Cape Town - Apparent untouchables and their culture of impunity could soon confront a disconcerting nemesis when an arsenal of documents – the transcripts of secret interrogations of human rights violators by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission – is opened to public scrutiny at a special reading room on June 17.
The room is a project of Right to Truth, an initiative of the South African History Archive, which received the documents from the Department of Justice after an 11-year battle.
Archive executive director Catherine Kennedy compared the collection of more than 100 transcripts to the Stassi Files of the former East German Secret police.
She said the transcripts were “a treasure trove of information that has to be carefully mined for nuggets of critical information”.
Those familiar with the records have described them as “a Pandora’s box, detailing a litany of illegal acts including premeditated murder, summary executions, evidence tampering, weapons tampering, torture, arms smuggling and reckless disregard for human rights”.
They put paid to the notion that rights abuses were perpetrated only by Colonel Eugene de Kock and a few other bad apples, presenting instead a picture of widely spread abuse.
In the transcript of the interrogation of former Civil Co-operation Bureau boss Joe Verster he questions the terms of the transition to democracy. “I am sitting here as an officer of the former South African Defence Force (SADF), a commanding officer in charge of special operations and I have a real problem with the approach that there was supposed to have been a negotiated settlement between the former government and the ANC.”
There is also the transcript of the evidence of Frank Sandy Bennetts, a security police operative who worked from the CR Swart building in Durban and served as supervisor of a farm where colonels De Kock and Andy Taylor plotted the killings of activists.
He reveals an operation which resulted in the death of an activist, on whom explosives were later planted as part of a cover-up.
The release of the documents has been welcomed by arms deal critic Terry Crawford-Brown.
He said:”We must conduct an audit of all the names mentioned and compare them to those now benefiting from the immoral arms trade.”
The collection also includes the transcript of former SADF head General George Meiring explaining his role in the 1990 Umtata raid, during which young boys were murdered by assassins armed with silenced pistols.
Weekend Argus