTGIETER: Mr Cilliers I want to assure you that we understand your submission and the authority. I just want to address a simple point. Do you agree with that or not?

CHAIRPERSON: Can I put the question differently. If it is prejudice that is sought to be protected. Whether it is prejudice against self incrimination or prejudice that would come if a person did not remain silent. Now if we had to test prejudice which would come from an (...indistinct) of the right to remain silent are we not permitted to take into account the sort of prejudice that would arise if we were to consider the prejudice that would be brought about by compelling a witness to incriminate him or herself?

MR CILLIERS: These are two different rights. I will concede this is something which can be taken into consideration. But perhaps I thought you wanted to limit it and all you wanted to know is whether it is applicable. All I want to emphasise is that it should be taken into consideration but you should be careful that you keep in mind that it is not limited to that disadvantage. It is the smaller disadvantage of the matter. This is what Justice Kriegler is saying. And I want to ask you to be careful that this is not the only disadvantage. It is a broader concept.

I want to emphasise it that Subsection 3 of the Act says it should not be allowed as evidence. And this is to do with the fact whether the record of your proceedings could be used as evidence in a latter court case. Or could ask somebody from the public to say that I was present and I heard that and that. This is the situation Subsection 3 addresses. But Subsection 3 gives no assistance for the situation described by Justice Kriegler in disclosing his hand. And if I can give the absurd example of the policeman who eavesdropped on the consultation and now they know what is coming, they can position themselves. They know what the defence will be. This can never be allowed in court but it can be to the detriment of the accused because his right to keep silent has been abrogated. And you must watch against this situation and prevent that. And that is the situation the Constitution makes provision for. And it says that this person has the right to keep silent.

ADV POTGIETER: Mr Cilliers one other point please. Your submission regarding the discretion is your submission that as long as there is statutory obligation a person like your client must only indicate potential prejudice and it leaves the tribunal with no discretion?

MR CILLIERS: In due course I will give you the relevant quotes but you precisely summed it up. That as soon as there is a potential prejudice and I will also refer you to authority and that is a basic right. It is trite law that the statutory obligation to disclose your hand to testify at all is a potential prejudicing for somebody who is approaching a criminal case. And it was the approach by Justices Navsa and Nugent that, that moment when State coercion is found to compel a person and leaves him no choice. And Justice Kriegler called it when a statutory obligation is placed on a person then there is prejudice. And there is the prejudice in the sense that he has to disclose his hand before the criminal proceedings.

ADV POTGIETER: It is the case and usually the case that non of these authorities you referring to has to do with the situation like this Commission which is of a temporary nature. You are referring to civil proceedings or to situations where after the criminal proceedings you can always return back to the proceedings which were suspended. We are not referring to a temporary body like this.

MR CILLIERS: You are probably one of the only temporary institutions who is doing this work and you yourself have never been confronted by this situation. The right to keep quiet is in the moment in the process of being presented to the Constitutional Court but it is not been finalised. And that is also what my research revealed. And there is no authority regarding the position regarding the right to keep silent. And I can refer you to Justice Navsa and Nugent who refers to these rights. Both these judgments do not refer to temporary institutions like you are.

ADV POTGIETER: Won't it be relevant regarding the matter of prejudice? It would be one of the factors which would be considered?

MR CILLIERS: It is difficult for me to say that you can ignore it but in the handling of that you should ask yourself the question is the position then in our legal system that a person's fundamental right as provided expressly by the Constitution through decades long legal process should you negate that and say because we are just a temporary institution we are going to ignore your constitutional rights. That is putting it very harshly but if you give to much weight or any weight to the fact that you are a temporary institution that would mean that temporary institutions can ignore the Constitution. And that only permanent institutions - and it is only parts of the Constitution with which you have a problem. And to put it very strongly it means that those provisions of the Constitution only are applicable to permanent institutions of State.

ADV POTGIETER: All that in the light of the objectives of this process for which the Truth Commission was convened in the view of the national objectives. In the case of the individual it is just a temporary suspension of constitutional rights and the national objective is stronger than the right of the individual.

MR CILLIERS: I am just sharing my views with you and I want to differ from you. Just to a temporary infringement of the rights. The rights of the individual are irreversibly finally prejudiced. This is an interesting approach and it is something which you should keep in consideration. And the choices which should be made and balancing the various interests. It is one of the things you should pay attention to. These individuals should be kept in consideration that it would be a final infringement of rights. So in other words this individual is placed on the altar.

You should pay attention to that yes. But unfortunately the factual situation is that here is a temporary institution and you can give me an assurance its time span is not going to be extended. This is the factual situation we have.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Cilliers what would the position be - I do not know if in any of your authorities that you have referred us there is a reference to the application of what now is Section 36 of the Constitution? In other words the limitations clause. How would that impact on your right?

MR CILLIERS: Regarding the right to self discrimination discussions were held in the Constitution Court and this is why it is so important that distinction between the right to keep silent and the right against self incrimination. And on the basis of the limiting provision and it is allowed that an institution like you can force a person to answer an incriminating question but you should give him guarantee that it will not be used against him. This balances out and this is acceptable. In the Insolvency Act and also in the Company Acts regarding insolvency interrogations and the Office for Serious Economic Crimes had the same situation they found that acceptable to balance the disadvantage accrued by the individual to answer a discriminating question. You give him the protection that it should never be used in against him. Although you say here I killed him at that and that time, it cannot be used against you. And that is the end of the matter.

It has not been tested the limitation clause, limitation based on the right to keep silent has never been tested. Why it cannot be applied is my submission is that this right if it is violated will never be put right. And this is what I have just told Mr Potgieter. This is not a temporary infringement by measures within your sphere. As soon as a person is forced to show his hand that is the end of his right to keep silent and every aspect of that is contaminated and that is final. In the light of that it is my respectful submission that no court can find that according to Section 36, the limitation clause will ever allow that in an open and democratic society to do this infringement.

One of the criteria in Section 36 is the essence of the right should not be infringed. And the essence of the right to self incrimination, that you should not be found guilty on the basis of your own evidence. And that should never be used against you. Although you are infringing on the right the effect of that is cancelled out. On no basis can the essence of the right to keep silent be protected. On that basis I submit it and I will argue that it is not justifiable.

CHAIRPERSON: Have you made all your submissions Mr Cilliers?

MR CILLIERS: I will continue. I want to quote to you short passages from His Honour Justice Navsa's ruling or judgment in SEAPOINT. And it is my respectful submission that Justice Navsa if you go and look at the judgment did a great deal of or big work in the evaluation of the position regarding the right to silence. He really looked at a variety of our decisions, Common Law decisions and gave an extensive judgment in this regard. So with all respect one should place great weight on his judgment.

I refer you to page 647 of his judgment. After most of the authority which I have referred you to he also refers further to the judgment by Justice Nugent the DAVIS v TIPP judgment. And gives the following ruling: -

"Refused to stay proceedings on the basis that the right to remain silent derives from the abhorrence of coercion to secure conviction and it achieves this by protecting an accused person from being placed under compulsion. Not by shielding him from making legitimate choices."

What the judge is saying there with all respect was the choice situation that I sketched to you earlier. What he is saying that is in the South African law he agrees with what Justice Nugent says that the right to silence does not shield some one from making legitimate choices however difficult they may be. What the law does intend to protect is protecting an accused person from being placed under compulsion. And this is the situation with all respect that we have here. We do not have the choice situation. We have the compulsion situation.

He continues: -

"He concludes that what distinguishes compulsion from choice is whether the alternative to remaining silent presents itself as constituting a penalty which serves to punish a person for choosing a particular route as an inducement to him not to do so."

In dealing with the facts before him, Nugent J says the following, he quotes: -

"In the present case the applicant may well be required to chose between incriminating himself and losing his employment. If he loses his employment that is a consequence of the choice which he has made but not a penalty for doing so. It will be the natural consequence of being found guilty of misconduct and not a punishment to induce him to speak. Hard as the choice may be it is a legitimate one which the applicant may be called upon to make and does not amount to compulsion. In my view his right to silence does not shield him from making that choice."

He continues in his conclusions by saying: -

"I do not consider the judgment of DAVIS case to be wrong. On the contrary I find it a persuasive and analytically correct."

On page 649 he continues opposite the letter (B): -

"In my view an examination of the history of the origin of the rule against self incrimination or the right to remain silent as conducted by Nugent J and as set out in the ZUMA judgment supra."

Honourable Chairman and members the judgment of Justice Kentridge in the Constitutional Court I have a reference in front of me. I will give it to you in time.

"Provides a pointer to how the problem ought to be approached. It is clear that compulsion by the State was the mischief aimed at. That explains why our courts are loathed to have persons who would be accused in criminal proceedings subjected to the coercive machinery provided by insolvency and companies legislation."

And that is exactly the situation in which we find ourselves. Here it is just not the compulsion by the Insolvency Act or the Companies Acts. This compulsion originates from your legislation with all respect. But that it is still compulsion and still is the coercive machinery of the State that is undoubtedly so. He continues lower down the page opposite letter (G): -

"I agree with Nugent J that in principle a defendant should be left to his own choice as to how he conducts the civil proceedings. In this case if the defendant is of the view that it cannot succeed on its present plea and that it is unable to file one because it might thereby incriminate Kennedy or expose itself to criminal charges it must then face the consequence of having filed a plea it cannot succeed on or it must face the consequences of not having a plea at all. The consequence may be judgment for the plaintiffs. This is not in the field of 'coercive power of the State' bona fide litigants ought not to be thwarted merely because the opponents are unable to resist the claims. Allegations of pending criminal investigations or proceedings without indicators that State coercive means are to be employed in the civil proceedings are not sufficient to prove prejudice of a kind that will justify a stay."

Here we have the situation and I can refer Honourable member, Mr Potgieter to this. We have a situation here that the opposite is said by Justice Navsa they are not only indications but the coercive machinery comes directly from the State. The direct statutory compulsion of national legislation. And we have a situation sufficient to prove prejudice of a kind that will justify a stay.

ADV POTGIETER: Was Justice Navsa dealing with a liquidation or insolvency case?

MR CILLIERS: I do not want to mislead you but I think it was a normal civil trial which he was dealing with. It was a normal civil matter yes.

In the judgment of DAVIS v TIPP there are also certain aspects which you can look at. Page 1157 of the judgment opposite (F) I want to quote briefly: -

"Civil proceedings invariably create the potential for information damaging to the accused to be disclosed by the accused himself. Not least so because it will often serve his interests in the civil proceedings to do so. The exposure of an accused person to those inevitable choices as never been considered in this country to conflict with his right to remain silent during the criminal proceedings. Where the courts have intervened here has always been a further element which has been the potential for State compulsion to divulge information."

And with all respect that is exactly what we are dealing with here. In as far as this the "civil" proceedings can be indicated you have exactly the situation where His Honour Justice Nugent just as Justice Navsa has ruled. We here have State compulsion by the statutory process.

He continues opposite letter (H): -

"In the present case the preservation of the applicant's rights" (that is the right to remain silent) "lies entirely in his own hands and there is no such element of compulsion. What the applicant seeks to be protected against is the consequence of the choice he may be called upon to make."

That is the opposite situation which is being presented to you and this is also contrary to the situation that you have before you. You have a situation here as indicated by Justice Navsa and Nugent where they will intervene where the courts have to intervene. That is where there is any form of compulsion to break that right to silence. The fact that we have to bring this application to you is an indication that there is statutory compulsion. There are punitive measures which can be used if you have found this correct and still refuse them then it could be a criminal offence and therefore there can be no doubt that this is State coercion or compulsive to break their right to silence. And as far as I am concerned this is in direct contrast to Section 35 of the Constitution.

Honourable Chairman, Honourable members it is clear and it is our respectful submission that in the subject discussion that all the elements are present whereby the legal statements over all the law in the long period and also decided by Justice Nugent and Navsa where you should intervene and not allow that as a result of statutory compulsion two accused people who would fall within the cadre of Section 35 that their right to silence is being denied them and that the Constitution is being ignored in that regard. With all respect you must look at the layout of a Constitution and I think that you have been confronted with arguments in this regard quite often. Perhaps I can just refer you to a useful discussion thereof in the judgment of ZUMA, 1995 (2) SA642 Constitutional Court on page 651. It boils down to the fact that a Constitution must be set out as such that it is there for the protection of rights and that all other legislation must be expounded in a way subject to the provisions of the Constitution. More specifically the fundamental principles.

In conclusion I would once again like to emphasise a point in view of the discussion that took place and exchange of ideas between Mr Potgieter and I. That we are convinced that in our law it says that the breaking of a right to silence is a potential prejudice to the State for purposes of judgment as follows. In a situation like this where it is common cause that his right to silence is going to be denied him to force him to give evidence regarding aspects which are exactly the same as the aspects for which he is going to have to testify in a criminal case. Where it can be said clearly that this is apparently prejudicial as is said very clearly by Justice Kriegler.

I just want to make this clear to you that our submission is that at its least it is a potential prejudicing and that apparently it is all that is required for you to give a ruling as requested and as quoted from the judgment of Justice Nugent. I do not want to repeat it again I have already read it to you. But with all respect in this situation we fall squarely in that cadre. And it is our submission that there is no other way in which to deal with this matter. That these proceedings be suspended until the finalisation of the criminal case. The short duration of life of this Commission which lies ahead can never be weighed against the disadvantages for the witnesses that their right to silence be denied them.

For purposes of illustration, just to emphasise this potential prejudice to you I want to illustrate. This is something that happened here this morning. The Attorney General made an agreement with the persons at the Commission who have to decide who is going to testify that their witness who they regard as important should not testify, must not be denied his right to silence. He has no such right because Mr Chaskalson said to us that this is going to prejudice the criminal case. If that person has to give his version now, it is going to prejudice the criminal case. I am not criticising Mr Chaskalson or the Attorney General in this regard. Most probably they are correct. The fact that Immelmann must come and tell his story will possibly prejudice the criminal case but even more so the fact that the witnesses here who are going to be the accused here in that criminal case it will prejudice their case even more by forcing them to testify. And in view of the fact that these accused other than Doctor Immelmann in terms of Section 35 of the Constitution have a fundamental right which is entrenched in the Constitution that such a situation should not exist. You should with all respect not take this away from them.

Further I can just mention that if it will be a problem I accept that my learned colleagues know about this, this witness which is now having to be protected and kept away from the disclosing of his testimony is one of approximately 300 witnesses that they regard it as so important that their important witness be kept away. That they want to protect that witness. How much more so not the situation with regard to the two accused who will be the only two accused in this specific case. As it pleases you.

ADV POTGIETER: Do you agree that the testimony of the two clients but especially Doctor Basson is of cardinal importance to this investigation which is before us?

MR CILLIERS: I will agree with you that in view of the evidence that I have heard his evidence will be important. Whether it will be of cardinal importance is certainly a question which is debatable. But I will concede that in view of the fact that the evidence before you is that he was the liaison person between the defence force and the specific laboratory that it is of importance. I do however want to see it in context. If I have listened to the testimony of Doctor van Rensburg more specifically that of this morning and so extent that of Doctor Swanepoel it seems to me if one speaks about a cardinal witness then Doctor Immelmann is that witness. But I will concede that Doctor Basson is an important witness.

ADV POTGIETER: And apparently it is relevant to us to consider when we make our ruling whether the testimony which Doctor Basson can place before us will be taken away from this process. Will be denied our process or not.

MR CILLIERS: If he does not testify and no written answers are given then it is the case. I am of the opinion and it is something that has never been discussed that instead of testimony a written submission can be given. Because the big danger I must say lies in the questioning situation. In the authority which is being referred here by Justices Navsa and Nugent it is one of the points that is made. That is the danger. Something which might be totally irrelevant for your decision comes out in re-examination or cross-examination by one of the lawyers representing any of their clients. I am of the opinion that there is a way of overcoming this problem by making a written submission.

ADV POTGIETER: Although this does not assist your submission. You say that there is an absolute right to silence.

MR CILLIERS: Yes but I will also tell you that in order to assist you we would definitely be prepared with regard to certain aspects we will have to accept that it will be difficult to deal with this because we have the problem with possible self incrimination, etc, etc. But that we would be prepared on a written basis to answer certain of the important questions that you might have.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Vally?

MR VALLY: Thank you Mr Chair. Mr Chair let's just understand the time frames here firstly. The first issue is that my learned friend did contact Mr Chaskalson on Thursday and said they may be bringing an application objecting to Mr Basson giving evidence. He said he would let Mr Chaskalson know what the decision was on Friday. It did not happen last week Friday. We did hear on Monday I concede that they were going to raise this point.

Having said that let me leave the Commission in no doubt that we regard the evidence, especially of Doctor Basson but also of Doctor Mijburgh of being of crucial importance to us. We have a limited life span. Our function and our statutory mandate is absolutely clear. We are talking about gross human rights violations potentially on a mass scale if the evidence regarding the cholera for example is found to be correct we are actually talking a form of genocide. So we find it very important to tress that it is crucial. We are coming to the end of our life. We have to complete our work at the very latest presently by June if the amendment goes through by the end of July. We are not going to have an opportunity to wait for this criminal matter which has been dragging on for a very, very long time in terms of when the arrest took place and when the trial is starting. I am not saying it is my learned friend's client's fault but that is the reality we have had to deal with. So we are strongly opposing the application.

Let me first start off with one of the points my learned friend made. He said that we are ad idem that the issues we are raising and the issues at the criminal trial are identical. I am afraid we cannot make such an unequivocal statement. Our knowledge of the criminal trial and the evidence relating thereto is not of such a detailed nature that we can say that. We have had a letter from the office of the Attorney General which we read into the court record. We do not know much more than that. Our hearing is clearly set out, the purposes of our hearing is clearly set out in the subpoenas we have sent and we want to enquire about the aspects relating to the gross violation of human rights in relation to the chemical and biological warfare programme. Of which Doctor Wouter Basson was at the centre. There is no doubt about that.

Let's just deal with the legal issues being raised. Let me say from the outset Mr Chair that we regard the provisions of Section 35 of the Constitution as binding on us. Let's be clear on that. We are (...indistinct) Commission but we are a Commission within the context of the laws of South Africa which makes it explicit that the Constitution should apply to us as well. So I have got no qualms about conceding that.

The first issue is this; are we in breach of either of the two gentlemen's constitutional rights. These are set out in Section 35 of the Constitution. There are two rights which we allegedly are in breach of. Now when you read Section 35 you read Section 35 subsection 1 and then the further subsections relating to the two issues. Section 35 subsection 1 reads: -

"Everyone who is arrested for allegedly committing an offence has the right,"

and then you talk about

"a: to remain silent."

And elsewhere there is reference to not being compelled to make any confession of admission that could be used in evidence against that person. So (...intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: Section 35 (I).

MR VALLY: Very well again.

CHAIRPERSON: 3 (J) I think. "Every accused person has the right to a fair trial which includes the right not to be compelled to give self-incriminating evidence."

MR VALLY: Well Mr Chair you should not conflate it all. 35 (3) says: "Every accused person has the right to a fair trial which includes the right," and then it spells out (I). (I) which is what you have just read. But I do not think it was (I). I think it was (J) not to be compelled to give self-incriminating evidence.

The point I am making is this fundamental right. Right to silence and right not to be incriminated or not to be forced to give evidence which is self-incriminating are within the context of a fair trial. Having started off from that premise my authority for saying that we have complied and are not in violation of the fundamental rights of the two witnesses. The primary authority is the matter of FERREIRA v LEVINE, South African Constitutional law reports 1995, vol.7 page 63. I have given my learned friend a copy of this judgment.

Maybe I should briefly say what this matter was about so as to contextualise it. This was an insolvency enquiry at which at the time Section 417 or I believe the Companies Act said two things which are relevant to this matter.

"1: In any winding up of a company unable to pay its debts the master or the court may at any time after a winding up order has been made, summon before him or it any director or officer of the company or person known or suspected to have in his possession any property of the company or believed to be indebted to the company. Or any person who the master or the court deems capable of giving information concerning the trade, dealings, affairs or property of the company."

And then there is a small b under 2.

"Any such person may be required to answer any question put to him at the examination. Notwithstanding that the answer might tend to incriminate him. And any answer given to any such question may thereafter be used in evidence against him. "

Now this was challenged. It was challenged under the provisions of the interim Constitution but with respect the provisions had been repeated with the language slightly cleaned up in the present Constitution. If you look at the interim Constitution and a number of different aspects were raised. I will deal with the one point which was raised which is the issue of self-incrimination. I will also show why the issue of self-incrimination is also directly relevant to the other point raised by my learned friend. Which is the issue of the right to remain silent.

At great length after detailed examination of various authorities we talking about American, Canadian, English authorities and also our own courts. And I also want to point out certain things as I quote from this section. The judgment I have before me I am looking at page 214, paragraph 153. And this is Ackerman J.

"A compulsion to give self-incriminating evidence coupled with only a direct used immunity along the lines indicated above and subject to a judicial discretion to exclude derivative evidence at the criminal trial would not negate the essential content of Section 11(1) right, which is the right to freedom or the 25(3) right to a fair trial."

In the interim Constitution you have Section 25(3) which says: -

"Every accused person shall have right to a fair trial which shall include the right,"

and then it refers to, adduce and challenge evidence and not to be compelled by witness against himself or herself.

You also under Section 25(3)(C): -

"To be presumed innocent and to remain silent during plea proceedings or trial and not to testify during trial."

I will continue. The Constitutional Court judgment goes on to say: -

"Would not negate the essential content of the Section 11(1) right to freedom or the 25(3) right to a fair trial."

Which covers those two aspects - self-incrimination and right to be silent.

"Only a discrete and narrowly defined part of the broad right to freedom is involved which could not conceivably be described as a negation of its essential content. As far as Section 25(3) is concerned the trial judge is obliged to ensure a fair trial. If necessary by his or her discretion to exclude in the appropriate case derivative evidence. Ultimately this is a question of fairness to the accused and is a issue which has to be decided on the facts of each case. The trial judge is the person best placed to take that decision. The development of the law of evidence in this regard is a matter for the Supreme Court. The essential content of the right is therefore not even touched."

The point here is having gone through all those cases and at bedlam discussed it felt it was very important for any society and trade in any society for directors of public companies to be held accountable for possible mismanagement and possible fraud. And to have to answer questions in relation to that. However in getting them to answer questions about their mismanagement, alleged mismanagement or alleged fraud relating to a company their fundamental rights should not be infringed. So the only issue for the court as Justice Ackerman has set out was the use of that information against that person in a trial.

If I can go on to what the ruling of Justice Ackerman was. He declared invalid only that section of the Companies Act to the extent only that the words: -

"And any answer given to any such question may thereafter be used in evidence against him."

That is a point. Once that prejudice is removed the right to question the person was held to be constitutionally valid in this instance there was not even a criminal trial pending. But even if a criminal is pending as in the case of Doctor Basson or a possible criminal trial pending as in the case of Doctor Mijburgh.

CHAIRPERSON: Are you saying that is the material difference between the provisions of Section 31 (3) and the provisions of that Section of the Insolvency Act?

MR VALLY: Yes our Act was passed bearing in mind this potential prejudice. And therefore Section 31(3) of our Act says specifically, having invoked Section 31 and having passed the requirement for Section 31(2) as we did this morning for Doctor Swanepoel. It says: -

"Any incriminating answer or information obtained or incriminating evidence directly of indirectly derived from a questioning in terms of Subsection 1 shall not be admissible as evidence against the person concerned in criminal proceedings in a court of law or before anybody or institution established by or under any law. Provided that incriminating evidence arising from such questioning shall be admissible in criminal proceedings where the person is arraigned on the charge of perjury or a charge contemplated in terms of Section 39 of this Act or in Section 3193 of the Criminal Procedure Act, 1955."

So that prejudice has been removed now the I would submit equivalent provision was left intact provided that prejudicial aspect was removed in the judgment of the Constitutional Court. On that issue the majority judgment is ad idem in this case. There are aspects of the judgment related to referral to the Constitutional Court and other aspects regarding Judge Ackerman's reasoning where the majority have their own views. I will quote what Justice Chaskalson said in that same matter he confirmed that aspect of the judgment of Justice Ackerman. I am just trying to find my quote quickly.

"I have the meticulous judgment of Ackerman J. I agree with paragraphs 1 to 33 of his judgment. I also agree with his conclusion that Section 4172 (B) of the Companies Act 1973 is inconsistent with the Constitution and with the order he propose as a remedy for that situation. Just deleting the part that it could be used in evidence against that person. I am however unable to agree with the analysis of the issue of standing and with the interpretation of Section 11(1) of the Constitution on which he ultimately arise for his decision. In my view the matter is one in which the applicants have standing and which can and should be dealt with under Section 25(3) of the Constitution."

Section 25(3) of the Constitution I will remind the panel again is in terms of the interim Constitution the provision which says: "Every accused person shall have the right to a fair trial which shall include the right to," and then we go into those two issues - self-incrimination and right to be silent.

"The finding that Section 41 (4)(1)(7) 2 (B) of the Companies Act is inconsistent with the Constitution is in essence based on a finding that the Section infringes a rule against self-incrimination. This is apparent from the reasons given by Ackerman J for holding the Section to be inconsistent with the Constitution. The rule against self-incrimination is not simply a rule of evidence. It is a right which by virtue of the provisions of Section 25 subsection 3 is as far as an accused person is concerned entitled to the status of a Constitutional right. It is inextricably linked to the right of an accused person to a fair trial.

The rule exists to protect that right. The right to a fair trial. If that right is not threatened the rule has no application. Thus a person who has been indemnified against prosecution or a person convicted of a crime who is subsequently called to give evidence against a co-conspirator would not be entitled to claim the privilege in respect of evidence covered by the indemnity or the conviction, would not be entitled.

This connection between the unconstitutionality of Section 417(2)(B) and the privilege is recognised in the order made by Ackerman J which is designed to eliminate the conflict by ensuring that evidence given by a witness at a Section 417(2)(B) inquiry cannot be used against that witness if he or she is subsequently prosecuted.

A challenge to the constitutionality to Section 417(2)(B) should therefore in my view be characterised and dealt with as a challenge founded on the right to a fair criminal trial. It is precisely because Section 417(2)(B) is inconsistent with that right that its validity can be impugned. It is also the basis upon which the applicants launched their constitutional challenge in the present case. Although they relied on various provisions of chapter 3 to support their argument at the core of their complaint was a concern that they were required to answer questions at the inquiry which might incriminate them and which might thereafter be used in evidence against them"

ADV POTGIETER: Mr Vally whose judgment are you quoting from there?

MR VALLY: I am now quoting Chaskalson.

ADV POTGIETER: Chaskalson?

MR VALLY: That is right.

ADV POTGIETER: And what is the reference?

MR VALLY: I have quoted on my copy.

ADV POTGIETER: FERREIRA.

MR VALLY: That is FERREIRA v LEVINE.

ADV POTGIETER: Yes just the page reference of Chaskalson's?

MR VALLY: In my copy it is paragraph 160 page 221 leading onto page 222. That was the last quote.

ADV POTGIETER: Paragraph 160?

MR VALLY: Paragraph 160. And the previous quote was page 220 paragraph 158 a continuation thereof and paragraph 159.

ADV POTGIETER: Thank you.

MR VALLY: I am advised that my references may not be the same as the other references. We took this copy off the Internet and therefore the page numbers may not be identical.

ADV POTGIETER: I think the paragraph numbers would probably be the same.

MR VALLY: Thank you Advocate Potgieter. Now in quoting what Justice Chaskalson says and I want to emphasise that he agrees with the order by Justice Ackerman but he disagreed with the reasoning. Most of the other judges and I am trying to find this section but it is not really relevant, concurred with Justice Chaskalson's judgment. And his reference all the time is to Section 25(3) - the right to a fair trial. He is not separating the right to be silent and the right to self-incrimination. In addition thereto I would have thought it is implicit in the judgment if not explicit that if you say as long as you are not prejudiced in your criminal trial in that the evidence can be used against you and you can be questioned that implicitly states that you do not have the right to be silent. This is vis- a-vis this at the enquiry, at the insolvency enquiry. I am not talking about criminal trial. I am talking about the insolvency enquiry. Because bearing in mind the needs of society etc, relating to public companies and I will come back to that in relation to the needs that this Commission has to discover the truth as part of this overall package. On the one hand of giving amnesty to people on the other hand of giving reparations to victims and on the third hand, if you have a third hand of determining what gross violations of human rights took place in this period. It is a package deal.

And these are the interests in society and these are the relevant issues which have to be weighed up by the persons who both, by parliament ultimately and by the Constitution which is - and it is something I have to come back to as well. Which is what our Act is based on. It is where the genesis of our Act is. It is in the post-amble to the interim Constitution and which post-amble has been incorporated in a slight amended form in the final Constitution.

Having dealt with this case I must just add bearing in mind my learned friend quoting Justice Kriegler. I believe in the 1988 unreported judgment in I think the TPD Justice Kriegler had a minority view in this case. A minority view which does not help my learned friend.

At paragraph 195, page 259 he says:-

"The crucial point is that no witness subpoenaed to testify at a Section 417 enquiry can at that stage,"

and it is underlined. Not my underlining,

"possibly formulate allegations essential for relief based on fair trial provisions. And if the witness cannot bring the case within those provisions I see nothing in the Constitution that avails. There simply is no general prohibition against self-incrimination to be found anywhere in the Constitution. Nothing express and nothing implicit. It is only if and when the production of evidence obtained pursuant to a Section 417 enquiry jeopardises the fairness of the trial that the Constitution can be invoked."

So in our Constitution we do not have a free-standing provision relating to self-incrimination or right to be silent. We do not have the provision you see invoked in American congress hearings or whatever. There is no free-standing provision. It is a provision related to a fair trial. And just (...intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: But Mr Vally why then did the legislature in the new Constitution seek to separate the rights? If you read Section 35(1)(A): -

"Everyone who is arrested for allegedly committing an offence has the right to remain silent."

Now the Section 35(3) seems to be emphasising the right to a fair trial which includes the right and then. It does not - in other words if I heard you correctly you seem to be suggesting that in the judgment you have been reading Chaskalson does not separate the right to remain silent from the right to a fair trial. All of those are grouped together. But the new Constitution just reading it I am not saying something (...indistinct) but just reading it, it seems to please the right to remain silent as free-standing (...indistinct)

MR VALLY: Not law, with respect Mr Chairperson the interim Constitution said 25(1): -

"Every person who is detained including every sentenced prisoner shall have the right,"

and then it goes through the rights.

Section 25(2) says: -

"Every person arrested for the alleged commission of an offence shall in addition to the rights which he or she has a detained person,"

the first one and it sets out the rights.

Section 25(3) says: -

"Every accused person shall have the right to a fair trial which shall include the right to,"

And it sets out those provisions. It is emphasised in the fact that at every stage at the time of your detention, at the time of your arrest, at the time of your trial you have those rights. They are not free-standing. It relates to detention, it relates to the arrest, it relates to the trial.

Similarly Section 35 of the present Constitution, 35(1) says: -

"Everyone who is arrested for allegedly committing an offence has the right,"

Allegedly committing an offence. Then it says under 2:

"Everyone who is detained including every sentenced prisoner has the right,"

and it sets out the rights.

Section 35(3): -

"Every accused person has the right to a fair trial which includes the right,"

and it sets out the right.

The point I am making is it is not a free-standing right standing on its own. It is related to these; detention, arrest, trial. The point being made by my learned friend is we are prejudicing his client's right to a fair trial. That is what he is alleging. And that is the point I am making Mr Chair.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes Mr Vally?

MR VALLY: I have got other points but my colleague just wants to point something out to me if you bear with me Mr Chair.

Thanks for your indulgence Mr Chair. If we could go on. That is my primary argument. That we are entitled to do what we are doing and we are not in breach of the fundamental rights and my authority is FERREIRA v LEVINE.

Let's look at the limitation provision of the new Constitution. We are talking Section 36.

"The rights in a Bill of Rights may be limited only in terms of law of general application to the extent that the limitation is reasonable and justifiable. In an open and democratic society based on human dignity, equality and freedom taking into account all relevant factors including A; nature of the right.

B; importance of the purpose of the limitation.

C; the nature and extent of the limitation.

D; the relation between the limitation and its purpose and

E; less restrictive means to achieve the purpose.

Subsection 2: -

"Accept as provided for in Subsection 1 or in any other provision of the Constitution no law may limit any right entrenched in the Bill of rights."

Now there are two points flowing from here. The first point is the post-amble to our Act. Is again incorporated in Schedule 6 Section 22 of the Constitution. It says: -

"Notwithstanding the other provisions of the new Constitution and despite the repeal of the previous Constitution all the provisions relating to amnesty contained in the previous Constitution under the heading National Unity and Reconciliation are deemed to be part of the new Constitution for the purposes of the Promotion of National Unity and Reconciliation Act 34 of 1995 as amended. Including for the purposes of its validity."

The point is the post-amble is part of the Constitution. And Section 36 subsection 2 says: -

"Except as provided for its subsection 1,"

and I am coming to those limitations.

"or in any other provision of the Constitution this includes the post-amble."

Which is as I pointed out located in Schedule 6 section 22. This was held explicitly to be so by the Constitutional Court again because the points my learned friend are making are constitutional points. It was held to be by Justice Mohammed in the matter of AZAPO AND THREE OTHERS v THE PRESIDENT OF THE REPUBLIC OF SOUTH AFRICA AND FOUR OTHERS.

CHAIRPERSON: Do you have a citation?

MR VALLY: Yes I do. Actually I do not. I can give you the case number. We had the original judgment I am afraid I do not have the. But I can give you a copy of this. We have lots of copies.

CHAIRPERSON: Proceed.

MR VALLY: I am referring to paragraph 9 on page 11 of my copy.

"The effect of an amnesty undoubtedly impacts upon very fundamental rights."

I am quoting Justice, at the time deputy president Mohammed, now Chief Justice, Deputy President of the Constitutional Court. Let me go on. Paragraph 9:

"The effect of an amnesty undoubtedly impacts upon very fundamental rights. All persons are entitled to the protection of the law against unlawful invasion of their right to life. Their right to respect for and protection of dignity and their right not to be subject to torture of any kind. When those rights are invaded those aggrieved by such invasion have the right to obtain redress in the ordinary courts of law. And those guilty of perpetrating such violations are answerable before such courts both civilly and criminally. And amnesty to the wrong-doer effectively obliterates such rights. There would therefore be very considerable force in the submission that Section 20 subsection 7 of the Act constitutes a violation of Section 22 of the Constitution. If there was nothing in the Constitution itself,"

20 subsection of the Act is referring to our Act - Promotion of National Unity and Reconciliation Act, Act 34 of 1995. Section 22 of the interim Constitution refers to the right to have justiciable issues decided by courts.

"If there was nothing in the Constitution itself which permitted and authorised such violation the crucial issue therefore which needs to be determined is whether the Constitution indeed permits such a cause.

Section 33 subsection 2 of the Constitution provides that, same as provided for in subsection 1

"or any other provision of this Constitution no law whether rule of common law, customary law or legislation may limit any right entrenched in this chapter.

Two questions arise from the provisions of this subsection. The first question is whether there is any other provision in this Constitution which permits a limitation of the right in Section 22. And secondly if there is not whether any violation of Section 22 is a limitation which can be justified in terms of Section 33(1) of the Constitution which reads as follows,"

and it has got the limitation clause of the interim Constitution set out therein. He deals with some of the arguments and he says: -

"The status is determined by Section 2 (32)(4) of the interim Constitution which provides as follows,"

and in that section it says that the very fact that the post-amble is in the schedule means that it does not have any lesser status than any other provision of the Constitution. The difference in the final Constitution is as I quoted just now the post-amble itself says it is part of the Constitution. It says so expressly.

The epilogue therefore has no lesser status than any other part of the Constitution. As far as Section 22 is concerned it therefore would have the same effect if the provision was in Section 22 itself which enacted that and I quote: -

"Nothing contained in this subsection shall preclude parliament from adopting a law providing for amnesty to be granted in respect of acts, omissions and offences."

He is deciding to make law in that respect. But what he in fact says is this is how you read it. The post-amble relating to the genesis of our Act is part of the Constitution.

