Truth, Reconciliation and National Unity Commission (TRNUC) |23 January 2020

Four witnesses testify in special hearing

The Truth Reconciliation and National Unity Commission (TRNUC) yesterday held a special hearing were four witnesses appeared in public sessions which were followed by a closed session in the afternoon.

The commission had requested Cyril Lau-Tee to appear as a general witness in relation to activities of the resistance following the coup d’Etat of June 5, 1977. The chairman of the commission, Gabrielle McIntyre noted that they had received a lot of evidence about the one party state being afraid of its shadow but that fear was not completely unfounded and with Mr Lau-Tee being involved in resistance activities, they were happy to hear his evidence. Lau-Tee gave an account of the activities he was involved in to destabilise the country, of which, the authority never had proof he really did them.

At one point during his intervention, Mr Lau-Tee asked the commission if what he declared he did would be used against him in a court of law.

Mrs McIntyre replied that under their act, anything said to the commission is inadmissible before any civil or criminal proceedings in any jurisdiction other than the Attorney General, gathering information from outside the commission.

Mr Lau-Tee who is the third from a family of eight and was living at Anse Royale at that time, said his family was a strong supporter of the Democratic Party and when the coup took place he was only 14 years old. He further said that as a youngster, who was witnessing what was going on in the country, he did what he did to try to destabilise the country because the regime was victimising people through limiting their freedom, murder and so forth and that included members of his family where he lost one of his cousins. He also said that he had to later go into political asylum in the United Kingdom for 15 years for fear of his life and away from his family he dearly missed.

“There was nowhere one could go to get justice in the country. You either have to support the system or not. If you did not support the system, you had to find your own way out and this is what I did,” he said, noting that people were being killed, arrested and jailed, were not free to talk and to assemble among others.

He stated that at that time he really loved his country and he had nothing against her but it was the system in place that was sickening. He said among some of the victimisation issues that his family encountered at that time that caused him to be a resistance to the regime was that his younger brother and sister were evicted from the Seychelles Polytechnic in the early 1980s for no reasons and also the death of former resistance and cousin Simon Denousse who was murdered in October 1982. These incidents really angered him and caused him to follow in his cousin’s footsteps. He noted that he was also prevented from pursuing a career as a pilot because he did not support the system.

Mr Lau-Tee recalled that former President Albert Rene did mention in a meeting with form 3 students at the then Seychelles College, on the creation of the National Youth Service (NYS), that they will be sent to Coetivy for their national service where they will rear animals and do military training among other things, but President Rene later denied saying them after the students’ protest. Since, according to him, Mr Rene lied, this made him (Lau-Tee) lose respect for the president.

He said that he joined the Mouvement Pour La Resistance (MPR) and destroyed President’s Rene picture that had replaced the religious cross bearing Jesus Christ that stood on the wall of his form 5 class at Seychelles College. This was among his first resistance activity, where nobody, even those under interrogation at that time, knew who did it until yesterday.

Mr Lau-Tee recalled that as a young resistance of 18 years old, he was approached by the Minister for Defence Ogilvy Berlouis to discontinue his association with the resistance as the authority had known of his affiliation, and to report all of their activities to him (Mr Berlouis). He said several attempts were made to have him betray his fellow resistance members but he refused to be bribed for a boat, car, house or money.

He said that among his first duties for the MPR was the distribution of leaflets, videos and audio tapes from the resistance group in the United Kingdom which were placed at different places or hand delivered to people around the country.

Mr Lau-Tee claimed that he was the one who started a bush fire at Pointe Au Sel and also burned an SPTC bus at Les Cannelles in those days. He noted that he was also involved in cutting off the power connection on several occasions during the filming of a documentary on the state’s revolution by the then Radio Television Seychelles (RTS), which he had considered as a propaganda documentary. He said he did all that out of anger and frustration caused to him by the regime in power.

“I was never afraid when I went on my missions as I had prepared myself as to what would happen to me if I do get caught. I was prepared to sacrifice my life for the freedom of the people of Seychelles,” he said.

Looking back with wisdom, he noted though that he did not succeed in burning down the court house at Anse Royale as members of People’s Militia who had been guarding the place had left to patrol other areas, had returned and he had to abort his mission. He also claimed that he also did not succeed in burning down the Anse Royale school because a dog barked and woke up the watchman.

He said that he was then seen as a suspect and was constantly followed by members of the state security. He noted that he was able though to buy some AK-47 rifles from a group of soldiers as he always had at the back of his head that one day there would be a mercenary attack and he had to prepare an arsenal of arms for his own men to join in the fight. He further said that he bought an AK-47 at that time for R3,500 and he took the money from his father’s business. The arms, he said, were stocked at a friend’s place. He alleged that he went around with a pistol (which was supposed to be for Mr Denousse), he got from someone for his own security and even taught his mother, who knew about his doings, how to use it to defend the family.

