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Speaker 1: The Cradoc four inquest trying to find out what happened

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Speaker 1: to the credit four forty odd years ago now and

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Speaker 1: yesterday appearing in answering questions was the commander of the

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Speaker 1: Fluck plus unit, which was a unit that killed the

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Speaker 1: state's enemies, Eugene Dacock, sentenced to life in prison. Prime

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Speaker 1: Evil is his name, and he was on the stand

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Speaker 1: at the Creberga High Court and Rianne Mare daily Maverick

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Speaker 1: journalist was covering it. Re Young, Good afternoon, Hi John,

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Speaker 1: how are you?

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Speaker 2: You're right?

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Speaker 1: I'm interested in this, I mean, had there been informed speculation,

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Speaker 1: a strong belief that Decoc was involved in some way

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Speaker 1: if even if he hadn't actually pulled the triggers.

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Speaker 2: So Decoc was very prominent obviously in the truth in

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Speaker 2: this Reconciliation Commission inquiries as well, and he was actually

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Speaker 2: pardoned for his role in this, and very open about

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Speaker 2: a lot of the incidents around this one specifically, but

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Speaker 2: other incidents where he was directly implicated and according to

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Speaker 2: his information and what was found out in the TRC

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Speaker 2: hearings as well, was that he was actually an accessory

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Speaker 2: after the fact that he was brought in to try

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Speaker 2: and after some evidence of things but not necessarily directly

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Speaker 2: involved with the killing of the Credit.

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Speaker 1: For he said, I didn't regard them as terrorists, and

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Speaker 1: I only killed or ordered the killing of, or arranged

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Speaker 1: the killing of people that I did regard as terrorists.

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Speaker 2: Yes, so his words were more to the point, was

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Speaker 2: they are political activists, and activists are civilians. I view

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Speaker 2: in terrorists and I never considered them to be terrorists.

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Speaker 1: Was I don't know who comes to these things. I

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Speaker 1: don't know family and members are still there every day

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Speaker 1: when the inquest is sitting. But when he denied active involvement,

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Speaker 1: if he denied not knowing before the time that the

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Speaker 1: four were going to be killed, and denied any involvement

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Speaker 1: in the organizing of it, did say afterwards? Did say

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Speaker 1: that afterwards I knew about it and perhaps in some

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Speaker 1: ways helped to cover it up. Did it look as

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Speaker 1: if people were regarding those statesmans as credible?

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Speaker 2: See so, from the beginning of this third inquest into

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Speaker 2: the Credit Fau's death, he's always been one of those

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Speaker 2: prominent figures that everybody's been waiting on his testimony to

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Speaker 2: find out what he had to say. Despite him having

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Speaker 2: testified him two previous inquests as well. Everybody wanted to know,

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Speaker 2: and him being the figure that he is, having gone

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Speaker 2: to present for some of the atrocities during the apartheid regime,

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Speaker 2: I think there was a hope that more information would

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Speaker 2: come out, but in the end of the day he

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Speaker 2: steadfast in this version that he wasn't involved and he

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Speaker 2: only heard about it afterwards. The families there, there were

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Speaker 2: some of the credit forse wives were there, some of

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Speaker 2: their sons were the obviously looking for answers and wanting

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Speaker 2: to know who they can blame for their father's death.

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Speaker 2: And Eugene Dkok is one of those guys that they're

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Speaker 2: looking at for answers. Whether they were happy or not,

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Speaker 2: they didn't seem all that impressed with his testimony, but

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Speaker 2: it is unfortunately the version out then. I don't know

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Speaker 2: if that is exactly what they would have liked to

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Speaker 2: do it.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I can't imagine that unless there was a different

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Speaker 1: questions less new information had come to lights since he

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Speaker 1: last testified, and that would enable the evidence leaders of

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Speaker 1: the inquest to ask him questions and put him on

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Speaker 1: the spot about an obvious discrepancy between an uncovered fact

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Speaker 1: and what he'd testified to earlier. Then he was always

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Speaker 1: only going to say what he'd said before. Was the

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Speaker 1: questioning by the evidence leader or I don't know how

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Speaker 1: many people asking questions, how would you characterize that questioning?

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Speaker 2: So John, from the start was a lot of these

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Speaker 2: men that were involved, or these persons of interest as

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Speaker 2: they call them. These are elderly men, some of them

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Speaker 2: deep into their eighties. Those that are still alive Eujindercock

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Speaker 2: himself seventy for seven years of age. They are all

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Speaker 2: of them have this version of look, I cannot recall

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Speaker 2: what happened, it was forty years ago. So they all

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Speaker 2: refer back to their TRC hearings. Now, whether that is

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Speaker 2: a way of you know, escapegoats saying, look, nothing has

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Speaker 2: changed in the last forty years and then just claiming

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Speaker 2: not to remember or whether they is truly contrarm and

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Speaker 2: that's the only reason they refer back to those things.

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Speaker 2: But most of the testimony is based solely or purely

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Speaker 2: on what they have testified in the past.

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Speaker 1: And he's I understand you back at the end of

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Speaker 1: the week for ar two, what purpose?

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Speaker 2: So he's led his evidence and his statements from the past,

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Speaker 2: he's under cross examination from the legal representatives from some

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Speaker 2: of the other interested parties. These would be legal representatives

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Speaker 2: for police officials, for the military, for the families of

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Speaker 2: the deceased. So there's a continuation of him being grilled

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Speaker 2: on fast facts and fast statements that he's made. So

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Speaker 2: what more we can expect at this stage, I'm not

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Speaker 2: sure he did yesterday under cross examination or under examination

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Speaker 2: become quite heated in some of his discussions or some

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Speaker 2: of his retorts to some of the legal representatives that

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Speaker 2: were setting there, constantly saying I want the truth to

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Speaker 2: come out. Let's sit down, let's talk about the truth.

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Speaker 2: So I'm guessing these people are hoping to ask questions,

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Speaker 2: maybe trigger him, maybe getting to know color in outside

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Speaker 2: the lines go, are we statements what he said? I

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Speaker 2: don't know. We'll have to wait and see a Friday

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Speaker 2: what happens.

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Speaker 1: Thank you very much indeed for talking to us. That

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Speaker 1: is Rihanne Moreer, who writes about issues in Claerja region

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Speaker 1: for the Daily Maverick