CHAIRPERSON: What point turns on that Mr Vally?

MR VALLY: The point is the provisions of our Act relating to enquiries and hearings into the gross violation of human rights is envisaged in the Constitution and is not in conflict with those fundamental provisions. That is the one point.

The second point I wanted to make is if that is not acceptable then we look at the normal limitation of rights. I have a long quote where Mohammed DP talks at great length about our Act. He refers to the fact that we have a Committee on Human Rights Violations and what the obligations of that Committee on Human Rights Violations are which is finding out gross violation of human rights and the persons responsible therefore, etc. He quotes from our Act directly. He sets out what the provisions are.

The third angle that I want to raise is and if this is envisaged as being in violation of Section 35 then it is justified limitation on those rights in terms of Section 36. And again the answer is contained in the Constitutional Court judgment of Mohammed DP as he then was. On page 1 I think it is apposite especially in this case. This case where we are talking about allegations of Mandrax being manufactured on a large scale. Allegations of Ecstasy being manufactured on a large scale. Allegations of Cholera being used against people. Allegations of murder by Anthrax in cigarettes. Really with respect disgusting in any civilised society. Never could be justified. We are entitled to invoke the limitation to that right in this respect. And I quote from Mohammed DP: -

"For decades South African history has been dominated by a deep conflict between a minority which reserved for itself all control over the political instruments of the State and a majority who sought to resist that domination. Fundamental human rights became a major casualty of this conflict as the resistance of those punished by the denial was met by laws to counter in fact the effectiveness of such resistance. The conflict deepened with the increased sophistication of the economy, the rapid acceleration of knowledge and education and the ever-increasing hostility of an international community steadily outraged by the inconsistency which had become manifest between its own articulate ideals after the Second World War and the official practices which had become institutionalised in South Africa through laws enacted to give them sanction and teeth by a parliament elected only by a privileged minority. The result was a debilitating war of internal political dissension and confrontation, massive expressions of labour militancy, perennial student unrest, punishing international economic isolation, wide-spread dislocation in crucial areas of national endeavour. Accelerated levels of armed conflict and a dangerous combination of anxiety, frustration and anger among expanding proportions of the population.

The legitimacy of law itself was deeply wounded as the country haemorrhaged dangerously in the face of this tragic conflict which had begun to traumatise the entire nation. During the eighties it became manifest to all that our country with all its natural wealth, physical beauty and human resources was on a disaster cause unless that conflict was reversed. It was this realisation which mercifully rescued us in the early nineties as those who control the levers of State power began to negotiate a different future with those who had been imprisoned, silenced or driven into exile in consequence of their resistance to that control and its consequences. Those negotiations resulted in the interim Constitution committed to a transition to a more just defensible, and democratic political order based on the protection of fundamental human rights. It was wisely appreciated by those involved in the preceding negotiations that a task of building such a new democratic order was a very difficult task because of the previous history and the deep emotions and indefensible iniquities it had generated. And that this could not be achieved without a firm generous commitment to reconciliation and national unity. It was realised that much of the unjust consequences of the past could not ever be fully reversed. It might be necessary in crucial areas to close the book on that past."

He quotes the post-amble to the Constitution and he goes on: -

"Pursuant to the provisions of this epilogue parliament enacted during 1995 what is colloquially referred to as the Truth and Reconciliation Act. Its proper name is the Promotion of National Unity and Reconciliation Act 34 of 1995, the Act."

He sites the objectives of the Act and he says in paragraph 4: -

"It is enjoined to pursue that objective,"

and he quotes,

"by establishing as complete a picture as possible of the causes, nature and extent of the gross violation of human rights committed during the period commencing 1st of March 1960 to the cut off date."

For this purpose the Commission is obliged to have regard to the perspectives of the victim and the motives and perspectives of the person responsible for the commission of the violations."

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Vally do I understand you to be saying that in pursuit of the aims and I am stating it very generally but I just want to understand the essence of your submission. Are you saying in pursuit of the aims and objectives of the Commission Section 36 can be invoked to limit the fundamental rights of individuals?

MR VALLY: Not all fundamental rights. I am arguing the two propositions put forward by my learned friend.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes I am addressing this particular ones?

MR VALLY: Sure.

CHAIRPERSON: So that those rights are not absolute?

MR VALLY: Yes. Well the Act is clear on that.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes I understand but is that the essence of your submission with regard hereto?

MR VALLY: It is on this aspect yes. On this leg.

CHAIRPERSON: And you are relying on Mohammed's (...indistinct) for the proposition?

MR VALLY: Partly. Should I continue?

CHAIRPERSON: Yes.

MR VALLY: If I look at Constitutional Law of South Africa by Chaskalson et al and they look at the issue of reasonable and necessary and justifiable in an open and democratic society based upon freedom and equality. The first requirement involves a determination as to whether the objective pursuit by the government warrant the infringement of a right. And this is what I have gone through at great length. What the government was pursuing the objective was to find out the truth of gross violation of human rights in exchange a different leg of the Commission would give amnesty in exchange a different leg of the Commission would give reparation.

The objectives which can safely be identified as overriding importance are those objectives which reflect the values inherent in other fundamental rights. What can be more inherent in fundamental rights than protection against gross violation of human rights. It is the very essence of the fundamental rights we are talking about. And I will continue: -

" The government restriction must be designed to impair,"

I am quoting selectively from that paragraph 12 - 25.

"The government restriction must be designed to impair the right no more than absolutely necessary."

None of this can prejudice Doctor Basson and Doctor Mijburgh. It is up to his counsel and it is up to the trial court to raise any prejudice at the time to exclude any evidence. In a normal course of events he would plead unless he puts everything into dispute. But we are saying that prejudice is limited. Expressly limited in terms of Section 31(3) of our Act.

And finally only those restrictions which realises significant social benefits and do not unduly burden the affected individuals should pass constitutional muster. With respect to our detractors, the social benefits of our process have far overridden what our detectors have said. If you look at Mohammed DP's judgment in that matter. We were facing a civil war in exchange for certain provisions in our Act allowing amnesty. So that there would not be criminal trials, there would not Nuremberg trials, there would not be Tokyo trials. We agreed to give amnesty. For the benefit of the country, for reconstruction and reconciliation. But we need to know what happened.

Brigadier Wouter Basson as he then was is a key character here. We have presented enough evidence before you to at least show you there are questions which remain to be answered. Before any findings need to be made there are questions that need to be answered in terms of our statutory obligations. In terms of our commitment to the nation. In terms of the Act that parliament has given us. A democratically elected parliament.

Now those are my legal points. I just want to respond briefly to some of the points raised by my learned friend.

CHAIRPERSON: Just on legal points Mr Vally. There was a submission which was made by Mr Cilliers which as I understood it was seeking to say Judge Nugent in the DAVIS case was referring to a situation where there is no discretion regardless of the wedding of the provision that seeks to (...intervention)

MR VALLY: Mr Chair I was going to deal with the Nugent judgment specifically.

CHAIRPERSON: Very well.

MR VALLY: What happened here was very simple. Council employee was called to give evidence before a commission of enquiry in Cape Town. I am sorry I beg your pardon, in Johannesburg. The corruption was allegedly in Johannesburg.

"The Council convened an enquiry in terms of the chapter into,"

I am talking about sorry DAVIS v TIPP and O AND OTHER. And I am reading from the head note now Mr Chair.

"The Council convened an enquiry in terms of the chapter into allegations of inter alia bribery, corruption and theft which had been made against an applicant. The first respondent was appointed to conduct the inquiry. The inquiry was due to commence on a certain date."

Sorry I will just jump to get to the crux of the issue.

"The applicant applied for the matter to be postponed until after the conclusion of the criminal proceedings alleging that if the inquiry proceeded his right to remain silent at his trial could be compromised. He also alleged that his conditions of bail precluded him from consulting witnesses and this would prejudice him at the enquiry. It was argued that the applicant's right to remain silent during his criminal trial guaranteed by Section 25(3)(C) of the Constitution would be violated if the enquiry proceeded since he might of necessity be called on to answer evidence given against him. If he wished to avoid a finding of misconduct the applicant's evidence could then be used against him in the criminal proceedings. Accordingly it was argued the first respondent was bound to postpone the enquiry until after the criminal proceedings were concluded. It was held that the role of the courts was merely to ensure that there was no deviation from the path. Accordingly the only question the court was required to decide was whether the first respondent's conclusion that the applicant's constitutional right would not be infringed by the continuation of the proceedings. And this was held to be correct."

The issue that my friend went on about. I beg your pardon I did not mean to phrase it that way. The point that my learned friend was making is that because we have a degree of compulsion therefore the right to remain silent will be infringed. The prejudice involved regarding the right to remain silent being removed would be if the information was to be used against the person. That is an obvious situation.

In this case the argument of the applicant was if I have to give evidence in this disciplinary enquiry I am prejudicing my case and my right to remain silent. If I do not give evidence then I will be fired. So I want to suffer that prejudice. In this case Judge Nugent held that choice is yours but you have to give evidence. We will not postpone the enquiry. If at the enquiry you decide to remain silent well and good and you get fired. If you want to keep your job and give evidence that is your choice. It may prejudice your criminal trial.

The point I am making is the enquiry was not postponed and it was not postponed on that aspect of he was not compelled to give evidence. He had a choice in the matter. Now our compulsion to give evidence has an immunity provision attached to it which is addressed by the case of FERREIRA v LEVINE. And therefore the prejudice - because the very basis of this provision is no one should be compelled to give evidence against themselves. That is the essence of the provision. It is abhorrent to our justice system that people are forced to interdict themselves. It could lead to all sorts of compulsion and although our courts in the past have not been too proactive about protecting confessions this is a reason why confessions have to go through such a testing phase.

So in this case because he was not forced, although he could lose his job if he did not give evidence they refused to postpone the enquiry and left the choice in the hands of the person. He was personally prejudiced of course. But because there wasn't State compulsion involved it was found that they would not postpone the enquiry. And the enquiry continued.

ADV POTGIETER: So Mr Vally do I understand it correctly there the point was that if there was a statutory compulsion without immunity then

MR NTSEBEZA: Nugent J said well you have little or no discretion. So in other words a statutory compulsion without the immunity, without excluding the evidence that you would be giving from being used against you in a subsequent criminal proceeding?

MR VALLY: That is in essence correct. Nugent J did not go so far as to talking about whether if there was immunity. Like FERREIRA v LEVINE did. FERREIRA v LEVINE said provided you had that immunity and its quotes from there you could have that enquiry. Nugent simply said if there was compulsion then you would postpone. But compulsion meaning State compulsion. Nugent did not address the issue of immunity as far as I am aware.

We must bear in mind that our Section 31(3) takes the issue of derivative evidence very far. It says: -

"Any incriminating evidence, answer or information obtained or incriminating evidence directly or indirectly derived from a questioning in terms of Subsection 1.

The protection is very broad. What is 'indirect information' derived from the questioning. It is much broader than just direct evidence. And I think this right, this protection, this immunity inherent in our Act Section 31(3) is that immunity which is offered.

So the State compulsion is protected with this immunity which does away with the prejudice as FERREIRA v LEVINE has explained. So in this case the prejudice he would suffer regarding whether he had a job or not was regarded as one of choice. That is a matter of judgment of Justice Nugent in the matter of DAVIS v TIPP AND ANOTHER.

The issue of SEAPOINT COMPUTER BUREAU again the issue is - sorry I had certain sections marked. This dealt with I believe an insolvency enquiry. And I would respectfully submit that the Constitutional Court is very clear on this issue. It has made a ruling on something very similar. I believe it was (...intervention)

ADV POTGIETER: I think Mr Cilliers told me it was a civil matter but just check on that.

MR VALLY: I am sorry I had better check up clearly. It does involve liquidators but it involves - let me just read a brief bit of the head note for you Advocate Potgieter.

"The applicant applied for an order staying a civil

action instituted against it as defendant by the

respondents as plaintiff pending the determination of

a criminal case which was to be instituted against it

or in the alternative its managing director. In the civil

action the respondents, the joint liquidators of a

certain company claimed R487 500 from the applicant

company. The claim was based on the alleged

unlawful appropriation by the applicant of monies due

to the company in liquidation. It is common cause

that the police were investigating the alleged

misappropriation and that there was thus a nexus

between the action and the criminal investigation."

Again the judgment is interesting. In the head note they said - and by the way the civil case was not postponed. The issue was if there was State compulsion then there would be intervention. However the Court ruled:

"Bona fide litigant should not be thwarted merely because the opponents were unable to resist their claims. Allegations of pending criminal investigations or proceedings without indications that State coercive measures were to be employed in the civil proceedings were not sufficient to prove prejudice of a kind that will justify a stay."

So the fact that he would have to give evidence in a civil trial and it could be used against him in a criminal trial that prejudice was not held to affect him. In fact if the State compelled him to give evidence then the court would intervene. So the civil case was not postponed. The application was dismissed. Again our compulsion is linked to an immunity as covered in FERREIRA v LEVINE.

CHAIRPERSON: Do you have any further submissions to make Mr Vally?

MR VALLY: Yes very briefly I just need to, I have not gone into these cases in great detail. I got them a very short while ago. I have given my learned friend one copy of one of the cases. When he came to my office during the break I did mention to him that I could not find Constitutional Court cases specifically on the right to remain silent. Which he then raised in open session. It was an off the cuff, off the record discussion. I have given him a copy of this case now and it is a Constitutional Court case. NEL v LE ROUX N.O. AND OTHERS, citation is again 1996, 1 South African Constitutional Reports 572. The situation in this case:

"A certain person was charged on various counts of fraud and contravening exchange control regulations in the Magistrates Court. A subpoena in terms of Section 2051 of the Criminal Procedure Act 51 of 1977 was served on him requiring him to appear in the Magistrates Court to be examined in connection with information relating to offences with which he had been charged. The subpoena indicated that information was required from the applicant concerning inter alia the acquisition of a property by him in Spain and his association with H. On presenting himself to the magistrate but before being sworn in the question of the constitutionality of Section 205 was raised on the applicant's behalf. The applicant complained that if it was that if he was compelled to give the information required by the subpoena he would risk exposing himself to civil forfeitures as provided for in the Exchange Control Act."

I am still reading from the head note: -

"The Court first considered the applicant's contention that a Section 205 violated Sections 8(1) - right to equality, Section 13 - right to privacy, Section 15(1) - freedom of speech and expression, Section 25(3)(C) - right of an accused person to be presumed innocent and to remain silent and Section 25(3)(D) - insofar as it relates to an accused person's right against self-incrimination of the Constitution. Held that the arguments advanced on behalf of the applicant did not take adequate account of the implications of the qualifications in Section (1)(89)(1) of the Criminal Procedure Act as it applies to Section 205. Namely that the examinee is not obliged to produce any book, paper of document if he/she has a just excuse for refusing or failing so to answer or produce. If the answer to any question put to the examinee at an examination under Section 205 would infringe or threaten to infringe any of the examinee's chapter 3 rights this would constitute a just excuse for purposes of (...indistinct) Section (1)(89)(1) for refusing to answer the question. Unless a Section (1)(89)(1) compulsion to answer the particular question would in the circumstances constitute a limitation on such right which is justified under Section 33(1) of the Constitution. In determining the applicability of Section 33(1) regard must be had not only to the right asserted but also to the State's interest in securing information necessary for the prosecution of crimes. There is nothing in the provisions of Section 205 read with Section (1)(89) of the Criminal Procedure Act which compels or requires the examinee to answer a question or for that matter produce a document which would unjustifiably infringe or threaten to infringe any of the examinee's chapter 3 rights."

That is how far the Constitutional Court went in that matter. And I pause at this stage because specifically the right to remain silent is addressed here. And the prejudice in terms of the compulsion it is quite serious. There could possibly be confiscation of vast sums of money. Our punitive provision in terms of our Act is Section 39. And if I could refer to Section 39(E)(ii): -

"Any person having been subpoenaed in terms of this Act without sufficient cause fails to attend at the time and place specified in the subpoena or fails to remain in attendance until the conclusion of the meeting in question or ..."

In any event the point I was trying to make is simply that if he has just cause he must show just cause. You cannot invoke statutory 9 and the provisions therein if just cause is shown. It is precisely one of the defences which would avail to a person who is charged for refusing to obey a subpoena or for refusing to answer questions I would submit.

CHAIRPERSON: Were you wanting Section 39(E)(ii)?

MR VALLY: I was looking for the Section where a person could not refuse to answer questions without just cause.

CHAIRPERSON: Section 39(E)(ii).

ADV POTGIETER: It says sufficient cause.

MR VALLY: I am indebted to the Chairperson. The point I am making is this case, a Constitutional Court case on the right to remain silent is apposite in this matter. I would like to go further quoting you various sections of this case. But I have not got into it in such great detail. I was rushed to come back. I will just quote one last section at page 580 paragraphs c to f: -

"The Section 25(3) rights to a fair trial accrue only to an accused person. The recalcitrant examinee who on refusing or failing to answer a question triggers the possible operation of the imprisonment provisions of Section (1)(89)(1), is not in my view an accused person. 'For purposes of the protection afforded of Section 25(3) of the Constitution. Such examinee is unquestionably entitled to procedural fairness. A matter which will be dealt with below but not directly to the Section 25(3) rights. For the simple reason that such examinee is not facing criminal prosecution. The Section (1)(89)(1) proceedings are not regarded as criminal proceedings, do not result in the examinee being convicted of any offence. And the imprisonment of an examinee is not regarded as a criminal sentence or treated a such. If after being imprisoned an examinee becomes willing to testify this would entitle the examinee to immediate release. In American parlance such examinees carry the keys of their prison in their own pockets. The imprisonment provisions in Section (1)(89) constitute nothing more than process in aid of the essential objective of compelling witnesses who have a legal duty to testify to do so. It does not constitute a criminal trial nor make an accused of the examinee. This disposes of the attack based on the Section 25(3) fair trial rights."

And with respect I think that last sentence also applies to this particular hearing. But there is just one other case that I want to bring to the panel's attention. This is an Appellate division judgment of VAN VUUREN v ESTERHUIZEN N O AND ANOTHER. Unfortunately I have not given - have I? No I have not given my learned friend a copy of this. This also arrived a short while ago, a short while before I started arguing. In this case.

CHAIRPERSON: What is the citation?

MR VALLY: I beg your pardon Mr Chair. VAN VUUREN v ESTERHUIZEN N O AND ANOTHER, 1996 (4) SA 03 and it is the Appellate Division.

"The appellate was a former accused in a murder case. After plea procedures in terms of the Criminal Procedure Act were concluded the Attorney General refused to prosecute the appellate further at that stage and he had the accused and members of the family summoned to give evidence at an inquest. At the commencement of the proceedings before the Magistrate the first respondent, the appellate requested that the inquest proceedings be discontinued. The Magistrate dismissed the application and the appellate then brought an application for review of the proceedings."

I will go further with regards to the head note. I will just read the relevant portions Mr Chair: -

"The appellant?s right in the case of a prosecution to silence was going to be infringed. Appellant argued that. And a continuation of the inquest would thus conflict with the appellant?s rights to a fair trial as conferred by Section 25 of the Constitution of the Republic of South Africa Act number 200 of 1993. It was held the alleged prejudice simply sprung from the procedure which the Act had laid down. It was not attributable to the second respondent?s conduct. So the Appellate Division held that the inquest could go on regardless of the points raised regarding the alleged infringement of the right to a fair trial because there were criminal proceedings pending and because there was an inquest relating to similar evidence."

CHAIRPERSON: And now you are saying that the right there that was being placed into consideration in regard to a fair trial was the right to remain silent?

MR VALLY: That is what the appellant was arguing. Again there are probably other quotable quotes in the Act. Time does not permit me to go through all of them. I just want to very briefly (...intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: Are you giving us the authority there Mr Vally?

MR VALLY: The citation of the VAN VUUREN case?

CHAIRPERSON: No these other cases that you say you have not got time. In fact you do not have time?

MR VALLY: Well I am not going to exact quotes of what the judgments (...intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: That is why I am saying are you giving us citations so that we can go and look up the judgments?

MR VALLY: I can give you the citations. I thought I had Mr Chair. You want me to give you specific citations?

CHAIRPERSON: Are there further cases that you want to give to us?

MR VALLY: Oh I see, I see. There are other cases referred to in the cases I have given you but not at this stage. No not further citations I beg your pardon I misunderstood you Mr Chair.

CHAIRPERSON: Does that conclude your submissions?

MR VALLY: Almost.

CHAIRPERSON: Somebody is having a cell phone which is disturbing the proceedings because it is coming through the sound system. Mr Vally.

MR VALLY: Some of the other points raised by my learned friend I believe I have responded to most of them. I have already stated that I cannot state as a fact that we are doing the same as the criminal case. We are covering I believe a much broader area and we are covering an area as determined by the provisions of our Act. So I am not ad idem with my learned friend in that regard.

Another issue that I want to raise is my learned friend has pointed out that the fact that we have not called Doctor Immelmann is an indication that we have a choice to do so. I am not sure exactly what he said but any way he criticised us for that fact. The reality is this that whilst we are in the process of furthering the objectives of our Act there will be situations where we have problems with other State departments carrying out their statutory obligations. These issues will have to be resolved by negotiation failing which, by rulings. We have had that with Non-proliferation Board. In fact if the Attorney General had his way we would not have this hearing at all.

Yes there has been a compromise but no we have not compromised on our principles or the integrity of this hearing. We have got a submission in the form of an affidavit which has been made available to my learned friend which sets out all the allegations by Doctor Immelmann. They can in evidence rebut it. They can rebut it by their own representations in terms of Section 30.

But yes there will be such negotiations like they were with the Non-proliferation Council, like there was with the Department of Foreign Affairs representatives, office of the President, office of the Deputy President. We agreed to withdraw some documents. We are not in isolation. The Truth Commission is acting in the context of a society in transition. In the context of other peoples' statutory obligations. So we will not be unreasonable except where our obligations and our objectives and our functions are compromised. We will not compromise on the sui generis of this Commission and the decision was our decision. There was no compulsion by the AG.

And finally, (...intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: Before very finally?

MR VALLY: Finally, finally we have by arrangement with my learned friend many weeks ago sent written questions which we required and answer to. In anticipation of this hearing, they contacted us and said: "Well, in considering answering that we have to see the documents". We then sent the documents with a subpoena and said: "Now you have the documents, can we have your answers". These were not detailed questions. And they wrote back to us and said: "Having consulted with our clients" - I'm paraphrasing here, I'm not quoting directly, I don't have the letter with me but they decided, pending this hearing, not to give us that information, not to answer those very simple written questions. They are very broad, very general.

So I note what my learned friend has offered regarding written submissions. I believe, in the circumstances of this hearing and with respect to the issues involved, the very, very serious nature of the alleged gross violation of human rights, that simply providing us with written answers to written questions will not meet our statutory needs and our statutory obligations as set out in our Act. Thank you Mr Chair.

CHAIRPERSON: Advocate Potgieter?

ADV POTGIETER: Thank you Chairperson. Mr Vally, just one issue that remains for me. I was trying to understand the point that Mr Cilliers was making about a discretion. Now, I had thought that what he was doing was to submit an application to us almost in the form of a postponement, an application for an indulgence from us. He was saying that his request is for us to hold over the testimony of his two clients. And then he made the submission in the light of the case that he quoted and that the Chairperson referred to as well and he said well, there's no discretion.

Now, he doesn't say, it seems to me he doesn't say that the subpoenas are defective, he doesn't say that his client has been brought before us irregularly. He's really asking us to say: "No, hold on, don't let him speak now, let him wait until his criminal trial is finalised and then he can come and speak to you".

It appears to me as if there is always a discretion, unless I misunderstand the legal position, but to my mind there is always a discretion if a party approaches you for an indulgence and that as panel, having been given that request and having to decide on that request we have a discretion which we can exercise in the light of all the circumstance. We might find that it is perfectly Constitutional, this provision, Section 31 of our Act, but that because of the special circumstances of this case we will grant the indulgence and hear the witnesses at some later stage but it appears to me as if there is always a discretion. Now he has made the submission that according to the authorities there is no discretion. I don't understand that but what, how do you respond to that?

MR VALLY: I think the authorities are very clear, and I'm referring to the authorities quoted by my learned friend, that each case goes on the facts of that particular matter. The burden is much heavier in the event of State compulsion and this is because of the justifiable ...[indistinct] enforcing people to incriminate themselves which the State may do. This has been part of our common law and now it's part of our Constitutional law but it is based on that premise, that people must not be forced to incriminate themselves and that is why they have the right to remain silent.

I would submit that except for the provisions of the Constitution, there is a discretion and the burden is heavier or lighter, depending on the circumstances and facts of any case. I think my learned friend was quoting the judgement of Justice Trengrove in the matter of IRVIN AND JOHNSON v BASSON, if I am correct. Yes, he was. In the matter of IRVIN AND JOHNSON v BASSON 1977 (3) SA 067, Justice Trengove said and I quote:

"The principle as I understand it, is that if it is shown that proceedings in an insolvency and an examination of an insolvency are likely to prejudice the insolvent in his defence in related criminal proceedings, the Court has a discretion to stay all proceedings against him until the criminal proceedings have been concluded, has a discretion"

And he says where this rule arises rule arises from.

And in this Davis case, this is Justice Nugent's argument:

"Although the principle has been articulated in the language of a discretion, this may be misleading. I do not understand the decided cases to have held that a Court may direct the civil proceedings to continue, even where it has been found that they may prejudice an accused person. On the contrary it is clear that once the potential for prejudice has been established, the Courts have always intervened to avoid it occurring. In that sense it has no discretion"

But the prejudice referred to here is State compulsion again. Prejudice that Davis suffered was either get fired or damage your criminal case. And because he had a choice, regardless of the fact that both of them prejudiced him, he was not allowed to get a postponement of his disciplinary inquiry.

And I would draw the Court's attention to the Constitutional Court case that I quoted, that of NEL v LE ROUX AND OTHERS, in terms of which there was compulsion by the State to answer questions and the reasoning in that matter. So I would submit that that discretion is inherent save for where it compromises the fundamental rights set out in Section 35 of our Constitution.

ADV POTGIETER: So we ought to be persuaded by the factors which are placed before us indicating prejudice and if so, what degree of prejudice and then to be swayed either way on that sort of basis.

MR VALLY: That is correct. Firstly, is there an infringement, which I submit there is not of the fundamental rights. Secondly, if there is an infringement, is there a justifiable limitation of those rights in the circumstances of this matter, which I argued at great length quoting Mohammed and quoting the requirements of nature of the right importance ...[indistinct] and purpose of limitation. The nature and extent of that limitation, the relationship between limitation and it's purpose and less restrictive means to achieve the purpose.

ADV POTGIETER: And what we really must determine is whether in fact we should, on your submission, we should determine this against the background of a fair trial, against that sort of backdrop.

MR VALLY: Absolutely. It's not only my submission I respectfully submit, I'm supported by the Constitutional Court in that submission.

ADV POTGIETER: But then I understand you. And hopefully you have some copies of those decisions available for us because we will have to do some reading between now and when we reconvene.

MR VALLY: I will arrange to have clean copies made. My copies have lots of writing on them Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: In reply Mr Cilliers?

MR CILLIERS: As it pleases you Mr Chairman. There are certain aspects and decisions I also want to devote some attention to. At this stage I want to suggest, I note it's after 6 o'clock, that I need some time to look at these document Mr Vally has referred to and then tomorrow morning I will address you on that matter. I want to suggest at this stage that we adjourn until whatever time tomorrow morning.

CHAIRPERSON: Can I just confirm with my colleagues?

It is quite clear that due to the lateness of the hour we should be inclined to granting the request by Mr Vally without even hearing you, the request, submission made by Mr Cilliers. How we are looking at this, we would also like to have the opportunity to get copies of the authorities that have been cited. I never thought the day would arise when I have to do that, I thought in the Commission I'm not a lawyer, I'm the Head of the Investigation Unit but you never know, it catches up with you.

We would like to make a tentative arrangement which runs as follows: That the matter stand down, this particular matter stands down until such time as counsel have been able to provide to each other the authorities that they want to provide and/or look at them and until such time as we will also have been provided with copies of the relative judgements, which might be tomorrow or possibly Friday.

In the meantime I would like to indicate that the panel is of the view that if there is other evidence that would have been called, that that evidence be called tomorrow. I was of the impression that that is Mr Goosen and Generals Lothar Neethling and Niel Knobel. If an arrangement can be made for those to be available tomorrow.

MR CILLIERS: If I can assist you, Doctor Neethling is the person who has the medical problem but an arrangement has been made. He will land at approximately 9 o'clock tomorrow morning and be available from half past nine. I have already consulted with him, so the position is that if you need him here you can call him whenever it suits you. He is the available in the vicinity of nine thirty.

CHAIRPERSON: That's very helpful Mr Cilliers. And Doctor Knobel?

MR CILLIERS: General Knobel is here and he is available.

CHAIRPERSON: So can we then tentatively say the matter is, this particular matter is stood down until it can be reinstated, that tomorrow we take further evidence, such further evidence as is available and that we are adjourned until tomorrow morning at nine.

HEARING ADJOURNS

ON RESUMPTION ON 11 JUNE 1998

CHAIRPERSON: Ladies and gentlemen I would like to get an indication from Mr Vally as to which way we go.

MR VALLY: Thank you Mr Chair. The attorneys and counsel for Drs Mijburgh and Basson has indicated that he needs a bit more time this morning, so we will start off with Dr Goosen and then after Dr Goosen's evidence has been led and he has been cross-examined we will hear the reply to the argument raised yesterday by Mr Cilliers.

CHAIRPERSON: Very well.

MR VALLY: I see another problem. I don't see Mr Polsen here. Mr Polsen is the attorney for Mr Goosen, Dr Goosen I beg your pardon.

CHAIRPERSON: Is Dr Goosen here?

MR DU PLESSIS: Mr Chairman Gen Knobel is also here. We are ready to continue and he can continue, just to save time.

MR VALLY: ...in going ahead, but it may be wise to wait for his attorney. I assume there was a presumption by people that there would be the reply to the legal argument this morning and that's why Mr Polsen is not here.

CHAIRPERSON: There should be no presumption, the matter was adjourned to 9 o'clock for everybody. How do you want to play it then?

MR VALLY: If you will excuse me for a few minutes I just want to confer with my colleagues.

MR DU PLESSIS: Mr Chairman here is Mr Polsen.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very much Mr Du Plessis.

Mr Polsen welcome.

MR POLSEN: We are late this morning, unfortunately ...(intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: It happens to most of us. Good morning and welcome Dr Goosen. Before I ask Advocate Potgieter to swear you in may I just introduce one member of the panel who has not been with us but is with us today. To my extreme right, and as we always say it has nothing to do with their politics, it is Mrs Yasmin Sooka. She is the Deputy Chairperson of the Human Rights Violations Committee. She is a Commissioner and she is based in the Johannesburg office.

We have knowledge also of the presence of the Chief Executive Officer of the Commission who is in the hall here and who is looking after the interests of the Commission in making sure that using taxpayers money irresponsibly. Welcome Chief Executive Officer and Chief Accounting Officer.

Is it Mr Chaskalson or is it Mr Vally.

MR CHASKALSON: I will be leading Dr Goosen.

CHAIRPERSON: You will be leading Dr Goosen. If you could get Dr Goosen then to stand up so that he can be sworn in.

ADRIAAN JACOBUS GOOSEN: (sworn states)

CHAIRPERSON: Just to mention another ground rule. You will be totally welcome Dr Goosen to express yourself in the language you are most comfortable with. There are listening devices in the form of these head phones so that you shouldn't feel constrained at all even if questions come in English that you should reply in Afrikaans, if that's the language you would like to express yourself in.

Mr Chaskalson.

MR CHASKALSON: Thank you Mr Chair. Good morning Dr Goosen.

Could you please tell us what your qualifications are?

DR GOOSEN: Good morning Mr Chaskalson. Yes Mr Chairman please I first have one question. I will try and stick to English. I can also speak Afrikaans and some Tswana, I can only swear in Sotho, so I'll stick with English.

Mr Chair I have one legal aspect to settle. Please I see everyone has a few problems, legalwise, and I'm not really trained in the legal field. I have signed an oath of secrecy under the Secrecy Act of the Government, and I have also signed a document with the Surgeon-General which binds me not to disclose anything of the companies for a period of ten years, and not to be involved in any activity, in the field of activities of the companies for then years. Now that period only expires in 1999. Now I want to know from you, how binding will this be on me? I have understood from the Surgeon-General way back in 1994, that those, all the matters were out in the open and we could speak freely. I am not bound anymore. But as I haven't yet had any written confirmation of that I would just like to hear the Commission's opinion on that.

MR POLSEN: Sorry Mr Chairman. I think my client's concern is something which I tried to allay his fears but for the record, and let us put it on record, that I think the Act that would perhaps be applicable is Act 84 of 1982, "Act Safeguarding Information". Now I think under the compulsion in terms of this Commission's Act it will be excusable and he will not be in difficulty as far as that Act is concerned.

The only other Act which I think it can possibly apply is the Proliferation Act, but we've got mechanisms in place to protect the particular Act in terms of the agreement with my colleague Mr Arendse here.

So I don't really foresee a difficulty and for the sake of the record we've recorded the concerns by the witness. Should he be approached at a later stage legally or otherwise his excuse will be perfectly legal.

Thank you.

CHAIRPERSON: Very well expressed Mr Polsen, and I think since it is you who is legally representing him I don't think you have to hear Mr Chaskalson on the point. I think you are spot on. It's on the record. It is a sense in which I also follow your reasoning as to the protections that are built-in in the other Acts.

MR POLSEN: Thank you.

DR GOOSEN: Thank you Sir. Sorry for the interruption. I will proceed with the answers now.

I am for the record 47 years old. I qualified in 1975, in April 1975 as a Veterinary Surgeon at the Veterinary School of the University of Pretoria Veterinary Faculty.

I have also achieved postgraduate qualifications in pathology, clinical pathology in 1978.

MR CHASKALSON: Have you specialised in any medical research?

DR GOOSEN: Mr Chairman yes, there is no formal specialisation course or qualification for medical research per se. There are basic courses of which the ones I did in the pathology, physiology and the subjects I took for my postgraduate studies were physiology, toxicology and clinical pathology were amongst them and they was a very good basis for medical research. Afterwards though you start off as a research worker assistant, research assistant etc and you work your way up through international publications etc, etc, to become really a skilled or qualified scientist.

MR CHASKALSON: Have you published any scientific articles either locally or internationally?

DR GOOSEN: Chairman yes, unfortunately. I haven't got it with me but I can supply you with a complete list of publications in internationally recognised journals, several of them which are locally published and also several of them international publications. It is in the region of about 14 publications as first author and about twenty as second and even more as third author which means you were a co-worker in research teams.

If I can elaborate a little bit on the scientific side of it because I feel it's relevant later on and in the discussions we are looking for the truth and I feel one should look a little bit at scientists and what is a scientist. It is relevant. We were involved in a very, very high level of sophisticated science. Now a scientist only comes by experience and training, and scientists are controlled not by themselves, not by a boss, scientists are controlled by an international community of science. There are many rules and regulations in place internationally which controls science. The way science is done internationally is on the same standard all over the world. So all international scientific organisations, journals etc adhere to these levels of standards.

And I want to point that out to the Commission they must take it in mind in some of the future points that when we speak about good science and bad science etc, that science can be verified, and scientists can be evaluated for their achievements.

I also took part in writing some scientific books. I wrote a chapter on the standardisation of research animals in an internationally co-authored book which set the standards for research when using animals.

MR CHASKALSON: I'd like to return to these points at a later stage during our questioning.

Can you tell the Commission what you were doing prior to 1981?

DR GOOSEN: Chairman 1991, and I've sat here for three days and I've listened a lot about memories and fading memories and I must agree I have compassion with the people, it's a long time ago, but I will try to be as accurate as possible. If I am not sure of anything I will also indicate that I am not sure.

1991 I was working for the University of Pretoria, the medical faculty and also a joint appointment from the government through the provincial administration, the Department of Hospital Services. I was appointed from the side of the Department of Hospital Services the superintendent for research at the Medical School, and from the university side I was departmental head or director of the HA Grove Animal Research Centre, which was the centralised higher medical research facility for the university of Pretoria's medical faculty.