Mr Lau-tee also claimed that he took part in an organised demonstration against the regime where upon reaching Beau Vallon some participants, including his sister and brother, were arrested while he managed to escape. He said that he was constantly arrested and questioned after that.

He said that he was once betrayed by a family friend (Emilien Rosette) whom he had taken as his brother, who was assigned by state representatives to spy on him and later discovered he was also assigned to kill him (Lau-Tee). He noted that he had reconciled with Mr Rosette though he cannot forget what he (Rosette) did to him. He claimed that after several attempts by the regime to shoot him he sought political asylum as a stateless person in the UK.

He claimed he made several attempts to return home to meet with his family, including writing to President Rene but was not successful. He added that he came for his first visit to Seychelles in 2000 and it was painful for him to see that his father who was suffering from severe diabetes did not recognise him.

Mr Lau-Tee also said that his younger brother who supposedly hanged himself, did not do so as according to the report provided by the family doctor his brother had been killed and then hanged. He further said the case is still pending.

Mr Lau-Tee noted that he made sure that no one got hurt or any private properties got damaged from his actions. He said that he is not seeking compensation for his suffering but if compensation is to be paid in certain cases of suffering, the money should not come from the tax payers but from the number of assets belonging to the perpetrators.

Mr Lau-Tee took the opportunity yesterday to ask for forgiveness for his actions which he said have affected or offended some people. He said that he had reconciled with himself and now without any grudge, he meets and talks to many people who were associated with his suffering.

He said his catch of arms was discovered and taken by the authority.

Case 22: Olivia Vincent

Ronald Jumeau was called in by the commission as witness in Case 22 in relation to the death of Simon Denousse who was killed along with South African Mike Asher in October 1982.

Mr Jumeau, who was the chief reporter with the government owned Seychelles NATION newspaper, which published photos and an article about the incident at that time, said he was approached by the late director of government information services, Antonio Beaudoin, to go to the scene to report on a car explosion that had happened at Anse Forbans. He noted that apart from the dispatched driver, he was the only media person present and that the article was jointly written by himself and Mr Beaudoin because he (Mr Beaudoin) had attended a press briefing on the incident with the then commissioner of police, the late James Pillay. He said he did not remember who wrote the final story.

He alleged that the scene was exactly as had been told to him consisting of a wrecked car which had been destroyed either by an explosion or several explosions and or by a fire, with two charred bodies inside and one completely more charred than the other. He noted that the photos printed were taken by him. He said that with the ripped rooftop and ripped car doors, the scene showed signs of a very violent explosion, littered with wreckage along with resistance leaflets all over the place.

He claimed that he did not see any grenades when he was there at around 9am or so as he would have photographed them. He said he had no doubt that they were present and could have been removed if present for the safety of people coming to work at the scene. He further said that he walked freely around the scene and no security personnel present interfered with him. He said that at that time he had no doubt about what had been said had happened. He claimed he was told to just write about what he had seen.

Case 238: Andrew Pouponneau

Danny Payet was a witness in Case 238 of Andrew Pouponneau, an ex-soldier who disappeared in the aftermath of the August 17, 1982 rebellion.

The commission had claimed to have evidence that Mr Payet, as a participant of the rebellion, was taken to the Bel Eau army camp where he said he saw Mr Pouponneau.

Mr Payet, who joined the army in 1979, said that when Major Macdonald Marengo took over the Union Vale army camp from Major Raymond Bonte, who had encountered an accident following the mercenary attack, the camp was running as a business centre where the soldiers were used to work on farms where most of the products were sold to SEYCOM, a government wholesale and retail parastatal. He noted that they were sanctioned for no reason at all and had their salaries cut. He said that got the soldiers frustrated about the way they were being treated which later culminated into the rebellion of which he was among one of the leaders.

He alleged that he surrendered and was detained for one week in a jail at the Bel Eau camp of which the door was heavily nailed. He claimed that some other soldiers who were tied up to poles, like himself, were violently beaten and he was lucky not to have suffered the same fate as his late stepfather, who was a militia, had accompanied him when he surrendered.

Mr Payet said that Mr Pouponneau, who was limping, along with two other rebel soldiers, were on their arrival taken inside and from there he had no idea of what happened next to him (Pouponneau) or the others with him as he was put in jail for nearly one week, handcuffed with one hand with another soldier before being transferred in jails at the Union Vale camp. He claimed he did not have the opportunity to defend himself and was court martialled and sentenced to two years imprisonment of which he did only thirteen months before being discharged from the army.

