Ex-Policeman Tells Court of Hit Squad

A black death-row prisoner, the first former policeman to allege the existence of South African police assassination squads, told a court Thursday he killed government opponents on orders from superiors.

Pleading guilty to the murder of human rights lawyer Griffiths Mxenge, Almond Nofomela said: “I was a member of the security police seconded to a police assassination squad under the command of Capt. Dirk Coetsee and Brigadier Schoon.

“In late 1981, I was instructed by Brigadier School to eliminate (kill) a certain Durban attorney, Griffiths Mxenge,” he told the packed court in the capital of Natal province.

Nofomela and two friends were condemned to death in 1987 for the murder of a white farmer during a robbery. But just before he was to be hanged, he won a stay of execution by alleging that he helped to kill Mxenge and eight others on police instructions.

Nofomela said he spoke out to save his life after police associates promised to halt his execution but failed to act. Coetsee backed his allegations in a newspaper interview in which he said he commanded the death squad.

The other policeman mentioned by Nofomela is William Schoon, a senior officer who retired from the force earlier this year.

The allegations shocked the South African public and provoked widespread calls for a judicial inquiry into dozens of unsolved murders of opposition activists.

Human rights activists and government opponents have for years feared that police might be failing to find the killers because their colleagues were implicated.

But President Frederik W. de Klerk said a judicial inquiry would take too long, and instead ordered an internal investigation.

Nofomela is the first policeman to stand trial on charges arising from the inquiry, the results of which have not been made public. His case was adjourned to Feb. 28.

Police have also issued a warrant for the arrest of Coetsee, who fled the country after making his allegations.