MR CHASKALSON: Can you tell us what happened next?

DR GOOSEN: Chairman in relation to where we are going in biological warfare, 1980, 1981, those years were the years of conflict. We also had reference from you Chairman previously to when was the conflict and when was the conflict over etc, which was very relevant I believe and this whole thing must be said against that background.

Those were the years of the increasing tempo in conflict both internally and externally. Those were the years we heard on the television all the time the total onslaught syndrome. And all the South Africans referring then to white people, which basically it was popular to exclude everyone else as a South African, but people like even Pik Botha, and I am sure it's on tape somewhere, continuously tell us the total onslaught syndrome, Communism is coming etc, etc, so we were motivated to support the government of the day and support them physically, joining up with the military, etc etc.

So while being involved in medical research we also did our part, many of our South Africans, white South Africans, also some black South Africans I believe, did their part in supporting the military's effort. In that effort I was involved with the Surgeon-General's office as being a special advisor for veterinary matters. This was a position I held since 1977 when I finished with my military service, the one year stint.

In 1977 veterinary service in the medical division of the army or the Defence Force was really non-existent. It consisted of about a few national servicemen, "dienspligtiges". After finishing my service I was assisting the Surgeon-General then, General Nieuwoudt in establishing a proper veterinary, I don't know what you call it exactly, division or whatever the military terms will be, but the veterinary facility for supporting animals used in war like the horse centres, the dog centres etc.

Later on I was more involved after this was established, after the appointment of a permanent officer, veterinary officer. I was involved in a research committee doing research for the military in developing or improving the efficacy of the use of these animals in the military situation, especially in the border situation in a bush war where horses were used for transport and dogs were used for tracking, sniffer dogs etc.

So in '81, '82 we had a group of scientists going doing this type of work in civilian institutions, involving places like the University of Pretoria, the Department of Genetics, the Faculty of Veterinary Science; my own institute at the HA Grove Animal Research Centre were involved in this.

Financially we had quite a bit of leeway those days if you were involved in the military effort and it wasn't really strictly controlled how much money was spent on this, that and the other. It was taken for care if you were director of a government institution you had a bit of freedom to spend money on military projects. What we got in return from the military was national servicemen that were qualified as microbiologists, geneticists etc, veterinarians to come and work in our institutions, and also apart from spending time on the military project also spend time on the civilian or the medical problems.

MR CHASKALSON: During this period did you meet Dr Wouter Basson?

DR GOOSEN: Chairman I cannot exactly remember the first time I met Wouter Basson. It was during the period. We were working on a project concerning trauma and the effects of trauma on the body, for instance after car crashes, train crashes, the complications after these type of trauma on the body was shock lung, and this project of course was of interest to the medical service of the army or defence force, and we approached the Surgeon-General for assistance in, or his interest in this project and the results of this project of treating trauma, because it was the same type of injuries which were sustained in the war situation. Either landmines or shootings or whatever, or infections lead to this. And in this connection with the Surgeon-General I believe Dr Wouter Basson, who was an internist, we made then contact with him on discussing the possibilities and advantages which this projects which we were doing might have and have been applied to in the military situation.

MR CHASKALSON: Can you tell us how you were approached to establish RRL?

DR GOOSEN: Chairman, yes. It was also in the '82 timeframe period, '82/'83 period, and it was against this background which I have explained to you now. And Mr Chairman please, I don't want to justify what we did giving you all this background but I just feel it's relevant. We acknowledged what we were doing.

In that time period I was also internationally recognised, became then recognised as a scientist in the laboratory animal area which was a basis for good science because animals were always used as models for medical research. I was approached one day by two persons, and I cannot remember their names, but I remember they came from a company East of Pretoria, in the Wilgers, and later on it was established it was Delta-G people, and they approached me for support for laboratory animals. They told me they had a company, a private company involved in producing chemicals of all sorts, household chemicals, pool acids, etc, etc, and as we all know these products need to be tested for their safety, environmental impact etc, etc, and again the animal is the only practical model to test it in. But they had no knowledge of animals and models for testing etc, and they've approached me to assist them in putting up a facility for themselves, and would I be willing to do it etc, etc.

Then being a private company I said no, surely we are keen to support the proper use and not the misuse of animals in research of which we had a lot of knowledge, but I am a civil servant and you know but surely I think it's to the advantage of the country to expand science and I would assist them. They would have come back to me, they never came back to me.

Then this trauma project with the Surgeon-General's department was under discussion and this also in the timeframe. It was after the visit from the Delta-G people. I had more contact with Wouter Basson. But firstly in the project I had a veterinarian seconded to my institute by the name of Dr James Davies.

MR CHASKALSON: Where was he seconded from?

DR GOOSEN: He was seconded from the Special Medical Services.

Now Mr Chairman I am not too sure what part of the Special Medical Services, but it was known that he wasn't from the normal medical and veterinary core. Mr Chairman President or ex President de Klerk promised me a long time ago he would explain to all of us the putting together and the unravelling of the special structures of the army, the BSB etc, in fact that was in December 1989, and he promised to tell everyone about everything before January 1990. I have never heard it, so please I cannot unravel where everyone fitted in, into these special operations business.

Anyway Davies was known, and it wasn't a secret to me, that he came from one of these special operational areas. But he was sort-of finished with his project and he was then available to serve out his term as a national serviceman, he was seconded to us to be available for research on the project.

He did work on the trauma project and he had some contacts with Dr Wouter Basson on that, and then we had some discussions on the military. We always had discussion on this thread. It was the topic of the day, and who was the enemy and who was not the enemy. And Mr Chairman if you ask me who was the enemy I will explain it to you, but I don't want to waste your time.

Anyway I was approached at one stage to - we were also working, let me put it this way, we were also working for the army on a project on snake venoms. The army was interested in buying a kit which could go with every platoon or section in the bush for the treatment of snake venom and this was the one for cutting - when the snake bit you, you cut yourself and you applied a suction apparatus and you suck out the venom and then you don't die from the snake bite, because being thousands of miles away, whichever country we were involved in at this stage, you won't be near proper medical treatment. And we've been working with snake venom for months, we've published on this, the treatment, the efficacy of the apparatus etc. We had access to all the snakes, mamba, cobra etc, boomslang whatever. Davies was involved in the animal side of this project also.

And then I was approached to, in '83, and I am not too sure if we had discussions of formally developing biological weapons by then or not, before this incident or after, it was around the same time, I was approached to supply some - if there would be a possibility if we could supply some poison to eliminate an enemy of the State.

MR CHASKALSON: Who requested you to do this?

DR GOOSEN: Wouter Basson, Dr Basson.

We also had discussions around those times on chemical and biological weapons with Dr Basson. You know you work on the project on trauma and you sit down and you wait for results and you have a cup of tea and then you discuss these things. What can be applicable and what no. So at some stage we started discussing chemical and biological weapons and what the efficacy will be and what their place will be. And then during that time I was also approached to supply him with some snake venom. We did supply some snake venom, mamba venom, and we also supplied the mamba with the venom.

We also did some toxicity tests to establish the dose in non-human primates to see what sort of dose could be used. I can tell you a minute quantity is necessary intravenously to kill someone instantaneously. Intravenously in fact ...(intervention)

MR CHASKALSON: We'd prefer it if you didn't go into the exact details of quantities necessary, thank you Doctor.

DR GOOSEN: Okay. It is published anyway. It's not proliferation, it's common knowledge.

DR RANDERA: Sorry, can you just tell us, however, how much of that poison did you - was that the only poison that you provided at that time or was there something else that you provided and how much did you provide?

DR GOOSEN: During that time we also provided something else but that was then in the time - then I was starting to being approached to create an official testing facility for the Defence Force, to test chemical and biological products. But before we've started with it, while I was still with the H F Verwoerd Hospital, I was also approached, and you've heard yesterday Dr Odendal at the time was the microbiologist employed by us for, no clandestine work, proper good scientific work, or positive effective work, we also were approached for some other endotoxins which we could supply to eliminate some enemies of the State and this is true. These toxins and the key behind it was from the beginning not to be two things - detectable and if it was detectable then it shouldn't be traceable.

In other words if you supply an endotoxin which is derived from a bacteria which is normally present in the gut flora of a human being, and you know with these toxins or these bacteria there are always some of them present in one's normal flora, so at any stage some conditions in your gut can go wrong and then the toxins can be produced and cause the disease. So you can extract or have these organisms produce a toxin and you can inject the toxin into your victim and you can detect that he died from this but you would not be able to say if it was given externally or if it was derived from his natural source of bacteria under favourable conditions. So therefore the term not detectable preferably, and if it's detectable then it shouldn't be traceable to a clandestine application.

And this was the request and there were some toxins which we worked on. Dr Odendal also explained on some of those toxins in his testimony and that was the type of stuff we worked on.

DR ORR: Dr Goosen who was it who requested these endotoxins and gave you the criteria of undetectability and untraceability?

DR GOOSEN: Dr Wouter Basson.

DR RANDERA: Dr Goosen, is it Mr or Doctor sorry it is Doctor is it?

DR GOOSEN: It doesn't matter Sir, Daan Goosen. You are welcome.

DR RANDERA: Let me just get this clear. At this stage there was no front company, you were part of a university academic department and you were being asked by the military to produce various poisons, be it in the guise of snake venom or endotoxins. Now earlier in your introductory remarks you talked about scientists and responsibility of scientists and how scientist's work is evaluated, now when it came to this sort of work, two questions -

1. Did this go through any of your ethical committees at university?

2. You mentioned Dr Odendal that he was involved in straight scientific work if you like, was he aware as to where these toxins were going to?

DR GOOSEN: Mr Chairman, yes. I would like to address you, there are a few aspects which you've touched there. The ethical side and what do you think and what are you aware of etc, etc.

At that stage we were working in the following manner that Dr James Davies, who was seconded to us, he was sort-of then and we knew he had then contact with Dr Basson, he was doing the on-hand work. All the work done was done according to the guidelines of the ethical committees. All the work done was done according to the scientific rules and regulations which apply internationally. As I have said it was very easy. Dr Odendal produced the toxins as part of a project he had in producing models for shock, for work to treat, trauma patients. So that was there. The protocols were in place. The effects of these models were the results which could have been used applied in as a chemical weapon, or a biological weapon in this case.

So Chairman, and you must be very clear on this thing, the non-proliferation issue and how do you control that, that is not very easy. That is not very easy. What is proliferation and what is non-proliferation? In this instance is a clear example of what is the case. During normal good, proper, positive medical science these products are produced. They are standardised. You know exactly what is the dosage, what is the ...(indistinct). You know exactly how to produce it, because the scientists publish this internationally. This is my model for working on models to treat a human patient in shock. You understand what I am saying.

So there is no difference. In a lot of these instances, and I can come to others for you later, whenever you want to, there are differences in scale. There are places of control. There are mechanisms how you control and how you non-proliferate. There are very few people who are really in a position to do these controls and these measurements. I would be one of them. Why? Because I was involved in this. I was intimately involved in this in the scientific side. I know exactly about a lot of things. But what is more important I don't know what I don't know of many other things, and that you must also realise when you control these things.

So the ethical side of it - this is to answer you, how could we cover this ethically? It was covered already. So we had snakes, we were busy working with snakes, the treatment of snake bites. In the process we had snake venom, pure snake venom. It was approved, everything. Now in fact I took some of that snake venom to give to Dr Basson at six o'clock in the morning. That was the secret thing. To have him there early in the morning and James Davies and myself not to see everyone taking some of the venom. And we had a snake and we had a story and say okay we've milked the snake, it's finished. We had the snakes, we implant a marked venom - marked cells, radio-marked cells etc, so we had everything, but the secret was to have him there at six o'clock in the morning that nobody sees him picking this up.

In fact the morning he picked it up I dropped the vial with the snake venom and it broke, and it was on the floor and we had to draw it up with the syringe from the floor and put it back again. That was the way it worked.

The ethics of this, I don't know if you want me to ...(intervention)

DR GOOSEN: I think we may return to some of these points later but I would like to try and ...(intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: Can I just as a layperson understand what is being said. Do I understand you to be saying the production of snake venoms which would be used scientifically in order to - or to research around ways of defending people who are bitten by snakes, that went through the ethical committees because it was good scientific undertaking?

DR GOOSEN: That's correct Sir.

CHAIRPERSON: But the one thing that wouldn't go through the ethical committees would be where you are told at that level, at that six o'clock level ...(intervention)

DR GOOSEN: That's correct.

CHAIRPERSON: That you know we must also produce murder weapons ...(intervention)

DR GOOSEN: Yes Sir.

CHAIRPERSON: ...to assassinate political enemies of the State.

DR GOOSEN: Ja.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Chaskalson.

MR CHASKALSON: Thank you. Could you tell us when you were formally approached to establish RRL and how that came about?

DR GOOSEN: Mr Chairman yes, that was during that timeframe of period '82, the first half of '83 when we were busy with these activities. Dr Basson himself asked me if I would be willing to establish a clandestine facility for the South African Defence Force to evaluate products, basically chemical weapons products and some biological weapons products.

During that same in '82, '83 I was involved with a group of people based in France, through South African, through the Development Corporation, the NOK, the Industrial Development Corporation of establishing a private company doing contract pharmaceutical research, testing the efficacy and the safety of new pharmaceuticals for European pharmaceutical companies. We were negotiating this and it was known to my friends and colleagues that I was busy negotiating with these people, I was offered then this project with a colleague from South Africa, a financial man, a 50% share in this Europe/South African joint company of establishing this. I was involved with the company in establishing the market, the international market for this type of work to be established.

The bottom line was that in Europe and America the requirements, and my friend Professor Folb will bear me out on this, the requirements for registering new medicines became stricter and stricter. They need to be tested more and more, safety and efficacy. But the pressure on the European scientific community for not using animals became also stricter and stricter. Legitimate arguments like rats and mice etc is not good models for testing because the human is not a rat or a mouse was applied. South Africa, though, had a clear abundance of non-human primates. Now non-human primates to keep them as laboratory animals in Europe and America was a very, very, very costly exercise and large sums of money were paid for these testing of drugs to have access to non-human primates. So that was the basis for this agreement. And I was specialising in fact in this non-human primate model business.

So I can tell you, yes, I was involved in international market studies. It was a very, very viable business. We were involved in putting up a multi-million rand company with money put in place, high investors, with personnel, with shareholding of Nobel prize winners in pharmacology etc, with scientists involved because to get contracts, nobody gives you a contract if you have lay-people in your company. So you need to have reputable scientists in your company and we had everything in place to form this company. And if you will excuse me I wouldn't like to mention the names of the people involved. It is, as I have said, even Nobel prize winners.

Dr Basson, and he was aware of this, we had discussions on this and the way we are going, and he said, "look man, for the country, we need this. Can you not establish a clandestine company for us along similar lines to this. Because you are known now to be involved in this".

MR CHASKALSON: By clandestine I presume you mean a company that would be known to the public but would actually be operating or at least partially operating for the South African Defence Force?

DR GOOSEN: Yes, yes Sir, this was a question around how would we do it? Would I use this other one which I am involved in or not? No, not the other one, not the private one which I was really private with, but a clandestine front solely for the military. I had to make a decision then between the two options - either to go and work for the military and the country, sort-of producing under the same front, "dekmantel - dit was die dekmantel for hierdie maatskappy" - "that was the cover for this company" because Goosen was busy to develop a toxicological company. Everybody knew I was busy with that. The names just varied.

I had to decide if I wanted to go completely in a private business or if I wanted to join or facilitate the army in their effort on starting this facility of evaluating chemical and biological weapons. Chairman I believe someone said the other day they have good judgement, it comes only after 50 years of experience, and 50 years of experience comes from bad decisions. So I believe I made the wrong judgement at that stage. I opted for supporting the effort from the government. I was in fact flown, scheduled to fly to France, and I did fly to France to sign the final documents for the European/South African company, and I flew in, we had an half-an-hour discussion and I had to stay there two weeks because the planes were not leaving because we stopped the business then. That was the end of my option of being involved financially for myself in a 50% share in that company. I gave that up to be involved with this effort for the military.

So we had a lot of arguments on how exactly to set this company up.

MR CHASKALSON: Could you tell us who "we" are?

DR GOOSEN: Dr Wouter Basson and myself.

MR CHASKALSON: And it was only the two of you having this discussion?

DR GOOSEN: Just the two of us, yes. The initial discussions were amongst us and it went on for over a period of time. We didn't sit down in one session and sort out everything. This, as I have explained, was coming along over some time.

I learned from him that there was already a company in existence, a front company, producing the chemicals. Initially I didn't know which one, later I've learnt from him that it was Delta-G. Then I knew also the connection that that was the people that approached me about a year before to help them with the assistance of lab animals.

I've asked Dr Basson, at one stage, but I've met you here and we had some dealings and we had some business and we did some science etc, or we at the Institute did the science for him, he wasn't really involved in developing anything, who was he and what does he represent and how can I know that all these promises he makes that he can supply the money to put up the facilities, pay the salaries etc, etc, could be in place? He was at that stage, I believe, a colonel. He might even be a commandant still, a lieutenant colonel. So I asked him who are you? Where do you come from? So he said no, no, I am Wouter. I am a medical doctor, internist, but I can tell you one thing the generals listen to me, don't you worry. I promise you, the generals listen to me. You can make your plans, you can give up your plans, carry on.

Okay, then I made the commitment. I had to make the commitment then finally to him and say okay I will go with you because I had to make - before I was open with him I had to decide between the options. After I made the commitment I was then introduced to the people higher up who was the Surgeon-General, General Nieuwoudt, Nicol Nieuwoudt. He is deceased already I believe.

MR CHASKALSON: Did you meet with any of the other higher-ups, or was it just the Surgeon-General?

DR GOOSEN: No Sir just the Surgeon-General.

MR CHASKALSON: And did you continue that discussion as to how the company should be formed, whether it would be best to be a private company or whether it should be falling formally within the SADF structures?

DR GOOSEN: Ja. Yes Sir, this was discussions I had with Wouter Basson. I argued this matter also in the presence then of Surgeon-General Nieuwoudt. At the meeting I think the 2 I/C, my friend General Knobel might have been present, Charl Jackson might have been present. This was sort-of the more formal meetings to establish this company and how should the company be established. I was quite prepared that we establish this as a military unit under the control, the financial and hierarchial structure in the military, because I worked in a government department, strictly controlled, budgeted, all the bureaucratic things in place. I have dealt with the military for many years and I have no problem in working for "volk en vaderland" for this matter inside the military.

The final arguments pushed from Wouter's side basically was that, no, we cannot do this in a military milieu because the movement of the production side of the company will be too slow in the bureaucratic systems.

Secondly, you will not be able to recruit the very top scientists which were needed into the military situation. And it was agreed upon then by the Surgeon-General, and I also supported the point at that stage then that we do this as a front company.

But Mr Chairman you must also remember now this was just the post-info scandal and the public and the government and the politicians and everyone was very, very aware of the mismanagement of taxpayers' money. And that was why I said look, I don't want to be involved in the info thing, this is taxpayers' money, I want to have it clean etc, etc. And I brought up the thing of doing it within the military per se then.

But once agreed upon that it should be a front company, a clandestine operation, we set about to do that.

CHAIRPERSON: Can Dr Randera ask a clarification question.

DR RANDERA: Dr Goosen just make us understand at the time of setting up the company you decide to ask Dr Basson who is he, where does he come from? You are making enquiries as to his status within the military establishment. But when you talked earlier on about passing on toxins to him, whether it be snake venom or endotoxins, were you not asking those questions already and not made up your mind as to who this person was and what his status was? Because surely you are not going to hand over work that has been scientifically done by your colleagues, because that's what I understood you to be saying?

DR GOOSEN: Yes, yes, no, Mr Chairman I understand your question, I can reply to that, that it's two different matters. The one I have no doubt that he was connected to the military. I had no doubt that he was connected to special operations. I had no doubt that he had a lot of very, very top information on the war situation. He recited for us, many times, the structures of the ANC. Who were the enemies etc, etc, he convinced us of this threat and what the people planned etc, etc. So that was no problem that I knew he was connected and I knew he was from the military. We had formal official projects.

If I import a dog from Israel, a special desert dog that could withstand the desert conditions in Namibia and give him this dog to go and fight a war, that's one thing. Giving him a bit of poison - I know he was fighting in the war and I assumed it to be legitimate for the government then.

But if he comes to you and says "look, I want you to sacrifice your career", I was at that stage '82, what 30, 35, something like that. I was - we can recite the few of my - if you want to establish my credentials but I was young and I had a promising career. I had to sacrifice that to go into this effort on this man's word. Then I wanted to know more, really, did he have the backing of millions to establish this facility ...(intervention)

DR RANDERA: Sorry Dr Goosen you've answered my question.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Chaskalson.

MR CHASKALSON: So it was decided that a front company would be formed. Can you tell us what the brief that you were given for this front company was?

DR GOOSEN: Yes Mr Chairman. The brief for the company developed. It started off as one thing and then it expanded. The first instruction or the first line of thought was to establish an evaluating facility. This is exactly the same facility as we planned to do. In other words use animals, animal models to determine the effectivity, in this case the lethality, or damaging effect of substances using animals as models.

I have then learnt, and this was in the very early days before we officially launched the company, it expanded the brief that there was a chemical company already producing chemical weapons, chemical substances. It remains a weapon. And there was no facility to produce biological weapons. So it expanded then or it later on also included to create an ability for the country to test, in the first place; and secondly, develop biological and even chemical weapons.

Now Mr Chairman defensive and offensive, the whole argument, if I may elaborate one second. Defensive and offensive was not really a topic of discussion. We were in a war situation and a weapon is a weapon. A weapon can be used offensively or defensively. So I have a bit of a problem with all this big discussions around was it a defensive capability or was it an offensive capability. It was a capability. The applications of the weapons was not supposed to be our problem. But in discussions I've had and already outlined to you, there was no doubt in my mind, and there was no doubt in anybody's mind, that it was offensive, intended to be used offensively.

There are certain things which cannot be explained as being defensively, and I don't want to go into details. One can speak to the broader principles and put the issue aside for once and for all.

If you build a factory and planned a factory like Delta-G, which I have seen the plans and know about them, it is a factory producing to the quantities of tons, chemicals in the quantities of tons. Okay you can produce defensive neutralising stuff in tons. It is a possibility.

But then our final brief, or the other brief was, and very, very important one, was to develop a product to curtail the birth rate of the black population in the country ...(intervention)

MR CHASKALSON: Could you tell us a little bit more about this. Who asked you to develop this product?

DR GOOSEN: The person who directly instructed us or asked us to do this was Dr Basson. Now there was a lot of talk about the ethics of this, that and the other and the rest, and he spent some time quoting to us the censorship figures of 1982 or '81 or whenever the census was, I can't remember exactly, that the census office stopped counting the black people when they reached 45 million. And the government decided that it is not feasible to make known to the public that there was 45 million blacks. It was just too many. And this was mainly one of our big threats. I think the figure of about 28 million was made known. Now if those were true facts I wouldn't know. Up till today I don't know. But that was presented to us by Dr Basson.

This very fact - now I agree again with what Dr Schalk van Rensburg said. If you make the product and there are very, very good legitimate reasons for making the product and for my own ethics I was convinced and believed that if an ethical product, which doesn't cause pain, permanent damage etc, could be developed it could also have been in the advantage of the black people because of purely over-population. Taking for granted that these figures were true that were quoted to me we would run out of water, we would run out of natural resources etc, etc. I cannot deny this, gentlemen, this is what we discussed. This was why we started.

CHAIRPERSON: Ms Sooka.

MS SOOKA: You are saying that you overcame your own moral scruples on the basis that this product would be to the advantage of the black population, and in a sense without any form of consent you found that this was legitimate. As a scientist was that a rational explanation, or justifiable reason?

DR GOOSEN: Chairman, I can answer you now, unequivocally no. I made a mistake. If you take me back to that time period, and remember in the time period in 1982 I was sitting in the hospital when the bomb exploded in Church Street. I was there helping people full of blood, black people also coming in. So maybe we were not thinking rationally, but I might have taken the same decision again. But today I know it was wrong. You cannot, you cannot prescribe to people that type of thing. It is not justifiable.

DR RANDERA: Dr Goosen can we just not pass this issue about mistake. When people say it was a mistake and these conversations took place, can you be more precise about that. Because was it a mistake or was it a belief system, a culture that prevailed at the time that said you know, black people were not of equal standing that without their consent we should be producing substances to control and to make a decision, in a sense?

DR GOOSEN: Yes, Chairperson, yes. ...(intervention)

DR RANDERA: What I am trying to say is, let's not, we are using words it's not that easy to say it was just a mistake.

DR GOOSEN: Chairperson yes. I hear what you are saying and that is exactly right. That is what we did. We felt in the environment we were operating in that we had the right to decide what was good for other people.

You ask me, do I think I am a racist? No, of course not. I am not a racist. I have many black friends. I grew up on the farm, I played with the black people, everything. It wasn't a thing which was directed against hating blacks or whatever. But that was the environment, that was the climate that was created around us by the propaganda of the politicians and everyone of the day. And this is one thing which I, as a scientist, feel very strongly about, and it grieves me.

And I have - we can get later to that, but in a period of time I had very tough times handling these things emotionally, without any assistance from anyone. Psychologically very, very tough. I had nervous breakdown on all of these issues and many things. We suffered as scientists a lot I can assure you, and I cannot make this good.

But what grieves me is that the people that created this climate is now denying it. Like if you listen to a person like Minister Pik Botha you would have sworn he was born an ANC member. He never said total onslaught, Communism - that's the enemy. Never. He denies. And this is what grieves me Mr Chairman, that they are ducking their responsibility for what they did. Because I have no doubt in my mind that those are the responsible people that created the climate. And they supplied the money, Mr Chairman to do this.

MS SOOKA: May I follow that up with one question because part of what we are supposed to do is explore motives and perspectives. You talk on the one hand of being in a war psychosis mood, and you talk about the total onslaught, but really the bottom line would be to control the numbers of black people, and it's the end product of that is really to maintain the supremacy of a white minority group in the country at the time. So from your perspective which, I mean at the end of the day what was the real reason for creating this kind of product? Would it be the control of the population rate to maintain the status quo?

DR GOOSEN: Yes Madam. I of course can't conclude but my belief I can express, and that was my belief. I once sat down with Wouter and we had many discussions. He visited me at home many times and we sat down and we had a beer and we ate biscuits etc. He was very fond of a particular type of biscuit. I asked Dr Basson, "Wouter, why are you involved in this? Why are you involved in this. Because you are not getting for yourself a company because I've got the company, I've got the BMW, I've got the three storey house". I had it, that luxury lifestyle. Everyone thinks Goosen, my goodness he is great. That's true. And I asked him why Wouter are you doing this? And he said, I've got one daughter and one day, and he said we don't really have any doubt that the black people will take over the country, but one day when the black people take over the country and my daughter asks me, Daddy what did you do to prevent this, my conscience would be clean. And I must admit that was the psychosis which prevailed. And you can blame me for that, I have played my part in it. That is true, and I am sorry about it. But I was not guilty alone.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes Mr Chaskalson.

MR CHASKALSON: To stay on the issue of fertility research, I presume that one would have had to dispense of, in targeting a certain segment of the population, in this case the black members of the country, you would not be able to develop a specific drug, you would have to find a mechanism to get it to them, is that correct?

DR GOOSEN: Mr Chairman, no. The mechanism to get to it, to the people, was the last thing you would research. You would first research the drug and the method and then depending on what that would predict for you the circumstances if it would be viable to give it in the beer or in the maize or in the vaccinations, it would decide now depending on what type of drug you have of course.

And by the way Mr Chairman this project was known, personally I know, up to the level of the Surgeon-General, because the Surgeon-General visited us, both General Nieuwoudt and General Knobel taking over for it. When General Nieuwoudt was leaving the service, retiring, he visited us on a Saturday morning and when walking out of it, and we have explained all these projects to them, we had project meetings in fact, explained it to them, this anti-fertility project and the progress and the possibilities etc, and when they walked out he said, Nieuwoudt in the presence of General Knobel, this is the most important project for the country. That is the truth.

MR CHASKALSON: Will it be possible to find a drug or a vaccine which would only be effective on pigmented people?

DR GOOSEN: Mr Chairman the newspapers and non-proliferation people can listen clearly. And we have spent some hours and time on this proposition, on a drug effective against pigmented people only, yes, Dr Basson and myself. In 1983, '84, I am not too sure when, Dr Basson presented me with a document, with a scenario and a document. This document was delivered, he said, to the military attache in London, and this document contained a proposition from someone in Europe, and this guy says he's got a product, a bacteria, which has got the possibility of only affecting, making sick and killing pigmented people. That was in 1984.

Dr Basson asked me to research this fully, investigate it literature-wise. Not doing physical work on it, but to study the literature and the possibilities scientifically. Is that a possibility or not? And I did an extensive literature research and studied the sciences around it and we felt, concluded, and I shared it with him, that it is a definite possibility. Because this guy said, if we South Africans, the South African government is interested in that we should place an advertisement in a London newspaper and then he will make certain arrangements to contact us with this product.

Now Chairperson the ethics again of this. And Dr Basson and myself discussed that, and we have also discussed this with General Neil Knobel. What should we do with this?

Now Mr Chairman maybe I can give you an example. The space war, the star war weapons programme of America had the purpose of developing a weapon that can destroy anything, any place on earth. The most sophisticated weapon. That was the purpose of the star wars programme. The mission, the mission of the programme was to maintain world peace. Do you hear what I am saying? And we have discussed this aspect, the three of us. What do you do with this and it was decided it would be good if the government had this weapon. Not intended, not of thinking of using it at any stage, but using it as a negotiating back-up to know what your strength is, what you can do in a crisis situation. Now I have been asked many times, how can you do these things and what can you do, and it is easy to convict from England or from America; it is easy to convict India and those guys if they want to develop an atomic bomb, but they have got to think themselves.

So again, if a thing like this can be used to maintain peace, but what is peace? Peace is the strongest disempowerer and this was being the strongest. And again where was the wrong? The wrong was for the white people, basically, to try and stay in power. So not per se, not necessarily for having such a weapon as this.

Chairman what happened was that it was decided I would go to London and try and make contact and try and follow this lead up. In the same week before I would have left some people from Armscor were lead into a trap in Paris and arrested by a similar type of bait. And the day before I left I sat with my friend Dr Knobel in his office and decided what is the risk for me now, it might just be a trap or might not. And we didn't know. And I went over and I decided to leave it. It might have been a trap. So we never followed the lead.

To come back to your question, is it possible? Scientifically yes, I believe it is possible. I will discuss later on the real scientific threads of biological weapons and how can you control it. It is frightening, Chairman, frightening. This programme of Coast hasn't touched it. We have tried to but we were stopped before we could close to it. I will elaborate on it later.

MR CHASKALSON: Can you tell us what your responsibilities as a managing director of RRL were?

DR GOOSEN: Chairperson, yes, I was managing director. Supposed to be the boss on the ground level. That's what managing director meant. Establishing the programme. Erecting the physical facilities. Recruiting, head-hunting the suitable scientists and establish this facility for the government. Very, very strictly we were informed that this will be a military operation. This will be a government facilitation. I have registered the company in my name with three other shareholders.

MR CHASKALSON: Who were the shareholders?

DR GOOSEN: The shareholders were myself, David Palmer, Andre Immelman and later on Schalk van Rensburg.

MR CHASKALSON: Did you receive shares?

DR GOOSEN: We received each one 25% of the shares. When receiving the shares, the certificate, at the same time we have signed a transfer document again, and that was handed back to Dr Basson.

MR CHASKALSON: Whose name was the transfer document made out to?

DR GOOSEN: Blank. The structure of the company was to be, for front purposes, be run as this company I would have established to do contract research.

MR CHASKALSON: Was your international, or your national respectability and name important to that front?

DR GOOSEN: Absolutely.

MR CHASKALSON: Do you think it would have been possible for this front company to operate effectively with a managing director who was not from the scientific community?

DR GOOSEN: Chairperson, not at all.

MR CHASKALSON: We will return to this point at a later stage. Did you interact with the scientists during your time as the managing director?

DR GOOSEN: Yes Sir.

MR CHASKALSON: Were you aware of the research that was being done at the facility?

DR GOOSEN: Yes Sir. The research at the facility and the need to know principle and what must be done was a very interesting situation. We had very broad guidelines on what to do and we had a reasonably free hand to do what needs to be done. The guidelines I have explained about, which was the establishment of the evaluation facility and establishing a biological ability. We ended up - not ended up but it developed soon that practically we have developed very, very comprehensive physical facilities, laboratories capable of handling research up to the P4 level. Facilities capable of employing GLP, good laboratory practice; GMP, good manufacturing practice; which compares the iso-standards, which Dr Swanepoel claimed to have been - went to look for in the nineties, we've developed it in the early eighties because that was necessary for good standards. We have agreed that if you are scientifically involved in this type of work it needs to be done at the highest level of quality you can do. Because it's not stuff to be playing around with.

Now we developed basically a few lines of, fields of research and I want to classify them as follows:

Firstly, and this is excluding our testing side of it, but the research and development - firstly, we employed Dr Andre Immelman who was professor of toxicology, and it was a good move to employ Dr Immelman because the first thing I have asked myself when trying to identify someone to employ was the question of integrity. Does he have integrity? Because being involved in such serious matters I needed people with integrity.

Secondly, scientific standing. To do and to say you are doing toxicology work for the world you need the top toxicologist in the country - which he was.

Thirdly, we had a request and a - not a demand, a "behoogte" a need, a need, given to us from Dr Basson for developing certain products. Now I can put these products under the name of dirty tricks. These are the individual things which we have seen listed here which are not weapons of mass destruction, this is like a pistol. Shooting one by one. Being a toxicologist Dr Immelman was suitably qualified and had experience in the toxins, toxic chemicals, toxic plants in a wide range. And he was a top person for that position, and that was why he was employed as a director.

The second scientific side we got going was the one of reproductive physiology. And the reproductive physiology we earmarked Dr Schalk van Rensburg for, and there was a slight difference between myself and Wouter Basson. I know he thought Dr van Rensburg was the wrong guy to be involved with. He didn't tell me then because he approved his appointment. Dr Schalk van Rensburg had reproductive experience and he was also involved in the micro-toxins, which is the toxic type of thing which was necessary.

We earmarked Professor Riana Borman, who was working on impotency and infertility, specialising in research areas in those fields. And they would start at that then the most sensitive and important project for us.

And the third line which we said alright, we must give this attention was the one of the development of biological weapons. Now the new generation of biological weapons is tied in with the genetic engineering field, and this is - and Dr Odendal has touched on some of these products when he said they developed an anthrax which was resistant to penicillin. Now this genetic engineering, molecular biotechnology, recombinant products, these names are all very highly sophisticated science. This is where you have to transfer gene material, which is the basis of life, the basis of everything, from one organism to another organism. And that is very, very difficult work to do, and Dr Odendal started out a division in that side. Now you don't establish that within one month. There was no trained, no trained people in the country in genetic engineering and biotechnology. Only one or two people in one or two of the universities were involved with this type of work.

I would like to come back later when you would like to hear something about non-proliferation, on how you then really - what is the possibilities of this and how can one control it, if you would be interested.

But that was what we set out to do.

MR CHASKALSON: Just almost at a tea break I would just like to quickly take you up to the period where you were removed from managing director. Yesterday we heard from Dr Swanepoel who told us that when he took over the company was in, and I may not be using the correct word, but his description was that the company was in chaos, it was in shambles, there was a horrible state of disorder. What is your feeling about the state of the company at the time you were removed as managing director?

DR GOOSEN: Mr Chairman I really think it would be a waste of time for us to get into the mud-slinging between myself and some of my previous, or other friends and people. The state of the company was the following:

It was in 1985, the end of 1985, the beginning of 1986, we started, I started the 1st of November 1983 with nothing. Myself. By 1986, the end of 1985, the beginning of 1986 we have built and completed a physical facility, the laboratory side of it. We have employed the core people. We have traced them, employed them, and I can vouch when we started out good, honest, integrable, quality people. We have employed them. We had many discussions and studies in hand.