He said that he had heard many rumours about Mr Pouponneau’s disappearance – that he had jumped from the jeep, he had been killed or had fled to Madagascar, among others. He claimed that apart from seeing other high officials in the likes of Ogilvy Berlouis, James Michel, Major Rolly Marie among others, he did not notice the presence of President Albert Rene.

Case 016: Brian Victor

Dr Maxime Ferrari was the last witness in open session before the commission yesterday afternoon where he gave additional evidence in Case 016: Brian Victor who was the sole survivor of an attack which occurred at Sans Souci in July 1983 where two of his colleagues, Sonny Elizabeth and Michael Hoffman, lost their lives.

He reiterated that he was not before the commission to defend himself other than telling the truth about what he knew. He noted that he had already asked for forgiveness from the people of Seychelles for things he had done on numerous occasions, and did so again yesterday.

Ninety-year-old Dr Ferrari said that apart from what he had known, he also got to learn from the sufferings that some people had endured under the one party state and also of those who had said they knew nothing of what happened or nothing had ever happened.

He further said that Mr Victor came to speak his truth about what happened and he wanted to add what he knows so that he (Mr Victor) will further know the truth about what happened.

On giving additional information as to what happened that day, Mr Ferrari noted that when Mr Victor brought his passengers with him between mission and exile (Sans Souci), he firstly said that he did not meet President Albert Rene that day as claimed by ex-army officer Jemmy Marengo, who was involved in the incident, or else he noted, he would not have asked Mr Victor what had happened to him as he would have known. He claimed that meeting President Rene to him was out of context.

Dr Ferrari explained that what happened to Mr Victor made him realise that he was serving a government that was killing people and it was at that point that he decided to leave the country for his personal safety. He claimed that upon making his morning duties and saw Mr Victor around 7am, he handed in his resignation at noon and left the country at night the same day. He alleged he didn’t leave Seychelles but escaped from Seychelles.

He noted that upon seeing a bed with curtains drawn all around it, it signified that someone was seriously ill and as a doctor, his reaction was to have a look as to who is behind the curtain and it was at that moment that he saw a bandaged Victor and had a conversation with him.

Dr Ferrari said he was very angry but not with Mr Victor, rather about the state killing its own people, after hearing Victor’s story. He claimed that in the presence of another patient facing Mr Victor, he had cried: “What is happening in the country with the killing of people like that”. He said it was a pity that the patient who heard his cry had passed away.

“I want to tell Mr Victor, if he is listening, that the moment he told me he was beaten by soldiers and two of his passengers had lost their lives, I was with him because it was at that moment that I came to realise that I cannot stay in a country like that and serve a regime that is killing people,” he said.

He said that upon confronting Mr Rene about the incident after attending the Seychelles People’s Progressive Front (SPPF) meeting in the morning, he claimed that Mr Rene had told him that they had been looking for problems with the army and the army had given them what they deserve. He said that as he was friendly with the US ambassador, David Fisher, who had informed him through an e-mail that Mr Victor was leaving the country and from his opinion, if he had relayed this information to Mr Rene, he (Victor) would not have been alive today.

He further said that following Mr Victor’s statement that he refused to see him when he was working in the United States of America, thinking he was tracking him down, Mr Ferrari noted that at the time he had already fallen out with the regime and had escaped from the country to exile in France and he had never sought to find him. He claimed maybe somebody was using his name to get into contact with him (Victor) but it was not him.

Commenting on Mr Victor’s allegation that some sort of poison was going to be administered to kill him, Dr Ferrari said that beyond doubt, as he was in government and present at the hospital at that time, it was easy to presume that the action would be carried out by him even if untrue. He noted that from his opinion, he could not envision any doctor or nurse at that time administering some sort of injection of poison as from what he had gathered while working with them as a government official for an hour or so every morning, they were beyond reproach, thus no trained health official at that time, he said, “would administer a dangerous prescription” noting that it was perfectly normal for Mr Victor in his state of mind at that time to think that somebody was still trying to kill him as he was supposed to have died.

Dr Ferrari also read an e-mail sent to him by the ambassador on August 14, 2000 in which it claimed that President Rene had threatened him (the ambassador) and his son and that the gun that killed Gerard Hoareau was purchased in North Carolina and President Rene signed the permit. It also talked about an attempted coup which Defense Minister Ogilvy Berlouis was the supposed mastermind and the involvement of Italian businessman and diplomat Mario Richie with the regime.

Speaking on the murder of Marjorie Baker, he said that he learned through his contact through the US state department that it was not Douglas Cedras who killed her.

He claimed that he, like others in the coup, thought that after a caretaker government there was going to be democratic election which did not happen as Mr Rene had already planned to declare Seychelles a one-party state.

The commission will hold its next regular sitting on February 4, 2020 and Mrs McIntyre is urging all complainants to put forward their complaints before February 9, 2020.

Patrick Joubert