[Note: PW stating that Mandela would not renounce violence. Though, FW De Klerk, spineless man that he was… let Mandela go anyway. I think PW Botha is one of the best Presidents South Africa ever had. That old man has balls – and is probably honest and true – and that’s why his enemies hate him so much. Jan]

Former state president PW Botha has rejected a claim that he encouraged a right-wing coup plotter to leave politics and “get a movement with an iron fist”.

“When I was state president I always said I was against the use of violence for political purposes,” he said from his Wilderness home Die Anker on Thursday.

“That is one of the reasons why I wouldn’t let [Nelson] Mandela go.”

Earlier in the day plotter turned state witness Lourens du Plessis told the Boeremag treason trial in the Pretoria High Court that he and a friend visited Botha at Die Anker in June 2001.

They were seeking to test his views on the political situation in the country at the time, and to get advice.

The two-hour-long talks were also attended by Botha’s wife, Barbara, and the former statesman’s financial adviser.

“I asked him how he viewed the position of whites in South Africa. He answered that whites were staring annihilation in the face,” Du Plessis testified.

“I asked him for advice on what we as young people can do to ensure our continued existence. He said to get out of politics and get a movement with an iron fist.”

Botha also told him that his successor, FW de Klerk, had sold out the country.

When he asked to explain this statement, Botha said he had been offered $2-million by an organisation like the CIA to ease the transition to a new South Africa, Du Plessis said.

“I asked him, Oom PW [Uncle PW], what was your answer? He said he told them: ‘I will not sell out my volk [people] or my country’.”

Botha (88) said he does not know Du Plessis.

Asked if Du Plessis has ever visited him, he said: “Many supporters of mine come here and say hello, and drink a glass of water or cooldrink, and they leave again. But I’m not involved in party politics or underground organisations.”

He also said he will not discuss politics with a man he does not know personally.

“If somebody turns up here and he asks me what I think of the political situation, I would say go and read the books by various authors about me.”

Asked whether he had encouraged the Boeremag plot, Botha laughed.

“They must put him [Du Plessis] to the test whether he lies or not,” he said.

He said, however, it is correct that “certain instances” had offered him money to sell out South Africa, but that he had rejected it.

This incident has already been written about in books, he said.

A friend of the Botha family who was instrumental in arranging the meeting, and who did not want to be identified, said Du Plessis had told him he wanted the honour of meeting Botha.

At the meeting, Du Plessis had made himself out to be “totally anti-black and anti-ANC [African National Congress]”.

He had asked for Botha’s views on the future of South Africa.

“Mr Botha said, in South Africa, democracy at the moment says the ANC is in power and that is how it will stay,” said the friend.

Botha had added that one had to realise the ANC was in power “because that is what God wants”.

The friend rejected any suggestion that Botha had encouraged the plotters.

“Anybody who knows Mr PW Botha, his integrity is absolutely above anything like that, to get involved in nonsense like that,” the friend said.

“I’m not trying to defend Mr Botha here. His name defends itself.”

Du Plessis’s evidence was being given in the trial of 22 alleged members of the right-wing Boeremag organisation charged with plotting to overthrow the ANC-led government.

On Thursday he also named Transvaal Agricultural Union (TAU) general manager Bennie van Zyl and vice-president Willie Lewies in testimony about a range of meetings held to discuss the coup plot.

He told the court Van Zyl had organised a gathering in Limpopo in mid-2001 where he (Du Plessis) “tested the waters” on a military coup. Also present were Lewies, former defence force group commander Frans Gunther and Boeremag accused “Rooikoos” du Plessis.

Gunther shot down the idea as unworkable, and the discussions shifted to farm security and the situation in which white South Africans found themselves.

At a subsequent meeting in Pretoria to discuss the “coup idea”, he overheard Van Zyl telling alleged Boeremag leader Mike du Toit “you have made much progress”, Du Plessis testified.

He also gave evidence about the printing of fake money to finance the coup d’etat. He had given Gunther a fake R100 note from a total stash of R100 000 at the Pretoria meeting for him to “see what he can do with it”.

“The thinking was that if he was successful, half of the funds could be used for the TAU.”

Du Plessis said he had given a certain Roy Smith R130 000 for the production of fake money — of which he got back R100 000 in false notes.

He also testified that he had made contact with leaders of the Portuguese community in South Africa, and that they supported the plans.

Du Plessis was arrested in connection with the coup plot in August 2002 but charges were conditionally withdrawn in return for his testimony.

The 22 men in the dock face 42 charges ranging from treason and terrorism to murder, attempted murder and the illegal possession of arms, ammunition and explosives. — Sapa

Source: Daily Mail & Guardian
URL: http://www.mg.co.za/Content/l3.asp?ao=65928/p>