We had many projects to start in place and we were starting with the projects. We did some work already. We have spent in the region of just over six million rand.

And by the way I received R50 000 per annum when I got there, and I can remember it even yesterday and tomorrow and the day after, and when I left it was R87 000 and the total package was about R150 000. Excuse me Mr Chairman, but that was my salary.

We had two audits, two full internal audits, two external audits from Pierre Theron, Coopers & Lybrandt, and they are still involved Coopers & Lybrandt in the project and they still have some of the figures and I think they should be looked at, this financial side of things. I will explain that later to you. But by 1986 we had two audits behind us and we can compare the queries on the audits between the period I was managing director. You are free to do that. But that was the state of the company.

I just want to conclude that I know that Roodeplaat has been visited by overseas experts on a non-proliferation basis and they have evaluated the facility which was established under my management with my colleagues, but large inputs from my side, they have evaluated it to be amongst the best in the world. Even better than those produced by the Russians.

MR CHASKALSON: Dr van Rensburg described the appointment of Dr Swanepoel as the end of the future. Would you concur with that statement?

DR GOOSEN: Mr Chairman I wouldn't like to blow my own bugle, I would just like to say it was nice for me to listen to Dr Schalk van Rensburg. It wasn't so nice to listen to Dr Swanepoel. I am a human being. But I believe the stage was set for a good future, and I believe removing a person like me from the company was detrimental to it.

I had discussions with Dr Basson. I had discussions with Dr Neil Knobel and I had discussions with General Nieuwoudt on this change of management and how it should be handled. Because I believe it was, for one thing, a very serious security breach by bringing in a completely unknown managing director, unrelated to the field at all ...(intervention)

MR CHASKALSON: By that do you mean that it would be difficult for the company to pose as a private company with somebody without the requisite knowledge at the helm?

DR GOOSEN: Ja. Without the knowledge, without the contacts I had. I brought in the projects. I brought in several overseas projects to keep up the front. They followed me. In fact scientists got off the plane in Johannesburg to do work in Pretoria, where I was, and when they heard I wasn't there you know what, they packed up and left. Not working at Pretoria anymore. They wanted not to be involved if I wasn't involved in the research.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Chaskalson I suggest this should be the end of this segment. The future will be at 11 o'clock when we begin.

HEARING ADJOURNS

ON RESUMPTION

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Chaskalson?

MR CHASKALSON: Thank you.

Dr Goosen, yesterday we heard of a meeting or possibly an informal discussion in which Dr van Rensburg said that you had told people something to the effect that their lives may have been in danger if they tried to leave the company, is this correct?

DR GOOSEN: Mr Chairman no, the way you phrased it is not correct.

MR CHASKALSON: Could you tell us what happened?

DR GOOSEN: It's not when you try to leave the country ...[intervention]

MR CHASKALSON: Company.

DR GOOSEN: Ja, it's not when you try to leave the company, you were free to leave the company. It was when you tried to jeopardise or undermine or give out the secrets we would have had the full, the secret thing we signed, that Act on us and I believe it is high treason and high treason is a capital charge. So that is the situation.

If you jeopardise the security or the projects etc., you could have been charged and the death penalty could have been imposed on you.

MR CHASKALSON: The understanding that I had from Dr van Rensburg is that he was talking about a threat from some or other people, is this not correct?

DR GOOSEN: Chairman, I did convey at a official meeting, I think it was a board meeting, that everyone must understand the seriousness of the business of the company and not make light of it because by implication it is true, that if you jeopardise the security of the company you could find yourself in you know, charged with high treason and high treason is a capital offence.

MR CHASKALSON: Can you tell us your perceptions of how the other scientists related to the change in management, that is when Dr Swanepoel replaced you?

DR GOOSEN: Mr Chairman, my perception was and based upon what by many scientists, that they were not sure why I was replaced, they were very unsure about the command structure and there was a bit of fear in the background, if this could happen so easily, me being replaced just like that, everyone felt a little bit threatened. You can also - it is on record and it is available or it can be available, written testimonies to this effect.

MR CHASKALSON: We were told yesterday that you were moved to the Roodeplaat Breeding Enterprises at this time, is that correct?

DR GOOSEN: Yes.

MR CHASKALSON: And you conducted work which was not strictly related to the programme during this period.

DR GOOSEN: Yes.

MR CHASKALSON: Were you at any stage during this - sorry, let me start again. Dr Swanepoel said that would, you still remained under his control during this period, is that correct?

DR GOOSEN: Yes, Mr Chairman.

MR CHASKALSON: At any stage were you approached by Dr Swanepoel as to what was going on at RRL since you had left?

DR GOOSEN: Mr Chairman, I'm not too sure ...[intervention]

MR CHASKALSON: Did Dr Swanepoel request your assistance with the running of RRL?

DR GOOSEN: Chairperson yes, it's an interesting situation, I'll try and be brief. I was removed from a management position. We had at that stage when I left, we had RBE, Roodeplaat Breeding Enterprises.

We had a plan to add another Directorate to RRL and this Directorate would be just a Directorate of RRL and it would have been run by Mr John Greyvenstein who was coming from ESCOM and he was an expert in the security dog business. And we already approached him and recruited him to be Director of this Directorate.

Then I was removed as Managing Director and they sat with me for four months. Dr Swanepoel in his own words told me later on that the whole thing around me was like a storm in a tea cup, there's really nothing to it but anyway he trained me well in four months because in those four months I really had no area to operate in. I was not allowed to do anything at RRL. I was not allowed to do anything, Greyvenstein arrived, he reported to Swanepoel and then they decided no, the Directorate must become a new company, a subsidiary company for RRL and I should be the Managing Director of the subsidiary company, so then it would create a legitimate thing for me, not to be so embarrassed by my situation sitting in the cupboard because everyone in the company knew I was sitting in the cupboard.

So I became Managing Director of RBE. Being Managing Director of RBE in the presence and with the Director John Greyvenstein who was of course also an expert in the field, you had two cocks on one heap. And of course, I mean this is management wise I think, a stupid move, to do that, have two cooks running the same thing and it led to conflict.

The conflict was resolved by dismissing my friend John Greyvenstein, you can speak to him, and I was - stayed on, remained as Managing Director of RTO. That was in '86. By '86, RTO was thought to be a very good idea, there was very legitimate talks at the time of privatising a lot of State functions and the one was a very good one of consolidating and privatising the security dog business, the police, the army and Eskom, the railway and also the prisons. We worked out new and improved techniques of breeding, training and raising dogs and we've charged the clients for that R10 000 for a trained dog.

Now the estimates by the government, the government Auditor-General estimated the cost of a dog to the army at that stage to be R27 000 and we succeeded in producing successfully these dogs and producing them to the army at R10 000, saving R17 000.

I was visited at one stage by the management of RRL including Dr Andr? Immelman, Spalmer, everyone and they've looked at the operations of RBO and Andr? Immelman himself wrote me a letter which is also available, congratulating me on the excellent operation we were running. That was in '87 and in '87 I was definitely approached and appointed again as the "Bestuurder, Hoof van die Proefdier Eenheid, die Proefdier Sentrum". (Head of the Experimental Animal Centre).

Now the lab animal unit was physically the largest and the heart of the RRL facility. That was where all the research was being done. That came about because when I was with RBO international scientists came, also contacts of mine still from previous years, came to do projects on baboons at RRL.

And there wasn't a backup amongst the people to supply and assist in these projects and I had to go back and do the project. And in doing the project I was shocked that the standard of the management of the research facility, it was not up to international standards, it was below standard. In fact, the rats and the mice were running freely around in the corridors, the baboons were dying without water over weekends and I was shocked. So Dr Swanepoel asked me to come back and please help him because he couldn't rectify the situation under his management, and there was written proof of that, that I was asked to come back.

So then we asked Tjaard Viljoen to also be involved in the management and that was in the time period referred to by Dr Swanepoel, that I couldn't be got hold of because: "he was not here and there and everywhere". He realised that it was a bit much asking one person to be Managing Director of one company and also having a vital role to play in the other company.

We got the assistance of Mr Tjaard Viljoen to assist with the management in the RBE company.

MR CHASKALSON: Sorry, what recommendations did you make to Dr Swanepoel as to how RRL could be brought back to its standards?

DR GOOSEN: Mr Chairman, it was clear to me that the main function of a Managing Director is to give decisions. That is what it means, if matters come up. And he was Managing Director and he was the authority in the company and notwithstanding what he was saying he knew very well what was going on.

He was informed on all the projects and what they meant and what they could do but he didn't have the basic knowledge to base decisions between scientists and give right decisions on these matters. This created a lot of conflict in the company, as was discussed already.

And one of these aspect was of getting the control and standards back in the laboratory animal facility. The control there was gone because every scientist tried then and has been in control of his own little experiments and that of course can't work, that's unscientifically.

Nevertheless what happened is that we still needed to say we had a contract research facility and we had to conform to the legal requirements of having been inspected and tested by outside independent inspectors. And one such inspection was done by the Medical Research Council on the quality of our laboratory animals. Their finding was that there was sub-clinical and clinical disease prevalent amongst our rat colonies and our laboratory animals.

Now of course, it doesn't need much explanation to see that when your animals you're using in doing all these things are sub-clinically sick, they will not react normally and you will get false results. This is known phenomena in the laboratory animal world, that you do these tests regularly prescribed and when you get a breakdown in this disease situation there are certain steps you need to follow to rectify it. You need to close down the facility, you need to clean out all the animals, you need to import new stocks, genetic microbiologically defined stock from wherever in the world they are available.

So I confronted him with this scenario and said: "We have to close down, we have to this, this is what is expected of us now to do", and he said: "No man, let's cover it up and carry on". He wasn't interested in closing it down and I said: "Look but it can't work this way and you cannot manage the ...[indistinct] the way you are approaching it".

Basically his approach was, he is a Manager and his business was to manage scientists but he knew nothing about scientists and science which was just the proof it didn't work. It is another point which I feel, you cannot have any control on these projects if the person in charge doesn't know what to control.

I felt I cannot work with this. Morally then it was for me the biggest problem to be faced with what we were doing and then to be knowing we were doing it with tools which is not kept intact, so that nullified our science, which for me then was morally, at that stage, in that milieux, completely unacceptable.

So I requested him that we solve this problem, he said: "No", I said: "I've requested to see the superiors" ...[intervention]

MR CHASKALSON: Who were the superiors?

DR GOOSEN: The superiors we considered to be Dr Wouter Basson and the Surgeon-General.

MR CHASKALSON: Did you have any meetings with either of those two people?

DR GOOSEN: No, it was, he told me quite directly that his "opdrag" is to solve all problems under him and not refer it.

MR CHASKALSON: Did you try on your own to bring this to ...[intervention]

DR GOOSEN: Yes.

MR CHASKALSON: Carry on please.

DR GOOSEN: I've tried on several occasions. Some of these concerns, when I was removed from the office of Managing Director initially in 1986, General Knobel and I had a long discussion one Saturday in my offices at Roodeplaat about the management change. You've asked me previously Mr Chairman, this management change.

And we agreed upon the management, that the management should be done by someone with some insight in the science and I've said if they are not happy with me doing it, get another person but suitably qualified, better than me, to do the job, that is what is needed but then they brought Dr Swanepoel. And it is not his fault, it is not his mistake. Whoever did that I cannot vouch for, it just happened.

So I told Dr Swanepoel: "Look I don't think that you are at fault or whatever but it is unfair of the people in charge to expect of you to manage this facility in an effective way".

MR CHASKALSON: I'd just like to clarify something with you. You're talking about this conversation taking place somewhere around 1986.

DR GOOSEN: Yes.

MR CHASKALSON: At that stage, General Knobel was not the Surgeon-General, can you clarify his involvement in the project?

DR GOOSEN: Okay. General Knobel and I were acquainted before we started with the project. General Knobel was the Head of Department, he was Professor and Head of Department in the University of Pretoria. In fact we were neighbours, his facility and mine were just on the opposite sides of the parking lot. And I regarded him very highly as a person and as a scientific person etc. Now General Knobel then moved from that position to being in the Army and he became the 2I/C ..[indistinct], and it was known that he was to succeed General Niewoudt. From his position as scientifically based he was involved in the project from the early days, I can't remember exactly when but from early meetings he was present in the project.

In 1986 when it became known to me that the management was unhappy with my management and the sponsors as we called them, I've seen General Knobel and I've also seen General Niewoudt at that time and we discussed this change in management and what it implied. They couldn't satisfy me on any point as to exactly why precisely they want to remove me. They had some stories like: "We want to make you available to have more time to run the anti-fertility project" because I was specialising also in anti-fertility, that was my keen interest. And I said: "But I cannot be involved in running the anti-fertility project because Dr Schalk van Rensburg and Professor Borman is doing that and what will I be doing there"? And then they said: "You must do this and that" and on the other hand - and I'm going back a little bit now but this sets the scenes for a couple of years later, in '86 General Nieuwoudt said to me: "Listen Daan" and we had a discussion and I said to him: "General, if you and I don't agree on working together it does not matter if I am right or if you are right, if you don't agree with the way I do things I'll leave because you are the boss. If I cannot convince you of this then I leave", so he says: "No, man we like you, you're a good guy, we want you here but let's change this management thing, let's do it then finally the following way, we do it like we run a hospital, the academic hospitals. We'll have two persons in charge, the one is the Superintendent of the hospital", which in 99.999% of cases is a medical doctor and the other one is the Dean of the Medical Faculty which is 100% of the cases a medical doctor. And he said: "In this case we'll bring in Dr Swanepoel to assist you sort-of as the Superintendent side and he will run, as if indicated, the administrative side of it and you will be the Dean sort of, running overall the scientific side of it reporting then to us. You will be reporting to Wouter more and Dr Swanepoel reporting to the auditing side of it more". So I said: "Well, that sounds fine to me", so he said: "Okay, tomorrow afternoon 4 o'clock we'll have a meeting at my home in Muckleneuk".

We had the meeting and at the meeting he said: "As of today Daan Goosen, you are removed from your position, you have no contact or influence with anyone in RRL and you report directly to Dr Swanepoel". That is what happened in '86.

After I had discussions with them, I'm saying: "Please if you do this transfer management I'm happy, I will go if you're not happy with me but let's do it carefully" but that is what they did. '87, so that then developed RBO, the whole thing which we have explained. '87 I've gone back and I was then faced with this situation of now the standard of this research facility was seriously a concern for me and I wasn't supported by Dr Swanepoel in this and that was when I said: "Look, now I cannot go on, I have a problem, I have to sort this thing out". That was in 1988.

'87 I went back, the second half of '87 I went to Roodeplaat Teelondernemings. In the middle of 1988 these tests were done, the survey was done by the MRC and that was when I had an obstacle which I couldn't get over on my own.

MR CHASKALSON: And how did you try and sort out the problem?

DR GOOSEN: Mr Chairman, I couldn't really sort out the problem, it was sorted out for me. In the end of it all, and all the facts are documented and available, in the end of it all I was isolated, victimised - I don't want to go into details, I think in the end I'm very relieved that I was discharged. Apart from financially I was very definitely ruined but in the end of it I was called in to the Military Intelligence Office and there was a person - now those times were very stressful for me, I can't remember his name exactly, there was a person a Colonel, I think it was a Colonel du Preen, and he told me: "Look, you have committed a breach of security, we have to throw you in jail or charge you with high treason", something like that ...[intervention]

MR CHASKALSON: Sorry, could you tell us what your breach of security was?

DR GOOSEN: The breach of security was I supposedly said something at the Congress in the Kruger National Park in October 1988, which was giving away some of the company's secrets. I don't know what it was and no-one every could produce to me exactly what I've said but apparently National Intelligence, and this was told to me by General Knobel, picked this up, not Military Intelligence but National Intelligence picked this up and said: "Look, we've got a problem with one of your guys, he's letting out secrets or something".

I've seen in a file on the table there in front of the Colonel sitting in front of me, a document which I read upside down: "Investigation into Security Breach by Dr Swanepoel and Charl Jackson. Dr Riana Borman confirmed that Dr Goosen had done the Security Breach" but what no-one till today can exactly tell me.

What I remember saying was that: "If you are not doing your research up to international standards you cannot have people believe that you are doing contract research for international companies, therefore it is important for us to do our research on international standards".

Anyway, I was then faced with this, that the - I had to go to jail, he directly told me: "We have to throw you in jail but we won't do it, you may go quietly". I spoke to some of my colleagues for some assistance and some of them said: "Look man you're facing a stacked deck, just get out, you will get harmed".

Okay, I certainly still insisted that I want to see someone, I want to see the Surgeon-General - at that time it was in 1988, end of '88, it was General Niel Knobel, because I had a lot of confidence in his integrity etc.

There was a final meeting arranged with the General in his office and at the meeting I was given an option of signing a document which kept me from being involved in any activity which was similar to the company's Roodeplaat Breeding Organisation and RRL Research Laboratories and any subsidiaries etc., etc., and divulge any information from the companies to anyone etc., that document is also available, for 10 years, sign. What did I get?, R60 000.

So I said at the time to - and present at the meeting was General Knobel, Dr Swanepoel, Dr Basson, Mr Spalmer and I think a security officer, but remember this is now a week or so after the guy from Military Intelligence tells me: "Look, you go or we put you in jail". So I signed but I said: "Look, please, I cannot survive economically with six kids, not having an opportunity to practise what I'm good at, I cannot survive economically, can you not pay me out my pension"? Well, Dr Basson said - he was asked a question and he said: "Ja, well, no, I don't think it will go through", they will have to get Cabinet approval etc., it will take too long but there is not really a possibility.

So we left and - okay, after the meeting, when the meeting dismissed, General Knobel asked to see me alone which I appreciated and in the meeting we had together alone I said thank you for the opportunity and he said he was very sorry, what happened to me? In fact he was visibly upset, of course I was also visibly upset I think but he was sorry what happened to me but it was out of his hands, he could do nothing about it, he's not even sure what is happening around him, his office may even be bugged, this is bad times.

So, I said: "Okay, don't worry I'm going. I won't cause any trouble, I'm going, I don't want to be, I know Paraoxin and all those things". But I said: "I want to tell you something, there's problems and serious problems in the companies, please you must have a look at it, it is not working, it is not productive, whatever is produced is not up to standard". This is verified, was verified by Dr Odendal's testimony the other day, when he said he put out products without fully testing them in animals. I mean, how can you do that and they were forced to do that.

So I said to General Knobel: "Please, promise me one thing, have a look at it". And I made one mistake, I said: "These scientists left there who knows what has to be done technically, is Dr van Rensburg". And he promised me yes, he would take the matter seriously and he will speak to the guys and he will look into it and thank you and then I left.

MR CHASKALSON: When did you next hear of RRL?

MR SWANEPOEL: Chairperson yes, maybe there's - sorry , I then went and bought a farm in the Northern Transvaal without money, borrowed the money. It was a beautiful place. I have enjoyed it tremendously. Me and my family stayed there, farmed and practised there for nine years and on the farm in the Eastern Transvaal rather, the other side of Tzaneen, I was visited by several people whilst establishing there, the de-briefing side of it I believe.

Mrs Rita Engelbrecht I think, she was an officer concerned with the, not an officer, a person, I don't think she was a military officer but she was involved with the security surrounding the projects, she visited me and discussed my situation, am I, I think assessing if I was a security risk or not. We had long discussions - I don't want to waste your time, I expressed my concern again about the security situation of the company, of what was going on there and not my own, fully she took cognisance of the fact.

I was later visited by General - and I'm also not sure again of his name, I remember I was fixing a pump when they called me in front of my neighbours and everyone and said: "General so and so is looking for you" and all the neighbours were looking at me: what are you doing with generals. What can I say, what am I doing with the Generals.

I spoke to him and it was also a sort of a de-briefing exercise and assuring me that they are looking into matters etc., and again I fully voiced my concerns to him. To both Rita and the General I expressed again my grave financial situation and that I am desperate in having to look after my family and I have no money, can't they help me and he said: "Look, I will speak to the "old boys network" and see if we can't help you" ...[intervention]

MR CHASKALSON: Sorry, which General was this?

DR GOOSEN: I can't exactly remember, under correction, Beukes.

MR CHASKALSON: Did anyone else approach you about what had happened to RRL possibly from within formal SADF structures?

DR GOOSEN: Yes, Chairperson, I had frequent contact and visits from the people, personnel, my friends, all of them. There is not really anyone of them who isn't my friend, during those periods, concerning if I'm alright.

There were rumours apparently and at one stage someone told me that I had cancer. And we did work on carcinogens, I knew a lot about carcinogens. There's certain substances in smoke which causes cancer and you can buy them all off the shelf and apply them to someone and he can get cancer. It's not proliferation, it's common knowledge.

So they enquired about my wellbeing etc., particularly during the time when the company started to move in privatisation and closing down etc., I had a lot more contact from concerned scientists and people: "What is happening, where are we going, what is wrong".

Roodeplaat Breeding Enterprises was closed down, summarily it was told to them that the company was making a loss. I believe they were running fully within their budget when they were closing down.

Mr Chairman, may I be allowed for one minute to explain my ruining Roodeplaat Breeding Enterprises?

MR CHASKALSON: Carry on.

DR GOOSEN: Roodeplaat Breeding Enterprises had the contracts with the Government, the Army, Escom and the Prisons Department. In 1988, around there, the Army said: "Okay, if you are producing so effectively dogs for us, can you not also train our dog handlers"? So Roodeplaat Breeding Enterprises also built a college to house trainees and train the dogs with their handlers. Now that meant that the present facility of the Army at Bourkes Luck needed to be closed down because it was redundant, because Roodeplaat Breeding Enterprises would take over the function, privatised.

It so happened that it was in '88 and 1989 elections were around the corner. I left in 1989 in January/February so in 1988 the elections were around the corner. Some of the personnel at Bourkes Luck wouldn't have wanted to move back to Pretoria so they went to their Member of Parliament, a National MP and they tell him look: "If you close down Bourkes Luck, we have won this constituency by 40 or 30 votes, whatever, the previous round of elections, so if you close Bourkes Luck we might lose this seat in Parliament".

And then the National Party Government decided they cannot close Bourkes Luck, they must keep it open to win a seat in the election. By doing so eventually the contract for training the Army's personnel was cancelled. This was told to me in the presence of Dr Swanepoel and Dr Basson by General Knobel in his office one morning.

So of course - but I, you've heard that I was the guilty party in losing the contracts. Anyway, in the closing of RBE there was again a lot of contact by the RBE people to me for guidance for their future, what should they do etc. In fact I was approached by one group of people with people in financing and they wanted to buy the facility and operate it privately, really privately and they wanted me to come back to the facility and run it for them.

At that stage I was phoned by people from RRL, the security persons and they threatened me and said: "Look, you will get hurt if you continue getting involved with that". I told them: "Get lost". I was warned in that time and in later years twice by friends of mine: "Please, look out, there is a contract out for you", no names. It's not really important but that's what happened, I mean they phoned me and said: "They want to kill you".

I was also phoned by friends who said: "Look, you mustn't underestimate the hatred Swanepoel has for you". Please it's not really relevant but that was the milieux I operated in. Then we get to the privatisation in '91/'92 of RRL and again as you've heard before, there was a lot of unhappiness going around, who gets the shares and who doesn't get the shares and what should become of the place. And again I was phoned by scientists and people and informed of what's happening and not happening but I know nothing because I was sitting out in the bushes minding my own business.

And then I was phoned one day from overseas and said look, - it was a reputable overseas pharmaceutical company who knew me and they wanted to buy it as a facility for themselves but they would be interested if I would managing it again, it I was interested in that option. I said: "Look, I don't know about this, I have no involvement anymore but, and I'm not really at free will to do it being bound by these documents I've signed".

And there were also then people unhappy about the privatisation, scientists and personnel from RBE and they phoned me and some of them threatened to see the Minister, see the press, see this and see that and I thought that would be very dangerous in those years when the negotiations were going, to make this thing known in a wrong way. I felt it my duty to inform authorities responsible, government authorities, the National Party was still in government and the Minister, I spoke to the Minister of Defence for four hours on the project ...[intervention]

CHAIRPERSON: Who was this Minister?

DR GOOSEN: The Minister was at that stage Roelf Meyer. I spoke to him for four hours and he confirmed a few things to me Chairman. He knew Dr Wouter Basson and surely it was Dr Wouter and he knew about the project and he knew about the sensitivities and he made one comment to me, he said but it is difficult for them to control Dr Basson, I said: "Ja, I can imagine, it was also difficult for Dr Basson to control me apparently". That was what Dr Swanepoel told me.

But anyway, we resolved that who should we ask, the Minister of Defence and I, who should we ask to look into this matter and we agreed that we can approach General Knobel being a man of integrity, being involved in it anyway, being a person I trusted fully, to voice our concerns and approaches.

In fact, what I told the Minister at that stage is, if this thing is played right, the Government can sell this facility to private enterprise and get back 10 - 12 million into the gate of taxpayers money, at least get 10 - 12 million back. That is a possibility and I can facilitate in this.

CHAIRPERSON: Dr Goosen, I just want to make sure that I got you correctly. Did you say that you spoke to Roelf Meyer in 1992? Was it 1992 or ...?

DR GOOSEN: Chairperson, that was round about the times of Boipatong. I believe it was early in 1992. That was the time period Mr Meyer was Minister of Defence, it wasn't very long.

He phoned or contact, I don't know, phoned or contact but he was in contact with General Knobel and General Knobel contacted me telephonically and we had a nice discussion on the phone but of course you cannot speak on the phone of serious matters but I outlined to him the possibility that I might assist him in resolving this problem, in getting money back for the government and advertising this company, get it off their list of concerns, being very sensitive in the negotiations at that stage.

General Knobel, - but again I voiced also the concerns that there were very unhappy people at that stage running around and who may cause a security breach. I also informed them about that. He said he would go into the matter and come back to me and he never came back to me. So it went by, no problem. What happened is as you know of course.

CHAIRPERSON: Dr Randera?

DR RANDERA: Dr Goosen, just clarify again for us, you leave the company, you buy a farm, yes, there is some contact inbetween so you've got nothing to do with the company as I understand it, from 1989 onwards. But in 1992 you still go back, first of all get an appointment with the Minister, so did you know the Minister yourself to be able to get that sort of contact with him?

DR GOOSEN: Yes, Mr Chairman.

DR RANDERA: And how do you come back into the picture?

DR GOOSEN: As I explained Mr Chairman, I ...[intervention]

DR RANDERA: It's in your interest again. I know you were still talking to members of the scientific community but you are now talking about wanting to buy this ...[intervention]

DR GOOSEN: Ja, two reasons. I was concerned about the security situation of the company and of my friends still present in the company. And you must also know that in - when we started these companies in the early '80's, Chemical Biological Warfare wasn't outlawed okay. It was only outlawed in the early 1990's, '92 or '93 these things were being outlawed.

Which - and I still feel up till today, a responsibility for the scientists I got involved into the company. They were people, good people and I felt a responsibility toward them. And I felt that if this thing is busting open or whatever, it could seriously affect their careers. So, that was the one thing. I was concerned then to the knowledge that came to me where I was sitting in the bush from these people. I was concerned about the security of the company.

Secondly, I was phoned from overseas, out of the blue, and say: "Look, we are interested. We understand Roodeplaat Enterprises might be for sale in 1992. We are interested in buying it. We will be interested in buying it if you are Managing Director or not Managing Director but managing in it again. And then I have these two reasons to say: "But gee, it might be an opportunity".

Look, in 1992 it was in the height of El Nino, we had no rain, I had no crops, I had no money, nothing. So then I said: but you're out of it, how do you get back? How do you in a positive way? I don't want to do anyone any harm or whatever but if this thing is for sale, why can't I be involved in it. And I knew Roelf Meyer, so I talked to him.

And then we said, okay, Niel Knobel is the man in charge, speak to him and I spoke to them and then nothing happened so I was finished, I wasn't involved any further then. ...(tape ends)

DR GOOSEN: What happened really is also known but that I found out later, the next contact which I had.

MR CHASKALSON: Would you tell us about that?

DR GOOSEN: The next contact which I had then with the company was in 1994, when again I was phoned one day by an advocate, no I've seen in the newspaper the day first, I opened this newspaper in 1994, December, round about there and in this newspaper there was an admittance by the government that they were involved in clandestine companies running, doing Biological Chemical Warfare, defensive.

So I said to my wife: "Interesting, this is the biggest secret of the government but here it's coming out". The next day the phone rang and an advocate something spoke to me and said: "Are you Dr Goosen"? and I said: "Yes". He said: "Are you the founder member of that company"? I said: "What", I said: "Ja". "Were you the Managing Director and the founder of the company", I said: "Yes". He said: "I want to speak to you", I said: "Wait, who are you"? He said: "No, I can't tell you". I said: "Wait" and what did I do, I phoned General Knobel and I said: "General, this is what happened, what's up"? So he said: "Daan, great stuff, you can relax now. This thing is out in the open now. We have told, President Mandela had a brief input so you guys can now relax, everything is in the open, we have told him everything". I said: "Thank God, I'm happy for that, at last".

And I said: "This guy, what now about this guy, I don't know what is his angle is"? So he(?) said: "Okay, I'll speak to him and find out what is going on and get back to the General"

CHAIRPERSON: Can I just come in here? Mr Chaskalson, do you have an idea how much longer you want to be with this witness, taking into account cross-examination, taking into account two other witness whom we want to hear today?

MR CHASKALSON: I do not expect to be much longer.

CHAIRPERSON: That doesn't tell me anything Mr Chaskalson.

MR CHASKALSON: 20 minutes.

CHAIRPERSON: Okay. Can I ask you Dr Goosen, do you know who this advocate was?

DR GOOSEN: This advocate was from the Office of le Roux, ...[indistinct] Cilliers and they were representing an employee of the company who was building a case against the company for doing him in on some money. They presented us then with a lot of documentation, which is available, which can be verified and which is authentic, of the dissolving of the company. In fact it boiled down to the following, I'll be very brief and keep it very simple because that's what happened.

The Defence Force, they established these facilities with tax payers money, 100%. In the region, the initial costs were six and a half million rands for the building, equipped and up and running for nearly 30 million, run from '83 to '92 at more or less the cost of seven million to ten million a year, all government's money. The income from projects in this company never exceeded 10% of the running cost. It was never really an effort to really get private contracts which was not surprising.

In the end the company was sold to a few employees for the amount of R100 000. Initially Dr Swanepoel - and I see you've got it in some of these documents, Dr Swanepoel's share would have been 75% and the personnel would have been 25%. Due to the interference of some of the personnel his shares were brought down to 50%. He said yesterday he received four and a half million rands for his 50% share, which cost him fifty thousand.

There was also another company in the end, by the liquidation of this company which received another four and half thousand, Contra Cedar Holdings ...[intervention]

CHAIRPERSON: Four and a half million.

DR GOOSEN: Four and a half million. So Swanepoel Trust received four and a half million, Contra Cedar Holdings received four and a half million, the owners, shareholders or whatever, Contra Cedar Holding, Swanepoel again. So in the end he received close to nine million rands, okay? Close to nine million rands.

Now, if he had his 75% share he would have got another four and a half million rands. Now, Mr Chairman, I'm just interested, is that not reason enough to be sour also? Anyway, this astounded me, that tax payers money could have been given to people and being sold off.

Now in the end when they liquidated it, they sold the facility back to the government, back to the government Chairman, for another eight or twelve million rand, I'm not sure what that figure is. It is available, you can look in the government's records, and they shared the money between nine of them. This to me was really astounding. I was shocked.

MR CHASKALSON: Dr Goosen, sorry to interrupt you, I'm just a little bit pressed for time, I'd like to move on. Do you know General Neethling?

DR GOOSEN: Yes.

MR CHASKALSON: Can you tell us how you know the General?

DR GOOSEN: The General and I are married family. He is married to the sister of my first wife which was my first late wife's mother and we were friends.

MR CHASKALSON: Did the General ever visit RRL?

DR GOOSEN: We are still friends, sorry. Yes, the General visited RRL. He visited RRL on two occasions, the first one was in connection with the testing of some gases which we wanted to be used in apparently riot control, on the baboons, someone referred to it previously.

The second time he visited as far as I know, to the, as a guest of Roodeplaat Breeding Enterprises inspecting or visiting the facilities and looking at what we're doing as we were clients then. In the end RBE, Roodeplaat Breeding Enterprises was transferred to the police which was under his, I think, jurisdiction. He can vouch for that. Which I think was very good. It is still being utilised very good for the government at the moment.

MR CHASKALSON: Did the General have any other involvement with the programme or activities that took place at Roodeplaat?

DR GOOSEN: Mr Chairman, no not really in my period. I know Dr Wouter Basson initially wasn't very well acquainted with General Neethling and we discussed the General's role in the project in being, having to be responsible if some of the products needed to be forensically tested at the end of the line, the General's department would be involved. But that's bona fides.

MR CHASKALSON: Earlier on you talked about a narrow line between defensive and offensive and so on projects. I accept your argument but I would like to ask you about intent and what your understanding of the intent of the programme was. Could you comment on that?

DR GOOSEN: Yes. Chairman, as I've said before we were not really unclear about the intent of the programme. We had a few concerns about it and that was the need to know principle, that if targets were identified - and we received descriptions of the scenario which would be applicable to the target, for instance the snake venom. Dr Basson would tell us: "Look, we've got access to this guy, we've infiltrated somewhere, we can get access to him, close access, we can hold him down, we can inject him and then we can kill a snake next to him and it would be made to look to everyone else he was bitten by a snake. So we were definitely presented with that type of scenario and develop and produce these tricks to apply to the scenario. We were very concerned about, that this should be used for legitimate opponents or the enemy - which we won't waste time on, I think we know, we understand who was the enemy at the stage, the ANC etc. We had long discussions on, with Dr Basson on Nelson Mandela, Dr Mandela, Oliver Tambo, all these guys. Die ...[indistinct] hierarchy, those were potential targets and we should develop these non-traceable stuff for them ja.

MR CHASKALSON: Now you are listing here individuals who opposed the government of the time, you are not talking about an attack on a military force which would be in some form of self defence or to prevent an initial attack, we're talking innocent people Am I correct in understanding that this is what you're saying? ...[intervention]

CHAIRPERSON: In one case may we note, he was talking about a prisoner who was incarcerated in jail if we are talking about Mandela. I don't know how much of an enemy he was in prison.

DR GOOSEN: Ja. Mr Chairman, to answer your question yes, that is true. Those people were considered the enemy by us. We cannot deny that, that is true. To come back to President Mandela. It is true, I personally had discussion with Dr Basson about, in the general lines, if one had to release him it would have been good if he had a disease which you know wouldn't, so that he couldn't be too long a problem.

We spoke about carcinogens at the stage and again as I said, carcinogens are reasonably available. There was no definite plan formulated in my presence that I know of. This was general sort of discussions on what the possibilities will be. No definite plan was formulated as far as I know.

MR CHASKALSON: Could you tell us what a carcinogen is in layman's terms?

DR GOOSEN: Carcinogen is a chemical substance or any substance for that matter which will precipitate and cause cancer induce, that is can induce cancer.

MR CHASKALSON: So, it would be a clandestine way of ultimately causing the death of somebody?

DR GOOSEN: That can be correct, ja.

MR CHASKALSON: During your discussions with General Knobel in which you spoke about concerns of the programme, did you ever specifically discuss any of the substances which we have heard could have been used for or against individuals?

DR GOOSEN: Initially when I was getting the scientific side running at RRL, we had meetings with the "borge" which consisted of two parts, one was the reporting on techinical aspects and the other one on financial. First the financial one and then the auditors would leave and then we would discuss the projects.

And these types of projects were discussed at one or two meetings because these meetings fell then in this use. And that was a centre of control, where we all could sit down with the people we respected, like the General, that he would be in control of the end use of these products.

MR CHASKALSON: What happened after those meetings fell into disuse, how did you used to report and how were your potential concerns about the use of these projects taken care of?

DR GOOSEN: Mr Chairman, that was after the first 18 months when I was removed. That was then the stages where it happened, just before the period where I was sort of not reporting anymore.

