Issued by: TRC
2 April 1999
The Amnesty Committee of the TRC is to hear amnesty applications for 24 former security policemen, for incidents ranging from bombings in Gaborone, Botswana, to the killing of political activists.
The hearings will be held from April 6 to 30 at the Idasa Centre, corner Prinsloo and Visagie streets, Pretoria. The hearings will be held on weekdays from 9am to 4pm.
Advocate Lynne Lockhart will lead evidence on behalf of the amnesty committee.
The committee will hear an application for amnesty application in connection with the June 1986 murder of 10 youths at Nietverdiend in the former Bophuthatswana.
Former police askari Joe Mamasela has admitted leading the youths into a death trap by promising them they would be taken out of the country for training in the African National Congress' armed wing Umkhonto weSizwe.
The following former policemen -- AJM Joubert, TJ Verster, WJ Loods, C Naude, DJ Vorster and PR Crause -- have all applied for amnesty in connection with the incident.
Mamasela has not applied for amnesty in connection with this incident. He was granted indemnity from prosecution in return for working with the Attorney General to track down the former security police involved in human rights abuses.
AJM Joubert, PJ Verster, C Naude, N Robey, JJH van Jaarsveld and C Vlietsra, have applied for amnesty in connection with the murder of Mr and Mrs Fabian Riberio in Mamelodi outside Pretoria in December 1986.
JJH van Jaarsveld, D Gouws, AC Kendall and SA Oosthuizen have applied for the killing of nine ANC youths in Kwaggafontein in the former KwaNdebele in July 1986.
PJ Verster, AJM Joubert, JJH van Jaarsveld, TJ Floyd, D Gouws, AC Kendall and SA Oosthuizen have applied for amnesty for the killing of Piet Ntuli, a former KwaNdebele government minister in July 1986.
The committee will also hear amnesty applications for the killing of Jeffrey Sibaya and a second person, in Hammarsdale in KwaZulu-Natal in 1987.
The applicants in this matter are J Hechter and P van Vuuren, as well as the late D Crafford, who has died since submitting his application. The matter was part heard last year. Mamasela has also admitted his involvement in this incident but has not applied for amnesty.
The amnesty applications of PJC Loods and MB Ras, will be heard for the killing of a Hammankraal policeman, Richard Motasi and his wife Irene on December 1, 1987. It is alleged that Motasi was informer for Zimbabwean Security Police.
The committee will also hear applications from JA Steyn, WJ Loods, CJ du Preez, CJDP Smith, PR Crause, WUCC Smit, GJ van Zyl, JJ Marais and DJ Nieweunhuis, in connection with the killing of MK members Kruschev, Karl Marx and Andries Moatshe in Silent Valley near Thabazimbi. The MK members were smuggling weapons into South Africa were shot and killed as they approached a roadblock.
PJC Loods has also applied for amnesty for the attempted murder of Congress of South African Trade Unions official, Jerry Thibedi, in Soshanguve in 1986. Thibedi was a high profile member of the union federation and he was involved in consumer boycotts.
Loods, together with Hecther and Cronje, built a bomb and together with Mamasela and another former Askari, took it to Thibede's house. Mamasela allegedly threw the bomb into the house. Several members of Thibedi's family were injured by no one was killed.
Issued by: Mbulelo Sompetha, spokesperson for the Amnesty Committee. Telephone 082-452-7870.