Operation Vula: The Post-Mortem
On Tuesday, 21 August 1990, Colonel Johannes Steyn and Lieutenant Colonel Hendrik J.P. ‘Hentie’ Botha, of the Natal Security Branch intelligence unit, reported to the apartheid Police Commissioner, General Johan van der Merwe, on the episode around the killing of two African National Congress (ANC) and Umkhonto we Sizwe (MK) operatives, Charles Ndaba and Mbuso Shabalala. Charles Ndaba was arrested at KwaMashu Township, near Durban, on 6 July 1990, and led the Security Branch to a place next to the Greyville Racecourse in Durban, where Shabalala was arrested. Both were killed on 14 July 1990 after refusing to turn on the ANC.
According to Lieutenant Colonel ‘Hentie’ Botha, he had recruited Ndaba as an informer in 1988. Ndaba then returned and became part of Operation Vula in 1990. Botha thus knew of the Operation to the extent that Ndaba did, but Ndaba and Shabalala were eventually killed by members of the Durban Security Branch after Ndaba signalled his intention to “take his chances with the ANC”. After they were killed by members of the Security Branch, which included Major du Preez, Warrant Officer Wasserman and Sergeant van der Westhuizen, their bodies were weighed down and dumped into the Tugela River. Johannes Steyn, Salmon du Preez, Lawrence Wasserman and Casper van der Westhuizen applied for amnesty for their involvement in the murders.
Later on, in 2017, one of the Vula operatives, Dipak Patel, confirmed that “Ro