What happened is, in 1985 Wouter, Dr Wouter Basson attended an officers course for one years, the highest course to be able to become a General I understand and being on that course he was not available to the project for one year in '85.

That created a bit of a void because Dr Basson was the link between me as Managing Director and the money and everything that was going on. And that was part of what developed into the situation, that we had some discussions on management and the problems in management and how this should have been managed, this company in '86 but I was fired before we could resolve anything.

MR CHASKALSON: Could you indicate for us what you view as scientific achievements that were made by RRL?

DR GOOSEN: Mr Chairman, the scientific achievements were made in the field of Chemical Biological Warfare and please, this is not proliferation, this is history. We supplied a lot of crude products which could have been used, we could have supplied and developed a lot of crude products which could have been used as this dirty tricks stuff, James Bond stuff.

We advanced far on the development of an anti-fertility vaccine but it was never really produced and I can say this, I was involved on the hard sides up to 1989. The third side of developing a biotechnological component, the genetic engineering side, no real biological weapons were coming from that. That unit, that unit has been transferred by Dr Mike Odendal refusing shares in the company. He transferred the unit to a non-war situation where it is developing and producing for the country for the first time recombinant(?) vaccines for use as good products. And again, the unit is still involved in producing Botulinum Toxin to very sophisticated levels. And it's a legitimate use, it is the thickness of leaf away from a weapon and not a weapon and the control is also not easy.

MR CHASKALSON: Just to clarify on that. Earlier on you told us that between seven and ten million rand was used for operating costs at RRL for a period of approximately nine years. You discussed a six and a half million amount which was used for the building of the facility and a thirty million amount which was for the upgrading of the facility. If we take the low side of the seven to ten million, 7 9's are 63 plus 30, we're at 93, we are talking approximately something like a hundred million rand which was spent. And given what you have just said to us we don't have any scientific achievement, we have crude dirty tricks and we have another genetic section which you said has subsequently been taken out of RRL and made a success elsewhere. Would that be an unfair representation?

DR GOOSEN: Mr Chairman, that would be the bottom line, 100% correct, completely under production for what was spent in the project, completely. But of course it can't be evaluated by a Managing Director who doesn't know about science.

MR CHASKALSON: Can I quickly refer you to TRC 52, it's list that has come to be known as a "verkope" list. I understand this is a 1989 list and that you were not in the loop at this stage. I just want to confirm the type of substances that we are talking about, that you had informed General Knobel of at an earlier stage. Are you telling us that at some or other stage you informed the General about individual murder weapons, for instance poison in a liquid or poison in chocolates or something of that effect?

DR GOOSEN: Mr Chairman yes, we might have discussed it. I cannot say which one of these products or whatever. What I remember we did discuss was the following: We did discuss targeting individuals and we did discuss the fact that I was concerned that the individuals targeted should be legitimate targets seeing that the scientist, myself and the scientists were not told who the targets were.

So we had no option of thinking for ourselves, it was a prisoner or not or whatever and this was apparently to safeguard us. So the fact the matter was yes, if we discussed the targets it must have been going without saying that we did discuss the chemical methods of taking them out, and it was in his presence.

MR CHASKALSON: Thank you Dr Goosen, I have no further questions.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you Mr Chaskalson. Cross-examination, Mr Cilliers, are you going to start?

MR CILLIERS: Mr Chairman, I've made a request to Mr Vally and it's something he had to discuss with you. We are in the situation, General Neethling came this morning, he is available, he's been available since nine.

His flight back, because of special flight arrangements which have been made for him, he is to leave a four because he has to be at the airport at a quarter to five and I've requested Mr Vally whether we can't continue with General Neethling so that we can ensure that he will be finished by four otherwise there won't be an opportunity to put questions to him. So I want to ask you to let Dr Goosen stand down so that we can hear Neethling's evidence.

MR POLSEN: Sorry, may I ask what does my learned friend envisage because I have a difficulty, I have to leave undoubtedly tonight at seven o'clock. Will we finish with Dr Goosen today? Has he got long cross-examination? What is his ...[intervention]

MR CILLIERS: I am convinced that we can do Dr Goosen and Dr Neethling today, we can finish them today. Like during the previous occasions if we can sit later than 4 o'clock. The only reason why I'm putting the request is Dr Goosen is still available after four and General Neethling not. I foresee that we will easily finish also with Goosen and Neethling today.

MR POLSEN: Provided we don't start at 4 o'clock and end at a quarter to seven because I have to leave early, there's no way that I will be able to stay.

CHAIRPERSON: I don't enjoy sitting late myself Mr Polsen but sometimes it happens. But you know, we will try and everybody here is listening. Mr Chaskalson or Mr Vally, do you have any...?

MR CHASKALSON: I don't have any major objection to this. We will abide with whatever your ruling is though. The only other point that we would like to just note is that at some stage today we will need to squeeze in the remains of a legal argument. Now may be an appropriate stage before lunch, alternatively we would be ready to begin with the General now. I don't ...[intervention]

CHAIRPERSON: No, no, Mr Chaskalson, you possibly want to arrange during lunch with your learned friends as to when you think that legal things must come. We have taken as much evidence as we want to take on the non-contentious issues. If we can then stand down the present witness subject to his arrangements.

And may I just emphasize that all the parties must time themselves. We have got, as I understand, two witnesses who we want to take. I would say there are two more witnesses who I would prefer we should take today rather than one because I do not know what tomorrow brings. And therefore we should pace ourselves such that by 6 o'clock we have done everything that we need to do and that includes calling two more witnesses and cross-examining them.

WITNESS STANDS DOWN

CHAIRPERSON: Will you call your next witness Mr Chaskalson?

MR CHASKALSON: The Commission calls General Lothar Neethling and Mr Vally will take over the examination.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Vally are you ready?

Mr Neethling welcome to these proceedings. Before you testify I will ask Advocate Potgieter to swear you in.

LOTHAR NEETHLING: (Duly sworn in, states):

CHAIRPERSON: May I just mention it for the record again General Neethling that you are quite welcome to testify and express yourself in the language you are best comfortable with.

GEN NEETHLING: Thank you, Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: If you would like to follow the testimony and you are acquainted with Afrikaans should General Neethling decide to testify in Afrikaans, we have facilities which have simultaneous translations. Mr Vally?

MR VALLY: Thank you, Mr Chair. Gen Neethling, can you briefly tell us what are your qualifications?

GEN NEETHLING: Mr Chairman, I am a scientist. I have two doctorate degrees in chemistry and related physiological biological chemistry and I regard myself as a person with a very wide range of interests regarding chemistry and electrical chemistry.

MR VALLY: This is precisely the area of involvement of Delta G and to an extent RRL, Roodeplaat Research Laboratories. Firstly I'd like to know if you had any contact with anyone at RRL?

GEN NEETHLING: Yes, let's start with RRL. RRL, I heard Dr Goosen I visited them twice, I visited them three times, and it was about the fact that I was the Head of the South African Police Dog School. This Police Dog School had a very big problem and they had one big problem that was to trace explosives.

MR VALLY: Gen Neethling, I don't want to know about RTO, Roodepoort Teel Ondernemings, I want to know specifically about the biological facility RRL.

GEN NEETHLING: I visited RRL once. It was one of the three visits I have mentioned. The other visits were to the dog unit. The only visit I paid to the laboratory described by Dr Goosen was in 1993. I was requested to investigate - I was retired at that stage, I'm still a consultant, I do it on a consulting basis and there was the case of a person who was injected with a specific substance in a town in Northern Transvaal with very detrimental consequences. The court case resulted and they said he was injected with the wrong material which led to impotence. This led to the situation that that sample I received, I had to investigate that and I had to present a report on that. I have the report here and all the details. I had a discussion with two of the scientists there, there's two Veterinary Surgeons who were involved in analysing that. I don't know how they did they. I obtained the result, I was satisfied and the defence was satisfied.

MR VALLY: We will come back to RRL in a while, but just on that issue who were you consultant to, was it a private person or Government.

GEN NEETHLING: In 1993 I was an independent entity. I joined the Police - first let me start from the beginning. I had a bursary from Agricultural Services. I want to the USA in 1959, and I obtained my Doctorate there. I came back and worked for the Department of Agricultural Technical Services till 1970. I was stationed at two places, at Roodeplaat Agricultural Institute, I doesn't have anything to do with the other Roodeplaat, that was my first station and I did many experiments there regarding grapes. Afterwards I went to Onderstepoort where I became the head of the X-ray section because my background in the USA entailed the use of radio-active materials in the field of agricultural research, and this involved the use of isotopes in agricultural research. I became involved in a big project where certain analysis had to be done where large pieces of analysis were made regarding cenellium and other substances leading to those diseases which caused diseases in agriculture and losses were made during certain cycles and caused great problems. Then I went to the South African Police. On the 15th of January 1971 I started there and I was asked to establish a Forensic Laboratory and that activity suited my temperament very well. I'm not a person who likes routine because I like to be involved in a lot of things at the same time and the forensic science was a very attractive option because I ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: I'm sorry, we have been told by your counsel that you want to catch a plane. I just want to know your professional history from this period to this period I was a Constable or a Lieutenant, from this to this period I was in this rank or that Department, that's all I want to know.

GEN NEETHLING: In 1971 I joined the South African Police as a full Colonel. I was promoted in '79 to Brigadier. I was promoted - I'm sorry, in '74 I was promoted to Brigadier Assistant Commissioner and in 1976 a full Brigadier and 1979 I was promoted to a Major-General, and 1985 to a Lieutenant-General. In other words, I was part of the general staff of the Police from 1979 until I retired in 1992. There was nobody longer before or after me and I think I can speak on behalf of the South African Police. Is that what you wanted? After August 1992 I retired. The post which I occupied at that stage was the post I occupied since '85, it was - I was overhead responsible for a whole range of departments. I was responsible for information systems, for communication, the dog school, the criminal record system and the forensic department. I handed over command of the forensic laboratory unofficially in 1985 when I Lieutenant-Colonel, and 1989 from moving from one building to the other, I handed over to the new Commanding Officer, that was Brigadier Heyn Strauss, and he also retired - he left the service a few years later and he joined SASOL. And in the meantime two other Commanding Officers were appointed. Since 1985 I was not involved in the daily activity of the laboratory. I was responsible for those five departments and I was also responsible for other loose kind of jobs. This meant that I was overhead responsible for a budget of more than R1 billion. It increased during that time because, as you know, computers and things are very expensive, and we were at all times involved in eradicating a big backlog regarding information systems, especially with the criminal record system. That was my career.

An unfortunate incident took place in 1989, the end of 1989, certain information was made available regarding ...(inaudible) and there was an appeal after a court case in 1994 where the allegation was made that I was responsible for the provision of poison to Dirk Coetzee, and at that stage I categorically denied that. I did not do that. My laboratory, while I was there, did not provide poison to anybody at any stage. We did our very best to develop an analytical capability which would enable us to solve any analytical problem which would develop in solving crime. That was my main purpose with the establishment of the laboratory, which was very successful and is becoming even more and more successful using new techniques like DNA.

I'm very sorry that I had to read all these lies in the newspapers and this has ruined my career. The Police had to make a plan and this post of the Head of Criminology in 1985 - they described it in the same way as what they did when they had to get somebody out of the system, they changed the job description and I landed up being an advisor for the South African Police, especially the Commissioner. My whole career in the Police was geared at the establishment of the laboratory.

MR VALLY: Sorry, Gen Neethling, did you wish to read a statement to the Commission before I started questioning you?

GEN NEETHLING: I have no statement in front of me.

MR VALLY: Okay, sorry, I do have your Police career right now. I need to ask you some questions.

GEN NEETHLING: Please do.

MR VALLY: Thank you.

MR VALLY: Firstly, when you were in charge of the Police laboratories, do you recall the Thallium poisoning case of Simpiwe Mtimkhulu?

GEN NEETHLING: I was notified about that, or I became involved in that through the Deputy Attorney-General, I don't know which of the two posts of the Eastern Cape. He contacted me at a stage and he said such a case did occur there.

This was mentioned also to the laboratory and said an analysis had to be done on a urine sample from a certain person. This sample was flown in, the dossier is available on the, that was in December, I don't know which year, it was early in the 1980's. The person who picked that up, it was sent by courier, he brought the sample to the laboratory. I wasn't present there, It was December, I was on two weeks holiday, that was the only time I could spend with my family. It was damaged there, and when they opened it there was no sample. Everything was dissolved in the cottonwool or the paper.

MR VALLY: The identification of a poison with which Mr Simpiwe Mtimkhulu was poisoned was done by Professor Frances Ames from the University of Cape Town, is that correct?

GEN NEETHLING: That is correct, yes. I have spoken to her on the telephone.

MR VALLY: And you specifically requested her to send you samples, was it tissue samples, hair samples?

GEN NEETHLING: No, I asked for hair samples and for urine samples, and I only received a urine sample. The hair sample, that was the only case where we had an example of possible Thallium poisoning, and there were certain characteristic strains in the hair of a poisoned person which is easily identifiable according to the literature, but there was no sample which we could use for that. The analysis which Dr Ames did was done in England, and there was no question that I would question or query these findings.

MR VALLY: So the sample that was sent at your request to the Police Forensic Laboratories, either was damaged or didn't arrive. Your Police Forensic Laboratories where you were in charge of them didn't give any response to your perception of what the poisoning was.

GEN NEETHLING: There was no way in which we could determine what the possible toxin could be, and there was not further way how we could obtain another sample, because, after enquiries, they said there was not person available from whom they could obtain the sample, the person had disappeared, so there was no possibility to get another sample.

MR VALLY: We do know now what happened to Mr Mtimkhulu, are you aware of what happened to Mr Mtimkhulu?

GEN NEETHLING: I read during the court cases that he in one or other way was abducted and that he had disappeared, but how, I don't know.

MR VALLY: Well, let's leave, let's be specific, that he was in fact kidnapped and murdered by then members of the South African Police. Are you aware of that, that there's an amnesty application pursuant to this kidnapping and murder?

GEN NEETHLING: I do not know who the people are who were involved. I read that he had been abducted, but I don't know about that, but I know that he had been abducted by the Security Police in one or other way and was killed then. I don't know how and I don't know who were involved regarding that specific action.

MR VALLY: Are you aware that a General is claiming amnesty for his abduction and murder, a General of the Police Force, an ex General of the Police Force?

GEN NEETHLING: No, can you mention his name?

MR VALLY: I think it had come out in public hearings already, Mr Chair?

CHAIRPERSON: Right, yes.

GEN NEETHLING: It had to be the previous head of the Security Branch at Port Elizabeth. Which year was that, I don't know who was there. I had nothing to do with the Security Police's activities.

MR VALLY: My question is this, you being the upper echelons of the Police, and you joined as a Colonel in 1971, by '74 you became a Brigadier, in a space of three years you became a Brigadier, surely you'd be discussing those issues at that level?

GEN NEETHLING: No, not at all. At all meetings of Generals, no operational action with regard to people who had disappeared or were possibly hurt, not even the Biko case was ever discussed. It did not form part of the general function of the staff of the Generals. It was part of the Security Police.

MR VALLY: Are you aware that there was an action pending by Mr Mtimkhulu against the South African Police?

GEN NEETHLING: It was reported as such in the newspapers, yes. I think that was the reason why the Attorney-General took action if I remember correctly. I think we're now talking about 20 years ago, approximately 18 years, ago, I'm not sure. When was this incident?

MR VALLY: It was in the early 80's. Let's go on. There was evidence given here by Dr Jan Lourens that at the time he was Managing Director of Systems Research and Development, he was approached by you to accommodate a man by the name of Bart Hetima at his company. Do you know about Hetima?

GEN NEETHLING: I think it's just reversed. I introduced Bart Hetima to them. I met him in 1977/78 in Eastern Cape. He was the man who at that stage was the only man who had knowledge of the packaging of aerosols. He had a company in which he was the sole shareholder where he made aerosol cans, and at that stage we wanted to have our CS teargas packed in aerosol cans because that was a very handy way of using it. The Americans had already started using it in the late 60's and we started with tests in Komga and thereafter in Middelburg in the Cape, where he had his premises. He assisted us with the formulation of CS cans, and this became general equipment in 1982, and '83/'83 I met Lourens for the first time in '84/'85. Then the abilities of Bart Hetima came to the attention of Dr Wouter Basson, because he met him while he was with me while we were doing the testing for the CS gas formulation. Thereafter at one or other stage he worked for one of the companies of Dr Basson. Which one it was exactly I do not know. So, Dr Lourens, I don't think he's correct, he's not a doctor, he's Mr Jan Lourens. He has a degree in Engineering from the University of Pretoria. Is this another Dr Lourens.

GEN NEETHLING: He is a Dr Lourens, your attorney would tell you, he was present when he gave evidence. He advised us that you brought Bart Hetima to them and asked him to employ Mr Bart Hetima as SRD, Systems Research and Development.

GEN NEETHLING: That is not true, Dr Basson did that. I did not even know of the existence of SRD. The existence of SRD was made known to me by Dr Basson, and this was after we tried to get the capabilities similar to the ability to get the authorization and control, commander control post, and to have that established. It enables four Commanding Officers, two for example in whatever trouble may occur, for which the Task Force is used of the South African Police to be able to execute that function, and to be able to issue the different commands in the air without being intercommunication between the four teams. And there a Mr Jan Lourens received the contract which went out on tender to build that facility for the South African Police. That was the first time that I became involved with him, when he provided us with that electronic facility. It took approximately 1? years before we got hold of that piece of instrumentation. In that ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: What year was that, please?

GEN NEETHLING: I can go back in my documentation, unfortunately I did not bring it with because I did not think it was important, but this was in the mid 80's, approximately '85/'86.

MR VALLY: Are you saying that is the first time you met Dr Jan Lourens?

GEN NEETHLING: That is the first time that I met Mr Jan Lourens. If he received his Doctorate degree in the meantime, then he must have obtained it during the time that he was busy with his academic studies. I have no knowledge of the fact that he had a doctorate degree. I won't take it away from him either if he has one.

MR VALLY: He does have one, and it's a PHD.

GEN NEETHLING: I'm glad to hear that, but I would like to know when he got it because I haven't seen him for quite some time.

MR VALLY: Fine, let's go on. Do you deny then that you brought him, Mr Bart Hetima, to Mr Jan Lourens where Mr Hetima was working at your request regarding the putting of, as you say, CS gas into aerosol cans?

GEN NEETHLING: Absolutely, I'm saying that the man who offered Bart Hetima employment for the ability that he had in the manufacturing of aerosol cans, was Dr Basson, Wouter Basson, and whether it was in my presence or not, he said to Jan Lourens here is a man whose expertise you can use, see what you can do with him, because I had nothing to do with Protechnic, nor with Technotec or whatever other companies existed. While we are on that point ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: Can I just, before you go into that, can I just get some clarity. You say Dr Wouter Basson asked Dr Jan Lourens to employ Mr Bart Hetima, it may or may not have been in your presence.

GEN NEETHLING: That's correct. That's exactly what I'm saying.

MR VALLY: When you say it may or may not have been in your presence, is it because you had regular contact with Dr Wouter Basson?

GEN NEETHLING: I had regular contact with Dr Wouter Basson from the end of 1983 onwards.

MR VALLY: Can you tell us what this contact was in connection with?

GEN NEETHLING: Yes, I can tell you that it was just after General Johan Coetzee took over as Commissioner of the South African Police in '83, the end of that year, August of September, I cannot recall, I received a call from his Staff Officer to tell me that I had to come and see him. It was an afternoon. I went there to his office and found in his office, Dr Nico Nieuwoudt, Minister Louis la Grange, as well as Commissioner Johan Coetzee. I was then asked ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: Sorry, Dr Nieuwoudt was the Surgeon-General at the time?

GEN NEETHLING: That's correct, yes. General Nico Nieuwoudt. I was then asked to assist, if we could, in providing Dr Basson who had a firm with the name of Delta G, with substances which we could possibly use for the combating of unrest and crowd control with regards to the unrest that was prevailing in the country at that stage, and the philosophy which was already known to me, was that under certain circumstances one could provide or use sleeping drugs which could possibly decrease the anger of the crowds so that the principle of minimum violence could be used maximally. Minister le Grange, and I'm saying this - I'm now talking about people who have already died, and I'm very sorry for that, Minister le Grange and General Nieuwoudt I think were two wonderful people who gave me the impression that under no circumstances would they associate themselves with violence and we tried to do everything in our ability, and in the South African Police to do that as well, and I can prove this with numerous examples. We had conferences, symposiums and travelled throughout the world and attended these in an attempt to develop techniques which would be more acceptable to the South African Police that a bullet from a gun, and we succeeded in doing this. And in creating a series of products with regard to the application of teargas, water canons, sneezing machines, teargas from grenades, which was mor effective that the old grenades, and at the same time, we always tried to get a better teargas, and there was not a single one that was prescribed to us, and this a gas by the name of CR. That day I was told that the ability that was developed, it was in the process of being developed, would be able to synthesise both the CR and CS gas.

It is so that I was then informed and that Dr Basson showed me plans of a laboratory. He also asked me some questions with regard to improvements which could have been made. I gave him my input in that regard, and I was told that the capability would exist to make CR and CS. That was the first thing.

The second thing was to develop a possible smoke which would be able to influence the state of mind of the crowds, and three substances were listed which they knew they could obtain from me because it was publicly known that the drugs that we confiscated in the course of normal criminal procedure all ended up at the criminal forensic laboratory after the cases has been completed, because we - after we had heard that people were pushing it back onto the street again after the court cases had been finished, then one has to go after the same things twice, and we then said that we would store in centrally, which we did and of those tablets on three occasions methaqualone tablets were given to Dr Basson so that he could extract the active ingredient, mandrax, and use it for further synthesis to obtain substances which would be physiologically active. In other words, we were looking for sleeping drugs, that was the one component, namely methaqualone, the second component was lysergic acid ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: Sorry, is that LSD?

GEN NEETHLING: Yes, that's the active ingredient in LSD. It comes from a whole conglomeration of tablets that was available. They are light-sensitive and there was nothing more that approximately 50mg of active ingredient present in those tablets because one tablet usually is 50 micrograms. This was the sum total. And the third possible category was the changing dagga into powder form. This could have been possibly changed into a gas formulation so that we could throw it into the air and instead of throwing stones and using vehicles for arson, that you did not want to do this anymore and you then become more peaceful. And for that a conscript was used who worked with me for approximately nine months. There were many conscripts who came to me as scientists ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: Sorry, would you give us his name please?

GEN NEETHLING: His name was Sotas, Dr Sotas. He came to me and we gave him the capability to take fresh dagga plants and to extract them and take the dagga oil out of it, and with that he went forth in the hope that they could make grenades or products which could be broken down into powder. The same principle therefore as the previous two. That was a once off occasion, that of Dr Sotas.

The methaqualone mandrax, I think it was three times that this happened, each time this was done on request. The procedure was as follows, the Surgeon-General, Dr Nieuwoudt would phone me and asked whether I could help Wouter. Wouter would come to me, then Wouter would come and he'd say, I want so many mandrax tablets, and I'd say how many, 15 0000 or 10 000, whatever I had at stage, he would take it and leave, and I knew that they were trying to make derivatives and also to put this into the grenades. This was a project that I was kept informed of, but grenades were never produced, which, let us say, were used operationally. It was always just on an experimental or testing basis.

The only grenades which were produced a bit later, on an operational basis, were those the teargas CR. These tear-gases, we tried to make in the late 70's without any awareness from my side that there would be possible interest from the Defence Force. We asked that Sasol would, with its laboratory Sentrachem would make us a few kilograms of the substance, and they gave me 10 kilograms of wastage materials, because they had problems in manufacturing this, the people who were working with this had to wear wetsuits, etc to protect themselves, but we started using this, or tested this in aerosol cans and ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: Sorry, Gen Neethling, let's come back to the CR gas in a short while.

GEN NEETHLING: Yes, okay.

MR VALLY: We're still at the point where you said that drugs which were confiscated were sent to the Police laboratories under your control and ...(intervention)

GEN NEETHLING: Under the control of the laboratory, yes.

MR VALLY: Which you were the head of at the time?

GEN NEETHLING: That's correct.

MR VALLY: And you were instructed or requested by the then Minister, Mr Louis le Grange, Minister of Law and Order or Police at the time, with the Surgeon-General, Dr Nieuwoudt, present as well as the them Commissioner of Police, Mr Coetzee?

GEN NEETHLING: That's correct.

MR VALLY: To assist Dr Basson?

GEN NEETHLING: Yes, that's correct.

MR VALLY: And to provide him with whatever he needed?

GEN NEETHLING: To give him the specific methaqualone, ...(indistinct) and LSD, just those three things, nothing more, nothing less. There could have been many other things, he could have asked for Dystopian, which we literally had tons of, all these valiums, libriums, etc that are abused. They didn't want that, all they were interested in were these three things.

MR VALLY: So in lay person's terms, Mr la Grange, in the presence of the Commissioner, Mr - I forget his rank at the time, General Coetzee ...(intervention)

GEN NEETHLING: Full General, he was the Commissioner.

MR VALLY: And ...(intervention)

GEN NEETHLING: Lieutenant-General Nico Nieuwoudt, Surgeon-General. In the meeting would also have been General Viljoen, but they told me General Viljoen could unfortunately not be present, as something had come up. He was supposed to have been there, but he wasn't.

MR VALLY: And General Viljoen, what was his position at the time?

GEN NEETHLING: He was the Head of the Defence Force.

MR VALLY: So the Defence Force was the - did he send someone in his place?

GEN NEETHLING: No, it was only those three persons and I.

MR VALLY: So they advised you to supply Dr Wouter Basson with mandrax, LSD and dagga?

GEN NEETHLING: That's correct, yes.

MR VALLY: Alright, let's go on from there, you mentioned that you supplied him with mandrax on three occasions to your knowledge?

GEN NEETHLING: As far as I can remember, it's 15 years ago already.

MR VALLY: And secondly, you earlier on said on one occasion there were 100 000 mandrax tablets, is that correct?

GEN NEETHLING: No, I said that at one stage we had up to 100 000 tablets in our possession as the cases built up and we repossess these things, but once a year these tablets were destroyed and we burned it because - it was a mess, it wasn't easy to burn these things. Iscor wasn't very happy.

MR VALLY: How much mandrax do you think you supplied to ...(intervention)

GEN NEETHLING: An ordinary mandrax tablet's content is 250 milligram, it's a ? gram per tablet. In other words, four tablets is one gram and 4000 tablets are a kilogram, and a 100 000 tablets are 25 kilograms, if I have to make quick calculations.

MR VALLY: How many tablets - mandrax tablets in total did you supply to Dr Wouter Basson?

GEN NEETHLING: I think it was probably between 100 000 and 200 000, between 25 and 50 kilograms of methaqualone, but now I must also say that one is not going to get 100% extraction, and even though we say that there is 250 mg, perhaps you most probably will only get 80%, you'll never 100% back. So let's make it 50 kilograms maximum as a substance to be used for further synthesis for a changing of the molecules to be more physiologically active, because one of the problems of methaqualone is that you cannot burn it very easily.

In other words, if you put it into a smoke formulation, then you destroy the active ingredients, and that's the big problem we have with CS, the normal teargas which to South African Police uses. The problem is that when you put it into the grenade, you pay so much for the grenade, it costs R50,00 of which R30,00 is for the active ingredient, and you only get 15% back. The other 85% is being burned, it's as good as taking a roll of money and burning it, and this is uneconomical, and that is why CR is so much better. It has a much better formulation to be broken down into powder form with less activity, less costs and much higher physiological activity.

MR VALLY: Let's just come back to this, I am going to come to CR gas rest assured ...(intervention)

GEN NEETHLING: I couldn't hear.

MR VALLY: We will get back to this.

GEN NEETHLING: No problem.

MR VALLY: I want to stick to what we're talking about now, in your estimation you gave Dr Wouter Basson between 100 000 and 200 000 mandrax tablets?

GEN NEETHLING: Approximately, yes.

MR VALLY: How much LSD did you give him?

GEN NEETHLING: I think there wasn't much more than 5000 of the different cases, from 10 or 15 cases, everything was thrown into a holder or container and average activity was not much more that 30 micrograms per tablet. Let's make it 33.33 micrograms, in other words, one needs 1000 tablets for 1 milligram and 10 000 for 10 milligrams, and then you hope that this is the average activity, because the LSD is inclined to bet light-effective, it changes with light, it deteriorates, or disintegrates and that is why it is kept in silver paper or aluminium paper, it doesn't want light, nor does it want any watery substance, so I don't think I gave him any more LSD than 5 milligrams, but it's a great deal if you say that you have 5 milligrams of pure LSD, then with that you can theoretically put 50 000 men on a trip. If you can have every chap breathing in 50 micrograms it's an ideal substance, just like ecstasy, if I could give ecstasy to every person, he will not make war, but love, then I can in a matter of 10 minutes, I can change his whole spiritual condition, and this is what happens in the lives of the young people today. I live behind a rave club and this is definitely not a casino, these people just carry on from Friday till Sunday on two tablets.

MR VALLY: So we've got approximately 5000 LSD tablets, we've got approximately between 100 000 and 200 000 mandrax tablets, how much dagga did you give Dr Basson?

GEN NEETHLING: I want to tell you that while you asked these questions, I knew that this question was coming. I'm trying to recall, but I don't think it was more that 5 bags, 5 of these canvass bags, because we have a big problem at the laboratory that it's not at all equipped for any synthesis or any extraction on a large scale, because our samples are always too small we work on a micro-scale, never on a macro-scale. If you therefore take dagga and you want to start extracting kilogram of dagga when we do not have to ability. He had to bring his own pots, I did not have the pots or the glass apparatus to do this. Where he obtained this I do not know, neither did I ask, but he extracted it and with that he left. I think that it wasn't more than 5 bags and this took him quite a while because it had to be done bit by bit.

I will try and calculate this, a bag is approximately 50 kilograms if it is well filled, and the percentage of active ingredient if it is good Durban dagga that you get in the Valley, which the people are crazy about in Europe and wherever, then you can get 2?% oil from it. In other words we say that 5 bags X 50 kilograms is 250 kilograms. 250 kilograms X 2,5 ? 100 = 2,5 kilograms X 2, gives you approximately 7 kilograms of oil, 8 kilograms if you work very well, but I do not believe that he took 7 kilograms of oil away. This is now the active ingredient, this must still be - he was still to get another substance from that and 30% thereof is the molecule that I am looking for to start with to be able to make derivatives or to try and get that molecule, so it was most probably a third of 9 kilograms, let's say that is 3 kilograms of active ingredient.

In other words, that is what I wanted and with that I hoped to be able to do enough tests to know whether it works or not. Obviously it did not work because we never heard of it again. We did not hear about LSD, ...(indistinct), nor about dagga and on two occasions I was involved in the turning into powder of mandrax which became a reality later because they changed the whole formula of burning this - of organic material. At 55 degrees, everything is broken down, so you must get something that remains cold while you make smoke, and that's not so easy.

An ordinary cigarette if you draw in, then the point of that cigarette's temperature is between 500 and 600 degrees Celsius. The more oxygen that comes through, the higher the temperature goes, and this is what you do not want, and this was the big problem with methaqualone, to get it to such a state that it would end up in the air, and together with the lactose and the prorate and nitrates which are used to combust this, that is still remains active and does not burn.

CHAIRPERSON: I think this will be a convenient stage to go and take lunch and smoke cigarettes and dagga ...(indistinct). We'll adjourn until 14h00.

HEARING ADJOURNS

ON RESUMPTION:

CHAIRPERSON: Can we get ready to start ladies and gentlemen.

Mr Vally. General, may I remind you that you are still under oath.

LOTHAR NEETHLING: (s.u.o.)

MR VALLY: General Neethling we have just talked about the quantities of mandrax, LSD and dagga you supplied to Dr Wouter Basson at the request of the Minister of Police in the presence of the Commissioner as well as the Surgeon-General at the time, Dr Nieuwoudt, and you advised us that were informed the purpose was to see if it could be used in some form as a means of crowd control or riot control?

GEN NEETHLING: Yes, riot control, or the control of crowds, and kind of as a sleeping drug. This came from the study group consisting of the people from the Army, the Police and from Armscor. We met once every three months, we sat around a table and we discussed the needs of the Security Forces regarding the activities which were going on and the question of the obtaining of water canons and obtaining other substances which were required or gas masks, it was a big problem, the Security Forces did not have gas masks.

When the riots started in 1976, the South African Police were caught unawares. They had nothing apart from guns, shotguns, and sharp point ammunition. Nobody wanted to use that and that's why there was a surge for various techniques to be applied.

And to prevent riots studies were undertaken. I went overseas three times to Germany, England, Israel, America to find the best techniques available.

CHAIRPERSON: In history is recorded that sharp ammunition was used in 1976.

GEN NEETHLING: Absolutely yes, but it was not the first choice, Mr Chairman. When the riots started we tried to make other plans. There was limited amounts of teargas, it was not enough. The people who supplied the CS, I don't want to even mention their names, because they won't believe it that they were the people who provided us with that, we had no capability whatsoever, and the few grenades we had we could not handle one big unrest whether we wanted to or not, and there was a different philosophy, a different approach regarding riot control or the control of crowds. We did our utmost most best, for the last seven, eight years it went better.

MR VALLY: Gen Neethling, just confirm again what date was this meeting, the one with Mr Le Grange?

GEN NEETHLING: It was between August 1983 or the beginning of 1984, I don't know exactly when, because at that stage you had a conversation, you talked to somebody, and you went along. I didn't make notes of dates, I didn't write down the date, but afterwards things took place, CR was developed, and I know when that took place the first time, I physically made contact with Dr Wouter Basson and I talked to him for quite a while was when we attended the first conference in Kent in 1984 in May. I made no secret of that, that certificate was in my office. I handed it in to Higher Court and I handed it in to the Appeal Court in 1994. There was nothing secret about that ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: Fine, we'll come back to CR gas ...(intervention)

GEN NEETHLING: I just want to give the date, it was May 1984.

MR VALLY: This is the reference to the conference in Kent, is that Belgium?

GEN NEETHLING: It's in Belgium, yes.

MR VALLY: We'll come back to CR gas in a short while.

GEN NEETHLING: Good.

MR VALLY: I still want to pursue the issue of the other drugs that were passed on to Dr Wouter Basson. The first question I want to ask you is this, how was the physical transfer made, the delivery?

GEN NEETHLING: The physical transfer was physically provided to Dr Basson, loaded into his car with my Staff Officer, retired as a Brigadier, Brig Arnold Mentz. I usually told him, Arnold how many are there, get 50 000, 60 000 tablets, and it was brought to his office next to mine, it was in the Jacob Marais Building. Then Dr Basson would collect it from there, put it in his car and drive away. The same with the LSG. The dagga was conveyed by Dr Sotas. He took that oil and left with that. Later on I realised that he was employed at Roodeplaat. I did not know where, I never saw him again.

MR VALLY: Fine, so there was personal delivery under your instructions by your ...(intervention)

GEN NEETHLING: Yes, when he came there he greeted me.

MR VALLY: Fine, now at this stage, did you have the consent of the Medical Control Council regarding the delivery of the mandrax?

GEN NEETHLING: Not at all. My Medical Control Council, the contact with them was limited. Later on I served on a committee, a scheduling committee of the Medical Control Body. I served there for four years.

MR VALLY: Well, let me rephrase my question.

GEN NEETHLING: Please.

MR VALLY: Didn't you require, I'm sorry, there are headphones there if you require them, Gen Neethling.

GEN NEETHLING: No, I'm a little bit hard hearing because of the tons of antibiotic I had in the last two years which I'm sorry about.

MR VALLY: No, that's fine, but I mean it will help you with the volume as well, if you need it, it's up to you.

GEN NEETHLING: I'll try.

MR VALLY: No, it's up to you, and there's a volume control on it. Sorry, let us continue.

From a legal point of view, as a Policeman, if someone other than the Police in the course of the investigations were to be given such large quantities of, and these were all illegal drugs, surely you needed some consent to legalise the possession of such drugs.

