Ex-cop denies wanting Thabo Mbeki prosecuted for apartheid-era crimes

A retired police officer testifying at the TRC cases inquiry has denied allegations that he met a senior prosecutor and told him that there was a solid case against former president Thabo Mbeki and the ANC 37.

The “ANC 37” refers to a group of 37 high-ranking ANC members who had applied collectively for amnesty through the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC).

Col Louis Bester was being cross-examined at the inquiry on Wednesday after his initial testimony in August, which focused on the problematic transfer of a large cache of apartheid-era case files from the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) to the police.

He denied that he met advocate Chris Macadam and that he made the allegations about Mbeki and the other ANC members.

Macadam is a former deputy director of public prosecutions in the NPA’s priority crimes litigation unit, and he previously testified that the executive branch of government interfered with and stalled the prosecution of apartheid-era crimes.

Bester’s cross-examination was previously deferred to allow legal teams time to access additional evidence, including a complete version of his investigative diary.

The session followed recent testimony by former Vlakplaas commander Eugene de Kock.

Bester rejected Macadam’s evidence that he and former investigator Sue Brits had approached him to prosecute Mbeki and the ANC 37.

He wanted to place on record that he was not involved in the matter in 2003 when Macadam claimed he had already been asked to provide evidence.

“I was not involved at all, so it’s just for the record’s sake that I want to put that on the record,” Bester said.

The first time he became aware of the ANC 37 was when he read a newspaper report in August 2007, which triggered an inquiry into allegations that a memorandum linked to the matter had been forged.

“So you hear the stories, but I never take notice. But the first time I saw the ANC 37 was in that article, when I started investigating the alleged forgery of the document.”

Bester said his involvement in the inquiry was limited to safeguarding the documents and arranging a forensic investigation.

“It was to conduct analysis on whether the signature on the memorandum authored by advocate Anton Ackermann was authentic.”

Ackermann headed the NPA’s priority crimes litigation unit from 2003 to 2013, where he was tasked with prosecuting apartheid-era perpetrators who had failed to receive amnesty.

According to Bester, he requested a quotation from forensic document consultants after then-divisional commissioner Johan de Beer instructed him to investigate the forgery allegations.

“I requested a quotation just for another opinion on the forged document so that we could make sure that we were on the right track as far as the forgery is concerned,” Bester said.

“The whole allegation was already public in the report. I only took notice of the article when I visited commissioner De Beer’s office, and there were serious allegations towards SAPS about that we perhaps forged the document,” he said.

Bester said the investigation ran from August 22 to 31 2007 and ended after the forensic consultant found there was no forgery.

He also denied having any prior knowledge of the ANC 37 dockets, saying they remained sealed and under the control of the NPA.

“None of these encounters would have resulted in me having any knowledge in respect of the ANC 37. Hence, I was never tasked to investigate such dockets,” Bester said.