GEN NEETHLING: I had that. I was provided by the Minister, under the Minister's instruction. He instructed me, assist those people because from that we will make derivatives which we could use. I'm also a pseudo policeman, just like the pseudo scientist, as a Policeman we did - do you know I gave Delta G the certificate that they may posses teargas. They produced teargas, and for that they required a certificate according to law, according to the law of 1984, the teargas act.

MR VALLY: Did you comply with the law requiring specific exemption?

GEN NEETHLING: Not at all.

MR VALLY: So, the holding of those drugs by Dr Basson, after it left your possession, Dr Basson would have been in illegal possession of those drugs in terms of the law?

GEN NEETHLING: With respect, that statement is incorrect. If a person acts on the instruction of the Minister of Security and of Chief of the Defence Force and if he has access to certain substances in order to do certain analysis, there is no basis to say that it is in his possession illegally.

MR VALLY: I want to respond, I think you can be the President of the country, but if you had illegal substances and you do not follow the procedures in terms of the letter of the law, you can be charged. The charges I'm relating to are in connection with both - you were ultimately a General in the Police Force, I'm not sure if you were Brigadier at this time already,

GEN NEETHLING: No, in 1984 I was a Major-General.

MR VALLY: Which is even more senior than Brigadier. You were Major-General in the Police Force and you were a pseudo policeman but it was your laboratories, it was your department that tested items that was sent before people were convicted for possession of drugs. Is that correct?

GEN NEETHLING: That is correct yes. I provided the material.

MR VALLY: Were you aware that it was very serious offence to have such a large quantity of habit producing substances, unlawful substances?

My learned friend did not answer and he's just continuing with his questioning, I thought he was avoiding it, and that's why I left the matter, but he must still answer me.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes, except just as I thought that I should be placed in a position to make a ruling your client went ahead and answered in any event. Now, Mr Vally, do you want to lay a basis for this conclusion, because it is really a conclusion that you are coming at, can you establish whether in fact Dr Wouter Basson did not have permission, like the General said he had permission, to be in possession.

MR VALLY: Mr Chairperson what Dr Neethling said, and what his counsel was implying was because the instructions came from the Minister and the Commissioner, etc, that there would be no illegality involved. I am querying this and I'm ...(indistinct) this from two legs, but maybe I should first respond to the objection which I thought I had. There was an act called the Medicines and related substances Act, no 101 ...(intervention)

GEN NEETHLING: From 1964, that's correct.

MR VALLY: You are aware of the act?

GEN NEETHLING: Oh yes, we worked with it every day. We caught people every day pushing drugs, giving it to the kids.

MR VALLY: So you are an expert in that area?

GEN NEETHLING: I wouldn't say I'm an expert at law, but I'm an expert in saying that we knew that when people brought in the evidence, we never collected any evidence, these were the people from the Police, the operation Police. I'm not an operation Policeman, I've never arrested a man in my life, and for God's sake, I hope I never have to.

MR VALLY: Did Dr Basson have the necessary exemption in terms of the Medicines and related substances Act?

GEN NEETHLING: I don't know. What I know is that doctors get away with murder, literally, in the sense that they can have anything in their possession, they can have morphine, they can have anything which is schedule 6, 7, 8 or 9 without possessing any paper. That is the strength or the power of that medical profession. I never queried his bona fides, I never thought that Dr Basson would provide or sell or use one gram of that himself.

MR VALLY: And you believe now that he did do that?

GEN NEETHLING: Yes, I still believe it. I don't think he used one microgram of any of those substances or sold any of that. Why would he do that?

MR VALLY: Well, let's come back to my question.

GEN NEETHLING: What was your question?

MR VALLY: The question is this, that as a very senior Policemen and as the expert on these drugs, because that was your field ...(intervention)

GEN NEETHLING: Expert on the drugs does not mean expert on exemption of the law.

MR VALLY: Yes, I accept that.

GEN NEETHLING: Thank you.

MR VALLY: Surely you would consider it of importance that a person you are putting in that dangerous position, remember with the quantities you are talking about, the person would not only be charged with possession, he would be charge with, tell us,

GEN NEETHLING: Possession, simply possession, it's in the boot, it's in the back of his car, it's three cartons of tablets ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: No, I agree that you're not an expert on the law, but he would be charged with dealing.

GEN NEETHLING: Me?

MR VALLY: Not you.

GEN NEETHLING: The medical man?

MR VALLY: That's right.

GEN NEETHLING: Never, why?

MR VALLY: Because, he's transferring it from place A to place B.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Vally is there anything that he is going to tell, I can quite appreciate, but he's not a lawyer, he possibly doesn't differentiate between what constitutes possession and when does possession become dealing, what quantities do you ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: Can I ask that question very briefly. Based on the fact that Gen Neethling was in charge of the Police laboratories ...(intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: He was not in charge of SANAB. Maybe people in SANAB might have known what constitutes possession, quantities ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: No, the fact is that the certificate which had to be produced to courts, no 1 had to confirm the substance and no 2 the quantities, and a gram or a couple of grams this way or that way made a difference between 5 or 10 years in jail.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Vally, I will allow it only to the extent that it is necessary for you to put something on the record, I don't really think it's going to take us anywhere, unless you indicate to me what objective you're seeking to establish.

MR VALLY: Certainly.

GEN NEETHLING: If I can put it on record, that's my attitude as well, Mr Chairman, I don't really think anything turns on this. I differ from Mr Vally's view on the law and I have a serious problem with his legal argument in getting to that, but I would rather suggest he put what he wishes to put, get the response so we can proceed. We don't need to waste further time on this, so I will abide the decision, I think that is the way that we should handle the matter.

CHAIRPERSON: Don't be tempted into responding, I can see you are - just put your hand across you mouth and let's get on with it, I'm serious. Mr Vally?

MR VALLY: The one question you allowed me to ask on that issue before I go on, Mr Chairperson, you're aware that when you gave certificates to courts regarding drugs which was sent to the Police laboratories, that you also would have to give the quantities found, because it is relevant, (a) to the charge, and (b) to the possible sentencing.

GEN NEETHLING: With regards to dagga, yes, but for other schedule 6, 7, 8, yes, should you be caught there would have been a statement, it's as easy as that. A SANAB person is always in private clothes. He walks along with a lot of evidence before he gets to the laboratory, and nobody catches him. I never thought that a doctor, a registered doctor, would be caught with any substance which can be used for the improvement of humanity, never ever.

MR VALLY: I don't know about classifying mandrax as something which will ...(intervention)

GEN NEETHLING: No, you don't understand. The purpose was that it to be used to get away ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: We'll come back to that, okay, I'll pursue that. I put to you, that you did not concern yourself with the fact that the possession of those drugs, the mandrax, the LSD, the dagga, by Dr Basson, whether that fact of his possession of those drugs was legal or illegal was of no concern of yours.

GEN NEETHLING: Not at all, because I had my instruction from the Minister who told me, that this is what the people requires from you, can you assist them, and I said yes Minister, thank you Minister, goodbye Minister. That's what you say to a Minister.

MR VALLY: If the Minister ordered you to murder someone, would you?

GEN NEETHLING: No, no and Louis le Grange was not that type of person.

MR VALLY: Because you knew it was an illegal act

GEN NEETHLING: No, it would have been against my grain to kill somebody, I've never killed anybody.

MR VALLY: Not because it's illegal?

GEN NEETHLING: No, it had nothing to do with illegality, what I understand here, and I can see from the evidence I read in the newspapers, don't believe what is written in the newspaper, if that is true what is written there, we should start by saying I am a conservative Afrikaner brought up in the Dutch Reform Church, and I don't believe in murder. Is that good enough?

MR VALLY: I hear what you're saying. Gen Neethling, did you ever enquire about the control mechanisms from a security point of view?

GEN NEETHLING: Not at all. Not of any nature with regarding the substances I provided to Dr Basson. After they've my office, it was put in his motor car, I never made any enquiries. I asked what was happening with the mandrax product, how far are you in developing those things into a powder, and they said they had problems getting it up in their ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: Into their, sorry, the interpreter cut short, you said they had problems?

GEN NEETHLING: They had problems to make it kind of into a powder form to get it up into the air.

MR VALLY: You are aware that mandrax is a massive social problem in our society.

GEN NEETHLING: I know it is a serious - being seriously abused during weekends, yes.

MR VALLY: You are aware that there is a massive crime problem in this country which can be directly linked in some instances to the proliferation of drug lords who control the sourcing and selling of mandrax amongst others?

GEN NEETHLING: It's worldwide, yes there was a large conference, I'm aware of the problem.

MR VALLY: We're talking about mandrax.

GEN NEETHLING: It's worldwide.

MR VALLY: We've got the unique situation where mandrax is a drug of abuse in South Africa, on a proportion far exceeding any other country in the world. Would you agree with that?

GEN NEETHLING: The reason is because we're the only country in the world which has such good access to mandrax via our Indian connection, yes.

MR VALLY: I see.

GEN NEETHLING: All the illegal laboratories in India are responsible for the wonderful provision of methaqualone in any form whatsoever to the Republic of South Africa.

MR VALLY: Yet you were prepared to release between 100 000 and 200 00 mandrax tablets put into the boot of Dr Basson's car, personally under your supervision ...(intervention)

GEN NEETHLING: At three instances, not 200 000 at a time, at three various stages, just make sure of your facts, it's 70 000 per time approximately, 3 X 70 is about 200 000. I was satisfied to put it in the boot of his car because I knew he's a responsible physician who would do with it what we expected, that is, put them in grenades and burn it, and also to make derivatives from that. He had a team of scientists, I knew some of them ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: Let me repeat my question, mandrax abuse is a massive social problem,

GEN NEETHLING: That's right.

MR VALLY: You got to know Dr Basson better at the conference in Belgium in 1984, you didn't really know him that well, you are pseudo Policeman,

GEN NEETHLING: Yes.

MR VALLY: The very fact that you were getting such large quantities of mandrax and the fact that you were providing certificates on a regular basis for people being charge or prosecuted and convicted in court, involving mandrax, you are probably aware of papers written on drug abuse in South Africa,

GEN NEETHLING: Yes.

MR VALLY: You're aware of the extent of the drug abuse in South Africa?

GEN NEETHLING: Yes.

MR VALLY: But as this pseudo Policeman, a Major-General,

GEN NEETHLING: Yes.

MR VALLY: You put, or arranged for 200 000 mandrax on three different occasions, altogether 200 000 tablets, without concerning yourself about the security risk, about the fact that it may get onto the streets, that it may be abused, that it may be re-sold.

GEN NEETHLING: That is absolutely correct. I have no doubt that these things will be channelled in the correct channels, because there were other people who participated in this project, there were other people who isolated this methaqualone and tried to make derivatives of that and they tried to get it into the air with grenades. What I saw myself, it didn't work.

MR VALLY: I will come back to that in a short while. So, you simply did not concern yourself with that?

GEN NEETHLING: That is correct.

MR POTGIETER: General, did Dr Basson give you a receipt?

GEN NEETHLING: No. It was at three instances, at three occasions apart from the dagga, and I did not request a receipt, not for any of those three transactions, not for one of those. I can't remember that I ever saw a receipt. I never requested one. What you have to understand, Mr Chairman, an instruction was given to me, your facility in the South African Police from the Minister to the responsible person, and he said we will try to exercise riot control or crowd control better, assist those people, we can't import that, it is too expensive, it is prohibited. If you buy those chemicals red flags will be seen worldwide because they're monitoring this, and they know that somebody is doing something, that is how they obtain their information to combat the drug problem worldwide, and I didn't have the least doubt that this was a bona fide operation, and after, what I really have to say, it was, because you won't spend hundreds of thousands to establish a laboratory, and that just to sell a few mandrax tablets.

ADV POTGIETER: Wait, wait, what was the idea with the dagga? Was the idea that they extract the oil to see whether it could be used and then to get more and more oil?

GEN NEETHLING: No, to use that oil and put it in a grenade, like an ordinary grenade, instead of teargas, you could add teargas to the dagga oil. We know the people all become hooked where people are smoking dagga. When you can get this dagga into a person, you will take away his desire to fight, quickly, and then we would have clapped our hands.

ADV POTGIETER: Now you'll find out that this dagga is going to work. What would they have done, planted dagga countrywide?

GEN NEETHLING: Yes, they would reaped the dagga and they would put those in grenades all the time.

ADV POTGIETER: And all the mealie fields in the Free State would be converted into dagga fields?

GEN NEETHLING: No, there's enough in KwaZulu Natal.

ADV POTGIETER: So Le Grange and his people would have planted dagga?

GEN NEETHLING: There would have been enough because to know that there's another substance apart from teargas which could take his desire for riots out of his life, and dagga is one of the things we know which will work. We know it works, a person is aggressive, he smokes dagga, then he goes and sits in a corner, and he has peace with himself.

ADV POTGIETER: You weren't shocked that these three drug depending substances ...(intervention)

GEN NEETHLING: To use those drug dependency substances means everyday people must use it, but if you throw a grenade in Church Street because there is a process march, and they want to break the shops down, and this person isn't going to smoke the dagga again tomorrow, it will only be the dagga bomb today. If somebody cause problems, and if you can throw the dagga, this is a philosophy that we said is was like that, and if you give enough, you will force somebody to get to the water like a horse, and they wouldn't do anything else, and then we would have given them dagga and say smoke it, and then it never would have been necessary to use a weapon, and I would have shout Hallelujah.

CHAIRPERSON: Except only if the dagga was a means to an end, the end being to arrest people at the end of the day. Mrs Sooka?

MS SOOKA: General, I have a question, you talked about "hulle" and I assume the hulle was your opposition,

GEN NEETHLING: The riot crowds, the crowds like in Uitenhage and they start protesting and we are frightened, what do I have to do, I don't want to shoot, I don't want to use my Casspir, I don't want to go in there and kill the people, what can I do? I can try to use water canons like they did in Cape Town, it works wonderfully. It works in Germany, one of the most civilised countries in the world, but also teargas, it works in America. In America they use this, but they don't tell us that. When there are problems, quickly the crowds are being controlled with teargas and they walk away like lambs.

MS SOOKA: I'm quite ignorant about chemical matters, and surely if you were shooting this stuff off, it would create dependency in the population?

GEN NEETHLING: No, no, not at all. To be dependant on dagga or to be dependant on methaqualone, it costs you a reasonable time of constant consuming, you don't expect that any person like a professional riot person, there are no such persons.

MS SOOKA: Can I ask you a question, did you ever check with Mr Basson on whether he ever produced this gas and that it actually ended up where it was supposed to, not on the streets?

GEN NEETHLING: I myself saw those grenades, and they didn't work. There was machinery being tested, special machinery being tested to ignite and combust those substances to determine the gas components,

MS SOOKA: You see, I just find it very strange that in a country where we have such an incredible problem with mandrax that you were content to allow such a huge amount to go off into somebody's possession where you retained very little checking at all.

GEN NEETHLING: It sounds like a large number of tablets, it's 50 kilograms. The amount of grams required for one grenade is 30 grams according to the normal procedures. That means that you can make a few thousand grenades, and that would be the end of the story. Those will not make any one person dependant on it, but it will combat the unrest. You don't want that the person will become so angry that he doesn't care whether he dies or not, you want to calm them down. There were techniques where they used helicopters for these grenades.

MS SOOKA: It just sounds so terrible that it wasn't so dangerous, I think we're laughing, but we actually underestimate what you actually got up to. Thank you.

CHAIRPERSON: Dr Randera?

MR RANDERA: General, I understood you to tell us earlier on that you were the Head of Forensic Services for the Police.

GEN NEETHLING: That is correct, I was in charge of six different departments, one of which was, since 1985, the Forensic Department.

MR RANDERA: Right, now riot control, does that fall under - does that come within your ambit as well?

GEN NEETHLING: Oh yes, I had control, I was involved with since we started having riots in this country, since 1976.

MR RANDERA: Just explain to me, how does that fall within forensics?

GEN NEETHLING: Well, one of the things is, how do you apply teargas to be most effective and to be economic, and this is a chemical agent, and a chemical agent ...(intervention)

MR RANDERA: Sorry, Dr hold on. Perhaps I have a very simple view as a support service that the Forensic Department is supposed to be playing, you are supposed to be providing a support to the Police Officers to be making a diagnosis in assisting them coming to a trial, or making ...(intervention)

GEN NEETHLING: Yes, I know what you're saying.

MR RANDERA: That's my understanding.

GEN NEETHLING: That's part of it. That's only part of it, sir. The Policemen, the real Policemen, not a pseudo Policeman like I am, they have various techniques and knowledge the ordinary Policeman does not have. I know the nature of the chemicals we are working with. If a grenade is being thrown somewhere and people are hurt, or it's said the people have become ill, or perhaps they died, where do they run to, they run to me, and then they tell me, come and explain to us what had happened here, is it possible, can somebody die from CS?

MR RANDERA: Hold on, Dr, that's exactly the point I'm making, that you are there to assist in diagnosing, let's say, where CS gas has been used, but you are now telling me that, and you seem to have incredible knowledge about it ...(intervention)

GEN NEETHLING: I hope I do.

MR RANDERA: That you were now getting into an area whereas gas was going to be produced to control these situations.

GEN NEETHLING: That's correct.

MR RANDERA: Now, I, as I - what I would understand from that is that it's actually out of your ambit. That's not within your department to be involving yourself in that.

GEN NEETHLING: No, you're making a mistake. The mistake you are making, as a scientist, the question is posed to me by the Head of the counter-insurgency unit, we are having problems with the grenades, they are not effective. What is the problem, and go to Swartklip, they produce them, see what happens, speak to Swartklip, find out what the problem is. The problem is it is the wrong kind of teargas. It's not being used effectively. Swartklip knows it, but they don't care, they have a formula, they are making their money. Whether we use 10 000 handgrenades per day, or not, it makes a difference because they make the money. For us it is very important to improve it. Now, who is the person to improve that. I've been sent world-wide, 30 times I went overseas, not for holidays, but to go and speak to scientists regarding riot control. I provided a thick account to the late Louis le Grange where I told him this is what was happening in Israel, in Germany, in England, and we saw what they did there, and only then they brought one or three water canons on that island. And they said, we were frightened because somebody is going to take us on in terms of the law.

In Germany, outside Germany there's one standing at every town, and we said this was a good thing, if for R1000 we could contain a crowd of 100 000 people instead of using teargas to do that, we could save a lot of money. We were the people, I want to explain to you, it wasn't only teargas, it was also our shotguns, these rubber bullets. We developed that for us, "us" referring to a committee of scientists of whom I was the head, chemistry, engineers, and we said, you should not use this weapon beyond 20m, if you use it further than 20m, you can't get anything better, it's not necessary to kill him, you can hurt him, and to tell him, now you're tired of this party, go home. You don't want to shoot him a hole in the head, and this is where we developed weaponry and even today, the world comes to us, we have patents, rubber batons, the caspirs, you find them everywhere, they can't do without this.

We develop systems for explosives right through the world. I was responsible for that, and I'm not ashamed of saying that. I did not get one cent for that because I was working for the State. What I've said, I was glad that I was there, because I think I made a contribution.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Vally?

MR VALLY: Dr Neethling, let's just go back to your responsibilities as a Major-General in the Police, we're talking about the period of this transfer of dagga.

CHAIRPERSON: Can I get an indication about how long you think you're still going to be with this witness providing for cross-examination and all that?

MR VALLY: I think it will be in the region of 35 minutes.

CHAIRPERSON: Okay, right. He has to catch a flight, when does he have to go?

MR VAN ZYL: I think we can even stretch it till 16h15, Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Vally, do you think by 16h15 you will be through?

MR VALLY: Mr Chair, we have an in-house travel agent, we can arrange a later flight quite easily.

MR CILLIERS: There is no....

CHAIRPERSON: Yes, no, but I just wanted to find out from you in terms of what you think you're going to put. Can you try for 15h15?

MR VALLY: I will, I will go faster.

MR VALLY: In your capacity as Policeman to whom drugs were sent for testing, I assume that confiscated drugs were also left under your control in your laboratory?

GEN NEETHLING: They were left in the control of the laboratory per se, that is correct.

MR VALLY: Right.

GEN NEETHLING: Behind locked doors.

MR VALLY: Right. Why would you accumulate such large amounts?

GEN NEETHLING: No, no, we did not want to, we had to, because the Police would steal it otherwise from the bloody Departments where they were working. In other words, when the case was finished, instead of destroying them, some of the Policemen, even at that time, made money.

MR VALLY: Fair enough.

GEN NEETHLING: So we decided, and maybe you missed that thing, we decided that this would be locally stored, and we would take control, and when we had enough, we would go and destroy it.

MR VALLY: Right, now that's my question, why would you accumulate such large amounts, to increase the risk of them being stolen? Why wouldn't you, as the matter of course, destroy an amount immediately after the case was concluded?

GEN NEETHLING: You are not aware of how a laboratory functions, and if you want to go to a laboratory and see the evidences pouring from the doors, from the windows, there is no time to think about that, except if you have a schedule, like we have. Once per year, or when the storage places are full, then we had to get rid of that. It was not a determined time, indefinite, you don't know when these cases will be finalised, some of those cases last 10 years.

MR VALLY: Now, you would have a reason to destroy drugs only if the case is complete?

GEN NEETHLING: That is correct.

MR VALLY: So once a year when you were destroying drugs, you wouldn't destroy all the drugs, you'd only destroy the drugs in relation to cases which are completed?

GEN NEETHLING: That is correct.

MR VALLY: Why would you accumulate such large quantities of drugs?

GEN NEETHLING: Because one case could bring you 10 000 and 30 other cases would bring in many more.

MR VALLY: You just told us you destroyed these drugs once a year.

GEN NEETHLING: That is correct.

MR VALLY: It seems like an incredible security risk.

GEN NEETHLING: It might be like that for you, but at my time there was no security breach at all.

MR VALLY: Yet you would let 200 000 tablets, put it in the boot of an individual who drives off, without any concern on your part about security. When you earlier said that you didn't trust the Policemen because they may sell the drugs again onto the streets.

GEN NEETHLING: Policemen are not medical doctors, he has the right to put it in his boot.

CHAIRPERSON: ...(inaudible) not just an ordinary person, he was not even in that case, he was a medical person, coming from the State Army or a State Army component, and that's the basis on which he relied on him being the recipient of it. I don't think he's going to improve on that.

MR VALLY: Fine, I'll move onto another issue, Mr Chair. As a chemist, if you're conducting tests on whether a substance can be effectively used in the form you wanted it to be used, to be mixed with other constituent elements which would allow it to be used in teargas, or to make it water soluble, why do you need such large quantities ...(intervention)

GEN NEETHLING: They're not large quantities.

MR VALLY: For the, no, let me finish, for the testing of the suitability of those drugs, because you were justifying the large quantities to, I believe, to Ms Sooka just now, saying, that's not so much, it's only 3000 teargas grenades. I'm putting to you that you hadn't even determined whether it was effective or not yet, you hadn't even tested it. You complained that the heat destroyed the active element, the methaqualone and therefore it wouldn't be of any use. You've earlier told us that in your laboratory you only worked with small quantities, that's how chemists work. You first do the test in small quantities, and thereafter you mass-produce if it was, if your thesis is correct.

GEN NEETHLING: That's not true. I said, and I repeat, listen well, 50 kilograms, 33 grams per grenade, that means, just hang on, let me finish ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: I'm so sorry, I did you correctly the first time.

GEN NEETHLING: Okay.

MR VALLY: I did hear you correctly.

GEN NEETHLING: That is why we had very little to work with.

MR VALLY: I ...(inaudible) that as a chemist and a scientist, that you do not need to make a few hundred or a few thousand grenades to test the effectiveness of a certain chemical substance under certain conditions.

GEN NEETHLING: You're wrong, you are absolutely wrong. I don't know what your profession is, but if you are a scientist, then I'm scared of you. A chemist is not a pharmacist, and there are people in the audience who cannot speak Afrikaans very well, but a chemist is not a pharmacist, he's a scientist. As far as I'm concerned, if you just want to go and look what means a pilot plant to say that today I'm making a grenade for the Defence Force. That means a few thousand grenades before one is released in this that it's good enough. We had the biggest trouble to make, to get a few hundred grenades of CR gas operative, and we used a few thousand.

MR VALLY: We're not getting much further, but if the issue is the effect of heat on the chemical and the destruction of the active element of that chemical, I put to you, that it would not have been necessary to supply the quantities you supplied.

GEN NEETHLING: You are wrong, Mr Vally. The reason is very simple, for 30 grams in a grenade which you want to process effectively, you cannot come with small quantities and expect to change it back into large quantities, that's not how it works. You do the formulation, you do your best, you do your measurements in a small apparatus, 20/30 grams. Thereafter you go and you produce a larger grenade and you burn it and you get the gasses, and you are lucky if you get an answer the tenth time.

MR VALLY: Let's go on. You were very please with the results that you obtained vis a vis CR gas, is that correct?

GEN NEETHLING: Yes, we were very happy with that.

MR VALLY: And you saw it as very effective means of crowd control?

GEN NEETHLING: That's correct.

MR VALLY: To use in anti-riot situations in South Africa?

GEN NEETHLING: That's correct.

MR VALLY: We've had Dr Koekemoer here giving evidence, saying that CR gas, or may I should ask you one more question before that,

GEN NEETHLING: Please do.

MR VALLY: And was it used on a large scale in South Africa?

GEN NEETHLING: It was used on two occasion of which I know, and then thereafter, twice operationally. How many are being made now I do not know. I do not know what the total capability was of CR production.

MR VALLY: I'm not asking you that, what I want to know from you, is was it issued as standard anti-riot equipment after its approval?

GEN NEETHLING: Not at all. During my time it was only tested, I have the papers that I can show you. It was approved by the Head of the Defence Force by the Minister of Police to say, go ahead, do your tests. We did tests on our own people, on two occasions. I was part of it each time. I went through all the suffering to be able to say, we are satisfied, these things are 100%. Thereafter it went to the Defence Force, Quartermaster of the Defence Force, because you cannot use anything that hasn't been approved by him. There it was approved that manufacturing could take place of that grenade, and it was known by a code number. Only the chap who was the operator says that, I'm going to use it, and then they would evaluate the effect thereof. They used it on two occasions which I know, and they said that they had never yet used so little smoke and had such success.

MR VALLY: ...(inaudible) it was approved for anti-riot control within South Africa?

GEN NEETHLING: As far as I know, the Quartermaster-General gave the Police permission, and I do not know how many of them were made, because he himself also took of them, but Swartklip can give us that information. On two occasions we were given grenades, and we used them, but I do not know if they were made after this again. I don't know what the reason could be, whether it was the ending of the project, I don't know, but CR gas was only used on two occasions, operationally,

MR VALLY: What I want to put to you is, and we have submitted that document, Mr Chair, it was attached to the affidavit of, I believe, of Mr Enslin, showing the production.

GEN NEETHLING: Yes, Mr Enslin Smit of Swartklip, yes.

MR VALLY: It was given to you, I believe, not to you Gen Neethling, but to your legal team.

CHAIRPERSON: I think, Mr Vally, there's a difference of opinion, I don't think the annexure was there by everybody else's.

MR VALLY: The annexure was there, Mr Chairperson, but we said that that would not be released to the public for reasons of proliferation, but it is there.

CHAIRPERSON: Okay. Production quantities,

MR VALLY: That's correct.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes, I think it was.

MR VALLY: I put it to you that Dr Koekemoer told us this hearing that he would not have approved, and he was the person at Delta G responsible for the manufacture, that he did not believe and would not have approved of CR gas being used within South Africa. He had no problems with it being used outside, but within South Africa, because of the toxic effect it had on the environment, because it stays in the environment for a period of at least, I believe he said 17 years.

CHAIRPERSON: Five years.

MR VALLY: Is it five years.

CHAIRPERSON: Minimum five years, yes.

MR VALLY: I beg your pardon, a minimum of five years. Now, you say that this was approved to be used as an anti-riot measure when it has this effect on the environment and that made toxic the environment for at least five years?

GEN NEETHLING: Mr Chairman, with all respect, I do not want to differ with Mr Koekemoer's opinion, but I do want to say that I think Mr Koekemoer doesn't know much about this. He has not yet walked through the smoke of a grenade, but he made the active ingredient of CR gas. What happened to it thereafter and what the smoke looks like and what the concentration thereof is on the environment, Dr Koekemoer knows nothing about that. Point no 2, the information that Dr Koekemoer received about CR is what he got from me, from no-one else, because it doesn't just lie there, you have to search for it, your colleagues abroad, you don't just obtain it very easily, and I would tell you this, that I had no concern whatsoever that there could possibly be traces of CR in the environment after I had thrown a CR or a teargas grenade containing CR gas. It would not hurt anybody, it wouldn't make a frog sing, nothing, because the environmentalists are very concerned about something they do not know anything about, and I want to tell you that we saturated areas with CR in Malierskop where a week later we operated, and nobody even complained of an itch, and I want to tell you this, while it is active and it chases you around, so in the end you do not know where to touch and where not to scratch. There is no area, not Malierskop or any other place where we heard afterwards that we had made a mess because the environment is polluted.

MR VALLY: Unlike CS, if you wash your face, you are actually re-activating its effect on you.

GEN NEETHLING: The reason for that, Mr Chairman, is very easy to explain. First of all, CR is much more potent in its efficiency in minuter quantities than CS. Secondly, because it is also lipid soluble, in other words, it dissolves in fats of your skin, it is less soluble that CS, which will disappear, you can wash it with water. Then, when you put water on again, you re-activate the feeling, you know what I mean, that means getting an itch again. But that disappears, I mean, I've went through it myself. Mr Koekemoer may have felt CR while he was making it, I'm quite sure he did, so he knows, when he went home at night, he would be itching like crazy, and I tell you now, after walking through that CR gas that we produced in the grenade that was approved by the Quartermaster-General from the Defence Force, there was no ill-effects afterwards. The next day I was quite happy, and I'm one that if it wasn't, I would have said, wait, that's not right, let's formulate again.

MR VALLY: And that wasn't the case. Mr Chair, I'm trying to rush, but bear in mind that Gen Neethling has got a lot to say.

GEN NEETHLING: When you're asking me I have to answer you, sir.

MR VALLY: Sure, as long as, with respect ...(intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Vally.

MR VALLY: Could I just go on. Do you know anything about the biological, chemical biological ...(intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Vally, can you, Mr Arendse,

MR ARENDSE: Can I also just add that not only is Gen Neethling saying far too much that what he's asked to say, there's also a lot of detail which is beginning to concern us, which is quite unnecessary and irrelevant to the enquiry.

CHAIRPERSON: If at any time there is a concern that he is doing so, you must please indicate the onus of it, and if it will facilitate your task for Mr Kennedy or anybody from your clients to sit next to you so that you can quickly intervene, then appropriate arrangements should be made for you to sit next to him.

MR ARENDSE: Yes, I don't think it's appropriate for me to interject at every term. There's in fact a number of things which we've picked up throughout the course of Gen Neethling's evidence thus far which concerns us, but it's just something I'm registering at this point, and that's all.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you. Mr Vally?

MR VALLY: Would you say that your knowledge of the Chemical and Biological Warfare project only extended as far as production of teargas and considering using dagga, LSD and mandrax in teargas, as well as the dog breeding programme, or did you know more than that?

GEN NEETHLING: Mr Chairman, that is a question that I cannot just say yes or no. Let me tell you what I know, that's easier. What I do know is that Delta G had a capability to make anything, no matter what. They had a synthetic ability which is the dream of every synthetic chemist, but the biological side, I've heard about this, very little, and I knew that there were biological peptides which were synthesised or they were trying to synthesise. There were agents such as snake-bite and biological no, not at all ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: I want you to look at document TRC 14, your attorney has it. I'm referring to page, stamped no 4616.

MR CILLIERS: If my learned friend can just indicate where it comes from. No documentation was given us for Dr Neethling, he was only given a subpoena, and if you can just indicate to use where we can find it and give us one of the bundle of documents of the other witnesses whom we also represent, then we'll be able to find it.

MR VALLY: Mr Cilliers the extension of bundles for his other clients, we did this morning give him this particular document again, and we pointed out the paragraph to him.

MR CILLIERS: We have found it. Paragraph what?

MR VALLY: The 12th paragraph.

MR CILLIERS: On what page?

MR VALLY: The ...(indistinct) number is 4616, the typed number is 6.

MR CILLIERS: Yes, top paragraph?

MR VALLY: Top paragraph,

"Dr Basson also mentioned that Major-General Lothar Neethling was fully informed regarding project Jotta. Dr Basson and General Neethling are using one another as sounding boards in the development and use of certain commodities. Dr Basson, however, also mentioned that due to the court case regarding CCB activities, whereby General Neethling was involved, that he could possibly be embittered and be regarded as a wounded lion."

And this document is signed by Head of Staff Information, Lieutenant-General van der Westhuizen, for the information of the Surgeon-General. So Dr Basson seems to indicate that you knew fully the production of all the commodities in terms of Operation Jotta, which included, I submit to you, both what Delta G was doing, and what RRL was doing.

GEN NEETHLING: May I answer. I would like to say to you that what stands here is an outright lie, the name Jotta I have seen or heard for the first time today. I've never heard of it in my life. I deny that I was informed regarding this project. I deny that I knew of any project of the Defence Force at any time. I never had any information as do the Ministers and the Deputy-Ministers of Defence, because I was a pseudo Policeman, that's point no 1. Point no 2, the person who compiled this document must have his head read, he is ashamed to give me what's my due, because he signed this information on the 25th of March 1992, coming from the Defence Force with a strong discipline signed, Lieutenant-General C P van der Westhuizen. I am seven years his senior. For seven years I had already been a Lieutenant-General, when he was in his baby shoes, and he - I do not even want to blame him for that, but this is counter-information which is not worth the paper it's written on. This is something that I have never known, the first time that I heard the word CCB was during the Harms Commission. I was not informed about CCB activities, now it says that I am a embittered, wounded lion. They must have their head read. I am not at all cross with Dr Basson, I still respect him as I did 15 years ago. That which I read about him recently, I do not want to believe that. I would like this case to go to criminal court, that he can be found guilty of something which I do not think he is capable of doing. Paragraph 22 is a lot of nonsense as far as I'm concerned, but if I look further at what they say about Jotta, then I agree that I know what Medchem is, I know what Delta G is, I know what Roodeplaat is and I know what Protechnic and Technotec is. I have heard about Lifestyle, but I have had nothing to do with them yet. Protechnic, I've purchased things, we've had things tested there, gas masks, etc. Official Armscor channels were used with Protechnic, same with Technotec. This whole programme of BSB is a misnomer, the programme called ABC, but the "A" is being left out, but perhaps we are ashamed of it. In Afrikaans it's nuclear warfare.

MR VALLY: You've made your point, you denied ...(intervention)

GEN NEETHLING: I am angry if I see this document that such nonsense is being shown to me. I'm not only denying it, but ...(inaudible) is a maniac and a liar, and if it was C P van der Westhuizen, I say to him categorically just like the President said to General Meiring, why do you give me this rubbish.

MR VALLY: Right, thank you. For the record, it's a letter dated 25th of March 1992, enquiries Lieutenant-General (Joffel) van der Westhuizen, who is the Head of Staff Information, and it was for the attention of the Surgeon-General.

GEN NEETHLING: He's here, you can ask him.

MR VALLY: I certainly will.

GEN NEETHLING: Thank you.

MR VALLY: I want to ask you another question. I refer you to TRC 111, we have ...(intervention)

GEN NEETHLING: Yes, I got that just now.

MR VALLY: Okay.

GEN NEETHLING: At the start, what page, this is a rather lengthy document.

MR VALLY: It is a lengthy document. I did mark off the specific page for your attorneys at some point. This is the Steyn report, the heading of this report is, "Staf geskrif vir die - Steyn Commission regarding risky activities or SA components". I refer you to page B11(iii). I think ...(intervention)

GEN NEETHLING: I got it, B11, yes.

MR VALLY: We first gave your attorneys just those two pages, then we gave them the full report.

GEN NEETHLING: Thank you.

MR VALLY: Now, you see the headings on top?

GEN NEETHLING: Yes, "persons involved in so-called poison murders".

MR VALLY: ...(inaudible) "persone betrokke, Brigadier W Basson, Generaal Lothar ...(intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: What page are you reading from, Mr Vally?

MR VALLY: It's B11, Mr Chairman, B11.

CHAIRPERSON: B11 of TRC 111.

MR VALLY: And (iii). It's where the tables are.

CHAIRPERSON: Carry one.

MR VALLY: I don't know if you want me to read it out to you, let me do so quickly,

"From the old group Charles Naude, Special Forces (CCB), a group under the leadership of Brigadier W Basson which executed all elimination commands or orders. General Lothar Neethling was intimately involved (evidence of these specific members obtainable). Under evaluation it is recommended that all the information in the previous column be read first. From the allegations are many questions which have to be answered before a meaningful evaluation can be made. Due to the allegations ...(intervention)

GEN NEETHLING: Perhaps I should continue.

MR VALLY: Please.

GEN NEETHLING: "the allegations, it seems as if there could possibly be truth in some of the allegations. Reporting received during December 1992 alleges, amongst others, that certain members of DLE rushed around with Goldstone's visit because there were beer cans doctored with poison. The explanation for the presence of the poison was that the Special Forces were to distribute it in Mozambique. The Special Forces poisons received from Seventh Battalion which can be received, it's a poison which is a new product which can be applied in any way, made available by Brigadier Basson, however, it's not possible to make a meaningful evaluation before affidavits are obtained and further investigation is done."

What is your question?

MR VALLY: Do you see the allegation in this Steyn report regarding your, and the word is not mine, the word is, I believe, "General Lothar Neethling was intimately involved".

GEN NEETHLING: Just read the sentence before that, it says, "all elimination orders were supposed to have been carried out". Let me just reply please, I want to say this to you. It is the first time that I've seen that a Steyn report wants to incriminate me for whatever reason.

CHAIRPERSON: In your opinion that's correct, well not correct, but I read what I see, it does not appear that this is the Steyn report. You know there has been a lot of dispute whether there was or was not a report. It seems to me if you look at TRC 111, it says, "Staff memo for the Steyn Commission". It is documentation that possibly was put before Steyn that may have then lead to the so-called report. Whether it was ...(indistinct). So, we're not talking about the Steyn report here, but I suppose you know it was ...(intervention)

GEN NEETHLING: I agree, Mr Chairman. Thank you for clearing this matter up. In any case, as far as I see this document, this is very beautiful, the same category as this one that was TRC 14, as far I'm concerned I do not deny that I have had a very close relationship with Dr Basson, and I will tell you exactly, I was with him four times overseas. We've had many hours on the aeroplane, which becomes very uncomfortable, we've had many hours together after-hours at symposia, and at certain instances where we were negotiating technology which is for the good of this country and which was for the good of the South African Police. That's why I was involved. Four times I went with him overseas, and people can easily, very easily deduct that when the Chief of the Defence Force gives me, he asked me to please accompany Dr Basson to give them cover so that they think that he's possibly a medical man, he's involved with the Police, that was his cover, and I was not afraid, because everybody knew me, they knew exactly that I was a Policeman. I did not have to hide it, and that was a cover and I was proud to be involved in this project. Where we went to Zurich, to Germany, to London to get equipment for us which we needed because there was a war going in Angola where there were chemicals used and we were standing there, we had nothing to protect us, nothing, and we got experts from overseas to testify to that. We went to the highest authority known to Europe, the United Nations advisor on chemical warfare which had seen atrocities in Iran, he was in Angola. We talked to him in Brussels, in Kent at least, I'm sorry, and I was intimately involved ...(intervention)

MR ARENDSE: Chairperson, can Dr Neethling stop, unless there's any value on that evidence?

CHAIRPERSON: Yes, I'm afraid I was going to begin to say so. You know, I think the essence of your agreement with the Ministry is not so much only on proliferation, it is also to the extent that third parties with which this Government has got to relations, unless the matter is absolutely ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: From my own perspective I would respect the position, except for what issues, he's the expert in Belgium, we're talking about Dr Hendriks.

GEN NEETHLING: That's correct.

MR VALLY: Well, with respect, Gen Neethling, we've had Mr Charles van Remoortrere here, who you do know,

GEN NEETHLING: Yes.

MR VALLY: And Mr van Remoortrere has confirmed that this Dr Hendriks has been convicted of fraud in Belgium, as well as academic fraud.

GEN NEETHLING: Yes, that's quite correct. Let me tell you, and ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: Sorry, is he your expert you're talking about?

GEN NEETHLING: I'm talking about not only Dr Hendriks, I'm talking about him being in Angola. I'm saying that the two international symposia that we attended was sponsored by the United Nations. He was used as an expert by the United Nations in the Iran/Iraq conflict. He was projected to the world as one of the biggest experts on chemical warfare and that's how we knew him.

MR VALLY: Whether he had been convicted of fraud and academic fraud?

GEN NEETHLING: Wait a minute, whether he in his department afterwards, after we met him in 1984, first time, I would not know. I saw him three times in my life, 1984 and 1986 and again in 1990, when he was here, walking through Angola dust, and checking the chemicals that were used there. He visited my laboratory, and he went off. That's how I know him, and I'm saying to you I have no idea what atrocities he did as far as academic forgery is concerned, and I have no idea why United Nations would use him as an expert the way they did.

MR VALLY: I'm just worried about time, Mr Chair, but I am really being forced into a situation where I have to wait for the answers. I have lots of questions left, Mr Chair, and I need your direction, I can confine it to just a few if you think under pressure so I know which ones to focus one, or I can ...(intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: We had an arrangement for quarter past, we're well past quarter past.

MR VALLY: Alright, in that situation I will ask two more questions. Firstly, Dr Koekemoer said he came to you personally because he was concerned about an order he got to manufacture ecstasy and instead of assuring him or advising him that this is illegal as a Policeman, or a pseudo Policeman, I can tell you that you should not be doing so, or I will take it up for you, you instead talked about better chemical methods to make the ecstasy. But that the understood that you approved of them manufacturing ecstasy. How do you respond to this?

GEN NEETHLING: I respond as follows, sir. Dr Koekemoer came to me at a party at a mutual friend who turned 40, naughty 40, which I attended. I attended that party and I was retired from the South African Police. That was after August 1992, and he came to me and said, what do I think of producing ecstasy for use of a mood-changer. I said I think it can work, I think it's a fantastic idea, but I've go a problem, I think the molecule is unstable. That's all I said. If he infers from that that I gave consent for something I couldn't give consent, he is dreaming, maybe he's under the influence of ecstasy himself. I have never had ecstasy in my laboratory while I was working there. I have never seen one microgram of ecstasy while I was in the laboratories active, never. I believe they are now running ecstasy everyday, but that's not the point, the point is I tell you, that I would not have given him consent the way he's saying that I say, go ahead, Koekies, carry on and make the thing. I said to him, Koekies, that molecule in my opinion, whatever it's worth, I'm a retired pseudo Policeman, I do not think will make it.

CHAIRPERSON: In all fairness to the witness, he said Generaal, you were more interested in the chemistry than the science and I think from what you say, that ...(intervention)

GEN NEETHLING: That's correct, that's what I said. Yes, I said to him, the chemistry tells me this molecule will not make it.

CHAIRPERSON: But I accept that you know the inference he seemed to be drawing that far from you discouraging from doing something which you thought might be abused if it fell into the wrong hands, far less effective if it is manufactured by people at that level. You didn't seem to concern yourself with that side of chemistry, because you were interested in the science.

GEN NEETHLING: No, not at all, that's correct. I was not concerned at all about possibilities. I said to him, it's worthwhile trying because it's such good mood changer, it's a fantastic mood changer. If I can get this into a grenade, I will have no nonsense with nobody, you know what I mean, I'll break up all these little tits and tats between man and woman, just like that. The Police would have no jobs, I'm telling you. So, I'm telling you the bloody molecule is ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: I have questions left which I want to get in please.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes, Mr Vally. Order please, order.

MR VALLY: What better form of a crowd control could you have than to get the most rebellious element of the society you were in, black youth, addicted to mandrax?

GEN NEETHLING: What better crowd control could I have?

MR VALLY: That's correct.

GEN NEETHLING: I would like to have no rebellious blacks, I would have the best crowd control.

MR VALLY: So, you would have no problems with creating a situation if it was possible, to create an addiction to mandrax amongst the youth in the townships?

GEN NEETHLING: Listen, sir, let me ask you, let me say this to you straight, and I'm happy that Professor Forbes is sitting next to you. Never, ever, in all my discussions we had with many people, the term addiction was risen once by me. I have no hesitation in saying to you, the way this is applied will not addict anybody, never. You will not come back tomorrow and say let me make a riot again so that we can get a sniff of that ecstasy.

MR VALLY: The question is very simple, what better form of crowd control could there be than to get an enslaved ...(intervention)

GEN NEETHLING: No, there's no question of enslavement here, there's no question of ever saying we want to addict people to CR or to dagga or to mandrax, or what, that was never the case. The case at hand is to try and change the mood, and mood changes are done with very small amounts, you do not get addicted by using it once or twice, that's not true.

MR VALLY: You know mandrax is an addictive drug?

GEN NEETHLING: Oh yes, sir, I do indeed.

MR VALLY: And a dangerous one at that.

GEN NEETHLING: Dangerous like what?

MR VALLY: Dangerous to the health.

GEN NEETHLING: No, we have never - there are no people dead ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: Dangerous to society?

GEN NEETHLING: Dangerous to society, yes, because they get virtually uncontrollable at some stage when they are in this process of getting to the high, they can become very difficult. I've seen that myself.

MR VALLY: General, in your various trips and dealings and associations with Dr Wouter Basson, and in your visits to Roodeplaat Research Laboratories, were you ever aware that they were making toxins?

GEN NEETHLING: No, sir, never aware. Never was the word toxin used by Dr Basson as far as production is concerned, in any dealings I had with him at any time.

MR VALLY: Were you never aware that he produced any substances which could kill people.

GEN NEETHLING: No, no, I knew that they were trying peptides, I knew that they were trying ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: What for?

GEN NEETHLING: They were trying to make the same things, changing mood, changing mood of people. Peptides are extremely nice things to have.

MR VALLY: So they're only making friendly drugs, they were not making any poisons.

GEN NEETHLING: No, no, we're saying friendly drugs, that is an overestimate, I mean, we're not saying drugs, we're saying chemical substance that will change your mind. Alcohol changes your mind.

MR VALLY: I see, they were not making any toxic substances as far as you knew?

GEN NEETHLING: No, not that I know of, sir.

MR VALLY: And if there were, what would you have done?

GEN NEETHLING: I have never been to that part of the buildings that were built by Roodeplaat. I was only concerned with the detection of explosives, and what I saw on my second visit to Roodeplaat, I was privy to an operation on a rat, which technology was attained in order to change the rat so that it can detect explosives for VIP protection. These are techniques that we picked up overseas. This is a whole industry which is extremely important to have for any country, and they showed me that on the same basis as the Dessert Mouse which can detect explosives to levels which are unknown even to dogs. They found out that they can change a little part in the brain and then this rat when it smells at that same level any explosive, it becomes extremely exited, and that is used to protect your VIP's, your presidents. This used - there's many things going on ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: Are you giving us a justification for what he was doing?

GEN NEETHLING: No, no, I'm saying that was the only time I was in a laboratory when they were still close the road, they were building the new ones, I've never been to the new one except in 1993 when I delivered a sample ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: If Dr Basson has asked your for some toxins ...(intervention)

GEN NEETHLING: I have no toxins.

MR VALLY: If he had asked you, what would your reaction had been?

GEN NEETHLING: Go to Onderstepoort.

MR VALLY: Go to where?

GEN NEETHLING: Onderstepoort.

MR VALLY: I see.

GEN NEETHLING: Veterinary Research Institute. They are using botulism everyday by the ton, by the ton.

MR VALLY: I'll remind you what you said in your trial ...(intervention)

GEN NEETHLING: My trial, what trial, I had so many?

MR VALLY: What trial is this now, please,

GEN NEETHLING: I don't know which one.

MR VALLY: Lothar Neethling versus Max du Preez ...(intervention)

GEN NEETHLING: Oh, that's my favourite one.

MR VALLY: And I read at page 1468,

"If Dirk Coetzee had come to you to obtain poisons and knockout drops, what would have happened then as far as you are concerned",

Your response was,

"I can think of many things. It depends certainly in which way he approaches me, whether he comes to my office, or whether I meet him in the passage, or where, my reaction would be exactly the same. I would probably chase him and I would probably have picked up the telephone and called the Commissioner or the ...(intervention)

GEN NEETHLING: I still repeat what I've said, what is the question?

MR VALLY: Do you ...(inaudible) to Onderstepoort to get toxins, whereas you said in this case that you'd get the person arrested.

GEN NEETHLING: You're missing the point, you're missing the point, sir. You're making an inference which does not exist. We also discussed things like appearances in the newspaper which says the Russians are working on virus which only works on Negrite skin, you know, this is rubbish, this is the same thing as saying, I would love to have toxin which puts everybody to sleep when I want, because then I will have no problem with the population when they become out of hand. Any country in the world would like to have something like this, and as a matter of fact, some of our most advanced countries do have things that will scare you, you who are afraid of addition, sir. I think they got things that really make you scared, which has got nothing to do with addiction.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Vally.

MR VALLY: This is my very last question. The reason I quoted this to you was, you made an amnesty application which you subsequently withdrew ...(intervention)

GEN NEETHLING: Which I what?

MR VALLY: Subsequently withdrew.

GEN NEETHLING: No, no, I didn't withdraw it, I was forced to withdraw it. I'm happy you're asking my this, because I want to have a press conference after this in any case, to clear up a few things ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: Mr Chair, I would like you to take note of that in view of the fact that we are pressurised for time here, and I'm being forced to cut my leading of ...(intervention) short,

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Vally, you're taking more time, I've taken all the notes.

GEN NEETHLING: Let me quickly respond, Mr Chairman. As far as I'm concerned, I asked for amnesty, I said I would like to ask for amnesty for anything that could be laid before me of which I do not at this point in time have any knowledge of. I do not know what they came with, like this "teeninligtingsinformasie", this is rubbish. Now, I don't know what they can come up with in the future, then I would like to say, if something like this does occur, and then I got the answer back from the Amnesty Committee, you cannot do that, sorry, unless you state the incident and the time, we cannot even look at you for amnesty, and please withdraw, and I said, under those circumstances if you don't want to help me, I have to withdraw, what else can I do. I can't go in front of the Amnesty Committee on my knees and beg them, please reconsider, I've got it right here, I've got all the papers here, they sent it back to me. So, I did not withdraw it, sir, please let the record speak for itself, the Amnesty Committee told me to withdraw unless I specify the deed and the time and the place, which I said I cannot do.

MR VALLY: Mr Chair, for the record, I want to do two things, I want to read the letter sent the by Amnesty Committee to General Neethling into the record, and I also want to refer to General Neethling's amnesty application.

Very briefly, the amnesty application said as follows, ...(intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Vally, can I just establish, what is the purpose?

MR VALLY: Well, the purpose directly relates to my previous question regarding the case of General Neethling and Max Du Preez. That's why I asked that question, because the amnesty application refers to that case.

CHAIRPERSON: I'm just wanting to find, where does this all lead us in terms of this particular enquiry that you are referring to.

MR VALLY: That is, or was General Neethling in terms of what he states in his amnesty application saying that the allegations or any possible evidence given by him in the Max du Preez case was incorrect, or the allegations against him was correct, I'm not clear. General Neethling can answer the question, but I want to read what he said in his amnesty application, it is not altogether clear, but for the sake of the Amnesty Committee I also want to make clear what they told General Neethling, because there is a distortion, as if he was forced to withdraw his amnesty application, when this is not the case.

So the first issue is a question relating to his amnesty application, the second this is, for the record, so that understanding of what position of the Amnesty Committee was.

MR CILLIERS: Mr Chairman, with respect, my learned friend says he wants to set the record straight because there are allegations made regarding the Amnesty Committee. We are pressed for time and if I read the situation correctly, this will cause a debate which will take time and it will take away the right from other people who would like to pose questions. If Mr Vally wants to put the case right with the press afterwards, it is his right to do that.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Cilliers, I don't know where this thing is taking us and I certainly - if you want to put a specific thing to Mr Neethling as to whether, whatever it is, I mean to read this thing into the record, he has told us he made an application, that application was rejected on the basis that he states, and I want to know the further question, where does it take this particular enquiry to?

MR VALLY: Mr Chairperson, there are two issues here, the one is directly related to the enquiry which is the subject matter of his amnesty application, which, and it's very short, and the second issue is an allegation he made against the Amnesty Committee which is false.

GEN NEETHLING: I made no allegation against the Amnesty Committee, sir. Please repeat that allegation if I may, I'm stupid, I'm not a legal man, please tell me.

CHAIRPERSON: And where does it take the enquiry into the use of chemical and biological warfare in the programme in the perpetration of violations of human rights, Mr Valley, with respect ...(intervention)

MR VALLY: With respect, Mr Chair, the first issue regarding the amnesty application relates to poisons, etc as referred to in the Lothar Neethling versus Max du Preez trial. That's why I quoted that passage regarding Dirk Coetzee.

CHAIRPERSON: Why don't you put it to him? Why don't you put it to him ...(inaudible)

MR VALLY: Thank you, Mr Chairman, if you give me a chance, I will.

CHAIRPERSON: The allegation was made that you did ABC and D. You don't have to go through the torturous process of referring to his amnesty application. I think that case is common cause, in fact he quotes it ...(indistinct) reversing the amnesty application, even gives you reference, 1994(1) SA708(d). Put the allegations to him.

MR VALLY: My question is this, you reported to apply for amnesty and I quote,

"In the light of previous events when evidence was published against me, see Neethling's case, if it is so, I ask cordially for amnesty as asked for by Bishop Desmond Tutu for all of us to participate in the process and the Amnesty Committee said",

You had not specified the acts for which you are asking for amnesty. My question is this, are you saying that the allegations made against you in the case of Lothar Neethling versus Max du Preez, are in fact true and you're asking for amnesty for those?

GEN NEETHLING: No, sir, I said if they come with the same lies regarding any other incident, I would like to now ask amnesty because I want then to, like this year, I mean I'm extremely disturbed about this document which says that I know anything about Jotta. This is a complete lie, now, it's so easy to brand a guy. Let met tell you, sir ...(intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: Can I ask a question, General, do we understand from your application such as it was, that you were seeking an opportunity to put the record straight in relation to all the allegations that had been made.

GEN NEETHLING: That's correct, and if the Amnesty Committee was the vehicle that was available, that was the vehicle you wanted to use.

GEN NEETHLING: That is correct, sir.

CHAIRPERSON: Are you saying we shouldn't construe this as having been an admission of any of the allegations that were made in the cases referred to?

GEN NEETHLING: Absolutely correct, sir, because that's why I said I cannot supply the Amnesty Committee any further detail because I do not have it. If I had this document at the time, and I think it would have been relevant, if I had this document TRC 111, I would have referred to as that I said, I deny this, it's not true. I did not have this document, sir, I did not have this document. I would have referred to that as ...(intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: I think the difficulty that we have is that you possibly did this without having benefit of legal advice because, I mean, you wouldn't - had you had legal advice, you would have been told that you do not use the Amnesty Committee process to deny allegations against you.

GEN NEETHLING: Sir, ...(intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: You actually use them to admit allegations against you so that you can amnesty.

GEN NEETHLING: Let me tell you how this came about. I was asked by the Commissioner, the previous Commissioner of Police, General Johan van der Merwe, he said to me, Lothar, in view of this request, almost begging, of Bishop Tutu regarding participation, we have decided to ask anyone, please apply for amnesty. I said to him, but I cannot apply for amnesty, because I don't know what for. He said: "Don't worry I'll send you the forms." I got the forms from one of his couriers delivered to my house. I filled in that form at about quarter past nine at night and it was said to me: "Don't worry about the under oath we will do it at the office." And it was gone. I didn't even think it was not by oath. So there it was. And then it came back to me a couple of almost a year later if I remember correctly the time. And it said: "Please give me more detail." I said I can't and then they said: "In that case please withdraw." I said: "Then I have to withdraw. I cannot do anything else." And then I withdrew.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Vally.

GEN NEETHLING: But on this point Sir may I ask your indulgence for 5 seconds. I was born in 1935 in Germany. I left Germany in 1948 at the age of 13. The war ended in 1945 and if you read the press you will see that I am being accused of having had 5 years of Nazis training, 5 years of Nazi training which means I started at the age of 5 to become a poisoner and I resent that. It destroyed my life. Simple irresponsible journalism and this is happening in this country every day. And I am making part of this process the way I see it coming out of here not what is said here but what is written. And this is written words, these are written words. This is deadly poison. This is what this is.

MR VALLY: General Neethling.

GEN NEETHLING: Yes Sir.

MR VALLY: Have you ever been in Doctor Immelmann's walk-in safe?

GEN NEETHLING: I have never been in Doctor Immelmann's office. I was surprised to hear that I was accused of being one of the two frequent visitors. I have never been in Immelmann's office. I am telling you. And I have two suit cases with which I went to work and none of them can be bulging because they are fixed form. There is one of them. The other one is the (...indistinct) It cannot bulge. This is ridiculous. And I don't know why he said that. I would like to see him there and ask him: "Please why are you not telling the truth? Why are you bringing me into a situation which does not exist." Let Immelmann ask you. Let anybody else ask you. I have never been in Immelmann's office, never.

These are the sort of allegations which are being thrown into the world which makes Max du Preez very happy because he says now he is going to get me again. He can try.

MR VALLY: You are of course aware of the allegations Doctor Immelmann made in his affidavit? It has been shown to you?

GEN NEETHLING: I have no idea what Immelmann said. I have nothing from Immelmann.

MR VALLY: No I am sorry. Not Doctor Immelmann's affidavit. I beg your pardon.

CHAIRPERSON: You wanted to say van Rensburg ja.

MR VALLY: I think it was Mr van Rensburg. I beg your pardon.

GEN NEETHLING: Allegations that van Rensburg makes against me for carrying out poisons in bulging suit cases. I don't even laugh.

MR VALLY: I have no further questions Mr Chair.

MR POLSEN: Mr Chairman I am sorry I have to put the record straight. I don't think Doctor van Rensburg ever said that Doctor Neethling carried out poison in bulging suit cases.

CHAIRPERSON: Ja.

GEN NEETHLING: The press may have said that but the witness didn't say that.

GEN NEETHLING: Yes. Well Sir you know this disturbed my wife. She cried like a baby.

CHAIRPERSON: No General he was addressing the Chair.

GEN NEETHLING: I am sorry Sir, sorry.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes thank you. Cross-examination Mr Polsen?

MR POLSEN: I have no questions Mr Chair.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr du Plessis?

MR DU PLESSIS: I have no questions.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Currin?

MR CURRIN: I have no questions Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Norman Arendse?

MR ARENDSE: No questions Chairperson.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr van Zyl?

MR VAN ZYL: We have no re-examination of the witness.

MS LEVINE: Mr Chairman, can I be heard? My name is Melissa Levine. I am an attorney with the Aravan and Dicks in Cape Town. I have received instructions from a colleague and a correspondent attorney in Johannesburg today, David Disan of the firm David Disan, Ameer and Ndlovo to put certain parts of the record in the case that has already been referred to in this hearing - the case of LOTHAR NEETHLING v MAX DU PREEZ a case which I understand was heard before the local division in the Transvaal. Either the Witwatersrand local division or the Transvaal provincial division I am not certain.

I have also been supplied by Mr Disan with certain parts of the record which on behalf of Mr Disan's client, Die Vrye Weekblad the erstwhile newspaper edited by Mr Max du Preez I would like to put certain of the parts of the record to General Neethling on behalf of Mr Disan's client, Die Vrye Weekblad. And I ask the Chairman for an opportunity very briefly to do so?

CHAIRPERSON: Mr.

MR CILLIERS: As it pleases you Mr Chairman. If it is my learned colleague's statement that she appears on behalf of the Vrye Weekblad it has not existed in the last few years. She pretends to be appearing for a client that does not exist. I am worried if this matter is becoming now seems to me a personal battle or dispute which wants to be reopened. It has nothing to do with CBW. And it is my respectful submission that there is no relevance of this matter towards this one. That matter was about allegations of poison being presented to a certain policeman. But this has no bearing on this matter.

In the first place my learned colleague has no locus standi to appear in front of you for a client that does not exist. And secondly there is no relevance to what we are discussing here.

MS LEVINE: If I may respond very briefly to what my learned colleague has said. It is absolutely correct and it is my instructions that the Vrye Weekblad does not exist any longer but in fact I would then be representing Mr du Preez who was the erstwhile editor of the Vrye Weekblad. And my understanding and instructions are that the Vrye Weekblad was in fact forced to close down as a result of a substantial award of costs made against it by the Appellate Division as a result of this matter which was subsequently taken before the Appellate Division where the Vrye Weekblad for various reasons could not discharge an onus of proof in the defamation case upon it and was therefore ordered to pay certain costs. As a result of which it was forced to close down. So the erstwhile company Wending Publikasie which was the owner of the Vrye Weekblad does not operate any longer. Whether it has been deregistered I do not know. And I am not instructed on that as yet.

Further with regard to the allegation of my colleague or the submission made by my colleague that this is a personal vendetta of Mr du Preez my understanding from my conversation with Mr Disan this morning was simply that when the matter of LOTHAR NEETHLING v DIE VRYE WEEKBLAD MAX DU PREEZ AND OTHERS was taken on appeal because of the fact that Mr Justice Kriegler in the lower court, the court lower than the appeal court held for Die Vrye Weekblad. Then General Neethling then saw fit to take it on appeal. The Appellate Division could not find either way between the parties because it was simply a question of it did not know who to believe. So there was no finding made on credibility. And Mr Disan's instructions to myself have simply been should new evidence come to light during this hearing which could have a bearing on General Neethling's credibility then that new evidence will be brought and the appeal case reopened.

So it is in the interests of truth and in the interests of justice it would be submitted that these parts of the record in the lower court be now put again to General Neethling and that it is in interests of truth and justice that they be put.

And I therefore respectfully submit that the parts of the record may be put and that it would be part of the job of this Commission or the duties of this Commission to hear such submissions. Thank you. I await your......

CHAIRPERSON: Can I just find out from you are you saying those parts of the record are new evidence or is it your contention that out of questions you may put to the witness new evidence might come out that might necessitate the re-visitation of the judgment of the Appeal Court?

MS LEVINE: That would be the submission to the Truth Commission.

MS SOOKA: May I ask the attorney what the connection would be between that and this particular hearing which relates to chemical and biological warfare?

MS LEVINE: May I just explain that this particular case, as I understand it, and these are my instructions on which have I have been briefed this morning, this case arose out of an article which was carried in Die Vrye Weekblad in which certain allegations of General Neethling supplying poison to the police were made. And General Neethling then sued the Vrye Weekblad for defamation of character. And there were certain questions in the parts of the record that I have are questions, examination in chief by the legal representative a certain Advocate Osry at the Johannesburg Bar representing General Neethling, to General Neethling, asking him to clarify certain things allegations that were made about him regarding the poison, supplying poison to the police. And this was evidence that was put to him and we would like to put it to him again because they relate to the aspect of giving poison to the police.

CHAIRPERSON: Hanif or Mr Vally do you want to be heard on this point?

MR VALLY: Two points. Insofar as it is relevant regarding the chemical and biological warfare hearing and there are aspects of that case, the whole case revolves around the issue of whether Doctor Neethling did or did not provide poison and I think ultimately the Appellate Division ruled in Doctor Neethling's favour. So insofar as those issues relating to poisons are concerned it is relevant.

Insofar as the other motivation by my learned friend I would point out the provisions of Section 31(3) and my interpretation is that it does not have to be invoked after 31(2), that is just to compel people to answer. But Section 31(3) of our Act which states: -

"Any incriminating answer or information obtained or incriminating evidence directly or indirectly derived from a questioning in terms of subsection 1 shall not be admissible as evidence against the person concerned in criminal proceedings in a court of law."

And it goes on.

We have talked extensively about Section 31(3). So that is my view.

Insofar as further information on the poisons yes there is no problem. And insofar as any other motivation there would be a problem.

MR CILLIERS: I would like to add the motivation has been provided. That is what Mr Vally is referring to. They want to see whether new information can be obtained to open an appeal. My learned colleague does not have to explain to you how that is going to be done. But they have one or other way that I do not know of. But the motivation is not bona fide to assist you to make a decision which you are supposed to make. You know there is only one day General Knobel which still has to testify. Doctor Goosen must leave before seven 'o clock tonight because Mr Polsen is not available. With respect, there is no time for this kind of internal vendettas between Neethling and Du Preez. And we should not use this forum for this. I oppose this.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Vally to the extent that you concede some merit in the sort of questions that would have been put were we inclined to allow this isn't it your view that they have been (...indistinct) I just had sight of this, if this is the portion of the record that is sought to be referred to David Disan of (...indistinct) Ameer, Ndlovo. Are these not the sort of questions that in the context of your raising the amnesty application you did cover and put is there anything new that you are going to be getting by putting these questions?

MR VALLY: I am in no way to answer that Mr Chair. I have not gone extensively through the whole court record. I just asked a specific question relating to the response of (...indistinct)

CHAIRPERSON: Exactly this is not even pretending to be the whole court record.

MR VALLY: I have no idea of more information in the record or the types of questions. I can't say that I have covered that aspect. I really have no idea.

CHAIRPERSON: I hate to have to do this. Can we take just 5 minutes?

COMMITTEE ADJOURNS

ON RESUMPTION:

CHAIRPERSON: An application has just been made by the legal representatives of Vrye Weekblad as it then was but not particularly for particular reasons on behalf of Mr Max du Preez for a legal representative instructed by attorneys in Johannesburg, David Disan and others to put questions to the witness, General Lothar Neethling. It seems to me that the canal of the application is that questions that may have to be put or that might be put to the witness might be of a nature that might assist the client on behalf of whom this application is made, in matters relevant to the credibility of this witness. And in a manner or in a situation which further evidence may be unlocked the nature of which might assist the litigant in the case of Max du Preez or LOTHAR NEETHLING v VRYE WEEKBLAD to bring an appeal against the decision of the Appellate Division. The basis seems to be that the Appellate Division returned a verdict that was not premised on a finding of credibility but had taken a position that it could not be said on the basis of all the evidence that either party had erred.

If I am correct in my understanding what I understand to be the basis of the application it is hoped that in our endeavour to establish the truth and in the course of questions being put to the witness evidence might abound that would necessitate re-visitation to the case in which the present witness was a litigant with one Max du Preez.

Without going into the merits of this approach it seems to me that Section 31(3), to the extent that it refers to evidence that might be produced if we were to compel this witness to reply to any questions put to him would defeat the very ends which have been made the basis of the application, it seems to me none of the evidence which might be obtained from this process would be usable for the purpose indicated.

Now even if we were wrong in this view it appears there is nothing that can be put further to this witness that is likely to bring about a different position in terms of the replies that he is going to give and those which he has given already when certainly from the Chair and from the panel the case was put to him or references to the particular case was made. He has denied that he has ever done any of the things with in relation to which he was a litigant in the case mentioned. And I cannot see that he is going to take a different position.

In any event it seems to me the issues that were canvassed in that particular case in which he was a litigant have been canvassed by Mr Vally. And seems to us then, constrained as we are by time, it is an application which we unfortunately have to decline.

The application therefore to keep this witness further for purposes of being questioned by representative of Mr Max du Preez is refused.

Mr Vally I suppose members of the panel now have to ask questions. Are there any questions from the panel? Doctor Wendy Orr.

DR ORR: General Neethling on Monday when Doctor Jan Lourens came to give evidence he said that towards the end of his time at Protechnic he came to see you to speak about his anxiety about the screwdrivers and the umbrellas and certain other things that had been developed there and also about other developments around security. And you evidently told him and I quote what he said: -

"I want to have my toys back."

Sorry I am mistaken.

GEN NEETHLING: Yes you are. I am so glad you are mistaken let me tell you because I don't have these sort of toys.

DR ORR: I am sorry I believe that was General Liebenberg.

GEN NEETHLING: No problem he is dead, ja. That is why I am also glad it is not him.

CHAIRPERSON: Dr Randera.

DR RANDERA: Dr I just want to come back to what many people have said, including yourself, and this is this question of the coming into existence of the CBW Programme. The rationale that is put forward is about a perceived threat. And sometimes in fact people have gone beyond a perceived threat they have talked about the use of - and I hope I am not contravening anything here, the use of chemical weapons in Angola in particular. Now my question to you really is were you ever party to documentation that was put to you where this was shown? Did you ever see any people who were harmed by chemicals used in Angola or was this just part of the propaganda that existed at the time?

GEN NEETHLING: Sir I am very happy that you are asking this question. I couldn't get it into any answers of Mr Vally because I would have liked to. I have seen at least 60 people who were maimed by chemical warfare. I have had blood analysis done on Choline esterase inhibition which clearly showed that these people have been poisoned. And they told us, the UNITA soldiers, something happened, something fell out of the sky. There was smoke and then all of a sudden they could not walk. They were lame. Sir if you saw these people, and I saw them not only in Pretoria at 1 Military, but I saw them in a hospital that was created specifically for soldiers in Angola. I was there myself. And it is horrendous. And we had no protection.

And that is why I am saying this programme is not BC it is ABC. There was no protection for the special force of the police, for any one of those. Atomic, biological or chemical. We have gone and we have produced the best material.

And I want to just tell you one thing. I have a letter here from Technotech. You know what company that is. Which says, it is a company that we have supplied during the Gulf War a very large(...intervention)

CHAIRPERSON: Excuse me. Any document that is sought to be introduced and does not form part of the documents has to be discovered first to legal representatives of the ministry. I am not saying that document cannot come in, except that until they have seen what it is you can say then you cannot refer to it.

GEN NEETHLING: Okay. What I am saying to you Sir is this, that our equipment that was produced, gas masks, defensive clothing was of such quality that one of the major forces in the Gulf War - and I am sure that I am saying this for the first time and if I proliferate, I will proliferate - was the best there was in the world. They refused to put on their own clothing. They only used our clothing and they took the lot that we had produced. So good was our stuff.

What I am saying to you Sir is we had this capability developed over a 10 year period. From when they started in 1981, 1982 planning this, the product the fruit of this whole project, of which I am proud to be part of, came about for the first time tested under battle conditions in Iraq. And we said thank God we did.

DR RANDERA: Just for the record when you say you are proud of the product you referring particularly to this? You are not referring to the whole CBW Programme?

GEN NEETHLING: No, no I know nothing about the rest. I told you what I know. I know about my involvement.

DR RANDERA: Thank you.

CHAIRPERSON: Mrs Sooka?

MS SOOKA: General you have told us today that you consider yourself quite an expert and quite often in your testimony you talked about the fact that you had been a number of times overseas. And I am quite intrigued by the fact that you supplied this Mandrax and LSD for the purposes of developing this riot control teargas. The question for me is, do you know of any successful teargas that has been produced from these substances? Either here in this country or anywhere else in the world?

GEN NEETHLING: I do, covert, yes. The Americans are producing beautiful things, beautiful.

MS SOOKA: From?

GEN NEETHLING: From derivatives of this class. And I must say this to you there is a lot of things that a lot of countries have got which they do not talk about because it is a national security threat to divulge things like this. It is a national security threat to divulge your system of defending your VIPs. When the President goes and he starts eating at a function ...(intervention)

MS SOOKA: Sorry just one last question.

GEN NEETHLING: Ja, I am sorry.

MS SOOKA: Was it successfully produced in this country?

GEN NEETHLING: I do not know.

MS SOOKA: Thank you.

GEN NEETHLING: Thank you.

CHAIRPERSON: General Neethling you are excused.

GEN NEETHLING: I would like to thank you very much, your whole board for being so tolerant with me and I am very happy that I had this opportunity to talk to your board and I hope that you will deliberate on all the facts that you will still be confronted with to get the truth of this product. Thank you very much.

CHAIRPERSON: You are welcome.

WITNESS IS EXCUSED.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Vally your next witness.

MR VALLY: Mr Chair there are three things outstanding. One is Mr Jan Lourens needs to be excused. He was kept on standby on 24 hour's notice. Dr Jan Lourens for cross-examination and that has not happened. And there has been no request that he be recalled. So he must be -there have been discussions about it I presume. Mr Cilliers will address you on that.

MR CILLIERS: I just want to put on record in order to accommodate Dr Lourens, Mr Currin, Chaskalson and I had a discussion. There are various things that we dispute but it is such not so essential regarding this project. It is more marginal issues. Our feeling is that we don't want to incur all these costs and we just want to state that we don't agree with all Dr Lourens' evidence. That we dispute some of that. And then we are not going to insist that he should be recalled. Mr Currin and Mr Chaskalson are also satisfied depending on your decision.

CHAIRPERSON: In any event in the case of any finding that would be made that would be detrimental to your client's interests the provisions of Section 30 would apply. And I think if we leave it on that basis.

MR CILLIERS: We are prepared to do it and also to address the problem of time. As it pleases you.

CHAIRPERSON: Very well. The second matter Mr Vally?

MR VALLY: And for the record Dr Jan Lourens should be formally excused from this forum.

CHAIRPERSON: He is not here.

MR VALLY: Through his attorney then.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Currin is Dr Lourens - well there is a difference of opinion whether it is Mr or Dr, it doesn't really matter. Dr Lourens is excused.

DOCTOR LOURENS IS EXCUSED VIA HIS ATTORNEY.

MR CURRIN: Thank you Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: Would you like, you are still going to hold a brief?

MR CURRIN: I am still here on brief we are not sure what other witnesses are going to say and he obviously reserves his right to cross-examine anyone who may say something which. Thank you.

CHAIRPERSON: Indeed.

MR VALLY: There are two outstanding issues. One is the reply of Mr Cilliers to the constitutional argument that he raised and I responded to. And secondly it is the cross-examination of Mr Daan Goosen.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Cilliers does not seem to be here.

MR VALLY: Mr.

CHAIRPERSON: Can we take the cross-examination now?

MR VALLY: We have got no objections.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Daan Goosen, Doctor Daan Goosen.

Mr du Plessis, do you want to start the ball rolling?

MR DU PLESSIS: Mr Chairman, I don't have a problem. I want to place on record firstly that my client was not informed about the allegations made by Mr Goosen against him. He did not have an opportunity to prepare himself. At this stage, because of limited time, I am going to address a few aspects with Mr Goosen and then my client in his evidence, will refer to the main issues. From a procedural point of view it is better to do it this way because of lack of time. With your permission I would like to continue.

DR ORR: Please go ahead.

CROSS-EXAMINATION BY MR DU PLESSIS: Mr Goosen, according to your evidence it appears that you regarded yourself as a scientist with a big potential, is that correct?

DR GOOSEN: Mr Chairman, if you haven't tried something you don't know how far your potential stretches.

MR DU PLESSIS: You've regarded yourself as a person with large potential, isn't that true? At that stage, before you became involved in RRL, isn't that so?

DR GOOSEN: Mr Chairman, I don't really know what the question is about, what is the definition of "large potential" please?

MR DU PLESSIS: Don't let us play with words. You ...[intervention]

MR VALLY: Mr Chair, I want to intervene at this stage. I want to remind Mr van Zyl(?) about - Madam Chair, I beg your pardon, I want to remind Mr van Zyl about the provisions of Section 23 of our Act in terms of how he should treat witnesses.

DR ORR: Please go ahead Mr Vally.

MR VALLY: Sorry, the Section is Section 11. It talks about when dealing with victims. Actions and ...[indistinct] of guidance by principles.

"Victims shall be treated with compassion and respect for their dignity"

I don't know whether you want to characterise this witness as a victim but really the unnecessary - I can understand probing aggressive questioning when it's relevant but probing aggressiveness without relevancy, an aggressiveness for the sake of being aggressive is really unnecessary in our hearing and I would ask that Mr van Zyl be asked to curb his approaches to this witness.

DR ORR: I'm not a lawyer and I'd have to ask my legal friends if Section 13 does apply in this case. We would ask that all witnesses be treated with respect and dignity and not harassed or badgered.

MR DU PLESSIS: Madam Chair, I am not aggressive.

DR GOOSEN: Sorry, I don't feel threatened at the moment but I just want to know potentially, what is my ambitions in life? I think I could have fulfilled by ambitions in life, yes.

MR DU PLESSIS: You had the choice. You told the police about this multimillion rand enterprise you could establish, isn't that so?

DR GOOSEN: That is correct. If you are referring to my financial aspirations, at that stage there was a possibility of becoming involved in potentially good viable financial things.

MR DU PLESSIS: You certainly would not have become involved in that if you did not have the potential?

DR GOOSEN: For those financial propositions I had the ability.

MR DU PLESSIS: Am I correct in asking, to ask whether the financial matters were very important to you?

DR GOOSEN: Mr Chairman, yes, money is for important for everyone I believe to a more or a lesser extent. It was important for me to have financial security for myself and my family. If it could have been more comfortable yes, it was important but I opted for being - as you can remember, the less favourable option financially at that stage, at that moment in time.

MR DU PLESSIS: You'd exercised the choice as you put it Doctor, for nation and fatherland.

DR GOOSEN: That's correct.

MR DU PLESSIS: But before you took that decision you first established whether there was sufficient money to get the project off the ground not so?

DR GOOSEN: That's correct.

MR DU PLESSIS: And throughout your evidence I got the impression that the financial aspect was very important to you because later you also said, when you were asked to leave, that you received an amount of R60 000 and you had a wife and six children to look after and you suffered, is that correct?

DR GOOSEN: That is correct. I would just like to know, at this point in time what has my financial then got to do with the evidence?

CHAIRPERSON: You are being cross-examined on issues that you yourself brought in reply to questions and I think it is the whole question of whether or not you are not testifying simply because you, you know, an allegation may be made that you are coming here only because you didn't get as much as everybody else got, that in fact you are so aggrieved that you want to come here and say things that - I'm not saying that is what counsel is trying to get to, but what I'm saying is, it may speak to your state of mind, your motivation for being here and for what might have induced you to come and talk before us.

DR GOOSEN: Thank you.

MR DU PLESSIS: Mr Chairman, I must say that you are very sharp.

Doctor Goosen, that is the impression I got throughout your evidence, that you are actually embittered towards the system that has left you in the lurch, not so?

DR GOOSEN: I will not deny that in phases of my life the bitterness was at higher and lower levels than at other phases, we are all human. What I went through is the truth. We are here to establish the truth, so what our learned friend is saying might be the truth. I can assure him that at this stage my bitterness has been handled and I'm not an embittered person any longer.

MR DU PLESSIS: We accept that today you are no longer embittered Doctor Goosen but your whole approach, your evidence seems, what appears from your evidence it seems that you are embittered about the way the system treated you, is that correct?

DR GOOSEN: Mr Chairman, no, I said that I was bitter at one stage and I did not know why I received the treatment I did. I believe that parts of the treatment I received was definitely not justified or fair. I cannot hide that, I am convinced of that. I was not treated fairly and it is true what he says but I do not think it influences the facts of my testimony. The facts that I have given I will stand by.

MR DU PLESSIS: During your testimony you also told this Committee how the system motivated you, the remarks made by Pik Botha regarding the total onslaught etc., etc., and in that way you also justified what you did at that stage, not so? In your evidence I never got the impression that you were sorry for what you had done, is that correct?

DR GOOSEN: I made it clear I think at a stage, that if today in this time I have to make the decisions again and with hindsight I might have made different decisions. I also said that if I was in the same position I might have made the same decisions again. I was very bitter about this whole aspect. In the whole situation I was also bitter about when I saw that the project was not making the progress I expected from it initially.

When I removed from the project in managing and developing the scientific area of this whole thing, the whole issue, not only from the money side, I was also embittered about that. I was disappointed. We had such ideals in the context of what we believed at the time, we had such high ideals and positiveness and working in this thing and I was also disappointed when that was not materialising.

MR DU PLESSIS: Doctor Goosen, there was testimony from Doctor Swanepoel that during the period that RRL's buildings were erected, that you made use of the building contractors to do extensions at your house on the farm, is that correct?

DR GOOSEN: That is correct Mr Chairman.

MR DU PLESSIS: Further testimony from Doctor Swanepoel stated that you entered into an agreement with the contractors that they would do that work for you at your house for free, is that correct?

DR GOOSEN: No, that's not correct Mr Chairman.

MR DU PLESSIS: Did you pay them?

DR GOOSEN: I haven't paid them Mr Chairman.

MR DU PLESSIS: If you did not pay them then surely they did it for free, not so?

DR GOOSEN: Mr Chairman, maybe I can elaborate a little bit on this point in time. I had an expansion in the family due to my second marriage and extra children and we decided to have some alterations on my home. Now this was normal procedure, for the company to support, subsidise and give loans for this type of operation. I applied to the company above board for assistance in these expansions and I tried to look for builders and shop around for work done.

The Director of Administration who handles this application said: "Man look Daan", this was Dawid Sparmer, he said: "Look Daan why don't you use Geoff Irons, he's on the site and he helped me with some alterations at my home, so you might just as well use him. So I said: "Look, I don't want to create a problem financially or an embarrassment or whatever for the company", so he said: "No, you are within your rights to contract him".

I approached Geoff and Geoff said: "Look man, I will do this work for you for nothing", so I said: "Geoff, I cannot do this, I will get a subsidy from the company for this" and he said alright he will do it and he will render me a bill for the services and a contract and the invoices for what we've used and his services which would have been submitted. I think it was in the region, the figures I have in mind is R17 000 and R22 000. Now Mr Chairman, this whole thing was in 1988 and in the time when I had the management?s problems and what I've described this morning, the - as Doctor Swanepoel said, was dismissed from the company, from service. That was during that period in time and I wasn't furnished with the final bill or a final inspection or bill from the builder. As soon as the builder can furnish me with the bill I will try and pay it. I will speak to Geoff immediately and say we can carry on with this. I haven't got the money to do it at the moment because I think Volkskas will take all the first money I get but if I do get some of my pension money, which I believe I ...[indistinct] from the government still, I might even pay him sooner.

MR DU PLESSIS: Doctor you have given us a long explanation but you have still not answered the question. I can deduce the answer to the question but the fact of the matter is that you did not pay the builders, is that correct? That is all I want to know.

DR GOOSEN: I have not yet paid the builder, he has never yet requested the money finally.

MR DU PLESSIS: Have you ever asked him for a final account Doctor Goosen?

DR GOOSEN: No.

MR DU PLESSIS: Why not, because you supposed he would do it for you for nothing, is that not so?

DR GOOSEN: I do not know whether the company felt bad about the way in which they treated me and paid him. Doctor Swanepoel had contact with me several times and never referred to the matter again until now, that it is still an outstanding matter. But once again, these are the facts of the matter, I have not yet paid him, I have thought about it a great deal, I've never been in the position to pay him, I do not have a pension nor a medical fund.

MR DU PLESSIS: That is not the point Doctor.

DR GOOSEN: I have not yet been able to pay him, even if I had wanted to and that's the point.

MR DU PLESSIS: There was evidence ...[intervention]

DR GOOSEN: The point of the matter is I couldn't have paid him because I wasn't financially in the position to pay him. Whenever I have the money I will pay him.

MR DU PLESSIS: Doctor Goosen, let's go back a few steps. There has been testimony that you did not pay the builder, we have determined that, that you have not yet paid him up to this day because there was an agreement that you entered into with him that this would be free but you did claim the subsidy at the company on the costs of what it would cost to make these alterations. So Doctor Swanepoel lied when he said you received the subsidy?

DR GOOSEN: I did receive the subsidy.

MR DU PLESSIS: But why have you just denied it?

DR GOOSEN: The subsidy has been paid back in the meantime. I deny the fact of the matter that I entered into an agreement with the builder to do it for free.

MR DU PLESSIS: That is not the point, as to whether you repaid the subsidy. The fact of the matter is that you were blatantly dishonest towards the company. You committed fraud towards the company to claim a subsidy on costs which you never incurred, that is the point, not so?

DR GOOSEN: No comment.

MR DU PLESSIS: Don't you want to reply to that or can't you?

DR GOOSEN: I differ on the agreement and if it's important we can get Mr G D Irons from Pretoria here, he is the contractor, and hear what the agreement was.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr du Plessis, I don't know how far you want to test the credibility of this witness.

MR DU PLESSIS: I won't take the point much further Mr Chairman, just another aspect that I want to take up with Doctor Goosen because that is the primary cause of these management problems which arose in the company, it's because he was dishonest with the company.

Is that not so Doctor Goosen?

DR GOOSEN: Mr Chairman, do I need to answer that?

CHAIRPERSON: Yes, you have to unfortunately.

DR GOOSEN: Mr Chairman, this is an allegation which I deny.

MR DU PLESSIS: But you do agree that you claimed a subsidy on amounts that you did not spend, you agree with that?

DR GOOSEN: And that, the reason why it did not happen is that I was retrenched or dismissed before the matter could be finalised. Before finalising this outstanding matter I was dismissed from the company, and the subsidy has been paid back.

MR DU PLESSIS: Doctor, why did you not - you are coming here now and you want to tell the Commission exactly what happened, why did you not take them into your confidence and also present these facts to the Commission, that you were dishonest towards your company?

DR GOOSEN: Mr Chairman, please I ...[intervention]

CHAIRPERSON: Mr du Plessis, no, that is a conclusion that we must come to. The question of whether the witness was dishonest is a conclusion that we must draw from the way in which he has conducted himself. I think you have really put your point and I'm sure the panel has taken note of the discrepancies and you can be sure that you can proceed onto something else.

MR DU PLESSIS: Thank you Mr Chairman.

There was further evidence that while you were still in the services of RRL, that you did private work of which you did not let the income go to the company, is that also correct? You used the company's facilities but the income you kept for yourself?

DR GOOSEN: Mr Chairman, I'm not exactly too sure what the question relates to. I was involved in some ventures outside of the company, so were some of the other Directors. So please, if he could elaborate, if he was referring to the embryo project we can carry on with that.

CHAIRPERSON: Well?

MR DU PLESSIS: Doctor Goosen, the question is very simple, you did projects which you did not do through the company, you used the company's facilities for that, in other words the facilities, the personnel and the equipment and the funds that you received for that you kept for yourself. The question is simply, is that true or not? I did not ask you whether other people in the company did the same, I'm asking you whether you did it.

DR GOOSEN: I haven't received money using company equipment if it wasn't accounted for, not as far as I can remember at the moment but I'm sure we will hear about it now.

CHAIRPERSON: But the proposition is very, very simple, you used the facilities of the company in order to earn funds or money which you never, for yourself, in other words, for which you did not account to the company. Did you do that?

DR GOOSEN: Mr Chairman, I was involved in a project, not in a project, I was involved in reproductive work before we ever started the company, in two aspects. The first one, and this is the only thing I can remember so let's elaborate on that, the first one was an embryo transfer project. I did embryo work, it was one of my scientific interests, doing embryo work. It is one of the reasons why I was also considered for taking the lead in the anti-fertility project, because of my knowledge in embryology.

Now, so I, and I also published and I also was invited to speak on embryology in Australia and I was involved in embryology in bow(?) vines with a friend of mine. I had a share in a cow which produced no income for us because she died and this even started before we started this company.

I was also involved in a project of embryo transfer, inter-species transfer ...[intervention]

CHAIRPERSON: Doctor Daan Goosen, I'm sorry. I think what is clear here is, you may have been doing all those things, I'm not even wanting to contradict you because I don't know, the issue here and I told you, all of these things have got a basis in law in which unfortunately I cannot attack. I think what is being said here is that you tried to portray yourself as a person who guiltless, who was blameless, who was doing everything for the country, when in fact you believed in what you were doing but what's more, you stood to benefit from it, you were enriched by it. And you were doing things that were less than honest ...[intervention]

DR GOOSEN: Mr Chairman, ...[intervention]

CHAIRPERSON: Now, I think that is why the specific questions are being put to you, like: "Did you ever use the facilities at that place in order to promote your own self interests, like getting money which you used for yourself"?

DR GOOSEN: No, Mr Chairman.

CHAIRPERSON: Advocate Potgieter?

ADV POTGIETER: I'm trying to understand the weight of this kind of debate, to sit an moralise about a penny here and a penny there. This was a front company not so?

DR GOOSEN: That's correct.

ADV POTGIETER: It was not a normal company, a normal commercial undertaking although the appearance was created that it was a commercial undertaking?

DR GOOSEN: That's correct.

ADV POTGIETER: It is a place of about a hundred million rand, less than 10% had to do with anything that generated an income.

DR GOOSEN: That's correct.

ADV POTGIETER: In other words, it was a bit black hole which just gobbled up money, not so?

DR GOOSEN: Yes. Mr Chairman, yes, this is exactly true and I have been involved with extra company operations which was not illegal per se. This created a problem, this one was the one with the Buffalo Project which I did in my own time, I put leave there, there were leave forms for everything signed, for doing the project on my grounds.

But when we moved into some grey areas and there may be some - I'm definitely not an angel, but when we pointed out that there may be grey areas now in this embryo projects of mine and my interests in the buffalo embryo transfer business to some day maybe gain from that and I stopped my involvement in the embryo projects. In fact we had registered those projects as official Roodeplaat projects and I have given up my right to any profit from it.

But there was a phase where I was busy with these projects and the time that I spent there I took leave for and during that phase and that time where we were busy in establishing the technology for the company's objective, for the purposes of studying these anti-fertility projects, we established techniques. In that period embryos used in the Buffalo Project were handled in the labs of course and we have designed in the labs equipment, collection equipment which was used in some of these projects which was then later officially registered RRL projects.

CHAIRPERSON: Miss Sooka, a clarification question?

MS SOOKA: Doctor Goosen, I think for me, what I understand that you may conducted work in that particular fashion but I think the question for me is, should you at some stage have made that clear to the rest of this company.

DR GOOSEN: Yes.

MS SOOKA: Because I think the inference that is probably being set up for us is that those were in fact the issues that would give rise to the problems relating then to your dismissal.

DR GOOSEN: Ja.

MS SOOKA: Because I think there is a sort of pattern, 1, that you utilised company facilities like having the building doing building alterations at your home without your in fact paying for them. And then I think there is a second thing that is being put before us, that you conducted work privately without declaring that to the company. And I think - I haven't heard that, that the third one would be that you possibly collected funds without declaring that either and I think those are important because they will go to your credibility.

DR GOOSEN: Yes, I will agree that that is important Chairperson. Let me put these two issues into context here. The one was right at the end, in 1988/89 period, that was at that stage.

The other one was in the beginning, in the 1985 period when we were busy establishing this thing. And those days, in those stages the lines were not clear around managing this company anyway because we started on credit lines in developing this thing but these were all declared, everyone knew, I didn't hide it.

The first point, everyone knew when we started, 1 November 1983 I was involved in these two projects personally. Like I could have had a farm in the Waterberg and farmed there for my own income, no problem. Okay, then there was no facilities at the company and I pursued these interests of mine privately with the full knowledge of my colleagues, we talked about it. This is one of the things we spoke about using as a cover.

If we could have succeeded in an inter-species transfer of an embryo, that is big science and big business, a world breakthrough, okay. So that was part of creating a front. We were confronted with many types of things in the initial stages of this company. For instance, and it is applicable because this is the same thing, these activities of mine were known to my directors, it wasn't an undercover thing from them. When we bought the farm where we established the company, the farm was bought and the agent was a friend of Doctor Andr? Immelmann and Doctor Andr? Immelmann got a kickback from this friend of his. He received R15 000 and he came to me and he said: "Look Daan, what do we do now, we are now in private business, how do we handle this type of situation"? I said: "Well Andr?, I don't know, the first thing is yes, we talk about it and declare it. You can't go back to your friend and say: no, no, listen we cannot do this, because we were under the impression business might operate this way".

We've discussed this and I reported this to Doctor Wouter Basson at the time and he said: "Alight, we know about it, let it go through". And Doctor Immelmann in fact didn't receive the R15 000 in cash, he received a ram from this agent which was his friend. We knew about and we let it go, it was R15 000. But it was known, it was organised, this was the way that case was handled and this was even before I used limited facilities to freeze a few embryos, to develop a few collection tubes which was part, which was part of establishing technology for the company anyway.

And then subsequent to that, very soon after that, we said alright, this might be a problem because it was then raised as a problem, we said: "Let's stop it", in earlier 1986, let me stop being privately involved in this company, in this endeavour of the buffalo embryos. I was involved with a friend of mine who put in a lot of money in the Buffalo Project. For him to put in, he put R50 000 in the project up to then which we started years before we started Roodeplaat. And I went to him and I said: "Look, I cannot pursue this project with you anymore, sorry, you lose all your money, I'm sorry about that" and he accepted it, being a friend of mine. And we can get him here to testify if it is necessary. And then we registered this project as an official project for Roodeplaat.

And as you've heard we had the one indication that you could have done any scientific project, a scientist there, which you wished to, allowed to do an in-house project which is in your field of interest. So I cannot see this being outside those lines at all.

The second case, as I've explained again, was at the end of my service period and it was - you know Mr Chairman, at the end of it, I was for six months not allowed to be at the premises. The people of the companies were for six months not allowed to visit me. Three months at least, let me see, from October to January. I wasn't to have any contact with anyone from the companies. And under those conditions this payment went by the by and I've testified to the fact and that is what I can repeat again.

I've been up front, it was known, it was registered with everyone, why would I do that? Geoff Irons was there every day, a good honest gentleman, he was on the company's site every day, Sparmer knew about everything, everyone knew about everything, why would I do such a scheme? It happened because I was under stress, I wasn't allowed there, I didn't see how I can survive for supplying for my family at that stage, thank you.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr du Plessis?

MR DU PLESSIS: Thanks Mr Chairman.

You gave us a long story but the fact of the matter is that you did claim a subsidy for something you did not pay. You did have private work done for which you used the company's facilities. You say that in 1986 there was a problem, but not withstanding the problem you did it again in '88, not so?

DR GOOSEN: Yes, Mr Chairman.

MR DU PLESSIS: And it is these aspects which gave rise to the management crisis or managerial crisis, not so?

DR GOOSEN: No, Mr Chairman.

MR DU PLESSIS: Let's continue on a following aspect. At a certain stage you asked General Knobel for assistance and General Knobel went out of his way to assist you, not so?

DR GOOSEN: Which stage are you referring to?

MR DU PLESSIS: The stage when you went to the head of staff finance, when you were taken to the State Attorney and to the "Ombudsman", and he went out of his way to assist you, not so?

DR GOOSEN: That's correct, yes.

MR DU PLESSIS: Why did you not take the Commission into your confidence and tell them that?

DR GOOSEN: Mr Chairman, I have no problem with telling the Commission about this. I just think that my financial crisis which I'm still experiencing doesn't have much to do regarding the truth concerning the CWB Programme but I have no problem in telling the Commission about this.

And can I just once again remind the questioner that we have a crisis in time here to get the truth. I had this here as part of my personal notes, to tell about all the contracts but if you want me to, I can for the next hour keep you busy with that. I have no problem with that, that is true what he says. General Knobel and I were known to one another, we were on a reasonably good footing and I had a high respect for him. And during these times of my personal problems I went to ask him for assistance because I trusted him and I had respect for him.

CHAIRPERSON: In fairness to the witness, I think that was tenor of the evidence as I understood. He did say things about General Knobel about which you might want to take instructions but I heard him quite clearly on what came across as being his inherent respect still for General Knobel.

MR DU PLESSIS: That is not the point, the point is that General Knobel went out of his way to assist him and that he never told the Commission. The question was just, why not?

CHAIRPERSON: Well, I think he has given a reply and I think the reply is quite satisfactory.

MR DU PLESSIS: Let's go one step further, did you have a discussion with General Knobel in his office after you were at the "Ombudsman"?

DR GOOSEN: That is correct.

MR DU PLESSIS: Yes, because now I will put it to you why you did not tell the Commission about it, there's a good reason for it. During that discussion General Knobel said he was sorry but he could not be of further assistance to you, is that correct?

DR GOOSEN: That's correct, yes.

MR DU PLESSIS: And then you threatened him Doctor Goosen, not so? Then you uttered a threat towards General Knobel.

DR GOOSEN: Mr Chairman, yes, I can give you the specifications of that threat, I've been threatened often.

MR VAN ZYL: The question is simple Doctor Goosen, you said that you were pressurised for time. I just asked you, did you threaten him, yes or no?

DR GOOSEN: Threatened him with what, with his life or to attack him, to take his car, what threat was this?

DR GOOSEN: It doesn't matter we will get to that.

CHAIRPERSON: I think it's material. Can't you put to him what he threatened the other person with?

MR VAN ZYL: Then you threatened him and now you will expose him because according to you he now knew about everything that was going on. When you did not get your way you threatened him and said that you would involve him in everything.

DR GOOSEN: No, Mr Chairman, the discussion went as follows, and let us start with it where we should in order to see the whole thing in perspective and I am sorry that I have to take more time. ...[intervention]

CHAIRPERSON: Excuse me, can I get it clear? Are you saying that he actually blackmailed him or endeavoured to blackmail him by exposing him of everything that he had ...[intervention]

MR VAN ZYL: That is the threat and the implications thereof.

And then General Knobel said to you: "In that case I will not speak to you any further, please leave my office".

DR GOOSEN: Mr Chairman, the last statement is definitely not true. We definitely parted on terms of -I wasn't satisfied with the meeting but we were definitely not, I wasn't chased out of his office and he said if there still is anything further he can help me with, I must still come back to him. So that is not true.

But the crux of the matter is that the Surgeon-General told me, when I approached him with the information on the dissatisfaction with Mr Hendricks, he told me that he would look into Mr Hendricks' dissatisfaction but it's a company matter. He assisted me in trying to get a payout for my pension, full pension which would help me financially. He had compassion with me in my economic situation with a large family. We went to the "Ombudsman" etc., he gave evidence at the "Ombudsman's" office etc. I gave evidence at the "Ombudsman", Just van der Walt's office. Then Judge van der Walt phoned me after that and said he heard some evidence and he found in my favour that I was unjustly treated by the government and that they, he finds that they need to pay me a sum of money, how much do I reckon and I said: "No, he can decide, I'm not demanding anything because I don't know what the lines are to determine this". I had the feeling that a part of my pension fund should be suitable and he said, alright he will negotiate with the Army for the amount. He phoned me back one week later and he said new evidence came to light which indicated that the Surgeon-General or the company's of the Surgeon-General had full right in dismissing me summarily because of three reasons. One was, and I can't remember it but the documentation is also available, something to the extent of being, misusing company funds, secondly, being psychologically unstable and thirdly, committing, giving out the secrets, the government secrets. So I said I would like to see the evidence behind that.

I looked at the evidence and I saw it was a letter signed by two of the Directors. And then I asked for a meeting again with the Surgeon-General to speak to him personally so that we can discuss this issue. One week before I was informed by the "Ombudsman" to get some sort of a bit of a compensation, and one week later I was accused of, in fact if you can you put it, I was convicted of doing all these things.

Then I arrived at his office and he was very friendly. Doctor Wouter Basson was also there and we had a discussion and then the Surgeon-General, Doctor Knobel more or less denied that he promised he could help me and Doctor Basson said that the Surgeon-General had absolutely no connections, I was taken into the service of the companies by myself, I wasn't appointed by the government, I wasn't dismissed by the government, the government has got nothing to do with it and there's nothing I can do about it.

And I thought, but this can't be true, this was a government organisation and there must be something one can do about it, that is what I said. ...[intervention]

CHAIRPERSON: Doctor Goosen, I appreciate that you may want to explain that what is put to you as having been, (a) a threat but more importantly, one that had a blackmailing element to the extent that you were saying you were going to expose General Knobel, but if you perhaps could be more specific and more without being elaborate. I think the question is, did you threaten him? You may want to say: "Yes, I threatened him and he also threatened me" ...[intervention]

DR GOOSEN: I might have said, and I can't exactly remember the words but I definitely might have said that they cannot deny that they have never known me and I, I will not rest or I cannot accept it that they can state they have never known me. That is not true. And they said I was welcome to speak to KEEM, to the Auditor General, to whoever I wished to, I am free to do that. I said: "Alright, I will speak to these people to get the facts".

CHAIRPERSON: Mr du Plessis?

DR GOOSEN: Because how can I prove a claim that I am innocent in being this bad person which they make me out to be.

MR DU PLESSIS: Doctor Goosen, from this long explanation, you said you can't remember what you've said. If you can't remember how can you dispute what Knobel has said, because he can remember what he said?

CHAIRPERSON: No, no, no, that's not what he said. He says he cannot remember the detail of it but he was clear about one thing, that there was an exchange there and he was seeking to say: "Look, I have to a duty to myself, I can't just be left in the street". I think Mr du Plessis, there is a way in which you can put a version to the witness.

MR DU PLESSIS: I've done it already Mr Chairperson. ...[intervention]

CHAIRPERSON: No, no, no.

MR DU PLESSIS: I told him that after Knobel had said: "I'm sorry I can't help you any further", he said: "Now I'm going to expose you because you knew about everything".

CHAIRPERSON: What is your response to the Doctor Goosen, without explaining?

DR GOOSEN: Mr Chairman, I definitely as I've explained it, said that they cannot deny that they knew nothing about this project and nothing about the appointing me and nothing about dismissing me. And that fact, if needs be I will expose it, to whom, I haven't said but at that stage I intended to expose it to the Judge, the "Ombudsman" with whom we had dealings, Judge van der Walt. I didn't go to newspapers.

CHAIRPERSON: Mr du Plessis?

MR DU PLESSIS: Thank you Mr Chairman ...[intervention]

DR GOOSEN: We had dealings with Judge van der Walt. I said to Judge van der Walt: "I am first going to speak to General Knobel again". And then I went back to Judge van der Walt and then Judge van der Walt said the OSEO office is right next to him. And I can carry on with the story.

CHAIRPERSON: No.

DR GOOSEN: We ended up next to the vice-president?s office.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes. Mr du Plessis?

MR DU PLESSIS: Mr Chairman, my client indicated that this threat he made was much more serious and I want to put it to you that when the Knobel said he wasn't able to help you any further, then you said you are going to ...[no English translation] ...[transcribers own translation] tell the people that he was involved in a plot to murder President Mandela. That is the threat you made to him.

DR GOOSEN: No, Mr Chairperson, I'm sorry, that is not true.

MR DU PLESSIS: Previously you did agree that you threatened him ...[intervention]

DR GOOSEN: I've already explained ...[intervention]

CHAIRPERSON: I think he has answered the question. I don't think we can test him. You have put a proposition to him, he denies it, let's get on with it.

MR DU PLESSIS: Thank you Mr Chairman, no further questions.

NO FURTHER QUESTIONS BY MR DU PLESSIS

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Polsen?

MR POLSEN: I would just like to record that the original statement differed radically from the second statement and it was not put in the first instance to my client and therefore it must be valued in that light. Thank you Mr Chairman. It looks like an afterthought.

CHAIRPERSON: Well. Mr Cilliers?

CROSS-EXAMINATION BY MR CILLIERS: Very shortly Mr Chairman.

Doctor Goosen, we've already given a lot of attention to the fact that there were problems with the way you handled various company matters, the subsidy, the private projects, the private use of company structures for your own gain. There were such allegations and some of those allegations are substantiated.

DR GOOSEN: Mr Chairman, we have already addressed that. I told you what my involvement was regarding the substance and you will have to decide for yourself. There is one other allegation which might be dishonest. At a certain stage I replaced my car's shocks which were not replaced at the approved dealer and therefore there was also an allegation against me. ...[intervention]

CHAIRPERSON: Well, I think those are the sort of things that ...[intervention]

DR GOOSEN: Please, I can't exactly remember this. I definitely don't deny having conflict in the company. I had conflict in the company, in every company there is conflict etc., but in my time not one cent was spent in training getting consultants on how to manage the company. When my successor came, thousands, hundreds of thousands of rands were spent in getting consultants to work out how the company should be managed.

So if I had problems, and that was not the problem and I've accepted and I also testified this morning that I went to my superiors and said: "Look, if you have a problem and problems with the management I don't mind, replace me or train be or do whatever you want to. I don't want to compromise the security of this cause we were fighting for".

MR CILLIERS: All that I want to achieve Doctor Goosen, and I'm not interested in the washing or dirty washing here in public today, this is not the purpose, all I want to put to you is that my impression is that there was, fairly or unfairly or whether the action against you was perhaps too strong, I don't want to comment on that, there were problems causing you to be replaced as Managing Director in the company and if got the impression from your evidence in chief, that it was an unsubstantiated action, my impression might be wrong. ...[intervention]

DR GOOSEN: Mr Chairman, I don't think that my friend can completely make final conclusions on the management of these companies because we have not spent time on what was my management problems. We can spend - and we can get every company employee to testify and we can line it up to exactly what my management problems were. So now to finally concluded here what the problems exactly were etc., I think would be a bit presumptions. ...[intervention]

CHAIRPERSON: I think what ...[intervention]

DR GOOSEN: There were some problems - in my mind in anyone else's minds it might be different, it is for you to decide ...[intervention]

CHAIRPERSON: No, no, no, I don't even think it's a question for us to decide. I think what is being put to you however is that if one takes the totality of your evidence before you were being cross-examined, it would have appeared from that evidence that there were sinister reasons for your replacement as a Managing Director.

And they are saying because they are putting these things to you which you are now admitting, there are, whatever weight may be put to them as instances, but there would technically be instances which you have now admitted which in any company would have formed a basis for you having been replaced or removed.

They are not saying those were the only instances but they by themselves could have been formative of a basis for you to have been dismissed. That is what is being put. Even if we were to take away all the other reasons, and we are not saying you must throw them out of the window, let's say the only things that had been in existence are the ones that are now coming out under cross-examination, the use by you of the facilities, this, this, this.

They are saying, would you accept that they do constitute a basis for a person to be replaced as a leader or to be dismissed, in themselves.

DR GOOSEN: No, Mr Chairman, they were not given at that time as the reasons for my dismissal.

CHAIRPERSON: Yes, but I think what is being put to you is, if for instance on your evidence you say they were not given as the reasons but on their instructions as I understand them, those are the basis' on which you were dismissed, is that ...[intervention]

MR CILLIERS: That is exactly the crux of the matter. The impression was created by the evidence in chief that there were no reasons or background regarding confrontation or conflict between you and the company, if that was the wrong impression I gained.

DR GOOSEN: Mr Chairman, yes, I haven't in my testimony touched on the dirty washing side at all. I've heard some of these allegations yesterday and I haven't referred to them and therefore you should not blame me for not bringing these things out in the testimony.

MR CILLIERS: I'm not trying to blame you, all I'm trying to say is that there were reasons, good or bad, it's not for this Commission to decide they are not going to rule on that.

Furthermore, is it not so that after the handling of one of these cases of alleged dishonesty and Doctor Swanepoel's handling of that, that you wrote him a letter to thank him for the way he handled that? You named it the sensitivity in which he approached this matter, can you remember that letter?

DR GOOSEN: Mr Chairman, I can't remember that distinctly, the wording of the letter and the exact circumstances surrounding it. If I can remember correctly it was about the extensions at my house. And those extensions I started initially buying a bath and trying to improve the house. I could not handle that any further financially and I applied for the subsidy and after I started with some of these this subsidy was approved.

MR CILLIERS: You needn't give the detail to the Commission. My only point I want to make is, and the impression that was created by your testimony, was that Doctor Swanepoel was this insensitive inhuman Manager and he treated you in an inhumane way. This does not seem to be correct if I look at the letter which you wrote to him in which you thanked him personally for the way in which he handled you when you could have been charged with fraud and it could have turned out in an ugly criminal case if Doctor Swanepoel wanted to do that.

DR GOOSEN: The terms which are mentioned now, I can't agree to but that there was a good relationship between me and Doctor Swanepoel is true. We worked in a positive work environment and also from his side I have a few letters on record thanking me for my inputs, my services and for attempts to restore these projects again, where he asked me again to come back to RRL. We worked together in a very positive way. I don't have a problem with Doctor Swanepoel as a person, as a human being, as a Manager.